- Good evening, everybody. On a cold Monday evening, we are starting our meeting now. Today is Monday,
- November 10th, 2025. And here in the NatU Heal Room, we have council members present, David Henry, Deckard,
- Wilt and Fidal. And I do believe that we're supposed to have
- Councilmember Marty Huck joining us virtually. She said she would be running a little bit late. Okay
- so we'll keep an eye out. And then I know Councilmember Peter Iverson will be absent. So we will go
- ahead and jump into our business of today. We are having it today
- because tomorrow is Veterans Day. And so in honor of the holiday, the county buildings will be closed.
- So we are just doing our business a day early. Next up, we will go ahead and get into our Pledge of
- Allegiance. So all of us that are able to stand, please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge
- allegiance to the flag of the United States of America
- and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice
- for all. All right. Thank you very much for that. Before we start going into our agenda, I did want
- to take a point of privilege to say, to have a couple of remarks.
- for a woman who was a trailblazer in our community who recently passed away, who is all on our hearts
- for a lot of different reasons. And her name is Charlotte T. Zitlow. Charlotte T. Zitlow was a trailblazer
- and a fearful leader and fearless leader all the way up until the very end of her passing. And I wouldn't
- be remiss if I didn't say a few words
- and just wanted to say thank you to Charlotte for all the things that she's done for this community,
- for this county, for this city, and we owe it to her to continue the work in her honor. So with that
- being said, I just would like for us to, if you all can join me for a few moments of silence.
- All right, thank you. And may her memory and legacy live on. All right, next up we will get into tonight's
- adoption of the agenda. Are there any council members that would like to make changes to tonight's agenda?
- All right. Oh, do we have anybody? All right. Actually, I do. Okay. Council, the board of commissioners
- have requested their item 7A ordinance
- 2025-39 terms and conditions for the Selva Thompson site be pulled from tonight's agenda. Second. Okay.
- Are there any other amendments to tonight's agenda? All right. And seeing none and not seeing Councilmember
- Huck virtually as of yet.
- We can go ahead and do voice vote. So all those in favor of amending or adopting tonight's agenda as
- amended, signify by saying aye. All those opposed, same sign. Okay, motion carries. All right, next
- up we have public comment.
- And these are for items that are not on tonight's agenda. So if you are here present and then at you,
- he'll room and you would like to speak on items not on tonight's agenda. Now is your time to do so.
- When it is your turn, you can come up to the lectern here and then at you, he'll room. You can you'll have to.
- write your name for the record, then you'll state your name for the record and the timers are all around
- you and you'll have up to three minutes to speak. And then if you are virtually, same thing, except
- you'll just raise your hand virtually, we will call on you, you'll unmute and you'll also have up to
- three minutes. So because we already have a taker here again, you can state your name for the record
- and then you'll have up to three minutes. Hi, I'm T. Randall. I'm here as a resident of the semi-square
- apartments south of
- the convention center, which are owned by the county. In the spring, we were informed that there would
- be no more lease renewals at our complex. It seemed like the long-awaited demolition of our block had
- finally arrived. However, over the summer, the county appeared to reject the notion of an imminent
- demolition. Now in December, when every other renter in the city is signing leases for the next year,
- We're left in the dark as contractors assess the building, inspect the utilities, and schedule annual
- unit inspections. All of these point towards conditions changing in our building. I would like to ask
- that the residents be given transparency about the future of our homes so that we can make informed
- decisions about our housing. Thank you.
- All right, next up, if we have, I don't see any takers on Teams via, or just yet, so we'll continue
- to keep going in the Net Yehovah Room. Again, state your name for the record, and you'll have up to
- three minutes. Hi. Hi. I'm Lynn Coyne, a long-time resident taxpayer of Monroe County, and I would like
- to ask how it is reasonably possible that the commissioners could spend
- thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of dollars evaluating the North Park land transaction when the
- council was not going to approve it. Now the commissioners being reasonably intelligent, responsible
- people would not do that, I assume, had they known. But then the council also being reasonably intelligent,
- responsible people would not have let them do that
- So I'm quite confused in terms of how my county government functions. I mean, all but Ms. Hawk, you're
- all Democrats. Presumably, you go to the same political functions, maybe even the same social functions,
- or you see each other here in the courthouse from time to time. How did we get to a position as a taxpayer
- that you are spending money on a project that was dead on arrival?
- And I'm sure other folks are just as confused as to how we got to this point. Thank you. Thank you.
- All right. Are there any other takers here present in the Net Hill room that would like to speak on
- items not on tonight's agenda? Once going twice.
- And looks like we have council member Hawk present with us virtually. Hello, council member Hawk.
- All right. And because we don't have any takers here in the room and virtually via teams, we will go
- ahead and proceed.
- with our agenda here, and so next up is item five, which is department updates. This is a chance for
- county government to talk about their updates. So if it is, and it's for items not on tonight's agenda.
- So if you are a county government, a department head, or an elected official that would like to speak
- on something on tonight's agenda, or not speak on something on tonight's agenda, give us an update.
- Again, you can come up to the lectern here in the NatU Hill Room.
- And you'll have up to 10 minutes. And if you are virtual, you will be able to raise your hand via Teams.
- Hello? Sure. Oh, yeah. But we can maybe pass you. OK. Either way, we'll still need to have mics for
- presentations.
- You'll have up to 10 minutes. Trying to figure out how to share.
- You're so kind. That's it. All right. Thank you so much for hearing us tonight. We come before you tonight
- to make a request. So first, I'd like to describe our multi-year search for a new facility site from
- 2022 to 2025.
- The search for a new facility site began because the current jail was failing and it was unable
- to sustainably meet constitutional levels of care. Now phase one took place in 2022 and it consisted
- of initial property reviews. The commissioners and council at that time reviewed four properties. The
- Fullerton Pike site was chosen but it required rezone by the city and the city unfortunately denied
- that. Phase two took place
- with further property investigations in 2023. At that time, an additional four properties were reviewed,
- including the city owned Hopewell property and the Thompson property. Now, the city said no, as we know,
- to the use of Hopewell and Thompson was given priority, but it presented five significant usability
- obstacles. And that's shown on the slide. Estimated costs are given where available on the slide as
- well. These included removing a 10 acre dirt mound at the cost of five to six million.
- purchasing an additional piece of property at the cost of $1 million, relocating Duke electric poles,
- which would cost 2 million and encounter a 2.5 year delay. And we would need city approval to build
- a road over a sink or quarry hole as well as to complete a tree study. Um, and the money for that would
- be unknown. Now do the time issue alone associated with Thompson. Uh, staff was directed to investigate
- North park.
- And of course, this was appeared to be the last viable option and was eventually deemed the best location
- by both the council and commissioners. We signed a twenty twenty four purchase agreement to purchase
- the North Park property in October.
- and the council approved that in ordinance 2024-54, which fixed the terms and conditions for the purchase
- in November of 2024. A property on Vernal Pike subsequently became eligible in late 2024, but the only
- way to obtain sewer connection was to voluntarily annex that property and involuntarily annex all continuous
- property at an estimated cost of $875,000. To date, we have spent over $4 million on design work for
- North Park and property reports and surveys for other locations.
- appropriate for the purchase of the North Park property, and there is currently no other property being
- considered or known as available. So with all of this in mind. We wanted to.
- for the purchase of the appropriation has effectively returned the project to the beginning. And that
- is going to incur a minimum of two additional years for completion. And again, we've spent over $4 million
- to investigate properties and there are other properties as well that we looked at convention where
- the convention center is currently going. There's property in Rockport road. There are a number of properties
- we walked but without doing other work.
- We do not have an alternate site as North Park was determined to be a best available site. The council
- had previously approved, as you know, a portion of the economic development income tax and a corrections
- facility income tax in order to pay for this project. And this project was moving along based on collaboration.
- based on working with the council and the board of judges and the sheriff and the clerk and the prosecutor's
- office and the public defender's office and all along the way, a lot of public input. Every site we
- looked at, we included public input.
- and that was the Broadview neighborhood, Thompson property, the Fullerton property where there's only
- one resident in the area we met with. The Vernal Pike, we had two meetings. Ellisville, we had two meetings.
- And of course, we listened to residents, we addressed their concerns. It's unfortunate to hear a lot
- of misinformation circulating in the public, from the Chamber of Commerce, from city officials,
- regarding things like transit where a plan exists, but we're not going to implement anything until the
- project's done. Treatment, which requires council funding and is an uncertain endeavor in the current
- political climate. In addition, the current jail facility cannot be remodeled. See the RGS and our QAW
- reports on the current building. The city wants us to work with them. Well, that sounds great, but,
- Where have they been for five years? They didn't support the Fullerton site. They established unrealistic
- and unnecessary restrictions regarding Bernal Pike property. And I'm sorry. No to Hopewell. I'm sorry
- to interrupt you, Commissioner Thomas. But on our agenda, we do have next steps listed and understand.
- At least in my mind,
- First of all, thank you for taking up us on our offer on showing up and talking about this. I was thinking
- that your department or your update would, again, those are for items not on the agenda. And technically,
- because next steps, and it sounds like next steps are on the agenda, I personally would like to pause
- this and wait until we get to that particular part. Because I think that was the idea.
- Um, I know you have mentioned that you had a department update. I did not know what that department
- update was about. Um, but because this is technically on the agenda, I'm going to ask if we can hold
- on to that until the end where we have this on the agenda. Can we strike a compromise? I would like
- to talk a little bit about some things that were said at the last meeting. Um, and, and, um, I would
- like to go because we,
- I'm going to try to join via teams after my appointment. I don't know if I'm going to be able to make
- it or not. Okay? Uh, Commissioner Madeira is going to do the same, so we're just trying to get this
- information across. It looked like a council item, so we.
- just assume that we could share this information, at least to get you teed up for your discussion later.
- Yeah, I get it. But my email to you all were to be to extend the idea for you all to come back and have
- the dialogue so that we could put that on the agenda, which is what we did here. So if you want to just
- briefly maybe talk about some things that were highlighted, and then let's table that until we get to
- the actual next steps, because that's the meat and potatoes that
- I personally want to get into compromise achieve. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. I appreciate the
- the opportunity to do this because we cannot be here. So as we saw at the meeting, what was difficult
- for us to work through was that we heard a number of different reasons from different council members
- for their no vote. And so some folks talked about the size of the facility.
- And again, as we mentioned, Vigo County just recently completed a jail and they're already under federal
- order to build another because their first one is too small. We are following consultants recommendations
- and the sheriff's department recommendations. The location, obviously there are a lot of places in this
- community that we've looked at. But one of the issues that continues to come up, well, it's a buy,
- is it a single floor jail? Does it have co located? Facilities with it with the other justice functions.
- How can we protect staff and what the sheriff has told us over and over again, and what we've heard
- from consultants is.
- you have to do a single floor jail. And so that leaves a lot of properties out, especially if you're
- colocating. And colocation is also a safety issue, as we know. You've gone ahead and you've completed
- those two taxes. We had the money. We're on the runway. We're on the path. And then the legislature.
- And most of you mentioned that. And I appreciate that. The legislature is in flux and just threw us
- a curveball. We get it.
- But one way around that is to say, hey, let's go ahead and ask our attorneys to do an extension on purchase
- agreement for North Park. And let's continue our vote on appropriation until we know what the legislature
- is going to do. So with that, we did come up with five questions. We're going to send you all an email with this
- on it, so you'll have it. Yes, Kim, I will send it to you too. We'll send it to all the council, Kim,
- staff, everyone, so you'll all have it. This is what we're asking of you, and we are asking you all
- to answer these five questions, but you have to do, our only caveat is you have to work with the same
- departments we've been working with, the sheriff,
- board of judges, prosecutor, public defender, et cetera. We put a deadline on it because the week after
- this deadline is when we have to report to Ken Falk any progress we've made or not made. So it's a very
- simple request, and that's what we're doing. The ball is in your court, right? If you have every right
- to say no to the purchase agreement, the appropriation,
- But the ball is now in your court because we've spent years doing the work, collaborating with the community,
- collaborating with all of these departments to try to get everyone's needs met. And it has not been
- easy and everybody's given up something or a lot of things in the process. And so that's why we're asking
- just these five questions to be addressed. They're very simple, straightforward,
- and we ask that you do that. Now, again, I will try to get back on later tonight, as will Commissioner
- Madeira via Teams, and we can walk through any of this. I apologize for stepping on toes. Did not mean
- to do that. Thank you for your time, and we look forward to hearing from y'all. Thank you so much. Thanks.
- Thank you. Before you go, because I keep hearing the phrase, the ball is in our court.
- Um, and you know, again, as our sports analogy, um, I'm a girly girl, but I love sports. Um, so I'm
- picking up the ball and I'm dribbling it. Uh, since you threw it to us now, you know, we're team county
- counseling and we're now trying to pump fat or pump, you know, do all those sports analogy things that
- they do. Um, so I guess how,
- is the ball in our court and collaboration when you just told us that we have to work within the deadline
- that you're giving us, and we must work collaboratively with the sheriff, board of judges, prosecutor,
- public defender, clerk, probation with these things. I guess
- I hear you when you say the things related to our city colleagues and some of those I definitely agree
- with. I think I'm a little frustrated and tired of sometimes elected officials talking and we need to
- do. We can walk and chew gum at the same time and we can walk it like we talk it, at least that's the
- motto I try to live by. But that being said, I do believe
- that because they also threw some stuff at us in the city, that this is an opportunity time for us to
- have collaboration with them. They spoke up and they said some things. Now it's time for them to be
- called to the carpet as well. So because the ball is now in our court, as you have mentioned, but then
- you give us these things to work with.
- How do you think that we can make a compromise much kind of like how we did with this conversation?
- How can we compromise in that? I bring the city if you want to have the city there, invite them. But
- there's a minimum base of who has to be there, and it has to include the sheriff and the board of judges
- and others. So that's whoever else you want to invite. You can invite the chamber. You can invite.
- you can buy it. You can buy it. You can buy it. You can buy IU. You can buy whoever you we don't care,
- but we just have that minimum requirement of please. Because here's the thing. We feel like we've been
- set back to step one. And we can go through and rehash 23 years of steps. But that's not going to change
- anything. That's not going to achieve
- Again, well within your purview as council members to deal with the budget and to vote no. But now we're
- saying here's what we need back from you so we know what to do next. And then we then we move on to
- the next steps together. But for right now, just rehashing everything like we've just done in two minutes
- is not going to change your vote.
- It's not going to change how you view things, but we need to know where you all stand because we heard
- a lot of different reasons for the no vote. And so this is our way of saying, look, we just need the
- temperature red in the room and we need that clarity. And then we'll all together figure out what to
- do next. But we're kind of stuck because we've done the work
- you've been there as a council, not you personally, all of you, but you've been there as a council all
- throughout this process and we've moved forward. And now I going back to step one doesn't seem to make
- sense because we would end up, I think in the same place, but we also feel like there is some lack.
- There's a lack of consensus among council members about what you do or don't want. And that's what we're
- looking for first.
- your clarity on what you do or don't want. And if you want to invite whoever to your table to have that
- discussion about that will bring you that clarity, great. Whatever you need, whatever you want. But
- we had to set a deadline because we do have a January 15th check in that we have to make on our agreed order.
- So we're not trying to be obnoxious about it, but we're letting you know that that's, yeah. And so wouldn't
- the January 8th, that's your meeting. Yes. Wouldn't that be something that I would think, and I'll look
- at council members as well to kind of see what their thoughts are. Wouldn't that be something where
- I would think that we would have a joint meeting where all of us could sit down and have that type of
- conversation? Sure. If you want to do it before the 8th, great, that's fine.
- But yes, I know, Tom, is that the essence? But yeah, so we just put that as sort of like that's really
- our baseline last date. Yeah, that we can. Yeah. And I think if you wanted to change the forum to totally
- fine as well. Yeah, totally cool. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully get back on the meeting of the end
- here and we talk about it. Why is that a deadline?
- because of Ken Falk's settlement agreement runs January 15th, so that would allow us to come to a consensus.
- Or not, I mean, I'm just trying to, there are many places that could go, right? One could be revisiting
- the extension of that, given that the county has been compliant with the order for so long, and that's
- due to the good work of the court system. So I hear that there's a sort of deadline, but I'm not sure we,
- I'd like to get to a place where we agree on, I think, facts before we get to deadlines and timelines.
- I have a lot of disagreement with what I've heard. I think there's some premises that we need to really
- talk about whether we agree on the same words here. I'm not sure I even agree that there's a deadline
- if anything is sitting out the ACLU and discussing
- potentially the extension of the agreement because we've done a great job living within the agreement.
- So if we get to first principles on that, that might be a reasonable thing to talk about that. I know
- you don't want to go here right now, but I just think that alone is enough to give me pause about whether
- or not that's a deadline or not. Thanks. We have to provide an annual update. And that should be done
- jointly because we're not even on the same page on progress. That's right. And that's why we asked for this.
- information and it's really not there are no difficult questions here but there is I think a lack of
- consensus among council members and it would be nice
- to have that consensus so that we can move on. With all due respect, we have had consensus on that vote.
- And so I think we need to be very clear about even the concept of consensus. Of course, when a project
- changes and implodes on itself, there's an opportunity to start talking about all the things that should
- be brought back to the table. That's what the public gave us. So I'm not concerned at all that we're
- back to a kind of creative destruction to figure out what we do here. I'm not even concerned that's
- an issue. But we did have a consensus point.
- I think it's been repeated enough in the media that it has to be corrected. 7-0 unanimous is consensus
- period on that particular piece. But a variety of reasons were offered by different council members
- for why they voted that way. And so how we respond to that, we can't respond to. We don't know what
- to respond to. So in the interest of time, I'm going to look to other council members to see if they
- have anything. We'll wrap up because, again,
- did not think that this was going to come up for this. Again, I'm a little turned off by this. I know
- you had a department update, but I didn't know that it was like this. So we'll finish here and then
- I want to pick up because hopefully you two will be able to come back and have this conversation with
- us. Yes. Counselor Henry or Decker. Yes. It made my mind.
- It's working. You're on. There we go. All right. This and this may be something you cannot answer, but
- I had heard this somewhere and I don't know where it was. There's been a lot of information out there
- that Mr. Falk was planning an upcoming visit to the jail. And I would you don't have to necessarily
- respond to this now, but I would like to I'd like to know how that goes. I'd like to also know what
- Mr. Falk's observations are around that once that's scheduled. And I assume that's a party with the
- sheriff, et cetera. I can provide an update on that. We scheduled a tour of the current facility with
- Mr. Falk for November 25th at 2 p.m. And I sent an email to all council members because Mr. Falk had
- indicated that if council members wanted to attend that tour, they could with him at that time.
- I appreciate that. I will check to see if I can to it, because I would love to do that. I think that
- that is a form of an annual report in many, many, many different respects. And I think that that is
- a critical, critical piece with all of this. Thank you. Council members, Feidl or Wilts, did y'all have
- anything? I don't have any more at this time.
- Council, how about you? Yes. Just trying to make sure I'm muted here. We can hear you. I would like
- to throw back a requirement to them because I think there seems to be a total misunderstanding of the
- county commissioners and perhaps others who have seemed to have no idea about
- what that's going to do to county operations overall for us to try to float this price tag because of
- the changes in the state legislation. And I am certainly not suggesting we go to the state and ask them
- to double up what would be allowed to do, because even that, it reduces the amount of money
- that we have to support all of county government. So it's a big picture. And I know that it's difficult
- when you really want something, don't only look at that thing that you want, but we at the County Council
- have to think about all of county operations. And so before they meet with us again, I hope they'll
- take a look at what the results of those dollars would be.
- Now I know that's not their job. It's our job to understand the fiscal issues. But I just would like
- to know that they at least understand what they're asking for. Appreciate that. Thank you, Councilor
- Hook. All right. Thank you all for your indulgence. Thank you. Sorry we can't be here later. Thank you.
- Sorry for interrupting Councilor Henry earlier either too. It's okay. Hopefully you all will come back.
- Yes, we will see you later. Thank you. Thank you.
- All right. All right. Interesting. All right. So next up, we will have item number six, which are the
- consent agenda items. Council, I move to approve the following consent agenda items for November 10th.
- the aviation department's request for a category transfer within fund 1107-0000 aviation of $62,766.82
- from the supplies category.
- and $92,863.39 from the services category for a total appropriation of $155,630.21 into the capital
- category. The Auditor's Office requests for a category transfer within Fund 1000-0002, General Accounting
- General Auditor, of $18,000
- from the personnel category to the services category. And finally, the county council meeting summary
- minutes for August 29th, 2025 as presented. Second. All right. All right. It wasn't working there. We
- got a motion and we got a motion and a second. All right. I feel like I got a.
- Hold this up, because it's really not loud. Are there any questions or comments from council related
- to this item? All right. Now we'll go to public comment. If you would like to make comment on our consent
- agenda items, you can come forward to the lectern here in the Net Youth Room, or you can raise your
- hand via Teams.
- and seeing none, we usually do consent agenda by voice vote, but because we have a council member that
- is attended virtually, everything tonight will have to be a roll call vote. So may we please have a
- roll call vote. Councilor Deckard? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Henry?
- Yes. Councilor Hawk? Yes.
- Councilor Crossley. Yes. Motion passes unanimous. All right. Thank you. Um, we tabled item number seven.
- So we will, um, which is item seven starts our ongoing business. And so now we, um, we titled seven
- a, excuse me. So now we'll go into seven B council. I moved to approve the amended exhibit for resolution
- 2025 dash 45 a committee recommendation for the Sophia Travis community services grant.
- All right, we got a motion and a second. Ms. Turner-King. So I'm displaying a draft of the amended resolution
- 2025-45A. The only thing that this amendment is going to change is the exhibit, which is, I'm scrolling
- down, and it's to change the purpose for the New Hope for Families project.
- It was previously listed as making homelessness brief for children. However, during a Sophia Travis
- meeting, this organization had requested to amend their project purpose, and the amended project purpose
- wasn't reflected in the spreadsheet. So now they're requesting to make their project preserving food
- access for low-income early learners. OK.
- Thank you very much for that. Council, is there any questions? Looking over here to my immediate right.
- Seeing none. Looking to my left. Seeing none and looking online at Councilor Hawk. Any more questions?
- All right. Everybody shaking heads. All right.
- that's cool. All right, so next up, we'll go to public comment. If there is public comment on this item,
- you can come forward to lectern here in the Nattie Hill room or raise your hand via Teams. You'll have
- up to three minutes. And seeing none, maybe please have a roll call vote. Councilor Feidl? Yeah. Councilor
- Wilts? Yes. Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Councilor Crossley?
- Councilor Decker? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. All right, thank you. Next up is item C. Council, I
- move to open for discussion in approval of an amendment to resolution 2025-42 hiring freeze for full
- part-time positions. Second.
- meeting there was a discussion of the hiring freeze and developing a process potentially developing
- a form for departments to fill out and a way for that form to be evaluated to evaluate request for positions
- to be filled as an exemption to the hiring freeze. So after the council meeting PAC was able to meet
- and I don't know if Councilor Wilts or Councilor Feidl would like to give an update as to what happened
- at the PAC meeting or if you'd like to
- me to continue talking. I can. Happy to. Thank you. Yes. So there were a lot of people at the PAC meeting
- and it was an interesting discussion. We did not come to. We didn't vote to.
- for anything over to council for approval. So we don't have an official amendment to the resolution
- to present to you all. But what we did talk about is the various ways in which the hiring freeze is
- untenable for a lot of folks. And everyone seemed to have a situation that
- was special. And I think Councilor Hawk actually kind of alluded to the fact that this was going to
- happen if we do a hiring freeze and we have a process where they're going to come to us, they're all
- going to come to us. So we did talk about the need to fully exempt the items on Councilor Feidl's list
- that she just showed me.
- So grant-funded positions would need to be exempted. Public safety positions, so the jail positions,
- specifically the corrections officers and the mayor deputies, of course. And I think we talked about
- that last time. And then the 24-7 operations,
- positions that are required to kind of be on duty 24-7. So that kind of reflects the youth services.
- And what was the last one? Oh, if the position is mandated statutorily, that would be obviously an exemption
- as well. If the work that that position is doing is mandated,
- Statutorily, that's a little bit different situation. So given all of those exemptions, in addition
- to that, one thing we talked about is instead of making this a flat-out bam freeze, given that we do
- not have at this point a specific fiscal goal besides, hey, we need to save money,
- And we don't have any way of getting to that specific fiscal goal in terms of a number right now. We
- just do not have that information. And therefore, we don't have a way of saying how long we need to
- have a hiring freeze. We don't have a way of saying to what point. Is there a dollar amount? So all
- of this is leaving the members of
- county government who come to work every day feeling pretty uneasy and I don't blame them. In order
- to maybe alleviate some of that one of the suggestions that was made during the meeting was to make
- the hiring freeze more of a 90 day pause on hiring so that when a position comes open in the processes
- started to fill that position there's a required
- 90-day pause before that position can proceed to advertising. Is that right? Did we say before it could
- even proceed to advertising? But they could be getting their ducks in a row. And within that 30 days,
- we would have time to get a fiscal impact.
- So we get an idea of what the fiscal impact of that position being open for 90 days is. We'd also ask
- for information on a form. So we had a draft form that employee services had started for us for this
- process. And I think we looked at a draft maybe last time or talked about it at least in our last meeting.
- That might not be the exact form. We still don't know. That's kind of the next discussion, but we would
- be able to get some information in that 90 day period. The freeze after the 90 days, if council doesn't
- act, then they get to go ahead and proceed with the hiring. We will monetize that savings
- for the 90 days. Obviously, that's not nearly the same kind of impact as freezing until we don't know.
- But at the same time, it allows our staff in county government to proceed with some vision of what's
- going to happen in the future.
- a little bit of faith in kind of their next steps. I think there are other things that we need to be
- considering as we put this into place, but right now we have many positions in line waiting to hear,
- and each one has varying levels of compelling arguments for why they should have that position. This
- allows us to kind of compromise on
- savings for 90 days, we could, I mean right now we've already passed, we've already passed a resolution
- saying that there can be no transfers into or out of the overtime lines. We could say stop moving anything
- in the tens if we want to make sure, I mean that's a level of maybe micro scrutiny that
- we might not be comfortable with, but if you wanted to ensure that that savings was realized and not
- utilized for something else, you could do that. That's all that I had. Did I capture everything, Councilor
- Feidl? Yes, I think so, but I think I'd also like to throw in maybe thinking about
- requiring that the liaison or liaisons for the departments that are on this 90 day chill or whatever
- we're going to call it, or it doesn't have to be 90 days. I think it could be 30 or 60 or 90, whatever
- the council would think would be suitable, that the liaisons would be required, I think, to meet with
- the departments to
- make sure they understand what the issues are so they can report back to the council in full to understand
- it better and hopefully open up more dialogue that way as well. Okay. First, I saw Marty's hand up.
- So I'll go to her and then I'll kick it back to us here and then at you, Hilary. Right. And I'll try
- to say this quickly. I know that during the budget process,
- we were concerned about the grant positions that would no longer be covered under the grants that was
- being moved over to general. And not all of those were paying for the insurance, which really sent our
- insurance costs higher. So I think we have to be very cautious when we're looking at grants to say,
- are they gonna be moving positions back into the grant out of general?
- from where they've been moved or just some thoughts because we see that if you have them in grants and
- then there's a thought they can always, the general can pick up everything else, we found this year
- that was very problematic. Councilor, I think I saw Decker's hand first and then I'll go to Councilor Henry.
- Thank you. Thanks for all this, and I appreciate two big things right off the bat. I want to say,
- number one, I appreciate any department heads
- wrangling through this. One of the things that does keep me up at night is anything that happens up
- here that causes consternation on what I call the counter positions, meaning the positions who are literally
- doing public service across the counter. I don't want anything here more than is absolutely necessary
- to create issues for it because I think in years past we've had issues around that. That said, I also
- appreciate the wrangling that
- was doing trying to figure out a reasonable approach on this, and it sounds like other than a delay
- and some concerns, there's some kind of goose eggs on figuring it out. One thing that I would be curious
- on, and this does not have to be answered today, when do we have amounts that tell us what you're working
- with? When do you know that? You know, I pay property taxes.
- And I pay them honestly and diligently. Let me say that for the record. I pay those property taxes on
- two different properties. And I marched in here last Thursday to pay my property taxes with the notion
- of I've got to do that because I've got to make sure I've done my part so these things get done. And
- I know that we get funding from all different sources. And the state is very particular about how you
- get a budget.
- what you do and what you don't do. And if you don't do it by the right deadline, you don't get to do
- anything. Or you do it wrong by this, you don't get to correct it. They can do otherwise, but we cannot.
- And I guess the question I would throw out is, when do you have a reasonable idea? And here's why I
- say that. I am very worried that we're, just like the end of that last budget, where we started into
- that path of keep cutting, keep cutting,
- keep cutting, keep cutting, and then we end up doing this anti-government horse, you know what, that
- we hear out on the street when there's actual service that needs to be done. And so I get nervous about
- just keep cutting, keep cutting, keep holding, keep cutting, keep cutting, keep holding, keep cutting,
- and I think that
- That looks good on paper, theoretically, but when services get cut, it becomes an issue. Our federal
- government just nearly put us all through a case study of hell on that, where when people don't get
- things, things start happening, and it's not real pleasant when people don't get things. So I would
- like us to have honest, accurate numbers as close as possible. I know that magically can't happen tonight,
- but I really, like there's no need to put people through
- wrangling and pressure and or cut services and stress if it's not the case or if it is. Because what
- we will do is we'll keep just eating each other and there's not going to be anything left here to do
- it. We'll have department heads quitting, we'll have staff not getting hired, services not rendered,
- people being crappy at count. We go down all these chains and I'm really worried about that.
- Councilor Henry. Thank you. Thanks for all the comments there. I appreciate the 90 day concept, especially
- because we do need the data to understand what we're saving in that position for a quarter and what
- that savings does due to the general fund. I think that's important. I agree with Councilor Hawke and
- that for the grant funded positions that do incur county cost, we need to understand that because it's
- not, it can't just be a blanket approval of a grant position if we are incurring the healthcare costs
- and wraparounds. Like that's just math.
- A lot of this still is cold, but it is the math that keeps me up with all this. I would like to see
- if we could possibly use that 90-day period as well to really reflect on
- what happens when we won't have the resource? I just keep thinking about the presentation by FSG at
- a long-term government finance meeting over the summer that shows by fiscal 28 and 29 negative numbers
- in our account lines, right? Because at some point, while all the services are being rendered fiscal
- year to fiscal year, there's this other timeline out there of winnowing revenue in the county, and that
- revenue has to come from somewhere, and that it could be increasing in taxes in our community, which
- no one wants to mention.
- It's getting, I think, people ready for a three to five-year mindset rather than dealing with the fire
- in their office, which is somebody quit today and we got to get that position filled. I do hope department
- heads can use that 90-day period to reflect on, well, what does three years out look like? Because we
- may be at a point three years out with diminishing revenue that that position might not be being filled,
- which means those FT hours are going to have to spill over onto other people's laps. The message from
- India is clear. It's do more with less.
- So we might be buying time with this for a year, but boy, I think two years from now, with fiscal 29,
- the revenue's gonna look very different, and we gotta start getting in that head space. I know that
- probably hurts people here in the county, but look, we balanced the budget on the back of the edit,
- which of course has triggered the commissioners to be here to ask for all sorts of things related to
- the jail. We're not gonna be able to tap that too many more times. It won't even be available to us
- as a tax feature, as an option three years from now. So it's just the math of it.
- That's it. That's what I have right now. It's just the math. Yeah. I guess I got a clarifying question
- related to the pause. And I think Councilman Wilts had said something. Within the 90 day pause on hiring
- or hiring the position, you said something about
- If the council to get a fiscal impact during this time frame, if the council doesn't act, then we will
- go ahead with the hiring. Can you clarify that for me, please? I'm not sure if I can clarify it, but
- I can respond. My understanding is that what we would be doing is implementing this default of
- you submit the email request to the council office, hey, I have a position open, I'd like to hire. That
- starts a 90 day, you can't do it for 90 days. And during that 90 days, here are a couple things we need
- from you, namely just some questions answered. During that time, I think that we would have the opportunity to
- say, hey, just like we've had the opportunity all along to say, hey, when they submit that, we have
- 48 hours right now. This gives us three months to really think that through and, OK, do we need to have
- them come to council? How much more information do we need? Let's talk this over so we can invite them
- to come to council if that's necessary. Find out what we need to find out.
- And if we don't take an action preventing them from hiring, then after 90 days, they would be able to
- hire. OK. That's the part that I needed to clarify. Sorry. It took so long. No, no, no. Yeah, I appreciate
- that. I guess, yeah, and listening to what Counselor Henry was saying, I guess this is food for thought because
- As I'm thinking about this and I think about all the grilling hours that we went into trying to kind
- of reduce a lot of things, if we do this, then what was the original intention of us originally doing
- the higher phrase from the beginning? Because I think that is in my mind. I know right now, I just am concerned
- because I know we might not have a necessarily dollar amount. This is X amount of dollars of the amount
- that we want to save by not going forward with hiring with these positions. But I think that I'm not
- necessarily working on a specific dollar amount. And I'm just kind of looking at overall general picture,
- because this budget season has definitely taught us buckle up, buttercup. The sequel is happening next
- year, whether we like it or not.
- I want to be able to, yeah, I'm not certain about this. Because it's almost like, if that's the case,
- then do we even do a higher-end phrase to begin with? And my idea is, I understand people might not
- like it. And I get it. I understand. But we are under different times right now.
- Um, and much like what we've been saying before is to continue to come back, you know, obviously adding
- the exemptions of the grant fund and public safety, which we did a couple of weeks ago, um, the 24 hour
- seven operations. I know we've had the clerk staff, um, or, you know, come in and speak to them about
- me too, me too. Um, so maybe that's also something to think about. And of course the mandated statutory
- positions, but,
- I just wonder if the work that we did to get us to the higher and freeze resolution with this is in
- vain by this concept. So I don't think it's in vain. I do think that it might have been premature. And
- this came from E. Sensenstein in the meeting.
- He said, well, best practice in HR. And all of a sudden I was like, oh, wait, maybe we should find out
- what that is. And it was, and correct me if I get this, oh, she's got like everything written down.
- She's not color coded. I need colors though, right.
- Before you, the hiring freeze is kind of the third thing you would consider. And first you would do,
- changes to the amount of hours worked is in there somewhere. But what's the first thing? Yeah, that
- kind of thing. Changing either from like 40 to 37 or reducing overtime. The things that we were, you know,
- talking about, but haven't done. And slowing down, I think, is kind of the first step in that process.
- Sorry, I don't remember everything that we did, because I obviously slept since then and lost some of
- it up the back of my head. But the hiring freeze is sort of the most drastic, and I think that
- Eve's point was there are a few other things that can be put in place and even long-term put in place.
- Okay, so Eve, you want to go ahead and unmute? Can you help us out with this conversation?
- I'm going to apologize because I am driving, so I don't know what I'm so sorry that will look like.
- No, it's fine. So we had that conversation and there are a lot of options that you can consider. I think
- what makes us different than some best practices is that we are government and that we are county government,
- which there's a lot of layers to that, right? You have different offices and their statutory responsibilities
- and elected officials and all those things.
- um yeah there there are a lot of options and it really just depends on how you want to carry this out.
- I think what you've all said tonight um about gap between what identified as your needs um for fiscal
- responsibility and the department's needs to
- carry out their job functions, right? And I think what is not happening there is consensus about what
- the goals are. And I think that you haven't figured out what is the goal? What are you trying to achieve
- to what degree? Like, is that a complete hiring freeze? Is that a pause? Where does that get you financially?
- And the departments are not buying into that because they don't necessarily understand. And I think
- that's what you need to
- That's where you need to get to a point where they understand and they can buy into maybe sitting there
- for 90 days, six months with a position open because that meets this goal that they are contributing
- towards. Does that make sense? And figuring out what that option is in the large scheme of all the options
- you could possibly consider.
- Thank you. Anybody else have anything. Yes. Councilor I think one thing also we talked about in the
- meeting with PAC was figuring out what the council priorities are. Right. So is there any sort
- of prioritization. I don't know via department via the service via whatever the criteria would be in
- what it is we'd like to see funded. Right. So that I think
- could be something that we could come up with to aid in figuring some of these issues out. I think it's
- like core work. What's the core work that really needs to get done here? I know all departments,
- I'm sure, and all employees
- should and want to feel valued and all that, but the reality is you have to look at the money situation.
- I'm usually on the other side of this with the employees, so I get it. But now I'm on this side with
- the money, and so you have to look at the money. And if you don't know the money situation, what are
- your priorities? And you figure that out and then base your decisions on what you're going to do on
- the priorities. At least that's what I think we talked about.
- was the priorities. Yes, that is actually, that's a really good point. We did talk about that and the
- need to think about our priorities, then use those to set goals. And that made me think about when we
- talked first about setting up the long-term finance committee, that was actually what we were talking
- about, is having a subset of council
- able to meet regularly to think beyond the annual budgeting process and think about where is it we're
- headed? What is it that we know for our future and can plan against and plan for? It might be worth
- taking a look at that. I think PAC could play a role maybe in more short-term type approaches while
- there's longer-term approaches being discussed in long-term finance.
- So it sounds like there's more discussion that needs to happen. So I guess the goal, so it sounds like
- what we need to figure out is what is the priorities that we have and trying to make this as clear as
- possible to department heads as we kind of navigate through this, because I understand
- that it's a little challenging and difficult. And I know since we kind of talked about it during our
- budget season in September, it's been, I feel like every time we've had a meeting, it's been on the
- agenda to talk about, which means maybe we're not making it clear to people. But I'm also, as we are
- having the conversation personally,
- I'm still liking what we are doing right now. Just because I feel like, again, like I said before, I
- think it's like, what is the point of having the high air and freeze if we are not? It feels like all
- the work and things that we've put into it has just, it's kind of been a lot in them.
- Sometimes we just don't have to stick to things. And people might not like it. But that's just what
- it is. But always, apparently, the magic word of the day is compromise and collaboration. So I'm of
- hope and intentions that we can learn something from those C words that we use a lot in county government. So yes.
- Councilor Decker. One thing is, I think one of the reasons we struggle with this is because I don't
- think it's the intention of anyone that life in a department gets worse or that anything, it's an effort
- to try to keep things from changing by changing them in the most subtle way possible. And to me, when
- I was supporting this notion
- and I can recall this very much during the budget. I saw this as a way for departments and council to
- be really thoughtful when an opening comes to say, is there any way that that opening makes you think
- about the way you're doing that position or that services while someone's not currently in it that might
- get you to rethink that versus the alternative? And the alternative is this.
- We either in the last budget would have went in and said, cut this position, cut this position, cut
- this position, or cut these services in lieu of that position. And nobody really wants that. They also
- don't want it in a year. And I think that this is a, and I really mean that. I mean, I get up here and
- I well about the state. President Crosley wells about the state. But that in a quarter, they don't really
- care until voters tell them otherwise.
- and voters are being real quiet on this one. It goes one way or the other. To me, it would be a thoughtful
- interchange where a department would say, you know what, and I've never, by the way, I'll say this,
- I've never heard a department ever say,
- I don't need that position or there's not a good reason. In fact, every spending item, there's a compelling
- reason why it has to happen. And I've gone into somewhere I'm like, they will never be able to talk
- us into this. And by the end, I'm like, my gosh, that was better than Netflix. I agree. That was the
- most compelling argument. And a lot of times, the overwhelming majority, it's just because we just didn't
- understand it or what have you. But this is an ability for it to me.
- department to say, rather than do this later with this council, or rather than have done it last time,
- this is a way to think through, is there any way in these tougher times? Again, telling associations,
- telling other folks what tough times look like when these things get done. I'm sure that's not the answer
- anybody really is looking for here, but this is just a mess because it's a darn mess.
- her hand up. Just to round out this discussion and maybe for the public, we have been looking at fiscal
- impacts. We have what we receive from the state as far as the
- impact to property tax but those are estimates of course and for local income tax we won't have the
- state estimate for that until you know we apply you know the we opt in to to the new taxes and it will
- be mid 2027 so because you know they come through in 2028 so and there is still talk about changing
- some of that legislation as well so it really is kind of the perfect storm because we don't
- have that magic number yet. It's just unknown. So it's very unfortunate, but we do have an impact we
- provided. However, it is, again, an estimate based on the information we know now. So I can resend that
- so it's circulated again amongst the council, if that's helpful. That would be appreciated. Thank you.
- Yes, Councillor Fryder. So I think one thing that I for sure heard loud and clear in the meeting, the
- PAC meeting from those departments who did attend
- was the fact that we have this preliminary form. I think the form, for whatever reason, they were feeling
- was quite onerous. If we do ask them to come back, are you asking them to come to the council itself
- or go through PAC or Human Resources and
- and our council staff with a form or what would be the council's personal, not personal, but preferred
- is the word I'm looking for, preferred preference there? That's actually on the next item, the form
- discussion. Yeah, because I'm curious about that too. Because that was a big discussion was the form
- and how long that was going to take. That was a big part of the discussion.
- Okay, so is there any other council member questions or comments related to a higher end freeze right
- now? I recognize that we don't have consensus on what it should look like. I do think we need to
- We need to come up with something quickly that clarifies the, and maybe that's the next agenda item.
- I mean, maybe I'm confusing them, but our departments really need to know what our thinking is on this.
- And I guess ahead of our next meeting, which is next Tuesday is next Tuesday.
- And that's when we have several of these positions coming before us for really kind of a decision. Right.
- And it would be it would be good for us to come up with guidance for our own sake. And maybe that's
- the I don't know. I just I'm feeling a little like we haven't finished and we need to kind of finish.
- Yeah. I hear you. I'm gonna go to Council Hawk. Maybe she has some insight.
- on this council? You're not gonna like my insight. We already know how much we were spending into the
- deficit and had to make up for it out of those dollars that we were thinking we were going to move forward
- with the jail. Well, now the commissioners and the public are saying, well, what are you doing? Well,
- you know, we didn't want to cut the budget. We really didn't. And so rather than cutting it,
- And for the most part, it got moved over into another fund, which was supposed to be for the jail. So
- why would anyone question the need to reduce spending? We are already spending more than we're bringing
- in, unless we plan to just forget about the jail altogether and just keep spending that economic development,
- which will
- actually be a part of the 1.2 by mid 2027. That's what we'll be looking at. The other thing is we really
- do not know what our property tax revenue stream is going to be because of all the new credits and so
- forth and deductions that is put in place and how much of that
- change is going to affect what a revenue is actually going to be, it may be better than what we thought
- because we were looking at the numbers that the state sent us was like, remember, there's the credit
- for all the homesteads of $300 or 10%
- the tax bill, whichever is less. So we don't really know for sure what's going to be 300 per homestead
- or 10% of the part that's left. So for us to say, well, we need to have a definite price tag set on
- these things, we do not know. And we should just absolutely give ourselves some grace because
- We don't know the future. Now we can make some projections. But what we do know is we're always spending
- more than what we're bringing in. Unless we go to the edit money. Yeah, that's a good point, Councilor
- Hull. That was some good insight. I appreciate that.
- I think I saw some movement over here. OK. Everyone's like, no, not me. All right. So I guess, because
- technically, we were opening the discussion for an amendment. And the amendment that we heard from Ms.
- Turner-King were to add some
- more exemptions to the resolution. Sorry, my mic is being really sensitive right now. It's all good.
- I think I started this off by switching C and D inadvertently. But I think we can do them together.
- So let me try to share my screen.
- This is the draft resolution that I think encompasses. I'm trying to make it bigger. So let me make
- sure. The first, it says amended up at the top. The first thing it does is add residential specialist
- positions and residential coordinator positions at YSB to the exemption list, which would cover the 24
- our facilities. I will say that YSB would like a broader exemption or for consideration of a broader
- exemption that just says anything residential coordinator and specialist position and also required
- positions by the Indiana administrative code which would include administrative and supervisory personnel.
- I don't know if that encompasses all of YSB positions.
- but they would like the addition of that language. So if you're amenable to such, I could put that in
- or you could leave it as is or as proposed thoughts. You had mentioned earlier other mandated statutorily
- positions. Wouldn't that cover that? Currently, there's not language in there that says or statutory
- positions. I can add that as a for.
- One thing that we did talk about in PAC was the idea that although there are exemptions for these, and
- I think the context was more of the public safety merit deputies, the jail staff, there are administrative
- positions that wouldn't be covered.
- I'm hesitant to say, yeah, include your administrators. I get that people need to have supervisors to
- get their jobs done, but an automatic exemption maybe is a step too far on that. I don't know. And it
- looks like Vanessa Schmidt from YSB has her hand up. Maybe she can add to that conversation there.
- I would just add in that for our positions, these are positions that are required to receive licensure
- to operate our emergency shelter, and so it does not cover all of the positions by any means at the
- Youth Services Bureau, but there are a few positions that you are required to have as licensed positions
- to operate the emergency shelter. That makes perfect sense. OK. But again, I guess for Ms Turner King,
- Could that? Could this suffice if we added the language of mandated mandated statutorily positions,
- would that be? Could that be OK with that? I guess that would be a clarifying question. Are you adding
- specifically mandated statutory positions for YSB or any mandated statutory position within
- county government? I guess initially,
- I thought you had mentioned that it was. Initially I proposed positions exempt as required by Indiana
- code or Indiana administrative code. The code. It's Indiana administrative code 211 48 which
- is administrative and supervisory personnel. That is what that code section is entitled.
- If I add that language, it would cover those specific positions as referenced by Ms. Schmidt. Other
- departments where there are statutory positions, is that what you're saying? That was my clarifying
- question. Do you want to add the language specifically allowing the positions covered by the IAC code
- for YSB, or are you requesting to add language that
- exempts any statutory position within county government, so not specific to YSB. I would say any of
- them in county government. As long as we are clear on how to define that, I think we are. I mean, I
- think you just look in the code and see, but am I opening up something I don't understand? Because I
- don't know what I
- I guess I will answer that question with what you just said. I don't know what I don't know. I don't
- know how many, I know there might be statutory duties clarified in the code and how those duties are
- delivered or what positions deliver them, I don't know is defined by code. So is it clarifying to say
- positions mandated in administrative code?
- Or statutorily code. Yeah. Any code. Yes. And leave it at that. Not duties, but positions. So the code
- refers to the positions. Is that right? Without knowing what all of these codes are, I don't know that
- I can say it refers to the duties or the positions. This specific
- IAC code refers to administrative and supervisory positions. If you think about the health department,
- they have core functions, and that's their statutory duties. And how those duties are delivered in the
- health department might be all in one position or in multiple positions. So I don't think there is a
- clear answer whether it's duties or positions. Could you say statutory requirements?
- because it sounds like there is more research that needs to be done before we get into that. Is that
- something that right now we could do with trying to, what we heard from Mr. Schmidt related to YSB,
- could we fix that? And obviously we are not fixing all of the resolution problems in one night tonight,
- Is that something that we could look at for later? Yes, I think you could look at it later. We could
- add the YSB specific language tonight. But I could comb all of administrative code and Indiana code
- and still miss some statutory requirement, because I don't run the health department, so I don't know
- everything that they're doing. I think it might be simpler, and I would maybe suggest, and I know we've
- talked about it a little bit,
- At the last meeting we were looking at a form and trying to define a process to evaluate positions.
- Maybe the process is amended to departments submit a request and then that request is just added onto
- the council agenda and one of the things council considers in the full conversation is, is this position
- fulfilling statutory duty or a statutory position?
- Because if anybody can tell you that, I'm sure the department's asking for the position can. I was just
- thinking that somehow it seems like that they could self-select out if they know that they meet that
- statutory requirement, right? If the department knows that it is statutorily required, would they not
- be able to say,
- statutory requirement, yes, and then that's it, right? I was a department head. When I made the request
- to fulfill the position, I would probably note this is a request to fill said position, which is fulfilling
- a statutory duty and put it right there in the request when they submitted it to council office. And
- then that would be? They know the code.
- and then that would be sort of the end of that, I would think, right? They wouldn't go any further anywhere,
- is that right? Would that be the end of it or would it have to still come to council? I think that's
- a council question, whether you wanted that to be the end and you just relied on the department head
- providing the code or if it goes to full council and that's part of the consideration. If we were to
- do the 90-day pause, then that gives
- for us to really find out if we're talking about statutory duties being performed versus a statutory
- position or a position required by a professional certification, you know, that's needed to then carry
- out the duties. I mean, there's some nuances there that, yes, I agree the department heads will know, I think,
- blind faith in differentiate and having them differentiate between what is a statutory duty being performed
- by a position versus a statutorily mandated position might be, might be something we want to ask. Like,
- you know, have a little bit of eyeballs on. Yeah. Okay. Yes, Ms. Turnkey.
- So going back, I just added language to number three, which is the added exemption for YSB only, because
- there are 24-7 facilities similar to the way the jail and the sheriff's office runs. And so it's residential
- specialist positions, residential coordinator positions, and or positions required by 465 IAC 211-48
- within the Monroe County Youth Shelter Bureau. That would be statutory positions
- specific to YSB but not everyone else. Is that language amendable to council? I say yes. So I'm just
- I think the easiest way to do this is to go line by line for potential amendments. And so if that language
- is amendable I would
- inquire whether there is a motion to amend accordingly. Just the sentence, not the whole resolution.
- Council, I move to amend the resolution 2025-42 to reflect the changes in red on the screen. Second.
- All right. We got a motion and a second. Is there any further discussion with council on this? No, but I see.
- Ms. Schmidt has her hand up, so if she wants to unmute and speak. Yes. I'm sorry. I just would hate
- for you have to come back. If it matters, you might want to change Monroe County Youth Services Bureau
- instead of Youth Shelter Bureau. Ah, perfect. Thank you. Otherwise, thank you. We appreciate that.
- Thank you. Friendly amendment to my motion. Consent. Hello, hello.
- Could I ask? Councilor Hawke, you have your hand up. You went away, I don't see you. I'm trying. Can
- you hear me now? I didn't hear what she said, changing the name of it to? Youth Services as opposed
- to Youth Shelter. And why would we do that? I thought we were doing the same thing.
- because it's 24-7 operations for the shelter. And by the way, the name of the shelter, remind everybody,
- is the Morris Binkley Home. It's not just the new shelters named after Morris Binkley. And so I thought
- we were tying that to the same thing because 24-7 as a jail, which is 24-7. Are you saying then it would be
- all other positions. I'm not sure I understand, but regardless, I think we need to make sure that the
- shelter operations are covered. I can read that administrative code section if it helps. It says, the
- child caring institute shall employ staff to perform administrative supervisory service and direct care
- functions.
- Functions may be combined only upon the approval of the department. And then it sets out requirements
- for the administrator and supervisory positions. And then. That sounds good. OK, so that should suffice.
- And that covers the shelter and that covers what Council Hawks concerns are. OK, I believe so.
- Okay. Okay. All right. So scrolling down, I've highlighted this yellow section because this is our current
- process. The elected official or department head submits a request if it gets sent to council. If no
- council member responds within 48 hours, the request is deemed denied. And then if a council member
- responds, it goes on to the council agenda. We haven't identified
- I don't think, a way to evaluate these requests. And until we do, we have multiple requests lingering.
- So should we amend the procedure temporarily and so we can figure out or iron out the details of how
- you want to evaluate the request to simply be
- Once a request is received, it will be added to the next council agenda for further discussion by the
- full council. No elected official and or department head shall move forward with the hiring and or transfer
- of the requested position until after the full council has the opportunity to consider and improve the
- hiring of the position at a public meeting. And so this would make it every request is just coming to
- you for a discussion. And yes, Councillor Wilts, and then I'll go back to Councillor Hawke.
- first of all yes I think that seems like a stopgap for right now but don't we need to vote on the one
- amendment yes yes that's what I wanted to make sure that's what I was gonna say excuse me Oh counselor yes I
- I didn't hear, she said we need to vote on which part? We needed to vote on Councilor Wilts' amendment
- to what Ms. Turner-King had put in the green for item number three. Do you see that? Oh, right. Yep.
- So that's what we're- Let's do that. Exactly. So Councilor Wilts' motion was to
- you know, have that amended. So we need to vote on that. So because Councilor Huck is virtual, can we
- get a roll call vote on this, please? Yes, this is on the amendment. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor
- Feidl? Yes. Councilor Deckard? Yes. Councilor Huck? Yes. Councilor Crossley? Yes.
- A motion passes five to zero. Thank you. And then kind of going back into what we were looking at before.
- Okay. Is it time for me to make my comment now on? Yes, go ahead. I just wanted to comment that I don't
- know about anybody else, but it seems to me that we are getting so much email, so much that
- something very important could be coming through and it'll be missed somehow. So I think there has to
- be some other way of making sure. I think one of the things we need to do is sort of pull out some of
- the other miscellaneous things we're getting and have just an email that's just for council operation
- business. But until we get to that spot,
- I would not want it to be that comes back just as email to us. And then if we miss it, I mean, has anybody
- else had that concern that maybe you'll miss something that because you didn't respond, they didn't
- get to hire the person? Yeah. We're all kind of shaking our heads or nodding, I should say,
- in here as well. Because I don't like, because of all the,
- the barrage of emails that we get throughout the day. Some of us might have the intention of wanting
- to respond to it and it gets buried in something and we miss it and we unintentionally miss something
- and it could cause some consequences for department head. I believe. Uh, Miss Turner King just suggested about
- having everything come to council right rather than needing a review would address that concern and
- we still have the opportunity to make another amendment in the future if that's too much and too cumbersome
- but at least correct at least we get everybody heard at some point so what it would be doing is effectively
- It renumbered it and I don't really wanna play with the word formatting right now, but it would strike
- what is now four and five and put three, previously three and four and just put in place three, which
- is what I read a minute ago. Council, I move that we amend the resolution in question to reflect the
- wording that Ms. Turner King has on the screen. Second. Okay, we got a motion and a second.
- Is there any further discussion? All right, seeing none. Do I need to take public comment for this?
- All right, so I always forget about this. If there's public comment on this item, you can come forward
- to the lectern here in the Nattie Hill room, or you can raise your hand via Teams. And seeing none,
- maybe please have a roll call vote.
- Who seconded? I did. Thank you. Councillor Crossley? Yes. Councillor Hawke? Yes. Yes. Councillor Feidl?
- Yes. Councillor Decker? Yes. Motion passes unanimous.
- So I don't know if you want to think about considering this, but so now if every position is coming
- to full council, is there information that council office or employee services can provide in advance
- of the council meeting that council would want to see, such as a fiscal impact or something like that,
- so that we can put it in there so when the requests come in, Kim doesn't call me and say, what should I do?
- The answer is yes. That's why we have the next thing on the agenda. I'm unclear if we're addressing
- all of this together, which is fine. I think that we did talk a little bit about that during PAC, and
- most of the information on that form is of interest. However, we heard from Department
- representatives who felt like it was very cumbersome and especially given the short timeframe we were
- requesting. This is a little bit longer timeframe, presumably, but maybe not. I mean, it depends on
- when the... Well, and that's the thing. So if somebody submits a request, is this to be put on the next
- available agenda? I mean, they may send in a request on Friday with
- with mean, which means, does that mean it goes on for a Tuesday meeting? So I need some timeline there
- and then with regards to fiscal impact, what are you looking for? Are you wanting like a fiscal impact
- if it's paused or what is the position costing us right now? I need more direction on what kind of a
- fiscal impact are you wanting?
- Councilor Hawke has her hand up. Yes, I think many of us have seen even yet just this year where they
- wanted to hire, you know, a replacement, but they wanted to hire them at a different price tag. It was
- going to, you know, go by the numbers. And maybe they wanted to hire them at, you know, maybe it was
- going to be a higher
- number of years or something of the sort. And when you look at the difference, sometimes it was many
- thousands of dollars. So I think the fiscal impact should be just like if you were looking at it coming
- out of your own pocket, if you were paying $50,000 for something to begin with, and somebody says, can
- you keep doing it? Well, yeah, but now it's going to be $58,000 making up those numbers. We need to
- know what that's going to be.
- So are you saying Councilor Hawk that you would like to see a fiscal impact in this? Right,
- if we're talking, yeah, if you're talking about a position and you could see what the person that's
- leaving, because we'd be talking about if you didn't have vacant spot, we could see what's getting paid
- right now and at what level they were and what they want
- if they have somebody in mind they're going to place it with. If it's not going to be that dollar amount.
- In other words, are we saving a little money? Are we spending a little more? And that's what I'd like
- to see. Okay, I understand. Yeah, Councilor Wilson or Fido and also
- maybe highlight whether or not we're not paying anybody in between those two people, right? Is there
- some cost savings there? So the total fiscal impact, right? Yeah. But then I also hear, and so to come
- back to staff to figure out how we can help you with this, because the idea is we need to have a deadline
- for people to get this information in because
- One a couple of things one we understand that people want to make sure that they are You know trying
- to scoot in to get things on the agenda at the same time It is also like their deadlines for a reason
- and so you know staff can only do what the department
- can do or you know which is to get your information in on time. So I do think that whatever deadline
- that we have. I guess I would like to ask Michelle like what comfort level are you because we should not be.
- If we don't have a deadline, people could literally email at 352 on a Tuesday afternoon and say, we
- want to be added to this agenda, and therefore then we can miss things as well. And then some people
- get upset because they weren't added to the agenda, and now they think they might be cited, and we're
- not caring, and all of those things there.
- We need to have a deadline to be put into place because everybody knows that we meet on the second and
- fourth Tuesday of every month, and there's a certain time frame for that to get those things in.
- Of course, we know that things happen and it comes up, but at the same time, what comfort level would
- you be in?
- and the auditor's office too, because that's a, I mean, both of our office, both council and auditor's
- office work in tandem to put together the agenda. Yeah, I think the deadline is like the Monday, is
- a Monday prior to the Tuesday, you know, it's at least a week, a week and a day. I would say,
- you know, at the latest it would be that Wednesday because we're still, you know, making adjustments
- to the agenda, but I wouldn't do anything past a Wednesday. I would say that it would then automatically
- just go if it's past Wednesday at noon, it just automatically goes to the next meeting. Because that
- would allow enough time for them to get the required information that we need to be included in that
- packet. So if they can't get it by the
- by the packet date and the packets go out, if there's not a holiday, they will go out around one,
- you know, on Fridays is I think the goal, you know, before the end of the day on Friday. So if we can't
- get that information, then, you know, I think it just has to automatically be forwarded to the next
- meeting. To interpret what you're saying into something that we could make a rule on,
- it would be noon, three days before the next meeting day. Working days. Three business working, whatever.
- Non-holiday. Yeah, working days. And if received after the deadline, it automatically goes to the next
- agenda. Again, this was ownership for department heads because
- I work in other entities where sometimes deadlines aren't, they're there and people act like they don't
- see them. And I think this is like, there's a give and take. There's that collaboration word that we're
- gonna use again because therefore you want this, so help us help you by putting, you know, getting us
- this information. And we wanna make sure that we are doing that because if we're asking for fiscal impact,
- There's a lot of work that goes into that. So it's a team effort. OK. That's not really part of the
- resolution, right? This is just for her knowledge to understand. Now we got your policy procedure situation.
- She's putting it into the blue now. This is a multi-color resolution.
- I think I've incorporated your comments. So requests for the next council agenda may be submitted up
- until noon, three business days prior to the publication of the council packet. If received after this
- deadline, a request will be considered at the following council meeting. I don't like the following
- council meeting though. Sorry, that was an out loud thought. Next available council meeting. The next
- scheduled. Yeah, next scheduled. Regularly scheduled.
- because there could be a budget, there could be. And then I also added language related to the fiscal
- impact conversation. So in preparation for the council meeting, the elected official and your department
- head shall provide with a request of fiscal impact that reflects a difference in current position cost
- and the cost of the position at minimum salary level and or the cost of salary at the level of a transfer
- into the position. This information will be verified by council office for discussion at the council's meeting.
- So that puts it on the department to be like, all right, I have this person leaving at an eight year
- level. I'm going to hire it at a minimum. This is the cost savings. And then Michelle would verify the
- accuracy of those numbers. So she's not doing all the work, which might make this a little bit faster.
- information have to come with that request? There's a deadline, the same deadline applies to that? I
- think it could be clarified. Well, I think the idea
- or at least my idea in drafting this on the fly was that the fiscal impact information would be included
- with the request in the packet so that all council members would have it. So presumably it would be
- submitted at the same time as the request. Yeah, that's what I thought. I just wasn't sure that was,
- I mean, yeah. Well, you could say requests and all needed, you know, subsequent information. Substantiating
- documentation. There we go. Yes.
- because you want the whole package. You don't want it coming in piecemeal. Then something gets lost.
- I just amended it to the elected official and her department head shall submit simultaneously with a
- request of fiscal impact. Yeah. All right. Is there any other questions or comments related to this?
- I think just for clarity, because we do have some departments with multiple positions that are the same.
- to state they need to state the title as well as the fund and account lines because sometimes they may
- have just for instance we've got jail who has who have positions in different funds but so I think we
- need to have you know what fund and what the position title as well as the account line that that is
- specific to that position okay
- So it says request should specify the fund position title and account line specific to the position
- being requested. Okay. Are there any other questions or comments from council related to this? I just
- want to make sure that it couldn't be
- misconstrued that what we mean is that by the next regularly scheduled council meeting doesn't really
- mean the next one from that moment. It means the one after. If they missed that deadline. I know what
- we mean. Is that what that says?
- where she's typing. Okay. Well, it says if received after the deadline. I just changed it though. If
- received after this deadline, the request will be considered at the council meeting immediately following
- the next regular scheduled meeting. So it skips a meeting, right? That's kind of what I was saying.
- Yes. Thank you. Council, I move that we amend the resolution to reflect the changes in blue on our screen.
- all right we got a motion and a second are there any other additional questions or comments from council
- related to this motion all right seeing none if there is public comment on this item you can come forward
- to the lectern here in the night you hill room or you can raise your hand via teams hey i had a question
- sorry what do you mean by publication or
- get moved. There was something in there that said something about before the publication. Do you mean
- just like before you send it out to the council members? Yeah. Distribution of the final council packet.
- Okay, I mean, that's fine, because when you say publication, it almost makes you think you've got to
- send it off to, you know, whatever. Get it bound. Good catch. I'll do the amendment to the motion. Second.
- My mic is really messed up tonight. For clarity, it says, prior request for the next council agenda
- may be submitted up until noon three business days prior to the distribution of the council packet occurring
- on the Friday before the council meeting.
- Mm-hmm. Yep, that's a lot, but yes. It is, but it's very specific. Yep. We are just trying to make it
- all clear. And we accepted and you seconded, so we're all good with that. Yep. And I see Ms. Schmidt
- has her hand raised again. Just as public comment, just to clarify,
- if we are requesting to fill the position at the same time as submitting that fiscal impact, if we don't
- know who's going to apply as far as if they have previous years with the county, would you like us to
- just leave that blank? Because we don't know who will be applying at that point. No, my suggestion is
- to always put minimum in there because if,
- you know, if you're not going to make a transfer in with someone else or something like that, you know
- that at least there's going to be a minimum. Okay. Thank you. Sorry. That's what the council wishes.
- No, that is, that's good. So do we have any other public commenters?
- Is that going to appear in the language or we're just clarifying without appearing in the language?
- I incorporate it into the language. So now it says, in preparation of the council meeting, the elected
- official and or department head shall submit simultaneously with the request a fiscal impact that reflects
- the difference in current position cost and the cost of the position at a minimum salary level and or
- the cost of a salary at the level of a transfer into the position if known at the time.
- and seeing no other public comment, may we please have a roll call vote? Councillor Feidl? Yes. Councillor
- Crossley? Yes. Councillor Hawke? Yes. Councillor Wilts? Yes. Councillor Decker? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. Okay.
- The only other suggestion I have at this time for this resolution is to eliminate the chart, which takes
- up a lot of room and it just has become cumbersome because the positions reflected in the chart had
- a higher date of November 1st, which has since lapsed. So I amended the language to say department heads.
- This would allow for the elect official and or department head to continue hiring the following positions.
- This exemption grants the department until the date explicitly noted within the chart, and it eliminates
- them all except the correctional center who was granted until December 31st to hire the facilities manager.
- All right. In a motion. Yes, I also move. All right. And I'll second that motion. All right. So any
- other further discussion on that item? It's pretty self explanatory.
- Okay. So seeing no other further discussion from council, if we have public comment, you can come forward
- to the lectern here in the night, you know, room or raise your hand via teams. So this is on the amendment
- because we're amending that again, right? Right. The list. Yep. Okay. This is to remove this. Okay.
- Thank you. You're welcome.
- and seeing none, may we please have a roll call vote? Councillor Deckard? Yes. Councillor Wilz? Yes.
- Councillor Crossley? Yes. Councillor Feidl? Yes. Councillor Hawke? Yes. Motion passes unanimous.
- Thank you. I think that's all of my suggested amendments. Councillor Wilz?
- to consider slash discuss adding to the exemptions positions in our justice system that are in addition
- to the corrections officers and the merit deputies and by that I specifically am referring to certain
- attorneys that
- Right now, we are pretty, I think, aware that they have differentiated caseloads and their caseloads
- are gigantic. We just hand it off. I think in both our public defender's office and the prosecutor's
- office, I think those deserve a little bit of extra consideration. I'm just throwing that out there to see.
- if there's other interest in adding that to the exemptions list so that we're not unable to, for instance,
- prosecute juvenile crime because we have nobody in that position. Which, by the way, that's the position
- that's open.
- I see Councilor Hawke has her hand flying up. So Councilor Hawke. Right. Would that all of these other
- plans for how they would come to ask for that position, take care of that situation? I think if you,
- if you, if we make this so broad that we're really not going to have this hiring pause or if it looks
- like we're being playing favorites in any way,
- because each department is going to believe that their position is the most important. And as they should,
- that's what the department head is supposed to do. So I wouldn't be in favor of adding any further right
- now into an exemption. Okay. Any other council members that have any feedback for Councilor Wilts related to that?
- Yes, Councilor Decker. I'm open minded to it. I think this is going to be a continued discussion. One
- of the reasons I had some concern about us doing this to begin with was just the administration of it
- is the hardest part. And we went through it last time and it was awful. And I don't mean that like,
- oh, wine, wine, we've got to work.
- It's why and when you gotta figure things out. I'm not quite there on this one yet, although I see the
- points and I think that we may have to come back to that for sure. Yeah. I think I tend to agree with
- that because again, then you have other departments, and I'm not saying that they are not by any means.
- I don't want anybody to take into what I'm saying that I'm not caring about these particular things
- that Councilor Wilts brought up. I just think that when we do that, we start now opening the floodgates
- for everybody saying that we're exempt, we're exempt, we're exempt. And we just gotta be very careful
- or mindful of that because then we do get into what Councilor Hawke was saying, the plan favorites.
- We also might already be there considering if you are certain department heads that feel like you should
- be on that exempt list and you're not, so that we already might be there and focus on us, yes. I totally
- appreciate that. What about perhaps thinking of it as we've got the hiring freeze and we've got certain
- exemptions
- but then maybe there's some that are not exempt but have that slow 90 day pause where we take that extra
- time. I don't know, just another. That's the thing. So what I hear you say is if we don't have them
- exempt, are you saying then we use that 90 day time frame to gather the evidence to. It's sort of like
- implementing that partial
- that hiccup that still gets at saving money, which is what we're talking about, but recognizes that
- there are certain positions that when going completely unfilled are going to disrupt operations in county
- government. And that's sort of where I would see some of these attorney positions.
- Um, certainly not every administrative position in the prosecutor or public. But, you know, and I don't
- know, maybe it's not every attorney position, but that's not where you draw the line. Yeah. I just think
- we need to think about some of these and before next week comes in, we're trying to make decisions.
- I want to at least get some of it out of my head. That's a good point. I think I saw hands waved to Ms.
- I guess. What I hear Counselor Wolf's describing is perhaps implementing a tier approach so that tier
- one would be a blanket exemption. So if you're listed, you don't have to ask us for permission. You're
- allowed to move forward with the hiring process. Tier two would be like a pause effect. So for example,
- the prosecutor or the public defender attorney positions, which are very restricted by the amount of
- caseloads they can cover,
- would not immediately hire, but would wait 90 days before filling the vacancy. And having gone through
- both the public defender and the prosecutor's hiring process, I don't think you can get through it that
- fast. So what I hear is maybe that's something that we need to think about. And we can maybe ponder.
- and bring it up yet again at another regularly scheduled county council meeting. But it's the cliffhanger.
- I think these are all things into consideration. So yeah, I would be willing to give it a thought.
- All right, now we need to come back to the overall resolution to adopt it as amended, right? Correct.
- Would it be helpful for me to draft a tiered approach resolution and send it to council for consideration
- so you can see it on paper before the next meeting? Or not? Sure. I mean, I don't want to give you more
- work, but if that's something like all things into consideration, if we're all thinking into it, I think
- we're not ready to make decisions right now. No, but it would be a draft. It would be a big old draft. Got it.
- Okay. So now we come back to... But we need a motion for that. I move to adopt the amended resolution
- 2025-42. Second. All right. We got a motion and a second to adopt this resolution as much amended. Is
- there any other final comment related to this?
- I appreciate Pac and the discussions that come from that and all of our council members here who have
- brought some things to the table. And again, it's not perfect, but it's something that we're still working
- on as we continue to go through this process and stand firm in trying to not spend more than what we
- are bringing in as Councilor Hawk mentioned.
- All right, now we go to public comment. So if there's public comment on this item, you can come forward
- to the lectern here in the Net-U Hill room, please entertain us, or you can raise your hand via Teams.
- And seeing none, maybe please have a roll call vote. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Hogg? Yes. Councilor
- Crossley? Yes. Councilor Deckard?
- Yes. Councilor Feidl. Yeah. Motion passes unanimous. Okay. Thank you. All right. Next up is item D,
- which is the hiring freeze request form. Council, I move to open for discussion the development of a
- standardized hiring freeze request form to assist council and departments through this process. Second.
- All right. We got a motion and a second and I'm going to look to the two PAC members here to
- talk about this form or miss Turner King. You just want to open it up and then we don't. I can, but
- I don't know if you were want to have this conversation yet, because we kind of just amended it to not
- require a form to kind of give you the opportunity to think about a form. Okay. Madam Chair, I withdraw
- the previous motion. All right, so there is
- no motion on that and we will move forward thank you for that um next up is item eight which is new
- business and that comes with the aviation department council i moved to approve the aviation department's
- request and fund eight nine five seven zero zero zero zero aip project number 45 for the creation new
- account line 3006 let me read that back lines
- three zero zero zero six contractual, and three zero zero eight one contractual county match, and three
- zero zero eight two contractual state match, and simultaneously approve an additional appropriation
- of $157,895 in the services category. Second. Second.
- Our mics are taking a little bit of time to get used to us today. So we got a motion in a second and
- I see Mr. Laverty is online. So if you'd like to unmute and go ahead. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay, great.
- Sorry. I'm also traveling the lake effect snow through off my plans. Oh, wow. Be safe. Thank you.
- The Monroe County Board of Aviation Commissioners has recently been awarded an FAA grant to design and
- plan a refurbishment of the air traffic control tower at the Monroe County Airport. The tower, which
- is 53 years old, has critical equipment and infrastructure that supports an airport with over 28% growth
- in operations since the initial construction.
- A recent assessment found that the air traffic control tower equipment and HVA systems have exceeded
- their life cycles and are in need of a replacement. This project covers assessment, design and project
- bidding. And the project, the total project cost is $157,895 with the FAA contributing $150,000,
- state $3,947 and local match $3,948.
- Thank you for that. Is there any questions or comments from council for Mr. Lavery? Yes, Councilor Decker.
- Thank you, Carlos, for being here and for presenting this. I'm very interested in this and very supportive
- of it. I am gonna ask you a real honest question. And if you need to get back with me later, that's
- absolutely fine. But I see FAA on this and they've been in the headlines a lot.
- Do we have a solid belief these dollars will get here and we will be able to do this project and not
- be into what Councilor Hawk talks about a lot with grant funded positions where we're holding the ball
- and there's not a partner there. How good are you feeling about this? A very good question. I actually
- feel very good about these. This award has been,
- This grant has been awarded. We have signed for it. The dollars are in the system. Conversely, however,
- there was another grant that we had a verbal from the FAA to expect paperwork for approximately a week
- later. And that day never came. And they did give us a phone call and let us know that that project
- was no longer funded by the federal government.
- but when it comes to airport improvement projects related to the bipartisan infrastructure law, those
- projects are all good to go. Thank you. Good news. Okay. Any other questions or comments on this item
- from council?
- So now we'll move on to public comment. If there's 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, may we please
- have a roll call vote? Councilor Hawk? Yes. Councilor Crossley? Yes. Councilor Decker? Yes. Councilor
- Feidl? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. All right. Thank you. Next up is item B.
- Council, I move to approve the Youth Service Bureau's request for a category transfer in fund 11140166
- lit special purpose, YSB of $4,500 from the capital category to the personnel category. Second.
- All right. And still with us this evening via Teams is Ms. Schmidt. Hello, welcome.
- Thank you. Good evening, Council. This is a category transfer request for us to be able to move that
- 4,500 into our part-time line. Those part-time staff directly support the Binkley House emergency shelter,
- and they are covering for staff on leave, vacation, benefit time, things like that, cross-training,
- as well as when we have an increased number of youth, sometimes our ratio has to change and we need
- a third staff. Okay.
- Thank you for that. Any questions or comments from council? I would say look to my right, but nobody's
- over here. So looking to my screen, because I normally would say look to my right and don't see any
- hands raised. All right. So we'll go to public comment. If there's public comment on this item, you
- can come forward to the lectern here in the net. You can raise your hand via Teams.
- and seeing none, may we please have a roll call vote? Councilor Crossley? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes.
- Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Deckard? Yes. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. All right,
- next up item C.
- Council, I moved to approve the Youth Service Bureau's request for an additional appropriation in fund
- 41110000 donation BTCC of $1,500 in the services category. Second. All right. And also, um, look into
- omission to add anything to this item.
- Yes, thank you. Yes, we would like to recognize the donations that we received for the MC3 sponsorship.
- So we received $500, or I'm sorry, we received $350 from the Firefly Children and Family Alliance, $150
- from Hopscotch Coffee, and $500 from Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, again, going to support our
- 10th annual summit coming up just in a couple of days. So we hope to see some of you there. And then
- we received $500 from a training
- our BTCC subcommittee did with the Bloomington Township Trustee to deliver a deescalation training to
- them. Awesome. Yes. All right. It's what we've been waiting for all year. We've been talking a lot about
- it. So are there any questions or comments on this item from council? Look into my screen and then look
- into my left.
- All right, then seeing none, if there is public comment on this item, you can come forward to the lectern
- here, and then at you, Hilbram, or raise your hand via Teams, you'll have up to three minutes. And seeing
- none, may we please have a roll call vote? Councilor Deckard? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Wilts?
- Yes. Councilor Hogg? Yes. Councilor Crossley? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. All right, thank you. Thank you.
- Next up, we don't have any presentations or discussions. We will move on to county council business.
- And looks like we have item A for the recorders updated or from the recorder's office black council.
- I moved to receive the recorder's amended sworn affidavit regarding the twenty twenty six records perpetual
- perpetuation budget. Second. All right. Michelle, what would you like to add to this?
- During budget sessions and shortly afterwards, the recorder submitted her sworn affidavit for
- her perpetuation fund. We just recently discovered it had a Scrivener's error. It had the wrong year.
- So she has updated that, initialed it, and we do have a copy of that in the office. Okay. Thank you.
- Pretty self-explanatory. But is there any questions or comments from council on this item? Yes.
- Yes, when I was in discussion with the recorder, and at that point she was thinking she was going to
- have to ask for an additional appropriation. So unless something's happened, maybe she's still going
- to and just not at this meeting. But what she was really addressing was, what is that noise? What she
- was really addressing
- was something that many of us have been talking about, which is travel and training issues. And so whatever's
- going on, it's echoing. So I think that we need to take a really hard look at the travel and training,
- how much it's increased different departments. I know we've had a lot of paperwork to look at,
- But that was pretty clear that we had some departments that were spending thousands of dollars more
- than they had in the past. And so we might want to take another look at that. For instance, with this
- elected officials training, just a few short years ago, the county council was not even included. And
- so those of us on the legislative group
- Went to the state and said we need to include the county council because it's important that we get
- the additional training Whatever it is that we need and so we got that but without some pushback at
- the state and so I think we need to be cautious because I'm understanding that from the recorder that
- we were putting some of the staff members on that elected official budget now, maybe that maybe that
- really was in the
- an appropriated fund and not in that elected official fund, but that's what I understood her to say.
- So I think we have to be real careful because we don't want them to remove the ability for the county
- council elected officials to use that. And we have to remember also that there are, there's a lot of
- additional training that's available online. There was just a really good one just last week put out by DLGF.
- that went into talking about the different changes in the property tax and what each of the things could
- mean. And so I hope everybody's looked at that and maybe that's what we have to be having the staff
- do is those things that's available with DLGF or with the online training with AIC instead of the very
- expensive overnight positions, overnight stays that's been happening.
- And we need to set the example for the other county departments because I think, unless the sky is going
- to open up and drop a bunch of money in our lap, we just, we really have to start looking under every
- rock for every penny. Just my thoughts. Thank you, Councilor Haug. Okay. Is there,
- Any other questions or comments from council related to this item? All right. And seeing none, if there's
- public comment, you can come forward to the lectern here, the night you hill room, or you can raise
- your hand via teams. It's also good to say all of these words without hearing my voice crack. Um, so
- yay for my voice coming back. All right.
- Um, but seeing none, maybe please have a roll call vote. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
- Yes. Yes. Yes. Motion passes unanimous. Great. Thank you for that.
- Next up is item B with the 2026 council schedules. Council, I moved open for discussion the proposed
- 2026 council meeting schedule. All right, Michelle, what would you like to add to this? Hold on, just
- hold on just a second. OK. So in the packet,
- there are three options to look at with regards to calendar. And so the first option, which is option
- number one, would be the typical council calendar. It shows the holidays. It shows pack meetings. There
- would need to be maybe
- a deviation with regards to the PAC meeting in May because we have an election on the 5th. And then
- without any deviations with regards to November or December, this is what the first option looks like.
- So then there was a, somebody had mentioned maybe taking a summer break
- So with that, I used the same calendar with no deviations with regards to November or December, where
- with the summer break, we would have a meeting in June, on June the 9th, and then council would not
- come back and meet again until July. This would accommodate for this past year, we had several
- council members out with regards to the summer break and traveling and this kind of thing. So there
- was just an option to maybe have a summer break. And then the final would be a, this would be a summer
- break with holiday meeting deviation. And so what I'm looking at here,
- would be if you start with in May, there is, what is it? It's Memorial Day is on the 25th, maybe possibly
- canceling the meeting after that, because people are still traveling with that. We would still have
- the break in June, as well as the July meetings. And then,
- With regards to budget sessions, the schedule that I have for budget sessions, which is in all three
- of them, are the same, except for this one where in October, where we're gonna be meeting a lot of meetings,
- we would just not have that last meeting in October. Then in November, we would have a meeting on the 10th
- And then tentatively, I can't say that, have a meeting scheduled for the 17th, as well as in December,
- we would meet on the 8th with a tentative meeting date on the 15th. And that's if you want to. And the
- reason is it seems like we're getting ready to right now, we're just having back-to-back meetings in
- November and December.
- If things aren't pressing, you could just do just once a month kind of thing. So these are just for
- you to look at. We also put in there, there's been a discussion with regards to Sophia Travis and moving
- those deadlines up so that we're not trying to do Sophia Travis as well as budgets during that same
- timeline of August, September, October.
- this has not gone to the Sophia Travis committee yet but these are the dates that we're going to present
- to them and those are highlighted in that teal blue. So that does move all of that up during the month
- of June and July when this would happen with Sophia Travis. That is when the departments are filling
- would be filling in their budget requests so that's a little bit of a
- I don't want to say downtime for the office because we are helping the departments, but it's not as
- time crunched with regards to getting the budget sessions and stuff together. So this is just, you know,
- whatever you guys want. I just kind of put three options out there. I would like to maybe have a possible
- recommendation from you guys. Next week, we've got departments trying to plan
- for their next year. And so if we can get these out to the departments, that way they can go ahead and
- get some departments that we also use the NatU Hill Room, we need to get those out to the other departments.
- These are just recommendations. If you have any other dates you want to see or a different scenario,
- just let me know.
- And I saw Councilor Fiddle had her hand up, so I'll go to Ms. Turner-King first, then I'll go to Councilor
- Fiddle and then Ms. or Councilor Hawke has her hand up too. And I just would add as a caveat in all
- of the options, the identified PAC meetings would be subject to how Council handles the PACPAS. Yes.
- Okay. Councilor Fiddle. So I was interested to know in each of the proposals you have here, how
- the total number of meetings compared to this year and previous years? Are we doing the same number
- of meetings? Okay, so I didn't add them up, so thank you. Yeah, I just basically used what we've done
- this year and I built upon it. The only thing that I did add was this year we had six budget sessions.
- Within those six budget sessions,
- because of everyone's time schedule and the way the departments felt and it just seemed like everything
- was very lengthy this year. I believe it's gonna be lengthy again next year. I added a seventh day to
- the schedule which would be September the 17th and I've used the budget sessions all across. The 17th
- would be strictly held for council discussion only. There will not be any department scheduled
- to have their budgets reviewed during that. They'll have to do that, those green dates that I've got
- there in September. Councilor Hawk. Yes, and I don't know whether it's at this time I should mention
- it, but I think we need to make it very clear that when there's going to be a discussion on whether
- or not we're going to do a bond,
- that that has come in much earlier, much earlier than what we did it this year. Because that dollar
- amount that was put on there for the bond, we had to vote on it before we'd even voted on the bond,
- or whether we even would have a bond. And remember, if we can get, and I'm not even saying for next
- year, but for whenever,
- We're not going to get that 1782, that approval or disapproval of our budget until the state sees that
- a bond has been sold. Well, if we don't get it started until then to even discuss it and vote on it
- then later and later, we're going to be maybe at the very end of this year or the beginning of next
- year before we'll even know if the state is approving our budgets.
- So I'm just saying we need to start, we need to, oh, did I hear that word requirement being used of
- us? For us that commissioners won't require something of us. And I think we need to require the people
- who are going to ask for a bond to begin much earlier, much earlier. So whether that needs to be on
- this document with a deadline for that or not, but that has,
- has to happen because we're gonna be standing here. We still don't know whether or not, you know, where
- we are on those budgets. Yeah, I wholeheartedly agree with that. And I saw some hands flying up. So
- Michelle and then Ms. Turner came. So I failed to mention that option one is our regular schedule that
- we've done in the past. Option two and three does eliminate a few days throughout the year. So
- Um, I wanted to make sure that you understood that. So option one is, is reasonably close to what we've
- done in the past. Thank you. And Mr. King, I don't know. This is the best time to make the remarks,
- but counselor hawks comment
- made me remember that at the last council meeting there was a discussion on establishing a timeline
- and procedure for future bonds and that discussion was tabled to this meeting but has it been inadvertently
- left off the agenda so we can address that at the end of the agenda as to whether you want to table
- it to the next meeting or what you'd like how you would like to proceed with that yeah because we definitely
- need to have a conversation of that and honestly we're missing people so i think
- I mean, that is a very good point because having it late in the game when we're already through budget
- season is it was challenging and frustrating to say the late or to say the least. And I think if we
- have those conversations ahead, I would think maybe June that would get our minds and our bearings right
- as we are gearing up towards
- budget but again since we're not all here and we have two missing council members that are present it
- might be a good idea for us to have that conversation on the 18th. Yes I see the auditor has her hand
- up. Sure just a note we are actually just waiting on that bond closing so we can get that information
- to the DLGF they have everything worked out except for that so that is the
- kind of what holds us up this time of year. But if I remember correctly, when speaking with Mr. Cockrell,
- I believe there are specific reasons for doing it late in the year, but I don't want to speak for him.
- So he'll have to explain that. Sure. And I think we also speaking of bonds and things to to kind of
- gear us up for thinking about budget. I thought it was discussed and maybe a couple of meetings ago
- where we could possibly have
- like an update throughout the year so that we know and understand what is happening so that when we
- do have that bond conversation ahead of budget, we have already in our brain like what has been done
- so we can think about that. I think Councilor Decker has his hand up so I'm gonna go to Councilor Decker
- and then I'll go back to Councilor Hoff. So my question was Michelle, you're wanting us to take a look
- at the calendars
- consider it hard and fast to come back and be ready to move on this next time? Yes, I would appreciate
- that. One thing I'll just say, there's always something wrong in a calendar the minute you get it. I
- thought the calendar for this year was pretty good, and then we start rolling it out. There's always
- something. But one thing is, given everything, everything we do is going to be more time intensive and
- more hard. I don't know how else to say it.
- and probably less rather than probably more rather than less and so I think it's adventurous to try
- new things with the calendar but the reality is then when you're not in here people are going to need
- you in here and it just is what it is. Councilor Hawke. I think maybe I should
- I was going to ask a question, but it's not really relative to the schedule. I mean, I just want somebody
- to put together what our tax rate is going to be, the realistic one, and not include the bond. And then
- we can put in that later. But if people are saying, what's going to happen with my taxes for next year,
- we don't even know what those rates are going to be.
- This is just real frustrating. I understand. I think I'm inclined maybe to like the second or the third
- one. I think agreed as some of us that have been on Sophia Travis plus this year budget purgatory sessions
- that we've had. It was a lot.
- And I think for council staff, auditor staff, and Ms. Turner-King as well, that was a lot to pack in
- in eight weeks.
- So I think we need to give ourselves a break. Ideally, what I would have liked to have done was after
- we passed our budget this past year to cancel the October 28th meeting, but then that turned into a
- session where we needed it and turned into our marathon meeting. So that was fun. But also, to say the least,
- And with that being said, and thinking of what Councilor Deckard said, we've added meetings this past
- year. I think of the pre-meeting that we had on the 8th of October, right before we had our final budget
- discussions and approval. So there's probably likelihood of us maybe adding it. But also the other key
- part is to give ourselves a break
- June and July and most importantly, I'm not I'm thinking a council like the council County Council But
- I'm also thinking about staff and department heads who don't feel obligated to make sure that they come
- here I think there's a work-life balance that I'd like to Hopefully think that we have and county government
- At least try to work towards that. So I would really like to see how we could kind of
- have that as an option. Our colleagues in the city love themselves some breaks too. So they have that.
- And I think that actually helps. You come back and you're refreshed and you're ready to go. So again,
- nothing is final. This is a presentation and we'll hear it again next Tuesday, Tuesday, Tuesday, November.
- Also, I wanted to let you know that David, Councilor Henry is online again. Oh, so I know he was saying.
- He wasn't sure. Okay. Hello. Alrighty. So we have Councilor Henry and Councilor Hawk via Teams,
- the duo. Okay. All right. So next up, so we'll think about all of this and then we'll bring it back
- to the table here next Tuesday. All right. Next up is what we were trying to get into earlier this evening, but
- what's really on our agenda. So let's go to item C. Council, I moved to open a discussion regarding
- outlining the next steps for the Justice Center. OK, OK. And I see that we have Commissioner Madeira
- that's in the room. So if you want to go ahead and come up to the table here and I see we have Commissioner
- Thomas joining us.
- as well so we can have the discussion, because I think what I'd like to do is to have those questions
- that were highlighted to us at the beginning to kind of look at as well. And I'm sure that we all kind
- of wanted to make comment at our marathon meeting, but we were so overworked and tired that we all went
- home here after that. I guess,
- You know, I'll open it up, and then we'll kind of have the conversation. And we talked about this. I
- was able to be a part of the noon edition on last Friday with Commissioner Thomas and former council
- member Eric Spomore, who is now the greater chamber, or now with the Greater Bloomington Chamber of
- Commerce. And so it was a rather robust conversation. So if folks want to go back and listen to it, you can.
- I guess the only thing that I would like to add to all of this is I appreciate the commissioners coming
- back and taking me up on my offer. Even, you know, not getting a response back from, you know,
- until here. We're here now. And as I mentioned, I completely understand that we we are folks can be
- disappointed.
- that that's that's the thing but to stay in disappointment as a disservice to what we have to do here
- and we we now need to put differences and disappointments aside and go now we got to come back to the
- drawn board because at the end of the day we still have folks that are in the justice building that
- are there we got to come up with the plan we have all things that we now have to consider so I want us to
- to do that. The other thing that I really want to highlight is I feel like my colleagues, all seven
- of us, we all have many different beliefs, but I think it was pretty clear and unanimous last two weeks
- ago, our reasons for the vote that we took. But again, we don't have to go back into the past. We're
- now trying to move into the present and the future here.
- So I pledge to my colleagues on the Commissioner's side
- If we truly really want to have collaboration and we really want to have, we can share the court, we
- can dribble, shoot, you know, throw passes like Mendoza and Cooper did on Saturday. And boy,
- was that a team. And I can only imagine what that would look like if we had that same mindset mentality
- in county government. So I would really hope that, um,
- we really say and what we mean when we talk about collaboration, because I will tell you, at times during
- this entire justice conversation, I do not feel like council has been respected. I do not feel like
- our voices have been heard. I do not feel like the collaboration effort has been a part of this process.
- So there's, you know, just as you all feel disappointment, there has been disappointment on our end, but yet
- continue to persist and we still keep trying to move forward. So I just wanted to say that.
- The other thing that I want to highlight, because I'm not certain if we have any folks from the city
- watching via Teams or watching this on cats right now or watch it back later, but what I would like
- to say, because it's been all in news media and different things like that, what I would like to say
- is this is the time for any city council colleague, any nine of you,
- who are watching or paying attention or will watch later or will hear from this meeting. This is your
- time now where you've told us that your reasons why you don't want to have, or why you didn't wanna
- have North Park. But there really wasn't honestly any solutions or suggestions that came with that.
- So I'm gonna ask my city council colleagues
- help us out in this particular timeframe. I know there were emails that were going back and forth of
- how they think they could contribute, but I think we can take it a little bit further and figure that
- out. And I appreciate those colleagues that gave that response, but to some of you who have not, I'm
- still waiting. So let's get it started. Let's keep moving forward because we got work to do and the
- clock is ticking and overtime is in full swing.
- So, with that being said, I've said what I needed to say.
- kick it back to my council colleagues, and then I really wanna talk about really next steps. What are
- the next steps that we can do together? I don't wanna hear one side of this or that. I wanna talk about
- what we can do together in this conversation. So I see Councilor Henry and Hawk have their hands up,
- and Councilor Henry had his hand up first. So I'll go to Councilor Henry, Hawk, and then I'll kick it
- back to here in the NatU Hill room.
- Thank you, Madam President. Can you hear me in the room okay? Yes. All right, it's a little delayed
- at my end, so I'll just try to be brief. Thank you for getting me back in. I am between classes right
- now. So I wanna agree with you that we maybe need to set aside the maybe autopsy as to how we got to
- this point, but to accept that we're at this point. I think that one thing, rather than maybe working
- through a question set,
- which is a reasonable idea, is to maybe take an approach where council passes a resolution about what
- its risk tolerance is for funding a future jail and or justice center. I also think that the budget
- is now driving this project. And I think as I was saying earlier,
- I think we need to get to a point where we all have a same understanding of the conditions. It's clear
- that we don't. Yeah, and I can appreciate why that might be. I mean, if you took a vote and felt you
- had your marching orders to move forward and you didn't want to acknowledge, you know, the changes in
- tax code, the consequences of an election, all that stuff.
- And then you lifted your head up and realized that, you know, that things were changing. I could see
- us getting there, but the budget now drives the project. And the truth is, you know, this body has decided
- that we don't have that risk tolerance for a budget that we are going to try to figure out how to fund
- the rest of county government for 20 years on. That's really important. So I think something about,
- you know, a setting of what we think we can manage and then having the budget drive the project is really
- where we need to start.
- So I don't really accept the idea that we will go down a path and ask these questions and talk to the
- stakeholders internally and end up exactly where we are because that is, to borrow a term from the city
- council, deterministic, right? It's setting the, expecting that we're going to arrive at the same outcome.
- And I just don't think that's the case. So what I think we need to do is figure out how the budget works,
- what we can afford.
- And then we need to have serious conversations about what is nice to have relative to what other communities
- do in Indiana. Co-location is not something every county in Indiana does.
- law enforcement has worked out ways to do transport of inmates from a facility to another facility in
- multiple counties in Indiana. And while it may be a state of the art practice or something that would
- be nice to have if we had unlimited resource, we don't. And also to say that we can't manage the risk
- management of that without that, I think it's just not accurate. It's the end of the day. So I think
- another thing this ordinance or this resolution should do is we need to get to common terms about
- what we all agree is actually happening or not happening. It has been suggested in the media that this
- is unconstitutional as is. I don't think that's the case. I think we've kept the jail constitutional
- within the agreement of the ACLU. I don't think we're agreeing on the terms. So if we can agree on common
- terms, common grounds, common understanding, common risk tolerance and budget, that will frame what this next
- step looks like. But let's be honest, co-location is what doubled the cost of the project. We know this
- and needs to be addressed and needs to be explained to staff that maybe this is a thing we're going
- to have to move away from if people want to be in new facilities. I'll just leave it there as a starting
- block and understanding how they're going to talk. Thanks. All right. Thank you. Councilor Hawke. You're
- muted, Councilor Hawke.
- Okay, I just have a question and perhaps no one wants to discuss it. At this point, some of these things,
- people are just sort of working behind the scenes. But from what I gathered, we have several people
- in the community that are coming forth with what if situation. And so I would like to suggest that when
- people make a suggestion of,
- a location or a different way of operating or whatever, that we keep that list and we don't just keep
- it within a few people, but that we share it with all of the council members. I don't like it at all
- when I hear, oh, we'll just send this to the leadership group. I mean, I think we all feel like we're
- leaders, you know? But there's gonna be a lot of different suggestions coming forward. And I think that
- people are,
- really engaged in toward making sure that we don't take forever to make a decision. And that's what
- it's going to take if you start going back into these committee meetings with every different department,
- we're going to be right back where we were because as you know, Jennifer, you sat on those meetings
- as well, so did Kate, went on and on and on. At every meeting we had, a different department was coming
- up with their wish list. And before they got through this wish list,
- sunk the whole project. So I think we have to look, I agree with Councilmember Henry, we need to look
- at what it is we're required to do. And of course this agreement with the ATLU doesn't require us to
- build a new jail at all.
- I don't know why everybody keeps saying it does. Do they think we don't know how to read or what? But
- it doesn't say we have to build a new jail. But that doesn't mean that we shouldn't be thinking about
- what we can do to make that jail better in the meantime, because no matter what we find, we're not gonna
- be moving there tomorrow. And because of changes at the state level,
- If some of these suggestions go through and makes it law at the state level, we're going to be required
- to have more. I mean, the result will be that we'll need more beds, not less. So those are things that
- I hope we'll look at. The other thing I wanted to share was that we had a member of the community come
- forward and say, how was it all this money got spent when we were not on board? I want to remind you that
- the purchase price of the property at North Park was something like 11, 350 or 11, 750, something like
- that. And we had a bond for that, bond anticipation note, and that had already been approved. And that's
- where all those dollars were getting spent down, and we didn't even see the appropriations going through
- because we'd given them a blanket check. So,
- And then when they came back and asked for $3 million and something, that was because they'd already
- spent $3 million and something out of the purchase price of the property. So that, I just wanted to
- share that as well. So, okay, enough of me. Sorry. Thank you. And to clarify, Councilor Huck, you said
- keep a list of locations. You're talking about locations that people are suggesting to the county.
- Oh, you're muted again. So you can't hear my dog bark. Just four answers. If there's people who are
- making suggestions and moving forward, and I understand some of this really should not be out there
- in the public if we don't, you know, we're talking about people's private property. And so we have to
- be respectful of that. But at least we need to make sure that the public knows that we're not just sitting
- around doing nothing.
- because I think there's a lot of people who are doing a lot of work behind the scenes that is not like,
- we're not going to throw people under the bus if they have a property they're thinking in mind because
- that can affect the personal property values. So, okay, that's where I was. Okay, thank you. All right,
- look down to my left here to see if anybody here had any,
- other additions for things that we heard and are impromptu department update and the discussion that
- we're having right now. Yes, Councillor Decker. I will jump in and just say we did have city officials
- or a city official on behalf of the council come in and and offer some comments and committed the city
- council at least.
- to telling us some of their preferences. And I made a comment at the end of that, that I'd like for
- that to be a public thing on properties and or conditions. If that is on a city position, I'd like that
- to be a public thing because one of the biggest issues we face in this community is NIMBYism. And I'm
- gonna say that and I'm gonna own that. And when you have a jail, you have NIMBY on steroids.
- And there's always a reason not to have something near you. Right. And sometimes we have very plain
- spoken people that are like I don't want that near me because blank and then other people come up with
- very sophisticated arguments. And this community is notorious for those sophisticated arguments. And
- we do that about housing and the way you build your porch let alone a jail. So for city officials who
- represent districts and have constituencies of
- I don't know, Dave Askins will know, but like 6,000 or some odd here or there, depending on what's going
- on, I would be curious what areas they envision, because we heard a lot of arguments about downtown
- Bloomington, keeping downtown Bloomington rich and all that. So I would just say, if everybody's putting
- their stuff on the table, where are you talking about? And be specific, and more importantly, we cannot
- say transparency just at election time, say that publicly.
- The other thing I would say is, I don't know. I keep coming back to the question, I don't know. And
- I've had a few silent people, people that don't get up at the public mic and were for us moving forward
- last week. I've had a few silent people reach out to me and get a little bit upset because they say
- the following, I'm gonna try to sum it up. Everybody knows you guys have to do something and you've
- been talking about this for years and they get mad.
- But when it gets to the particulars, that seems to be where everybody falls off. The one particular
- that seems to be just choking me, I'm going to be very honest about this, is I don't know what we are
- legally permitted to do with bonding, with building, with that tax that we enacted last year. We worked
- on that gangbusters.
- And I get a little frustrated because I was in that chair to my right and now a year has passed and
- it's our fault, I guess, that we're not moving forward. We passed that a year ago and I never have received
- an answer why at that time when momentum was going something changed. And I'm sure the public's like,
- well, we're glad that you didn't do that then. But my point is momentum seems to be hot
- and cool around here depending on time and month of ask. And so I don't know what we can do. And I'm
- not confident that I know why anyone up in Indianapolis knows about what we can do. And I know different
- ones of us have different faith in them depending on the year and the partisan control. But friends,
- I don't think they know literally when they are in for the next session what they will do. And I can't
- find a legislator that will stay still from this local area and talk about this issue. They want to
- talk about redistricting, that's fine. They want to talk about other things, but they don't want to
- talk about this one. And that tells me that there's not a lot of hot people beating the snare drum for the jail.
- This is the unmentionable, unforgettable, or forgettable. This thing has all those components because,
- again, it goes back to what I kind of said at the end. Other than the folks that are in there and their
- families and some of the other comments we've heard, who says this needs to be this way or better? And
- so I am interested. I mean that sincerely. I want to know what Ken Falk thinks.
- about when he walks through what he observes. I remember the old 2008, 2009 articles. What do you see
- now? Right? This is not 2008, 2009. Those sheriffs, those systems, it's just, it's different.
- Or maybe it's, I don't know. You tell me, Ken Falk, because this is a lot about that. But then I will
- just say the bottom line is every time, and I said this to Kate Wiltz next to me during the meeting,
- I was like, my gosh, there's,
- you can't resurrect the dead. That, two weeks ago, had hit a point where it's just, it's like you're
- trying to get Jell-O to build something that you could drive home tonight, and friends, it wasn't happening.
- And so for this to get to that point, some of these things have gotta be a little bit more solid than
- not, and maybe it is, like Councilor Henry's saying, maybe it is a resolution that starts getting around
- particulars, but it is gonna take a resolution
- that understands the needs within the system, to me, accurately talks about the word treatment. I think
- sometimes people who are elected officials talk about the word treatment and they have something in
- their head and then there's actual practices going on that they don't know anything about or they don't
- know as much. I think that's gotta be accurate. I think the details have to be a little bit more refined
- and I just feel like the I don't know is getting bigger.
- And my personal opinion is it is hard to keep hammering a train down a line when you don't know what
- the cargo is doing or what you're doing or where you're going or really if it's gonna be safe when you
- get there. And that's kind of this system. I'm not saying this doesn't need to be done. I actually believe
- firmly, overwhelmingly that it does, but the particulars are just choking it. So anyway, I've said too
- much, but those are just some of my thoughts. Thank you. Anybody else?
- I will speak. I don't have a whole lot to say right now because I feel like we were pretty clear when
- we talked about our votes whenever that was, a couple weeks ago. Seems like four months ago at this point.
- I actually don't mind being given the questions that were on the presentation. I think they're good
- ways to focus conversation and thinking. I think that they are conversational in that maybe we should
- really talk about that and find out where are our differences on some of these things as we move forward.
- I honestly don't think we're probably all that different. I can tell you,
- that I don't mind compromising what I think on any one of these questions necessarily, but it's when
- on top of compromising for four out of five, and I'm just throwing that out there, I haven't seen these
- long enough to know, but compromising a good chunk of them and not knowing how we're gonna pay for this
- and whether or not paying for it might even, I mean,
- It's scary. It's scary. So it's just, it was too much. And I get that that may not sound like a really,
- this is why I feel we can't do it. Yeah, there are multiple reasons. There are multiple things. It was,
- I felt like I'd made compromises. I felt like I'd been like, all right, okay, well, this is our best
- option. And then nothing happened except that, you know,
- We occasionally, twice in a year, got an update on what was happening. And then all of a sudden, we're
- being asked to approve something after just having demonstrated, I think, pretty clearly that we do
- not have an extra penny anywhere. So yeah, I don't have a whole lot of faith in the current project.
- at its current expansive level. I'm not unwilling to discuss it. I'm very interested in having conversations.
- So as frustrated as I might sound, I really am interested in sticking around and hammering it out. So
- hammering out is what I've been doing for a long, long time.
- I look forward to hammering it out of whatever we're going to call the process. I think getting together
- as many times as we can in earnest to talk about possible solutions that are feasible both financially,
- as well as meeting the goals of the people in the prisons who are unfortunately there, as well as people
- who staff the prisons, as well as the community who supports the prisons.
- So I think there are a lot of different components to this whole thing as always. But I'm more than
- willing to get down to business and meet and discuss anything, any time, as long as we're making progress.
- I think it's important to have a good understanding that just to meet is not good enough. We need to
- have goals at those meetings.
- maybe we're going to discuss one or two items. That's okay. It doesn't have to be all done in one session.
- But we need to have meetings that will produce results. I'm interested in results. And what is the impact
- going to be on everyone that's involved, right? So I'm looking forward to getting down to business,
- making decisions, and
- ultimately, hopefully, being able to have money to work with, because I don't think there's any guarantee
- at this point from what I see from the State House. I mean, there's talk of maybe it being discussed.
- Well, maybe discussed doesn't write the check, right? Where's the money to have that maybe discussion
- fund from going to come from? So I think without the proper funding, it's going to be really difficult,
- but I want to hear
- all the options about how to make it work going forward. And I think to kind of wrap that up to what
- I am writing down all the council members as everybody has been talking, just kind of going through
- and jotting down what's really important. And I really like the idea of a resolution. I think honestly,
- that might be the start.
- for us to say, again, as it's been mentioned so many times, is the ball is now in our court. I'm gonna
- stay in my lane now and figure out how to make that work and let's go. So maybe that is the discussion
- by way of resolution where we outline what we can and cannot afford, what it looks like to co-locate
- and cost and whatnot. And maybe that's the opportunity for us to start there.
- I think if we set the bar for what we need to do with that respect, then we can really start having
- the other components and conversations to be put into play. Because again, as I mentioned before, we
- can't afford it. And I know folks went to go, you know, talk to folks at the State House to figure out,
- you know, what's happening, what's going on. And we still haven't heard
- anything about their willingness. I know they're not in session right now, so it would be interested
- to see. But again, in interest of time, since we keep talking about deadlines and things like that,
- let's figure out a resolution. And let's maybe put that forward and continue to go. So yes, I saw Councilor
- Hawk had her hand put up. OK.
- I just want to remind us that even if the state said, yes, we'll let you double the amount of bond that
- you were going to have or whatever the dollar amount is, that does not mean we should because it will
- get paid out of that 1.2 income tax that we will be receiving if we even take it to the 1.2.
- And remember, that's where the economic development tax is going to be part of the 1.2. The jail tax
- will be part of that. Public safety is going to be part of that. And we've got to pay for all that stuff
- out of the 1.2. And so just because the state would say we're going to allow you to do more, would we
- really do it? Because if we use up all that 1.2 for that, then that's also to operate the rest of the
- county government.
- The other numbers that we're working at, the 0.4 for fire and EMS and the 0.2 for other governmental
- units, we can't even take it to 1.2 if the city takes theirs to 1.2 because that's going to get you
- up to three and all we can do is 2.9. And so I think we have got to look at the big picture
- I know I'm getting tired of me saying that, but we really have to, because if we say we're gonna use
- all this for this, then what are we gonna say when the fire department say that we need help? What are
- you gonna do when the town, well, when Bloomington Transportation or the library wants something, or
- the townships want something? That's under the point two, and we may only be able to do point one. So
- we cannot just look at
- just the jail because we've got to do a lot of other things. Okay, so I know we have the commissioners,
- we have Commissioner Madeira that's joining us here in person and Commissioner Thomas that's joining
- us virtually. Is there anything that you would like to add that hasn't been already discussed?
- Yes, actually. So, Councillor Henry mentioned that rather than work through questions, he recommended,
- you know, look at the risk tolerance, perhaps arrive at a dollar figure. And I think if we just get
- a dollar amount, we don't get insight into your values and your priorities, and that's really important.
- Those are points arrived at working through the questions, and I think we, I agree, we all need to agree
- on what's actually happening.
- you know, as the constitutionality. And what we're asking for is a conversation. I don't think we're
- calling anyone to account. Certainly, this is a power play. It's actually asking for something genuine,
- for a dialogue. And so I think that a dollar figure is not what we want here. We want something much
- more genuine.
- councilor hawk had this excellent remark if we have people coming forward with property we keep a list
- we do have a lot of people coming forward and leading and I agree I also think it would be a great idea
- to involve people more you know if we can
- to convene a public committee of leaders to weigh in on these matters if we can do so in an expeditious
- fashion. I think it's really important for the public to feel included and heard and to know that their
- views matter. And I also think it's important for them to appreciate the weight of these decisions and
- how burdensome and weighty and important they are for government. And sometimes it's really easy for
- people to come in and talk in front of a public microphone for three minutes. But when they are forced
- to look at these documents, and all of them are available on our website,
- They really appreciate these documents and perhaps the weight of this information in a new way. So I
- think public participation may have a very important role to play here as well. I am also scared about
- building an unaffordable facility. I also fear building a facility that will be inadequate for the next
- 50 years. I'm really scared, like you, about not meeting the needs of inmates and prison personnel and
- Justice Department staff.
- And one more thing, I do disagree strongly with the idea that we don't have to build a new jail. And
- with the fact that that's not mentioned in the settlement agreement, while that may be technically true,
- if you look at the four corners of the settlement agreement, that
- doesn't matter one whit, I think. So we have an envelope of documents. And it's that envelope of documents
- that that understanding is built on. It's not just the settlement agreement. We have to look beyond
- that. It's the studies that have been done. It's the committee meetings that have been held. It's the
- community surveys, including the CJRC surveys. It's the councils and the commissioners' actions that
- have been taken. And we've been moving forward as a community with one goal, which has been building
- a new jail and envisioning this new facility and this justice complex. So we can't suddenly say,
- years in that this is not the case and reverse course. This material is on our website. It's publicly
- available to every member of this community. And we invite you to review that if you think it's just
- the settlement agreement. So that is not just true. We cannot just look at the four corners of the settlement
- agreement and call it a day and say we cannot build a jail. We do not have to build a jail because it's
- not mentioned in that document. That is a simplistic and false notion. Thank you very much.
- The only thing I want to challenge you, Commissioner Madeira, on, and I'm kind of going back and looking
- at my caption here, and seeing what was said. It says, and I heard it, so I want to make sure. This
- is picking up what I'm hearing you say. It says, like you just said, we're actually asking for something
- genuine for a dialogue. So a dollar figure is not what we want here. We want something more genuine. Yes.
- I think two things could be true at the same time, but you're also asking the fiscal body. That's what
- we got sworn in and took the oath to do. That's literally a part of our job. So if we can't afford it
- and we don't have all the numbers into play, then what are we saying? So I just want to challenge and
- push back just a little bit because
- We do want that conversation, because if we don't have that conversation, then we're back at square
- one. So we want to make sure that we know that's what we're asking of. So I just wanted to kind of push
- back on that.
- I think we're on the same page. We just don't want a dollar figure without the conversation is what
- I was saying. Because there's always values and value judgments that are behind the dollars. And I think
- we want to be absolutely clear that we're on the same page instead of just getting a figure. For example,
- if you say we have $100 million to spend.
- I think we would want guidance from you on how to spend that 100 million. And without that guidance,
- we just can't move forward. Yeah. But I think that also can come through a way of resolution to absolutely
- is that we set the bar there. So yes. OK, I see Commissioner Thomas has her hand up. Yes, thank you
- so much. Appreciate having this discussion. I just want to say that
- Your consultant believed that you were without Senate Bill 1. Take that off the table for a moment.
- I know it's a reality. I'm not ignoring it. According to Mr. Garitas, things were aligned to proceed
- with the project as it was before the legislature met in 2025 and changed the parameters.
- So I'm not sure, I don't know what the answer is there, but certainly yes, the budget is key. But what
- we heard was for reasons to say no to the project was more than money. And that's why we're asking these
- questions. Because you are in charge of the money, clearly that is your job, that is a difficult,
- darn difficult task, especially in current present situation. But y'all were offering opinions on other
- parts of the project, and that's why we're asking these questions. And yes, so this is part of that
- conversation that needs to happen. And yes, money matters. Yes, you're going to have to make that decision.
- But if the parameters you set will help us look at
- what budget we're going to need as well, right? So we can have that conversation. But if it's not co-located,
- if it's not one floor, if it's not whatever, that's gonna change the budget too. So there's budgetary
- concerns obviously from the council side, but then there's what can you build for that much money?
- And I mean, if you wanna look at what happens when we insist on having
- the justice building downtown and we insist on having multiple floors, which at the time was normal.
- It wasn't that unheard of, but they don't do that anymore for a reason. You can look at our current
- justice building and all of its pimples and warts. It was good while it lasted, but it is not a building
- that can be remodeled or expanded. Those two things are
- just literally killing us. So thank you again. We look forward to the future conversations. All right.
- So yes, Commissioner Medeira. Can I add one more thing? There's two matters that I referenced before
- in the commissioner's meeting that I think also bear upon matters. There are two
- statewide measures that I think the public does not know about and council members might not know about
- that do bear upon
- the size of the jail, the jail in general. There's a proposed criminal rule that is open for comment
- right now. It closes, actually just closed, where the court proposed cutting the continuance period
- from 90 to 70 days and allowing judges to keep level one through three felonies and murder defendants
- jailed during continuances. So this basically means for serious charges, there will be more jailed bed
- days, even with a shorter continuance clock. In addition, there is a constitution
- So in 2023, the General Assembly passed a constitutional amendment to let judges deny bail to people
- deemed a substantial risk to the public, but they don't define what that is, which can create major
- due process issues. So to take effect, it must pass the General Assembly again this year in 2025-2026
- with the same language, and then will win voter approval probably on the November 2026 ballot.
- expected to win voter approval. It is not yet certified for the ballot, but if this passes, we will
- also have more pretrial detention, so we will have a higher average daily population. So these are two
- things I also am very afraid of when I think of this jail building and makes it hard for me to sleep
- at night again because due process concerns, etc. So I just wanted to share that as well. Thank you.
- Thank you. All right.
- So is there anything else that we need to discuss? I think we talked about this at great length now.
- I'm glad, again, that we were able to talk about next steps, because I know it was mentioned
- in commissioners' meeting that they hadn't heard from us, and we were trying to sleep after our marathon
- meeting. But after that being said, I did reach out, and I'm glad you all took us up on that offer.
- Now we understand the assignment and so I think this is something that is a work in progress and will
- continue to work on. And I just hope that our council, my council colleagues, all of us will consider
- what we need to do in next steps. Maybe that means we have a separate special meeting where we actually
- just focus primarily on this. I don't think that we could possibly have a conversation of a meeting
- like during a regular session of our meeting to have this. I think this is definitely something that
- is special and obviously
- of the time is of the essence so you know to talk about things such as resolutions such as setting a
- budget and saying what that looks like and what we can and cannot afford because that's you know what
- the fiscal body does so if there are no other further questions or comments from council and commissioners
- I will ponder on this, but not for too long, because I know we all got some things to think about. So
- all right. I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Thomas. All right. Next up, as we proceed
- and wind down our agenda here, we got item D. Council, I moved to approve resolution twenty twenty five.
- Approving the interlocal cooperation between the city of Bloomington and Monroe County regarding the
- 2024 Edward Bryan Memorial Justice Assistance Grant. All right, Ms. Turner King, what would you like
- to add? So I'm displaying the resolution. This is a resolution that approves an interlocal agreement
- for the JAG grant. This is a grant that we receive annually. Well, the city receives it and it is shared
- between the city and the county. The interlocal provides that the county receives 7% of the JAG funds
- made available through the Department of Justice, and that is based on violent crime statistics. And
- so this would mean that the county would be receiving in total
- $3,093 of the available funding and that the funds would be committed to the purchase of Taser cartridges.
- Council, what questions or comments might you have related to this item? Councilor Wilts? What's the history?
- of this? Is this like every year we've done this in perpetuity forever? I can say we've done it every
- year that I've been here. Beyond that, I'm not sure, but I don't think it's a new thing. And so the
- city gets the 93% and we get the seven or are there other jurisdictions?
- This is just city and county. Do we always use it for similar items? So the grant itself, we have not
- always used it for this items. It's always been a law enforcement purchase. Last year, I think we bought
- stop strips. It's always something that we work with the Sheriff's Office to identify why it's
- what it's going to be spent on. The federal code outlines what this could be used on, and I'm trying
- to find it on the fly here, but it's primarily for law enforcement purposes.
- Do we always indicate in the agreement what the purchase is? The agreement does outline the purchase,
- but there is the option and we have in the past used it so that if the sheriff's office identifies a
- different need, there's a process to amend the request for what it is to be purchased. But this is a
- reimbursable grant, so any amendment there to the grant must be amended prior to the purchase or expenditure
- of the funds.
- Since I'm new, I'll ask who Edward Byrne was. Who was he? Do we know? I know. He was a 22-year-old New
- York City Police Department patrolman who was murdered in the line of duty in 1988 while sitting in
- his car. He was shot five times in the head and died at the age of 22. Thank you.
- And that is in part why it goes, it's based on violent crime statistics because Officer Burns' death
- was committed by a violent drug gang in New York City. All right. Are there any other questions or comments
- on this item?
- Seeing none. If there is public comment on this item, you can come forward to the lectern here and then
- at your room or you can raise your hand via teams. And see. And prior to the vote, I do want to procedurally
- add what happens with the interlocal next. So this is on the commissioner's agenda for approval on the
- 13th because both bodies approve an interlocal.
- Typically city council would also approve the interlocal, but I've been advised by city legal that they're
- going to be sending the interlocal to the attorney general for approval, which is an option that the
- statute allows for. I don't have reasoning behind that statement. I just know that's procedurally what
- is going to happen. I don't know why the city decided that course of action.
- on the business that pays me, which is council. So, okay, so I'll let it go. Okay, thank you. Well,
- thank you for that tidbit of information. And now we will go to a roll call vote, please. Councilor
- Hawk? Yes. Councilor Crossley? Yes. Councilor Deckard? Yes.
- Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Wills? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. Great. Thank you for that. We were
- efficient in our meeting and we have now come to the time that we have missed because of marathon meetings
- where we welcome all colored discussions.
- as Councilor Feido gives us. So we are now at the Council Liaison and Comment part. And I'm going to,
- I would again look to my right, but Councilor Hawke isn't here, so I'm gonna look to my screen to see
- if she has anything to add. And you're muted. Yes, I very much want us to have a breakdown.
- I don't know who's gonna do it, whether it would, whatever, but we need to find out exactly where, how
- much we think the 1.2 is going to be. Break it all down, put dollar figures with it and recognize then
- where we are because we're already spending down a part of that because we spent it down out of the
- economic development and out of the jail tax. And I heard Council Member Deckard
- question, will we put that tax in place and we aren't doing anything with it? Well, remember that we
- are doing something with it. We have personnel in there. We have the medical contract in there, because
- it is not just to build a jail, but it's also for operations. And so we moved
- some of the jail operation costs into there. So it is being used, it just isn't being used to build
- another jail. But if we build another jail and we need more staff, we're gonna have to cover it out
- of this jail tax. This is not just like money that's gonna be sitting around, we don't know what to
- do with. But thank you. Appreciate that, thank you, Council Hawke.
- All right, I'm gonna look down to Councilor Feidl, because she already has her pad and pen ready. But
- I'm astonished, because I don't see any more, Caleb. I know, can you believe it? I know. I've just been
- so wrapped up in so many different meetings and projects, and I think we've been discussing many of
- them at the last several meetings now. And so I don't know that I have much else to add at this point.
- So I think a lot of our work has been done here that I've been involved in. So that's enough. All right.
- Yeah, I just have one comment or at least one topic regarding like regarding our schedule. We looked
- at kind of the meeting schedule for next year and some options there and some of the options I think
- rightfully consider maybe
- providing for what Councillor Crossley was referring to as work-life balance, giving us a little bit
- of a break, maybe knowing that sometimes of year we have to dig in and be the best friends that we all
- are for days and days in a row. Having been on council now for a few years, it's hard to get the business
- done in the amount of time we have.
- My knee jerk reaction is to be very hesitant to cut out meetings. Although I cannot take that. I do
- think that work-life balance is important. And I think one thing that we should consider as we plan
- for next year and even into the end of this year is committee work.
- whether it's official, unofficial, that kind of thing, but delegating to each other. I think I've said
- this before, but I personally think that having no PAC meetings at all this year was a bit of a mistake,
- just because there's plenty of work around personnel issues that we could be doing. And it's not that
- we can't do it without PAC, but we're not likely to.
- So I've been accused of being really into meetings. I do like a good meeting. But I just want to throw
- it out there that it might be worthwhile to really consider targeted approaches to getting some of these
- things done. I worry when we talk about the next steps with the jail that it might languish.
- if we're not really and I'm not questioning your leadership on it at all. Councillor Crossley I appreciate
- everything you're doing to get us moving forward. But you know these are the things that are in my head
- right now is like you know we've got these things that we need to work on things we need to move forward
- on and maybe it's you know carve out little pieces for subsets and bring it back to the whole at these
- at these bigger meetings. That's that's what's in my head.
- So to clarify, would you think like, are you thinking maybe more council committees to break up some
- of the work to maybe kind of break up the time spent in here and doing that and then bringing it back?
- Is that what I'm hearing? I think our time here could be better spent if we were forced to
- have some of us have some homework and bring it back. That's all. Oh, I don't do homework. That's not
- assigned to me typically. So I'm just saying if you want me to work on things. Well, tell me what it
- is. Give me a due date. I can do that. Yeah, that's it. I appreciate that. Thanks, Counselor Wiltz.
- Counselor Decker. Thank you very much, President Crossley. I will say that
- for the entire community, and this is a large statement. I think, and this, you could extend this beyond
- local government into state and federal too, if anyone were listening. I think life will be much easier
- if politicians do what politicians used to do best, and that was talk amongst each other. Having just
- the thing or the idea or what have you.
- just doesn't get it done. And so it's for hard things ahead. People are going to have to talk whether
- or not they like it or not. So one thing I wanted to say in my report, in addition to the wonderful
- tribute to Charlotte that went earlier in the meeting, I also want to mention another community lion
- and legend that was celebrated on Saturday was Pat Williams. Long time.
- Bloomington City clerk and Democratic Party chair for years did did those things.
- four years in a way that makes you sometimes question what was her secret to getting those done. And
- these legends, it seems that we're losing a lot of them, and I hope not their lessons. And there was
- a beautiful tributes to both in the last week. It's a lot for the community. So we certainly think about
- that. I do want to say I woke up this morning to more snow. I drove home in a little bit of snow coming
- from Anderson yesterday. And when I see that snow a little bit early,
- November 10th November 9th and 10th I always think of our highway workers and just gratitude to them
- and the emergency responders that have to work without ceasing around those situations thanks to them
- and of course Lisa Ridge and the whole team that makes that happen. I do want to say on the eve of Veterans
- Day thanks to all of our
- of the Monroe County veterans, which number in tremendous amounts. I do want to say for Veterans Day
- itself, it's important for veterans in the community. If you believe that you're in need of assistance
- in any way, we have a dynamic team just over in the Curry Building at 214 West 7th Street. We've got
- Steve Miller over there, our veteran service officer. We have
- is loyal assistant veterans service officer Andrew Blake those two go above and beyond as they did for
- this country they go above and beyond in assisting veterans and I routinely receive updates from them
- as liaison about
- what they can tell me about who they're helping, what they're doing. They are literally out where veterans
- are, whether that be a veteran sitting in their office enjoying the fine coffee that they share, or
- it's a veteran that is literally sitting out in the street in weather like this. They work with everybody.
- So if they could be of assistance to you or a veteran in your family, just ask, just ask. Sometimes
- the VA is cumbersome,
- Navigating that can be hard. Reach out to them. Search for Monroe County Veterans Affairs Office. Go
- down and see him. Call 812-349-2537. We are grateful to all those veterans. Thank you.
- Thank you. Yeah. And so tomorrow we are are off and county offices are closed because tomorrow is Veterans
- Day. So I just want to thank all the
- those that have served and continue to serve our country. I think of the veterans in my life who are
- no longer here, especially my dad, who is a Vietnam vet who was a Marine and almost lost his life fighting
- for this country. So I just really take my hat off and much gratitude and appreciation because of you
- we are. So I want to say that. And I'm looking forward to attending some
- of the Veterans Day events that are happening throughout Bloomington and Monroe County that we usually
- have to pay tribute to those that continue to serve. The other thing I wanted to say in addition to that is
- I think sometimes it's also important for folks to see people being out and about in the community.
- And I just want to take a moment and congratulate the NAACP on their Freedom Fund banquet that was about
- a week ago. And so I saw some council members there, Councilor Decker and Councilor Feidl, that were
- there in attendance. I got a chance to MC that or co-MC that with a guy that's near and dear to me.
- But there was this
- or the topic was the fierce urgency of now. And I think of the keynote speaker, Charlie, Dr.
- Charlie Nelms, excuse me, who made a quote or said a quote that has stuck with me since he said it.
- And he said, a vision without a plan is an illusion.
- And I keep repeating that because I keep thinking about all the things that we are doing right now as
- elected officials and all the hard work. And I think of the giants that we have lost over the past several
- years. I think of, you know, Judge Tyler Farrell. I think of, you know, Pat Williams. I think of our
- You know our our beloved council members Cheryl Munson and now I think about Charlotte Zitlow and all
- of those are great phenomenal women who did hard stuff and got
- jobs done and, you know, reached across the aisle and talked with people. I talked to Councillor Hawke
- about Charlotte and her, you know, her memories of her and that was a really interesting conversation
- that we had there about that and didn't learn or I didn't know about that. So I appreciated Councillor
- Hawke sharing that with me.
- As we continue to lose our giants and pillars in our community, I think it's incumbent upon us as electeds
- now to not necessarily feel the shoes of those people, because we will never feel unless and we will
- never feel that. But now the torch has been passed on to us. And so now we need to do what is right,
- because I keep thinking and I keep saying this a lot, but it's something I've thought about
- Some of my final conversations I had with Charlotte was that you can, and her small voice that she had,
- she said, you can do hard things. It might not be easy, but you can do them.
- And I think about all the conversations that we've had, the continued conversations, those that are
- sometimes that give us heartburn and pain, but it's what we get paid the big bucks to do and what we
- got sworn into office to do. And I say big bucks sarcastically. So with that being said, I appreciate
- all of our colleagues that joined us virtually and in person. And with that being said, happy Veterans
- Day. Thank a veteran tomorrow, but just every day. And we are adjourned. Thank you.