We can now call this meeting to order. Today is Tuesday, February 10th. Happy 10th day of Black History
Month, 2026. We are here in the NatU Hill Room, and present I have my county council colleagues, Spiral,
Wilts, Deckard, Henry, and not joining us in the NatU Hill Room is Councilor Hawk and Councilor Iverson.
I don't believe Councilor Ivett
Iverson might be able to attend virtually, but we're unsure with Councilor Hawke. So either way, we
have a quorum, so we will go ahead and get started with the people's business. So all those that are
able to stand, please stand for our reciting of 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, one God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. This is on all. All right.
So next up, we have the adoption of tonight's agenda. Does anybody have any amendments that they would
like to make for tonight's agenda? Yes.
Councilor Decker. Madam President, I would like to add just a discussion item, and I believe the appropriate
place would be in new business on the transit line that we have supported. I believe it's transit line
13 in the past. I'd make it 10A if that helps. I'd so move. Second, or if that's necessary. So transit
conversation.
Okay, so 10 a and I in light of our conversation of yesterday want to give folks an opportunity to maybe
have a brief conversation of because I know counselor Henry wasn't able to attend but I'm sure he has watched
the meeting from yesterday and maybe at the time council hawk will be present too so i want to give
us an opportunity to have a conversation from yesterday's joint meeting so i'd like to add that after
the transit conversation as well and that will be 10b what are you calling that again please um justice
conversation is there anybody else that wish to make
adjustments or amendments to tonight's agenda. All right, seeing none, and because we don't have anybody
attended virtually as of right now, so all those in favor of amended tonight's agenda or approving tonight's
agenda as amended signify by saying aye. All those opposed, same sign. All right, motion carries.
All right, next up, this is the time for the public to come in the Nattier Hill Room or virtually via
Teams. And so if you have to...
If you would like to talk on items that are not on tonight's agenda, you can always come forward to
the lectern here in the NatU Hill Room. Each person will have up to three minutes, and the displays
around this room here will show your three minutes. And then if you are virtually, you can raise your
hand via Teams, and you'll also have up to three minutes. So again, you just state your name for the
record, raise your hand, or come forward to the podium here, and you'll have up to three minutes.
I don't see anybody as of yet. Oh, okay, all right. One on teams as well. Okay, so we'll go here in
the Net-U-Hill room first. Again, the sign-in sheet is there for you. Sign in, state your name, and
you'll have up to three minutes. My name is Gretchen Clearwater, and I'm here tonight because I had
heard that there was maybe an issue about whether there would be enough funding for
holding the elections. And actually, that's on tonight's agenda. OK, so when do I publicly comment?
So it will be on the conversation of ongoing business, so 8A. That will be an opportunity for- So I
should just wait? Yes. OK. Yeah, because those are items. So again, this is for public comment for items
not on the agenda. And so that's on the agenda. Gotcha. Yes, just want to make sure. All right, I'll
just stay there.
All right. Well, we'll see you soon. All right. All right. So now I'm going to go back to teams here.
I saw a hand raised and I don't see it anymore. Um, with the person's hand, um, that was raised via
teams. If you'd like to raise your hand again, again, this is our for items that are not on tonight's agenda.
All right. Seeing none, I want to make sure that everybody has an opportunity to speak on those items.
And seeing none, we'll move on. Thank you.
So next up is department updates. This is for departments of Monroe County government to come and update
the council on items that are also not on the agenda. So departments have up to 10 minutes to give the
council an update. And again, you can either raise your hand via Teams if you're virtually, or you can
come forward to the lectern here in the Natt U Hill room. Yeah, looking around, I don't see any movements.
either in the room here or be a team so we will move forward. On tonight's agenda we don't have any
consent agenda items so we will dive right into our business for the evening and starts with number
seven with the hiring freeze review. Council I move to open for discussion and possible approval the
coroner's request to be exempt from the hiring freeze and be allowed to hire and fund one zero zero zero dash
0007 county general coroner a part-time reserve deputy position Second we got a motion in a second.
I see our coroner. Mr. Jeff hall is present welcome Good evening council. Good evening Yes, so I would
like to request the opportunity to hire a
current reserve deputy into a paid part time position. This reserve deputy has been with our office
since 2017. So it was before I took election as coroner. It's actually the same year that I was elected.
And I was under the impression that this individual had technically been a
employee of the coroner's office. Apparently a reserve deputy is a position that was created at the
time of the prior coroner's time plane and so I am wanting to move this position into a paid part-time
position solely because one of my current deputy coroners is going to be out on medical leave for about
two to three months having surgery and therefore this
Reserve deputy is going to be stepping into that role. Typically a reserve deputy in the way that our
office setup is, is a one unpaid shift per quarter. This individual is gonna be picking up a lot more
shifts and kind of covering that gap while my paid deputy is gone. In fact, he's already had five calls
this year since beginning of January. And to pull some numbers, he had 14 total calls that he was part of
From 2021 including the five this year. So already he's you know, I'm gonna be doing much much more
and I'd like to Allow him to be paid and compensated for those extra efforts Before that explanation
and look to my council members here to see if anybody has any questions or comments for mr. Hall. Yes
counselor will So my understanding is that you have
um is it four deputies you have it correct there's myself my chief deputy and then four um paid uh deputy
quarters okay and then the the deputy coroners are on contract and they're paid no not contract okay
could you explain to me are they then they used to be on contract maybe no okay what's the situation
they are paid for quarterly uh via
So they have to turn in time through to the HR. They're paid through payroll, but they're only paid
quarterly. So many questions. Okay. If they're turning in their time and they're paid quarterly, if
they don't turn in their time, are they still paid? I believe that is correct. Yes.
we've had for years. So I do know that our counsel, Molly Turner King, is working with the coroner to
move them to contracts. Maybe that's where I got that. I think that's where you're. I would just think
that if there was a full quarter where they didn't turn any time in, then I'm not positive that they
would get paid there. But if they turn in any time through any quarter,
Then they get paid, right? And they would get paid the same amount. Correct. It's not hourly.
It's a stipend. Correct. It's a stipend. Yeah. It's a quarterly stipend that's paid to each deputy coroner.
Okay. Regardless of hours worked. Okay. So this would be an additional appropriation to cover. Now you're
saying you've got one. I do have a question. Actually, it's clearly I have lots of questions. Sure.
No, that's fine. That's why I'm here.
you have a reserve person that is going to be covering or is covering more and more because one of the
deputies is not available. So typically they cover a little bit, they do it because they're volunteering
their time and service and that's amazing. What you're suggesting then is that
they permanently become part-time, not just during this absence, but permanently. That is correct, yes.
Yes, a permanent part-time paid position from now until the individual decides to leave the coroner's
office. Paid hourly, not stipend. Okay, and I see that you came up with a justified way to determine a rate.
an hourly rate based on the three thousand per quarter that your regular deputy was paid. OK. Am I also
I feel like I'm cross examining every time I ask you all questions and I don't mean to sound that way.
I got to work on my tone. No, absolutely. My office is a very unique office. It's structured
a lot differently than than many of the other county government offices. So in the description, what
I'm seeing is that you're also
asking then for the ability to hire up to five reserve deputies through this part timeline?
Is that correct? That was just a request. Obviously, if you know, if I'm not going out and hiring five
people right now with my office and the way that it operates, unfortunately, we don't have people lining
up wanting to come work for the coroner's office.
I do my due diligence to make sure that everyone that does come and work for the office is vetted very
properly. And they're not just coming for the glory and the fame. But unfortunately, yeah, there's no
one's lining up the doors wanting to come work for the office itself. It's usually individuals who have
worked with other deputies that I have, or individuals who work in a very similar jobs classification.
So this would to be
If I had another individual come forward, say in the next six months to have the opportunity to put
them through the process to bring them on as a paid as a paid part time deputy. But I'm really only
looking for just the one right now to really help out our office. I'm happy to let anyone else have
a turn. Other council members, do you all have any questions for Mr. Hall on this item?
You have more. Go ahead. Anyone else has anything? This is just super straightforward. I'm the only
person. Okay. It's okay. Well, I have thoughts and my thought is that given our current hiring freeze,
that while we could approve a part-time position to cover for
the person who can't fulfill their regular duties, I'm not inclined to go beyond that simply because
of the season in which we find ourselves of freezing all hireings or at least trying to. So that's my
thought. I mean, I want you to have the person on
I could maybe be convinced that it stays as a part-time position and it's not necessarily time limited,
but I don't think any more than one position is warranted at this point. I'm happy to listen to others
on the topic though. Just to clarify, you're stating that this one individual, if he were to be approved,
it would just be for a short timeframe or
And that's what I would think. My only rebuttal to that is I don't know what this deputy coroner stipulations
are going to be when he comes back from his surgery, if he's going to be on a lifting restriction, if
he's going to be on something that's going to limit his ability. I don't know. I can't predict that
the surgery he's having is a pretty common surgery and there is good recovery time from that. But I
don't want to say
you know, it's gonna be eight to 10, you know, eight to 10 weeks, two to three months until I get a
little bit closer to that. Having the opportunity to have this secondary or this reserve deputy fill
in as needed. I don't quite think that this individual is going to want to pick up any more shifts than
he needs to. As he is similar to myself, we all have other secondary full-time jobs. This is just a
secondary supplemental income.
Thank you, I appreciate that. Yeah, of course. And for the record, Councillor Hawke is in the building.
Okay, are there any other questions or comments from council related to this item? Seeing none, 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 Nightingale room or raise your hand via Teams.
Seeing none. May we please have a roll call vote. Councillor Fiddle. Yes. Councillor Hogg. I'm going
to pass since I was not here for the discussion. Councillor Will. No. Councillor Henry. Yes. Councillor
Decker. Yes. Councillor Crossley. Yes.
Motion passes four one one pass Thank you council. All right. Next up is item b from the highway department
Council i need to open for discussion and possible approval of the highway department's request to be
exempt from the hiring freeze and be allowed to hire and fund 1176-00
00 motor vehicle highway account line one five eight four two truck driver position Second, okay. We
got a motion and a second. We have miss Ridge here. Welcome So we after the last major snowstorm we
received a resignation So and you know, it's sometimes that's expected. He was a full-time truck driver
the last 20 years so he wanted to go back to being a full-time truck driver on the road, so
We did fill the last truck driver position. That position is starting February 23rd. So we are requesting
to fill this position. If we fill this position, then we're just down a mechanic and a highway engineer
at this time. And this is out the NVH fund? It is all out of the NVH fund. Nothing comes out of the
county general fund. Gotcha. OK.
I like when you say that, okay. All right, so any questions or comments for Ms. Ridge on this item?
Councilor Hawk. Yes. First of all, it is in a different fund. And if that fund runs short, they'll know
it and they have to make adjustments. So it doesn't affect the rest of the county government. But the
second thing is, you know, I don't think we slept through the snowstorm.
that we've had and had and had and neither is high rate apartment. And so it would just behoove us to
recognize that and know that this is something that we have to do. It's really public safety. Any other
questions or comments? Yes, Councillor Decker. I just wanted to ask you a question. As much as you're
allowed to say on this,
Was it the comparison of those two different being out on the road versus some of the work and a snowstorm
that was part of that decision for this individual? This was a tough snowstorm. And they worked a lot
of long hours. When you're driving a truck, you can't see. You're not on a four-lane highway. You're
on a country rural road that has embankments. You can't see where the road ends. You can't see the edge
of the road.
and it's very stressful. It's very mentally stressful, it's tiring, but they stay out there, they stay
at it until we are able to, we do give them breaks constantly. So what the guys go through, it's a lot
and it's not for everybody. So I appreciate the ones that stick with us and do the job and they do it well.
I did hear comments from people over the last few weeks where they've said, this is the worst one I
remember. And it might be getting close to the blizzard in a different way because we're now doing more,
more roads, more people, more, more things just to cover. So thanks again to all your folks for, for
doing that and the way that they had to do 48 hours straight, right? We get breaks, but we called them
in on that Saturday at 5pm and we sent them home on Monday at 5pm.
Councilor Wilts. Yeah, I will support this since it's not in county general and I can't imagine driving
in those conditions. I don't like driving anyway, so kudos to anyone willing to take on that challenge.
But I just wanted to take a moment and let you know that I was speaking with a constituent who lives
off of Stipp Road and they are
Pleased as punch about what's happened down there. So Yeah, and we had to be a really good project.
Yeah, I know it's been a long time coming but they're so excited and thankful. So passing that along.
Thank you. I'm so proud. Oh, I also called you and left you a message and told you how pleased I was
how the county came back out and took care of an issue near where I live, which is there was, I think, snow.
business that had got plowed into one lane of the road that we access in and out of the place. It was
taken care of just in hours. It was very quick. So I want to thank that. My neighborhood thanks you
for that. Yeah. Councillor Hawke. Well, we're passing out the compliments. In my neighborhood, right
before you get to my house, there's a major curve that you just can't
you can't get around it without some help. And so after you come through with the bigger trucks, then
a smaller truck with the plow came through to try to widen that without knocking down the mailbox. I
was so grateful. But without that, all of those people cutting through our neighborhoods to get over
to the next main intersection,
They couldn't have made it without being in real trouble. And so they took special care to take care
of those special areas that needed that. So appreciate it. You're getting all the love.
So we appreciate it, thank you. All right, so seeing no other further questions or comments from council
on this item, we'll go to the public. If you have a comment on this item, you can come forward to the
lectern here in the room, or you can raise your hand via Teams. And may we please have a roll call vote?
Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Henry?
Yes. Councillor Deckard. Yes. Councillor Crossley. Yes. Motion passes unanimous. All right. Thank you.
All right. Next up is item C from the Health Department. Council, I move to open for discussion and
possible approval the Health Department's request to be exempt from the hiring freeze and be allowed
to hire and fund one one five nine dash zero zero zero zero health account line one zero one eight nine
public health nurse communicable diseases position. Second. We have Ms. Lori Kelley present here. Welcome.
What can you tell us about this item? Good evening. So this request is to hire for a public health nurse
who the primary function is to oversee our communicable
case investigations. Second to that, this position will help to provide vaccinations and health screenings
to the public, both inside the clinic and during outreach services. So a little bit of a dual position
there, but the primary focus is our case investigations for communicable diseases. Thank you for that.
I'm looking to see if anybody has any questions or comments for Miss Kelly on this item.
I'll go with Councilor Henry and then I'll go back. Thank you, Laurie, for being here. So, did I talk,
was it hard? Okay, good, sorry. It's okay. It's the lights. It's like mood lighting in here. Anyway,
so I guess maybe just holistically, we haven't talked about the new clinic in a while. How are things
developing in terms of the setup of the clinic? This is a piece of it, obviously, but I know there was
an urgency to get things going on one January, but can you walk us through the status of where we are on that?
Yes, absolutely. So as of January 1st, we have taken over all of the communicable disease investigations.
So making sure that we have continuing care for those that are latent TB cases, lead case management.
We are still transitioning the vaccination services. So we are waiting on a generator. So in the settlement
agreement with IU Health, IU Health kept the generator. We originally thought that we would be getting that
with the equipment. So when that did not occur, we had to purchase one. We're waiting on that shipment,
which is supposed to happen within the next week or so that I'm aware of. Once that's installed, then
we'll be able to move forward with our vaccination refrigerators. So we have to obtain five days of
temperature readings along with pictures. And then we contact the Indiana Department of Health. They
come down, do a site visit. Then we're ready to go ahead and
order vaccines and will be able to start vaccinated in March. So in the interim then what just remind
me what's covering our services then because until March I mean we got I guess it's a few weeks away
but it's been what are we what's the stopgap how are we covering things right now. Sure, so we
Morgan County is taking referrals for vaccination services. We are still covering all of the communicable
diseases and we can provide health screenings and testing. So we are doing some testing for the public
either scheduled, we could through walk-in, but we don't have that established like open clinic space.
I have some data on how much Morgan, like how many cases or walk-ins Morgan County has and how many
cases we've managed in the county with the current partial setup with the current nurses for the T.
Oh, so we, as of today, when I looked, we have 85 communicable disease case investigations that are
currently open. So at the start of January, we had around 77 and we kind of fluctuated, give her a few
up or down at that. So 85 as of today is the highest that I've seen since January. So just trying to
work with two current employees to make sure that we're okay. It's not a small number. Okay. So thank
you for sharing that information and getting this going. Yeah. It's been a lot, but I think that we
are so fortunate that we have
to current employees who have really just stepped up to the plate. We're meeting on a weekly basis,
often more than that, just to review the cases, come up with plans for how we're going to make sure
that we continue that care. So really thankful for that. I think I saw Councilor Hawke and then I'll
circle back to Councilor Wilton-Deckard. Yes.
What time of the year or month do you schedule the vaccines at the schools, or do you do it on some
kind of a rotation basis? Currently, IU Health has been providing those, so we have not worked out a
strategy for who will be providing
those ongoing services, whether IU Health will be continuing that or whether we will. We do have a school
liaison, one of the public health nurse positions who will be starting later this month. And that will
be one of the items that will then begin working with the schools to reestablish those connections.
What services are we going to be going in and offering the schools? So that is still to be determined.
But the schools do still have access.
The school liaison position. Can you tell me a little bit more besides the vaccinations what else do
they do within and in the schools. Oh, in the schools.
eventually once the person of course gets hired and trained. So stop the bleed trainings, access to
CPR trainings for staff, help to provide evaluations on is there education assistance. So right now
our maternal child health coordinator is going in and providing tobacco and vaping education to some
of the schools so they can help provide some
access to that, nutrition. Really a lot of it is kind of working with the schools. What are your gaps
and how can we help fill those? We also, they check on their supplies or their supplies needs that we
could help to fulfill for them. Outside community events, can we help provide resources for bicycle
safety, food cooking demonstrations for some of the classes,
That that's just some of the programming that we've done kind of over the years and making sure that
their emergency response plans are up to date. I want to go back to something that you said earlier
and if you need to get back with me on this that's fine too. But you were talking about the average
of communicable I sometimes can't say that communicable investigations that they do in a in a month
and you said we're currently at about 85 you thought.
Yes, that was where we were at when I looked earlier today. Do you know, and if you want to get back
or if it slows things down, no worries, but do you know what a normal average, and I hate the word normal
or average related to communicable disease, do you know what a normal average is for us in a month?
I do think that's a huge thing the public should just kind of have on their radar as they think about it.
Just thinking off the top of my head, we're pretty close to that, roughly. We are collecting all of
our data for our annual report, so I do have that information that I could share with you. Some of it,
of course, we can't share publicly, but the information that we can share, we can do that, certainly.
Some of it...
We have seen some increases because when the Indiana Department of Health has lost some funding, so
they used to assist in some of these cases, whereas they've now put that back on local health departments.
We've seen a large increase, I would say, over the past year in some of those cases. They do help try
to support us where they can, but some of that has come in,
come back to us, whereas the state had some, I think they were interns that were helping to manage some
of that before. So I think some of it fluctuates just depending on funding. I appreciate that greatly.
Given everything, state and certainly federal, I think it's gonna be more and more incumbent upon
And I'm not telling you anything you don't know, but I do want the public to hear this. I think it's
going to be incumbent on people like you and our health officer and then us thinking about that. If
we're not monitoring it, I don't know who is. So thank you for kind of talking about that. It's not
the happy side of life, but we do those things. So the others have one or a crack at it. So thank you.
Any other questions or comments? Yes.
Thank you. Just one more thing. I just want to be clear. So 1159, why this funding line? Why this fund?
This was where the funding was originally established. So we were just transferring those funds that
were set aside for the IU health contract to pay for these positions moving forward into this year.
But that's the only reason.
Yes, when I looked at the 1159, it did make me, of course, more cautious because that affects all of
our other funds that are in what we call the frozen levy funds. So this is just like adding someone
in the county general fund. Can you tell me which fund is paying for the insurance for this individual?
I believe that was shifted into
the Health First Indiana Fund. All of the insurance for everyone was shifted into 1161. I thought it
was the other way around, but I'll look it up real quick. Previously in previous
years the 1159 covering the health first Indiana insurance and that was based on the recommendation
from the Indiana Department of Health. Well of course they would recommend that because it doesn't mean
we would recommend it. That's that's where we're falling short is how we're going to pay for the insurance.
I think you'd have that memorized, since we've talked about it so much. It is being paid out of $1,159.
Is there not room in the 1161? Am I saying that number right? Is it 1161 for this position? The room,
is that what you're asking? It's already budgeted. It's already budgeted in 1159. You guys already approved
this position and it's appropriated already.
Well, I know we've done that on budgets throughout the county, and this is our chance to change it,
which we're gonna have to change some of these things. Just because something's already been budgeted
and appropriated does not mean you can continue to fill it, because that's what hiring freeze means.
So we do not have in the current Health First Indiana budget any room to move the expense there.
So the budget that was approved last year for 2026 for Health First Indiana, we had to take a chunk
of that. And so we're paying the positions around four or five months, just a chunk of that. We're working
on doing our financial reports. So then we can submit to use funding that we had left over from last
year, but we do not have
currently have access to use those funds at this point. Okay. Is there any other questions or comments
on this item? Seeing none, I'll go to the public on this item. If there is public comment on this item,
raise your hand via Teams or come to the lectern here in the night
none. May we please have a roll call vote. Councilor Hawk? No. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Henry?
Yes. Councilor Deckard? Yes. Councilor Crossley? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Motion passes majority five to one.
Thank you. Next up is item D from the clerk's office. Me, sorry. Council, I move to open for discussion
and possible approval of the clerk's office request to be exempt from the hiring freeze and be allowed
to hire and fund 1000-0001 County General Clerk, a part-time phones clerk position.
Second. We got a motion and a second and we are joined this evening by our County Clerk, Nicole Brown.
Welcome. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening, President Crossley, members of the Monroe County Council.
I, while very respectful of the hiring freeze and asking to replace a part-time phones clerk, we had
a lovely lady who
had worked in a different clerk's office in another part of the state, moved to Monroe County. She worked
for a time in the public school system and they did some cuts and let her go. So she wanted to come
back to her clerk roots. The school system then realized what they lost and they hired her back. We
absolutely wish her well. But in the clerk's office, we have a multi-line phone system that is very,
There can be laws, but most of the time it is a very busy area because we have calls coming into the
Justice Building for all of the different areas of the Justice Building, the courts, the prosecutor,
the sheriff. People, when they don't know who to call, they call the clerk's office.
role has to have a working knowledge of pretty much every area of not only the clerk's office, but different
nuances of the judges, the courts, the prosecutor's office, the sheriff, and the person in that part-time
role not only covers lunches, but they can pinch hit if we have unexpected illnesses, emergencies, absences,
vacations, and I am requesting respectfully to be able to fill that role. Thank you. Thank you. And
for my other job, I know that y'all definitely get the calls because from our office, we get them and
vice versa. I appreciate you. I get it. I get it. All right. That's my government nerd of the day.
All right. Checking in for council colleagues to see if anybody has any questions for Ms. Brown on this item.
Councilor Wilks. Can you remind me how many full-time positions you have doing this kind of work? Because
you're saying this one's to fill in and to cover. So there are two full-time people in phones and then
one part-time. And we can, other duties as assigned, use the part-time in other areas, traffic,
for example, to maybe answer some basic questions at the front desk.
like the basic questions they would get on the phone. But ideally, two people are at the phones all
the time because it is a multi-line phone system. And so somebody's always calling in. I have a lot
of people who live out of Monroe County. They can't get to work or something like that. And so this
person is typically able to jump in and cover, as I say, the absences, the vacations, illnesses,
things like that. Thank you. You're welcome. Councillor Henry. Thank you. Thank you, Clerk Brown. It's
interesting. I was placing calls around the county today to different offices and I was having different
experiences with who greeted me first. There's an agency in the county that uses an automated system to
press one for operator two for so-and-so to get you where you need to go. I'm sorry. Yeah, there's another
agency that hasn't emptied their voicemail in a considerable amount of time, so it goes to an empty
or full inbox. So I guess my question's here just so I understand what's going on in the office. How
long has this position been open?
She just left. The school system hired her back and I don't blame her one bit. She will now get to have
her summers off. She had retired from another clerk's office, had worked there during the school year
just for some extra money and now she gets to have her summers off again. I certainly cannot blame her,
but she will be sorely missed. I can feel that from you guys. It seems like a big part of the team.
Just data on how many calls you're getting per hour in that space. You say a lot, but I'm just trying
to wrap my head around. Is it nonstop or what's it feel like? I can't tell you per hour. What I can
tell you is, as you might imagine, Mondays and Fridays are the busiest because we've either been closed
for the weekend or a county government holiday. Fridays, people get paid.
As I say, the person in that role, you have to know something about everything. People want to know
when their court date is. People want to know how much money they owe. Various questions. We get calls
for elections in the clerk's office when, as you know, the elections division is in a completely separate
building. There can be laws. I certainly would never try to
say that they are not in the middle of the week, it could die down a bit, but then as I say, that's
when we use that person to maybe pinch hit with somebody who might need some clerical help. My last
question was, I don't have the job description in front of me, but I'm presuming there's a line in that
part-time job description that says, and other duties. Other duties as assigned. And you've described
some of those other duties. Absolutely. Okay, I think that's all I have. Thank you.
Did I see your hand raised? No. Okay. No questions. Okay. All right. Councilor vital. I wonder if you
can tell us how many phone lines there are that these people answer. So I'm going to say there's three
phone numbers that come in from the public. But of course, nearly everybody in my office has a phone.
So they, I mean,
if it comes in and a clerk can help, a deputy clerk can help, it's transferred in-house to those people.
But there are some things that need to go straight up to the court, are not in our bailiwick.
Excuse me, some things that would need to go. People call us for, you would not imagine some of the
different kinds of calls we take for things that have absolutely nothing to do with what we do. So we
want very kind,
compassionate people with a working knowledge of pretty much everything that goes on in the justice
building to be able to feel those calls as quickly as they can, especially on those Mondays and Fridays
that I described to Councilman Henry. You're welcome. Okay. Yes, Councilor Wilts. Pardon me if this
was in our packet and I missed it. I'm curious.
what you have in your part-time line set as, and what you're expecting in terms of how many hours this
person will work. So, Counselor Wills, as you know, part-time is up to 28 hours. The particular person
in the role that just left, she didn't need all 28 hours. I believe she worked about five hours a day.
I have worked, it depends on who,
applies and who's a good fit for our office. I have worked with IU students just up the road, worked
around their class schedule. It just depends on who's applying and how many hours they're interested
up to 28. But if you're asking if I can accommodate that 28, yes ma'am. That's where I was headed, yes.
Great. No other further questions?
Seeing none, we will go to public comment. If there's public comment on this item, you can come forward
to the lectern here in the NETU Hill Room, or you can raise your hand via Teams. And seeing none, may
we please have a roll call vote? Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor Decker?
Councillor Crossley? Yes. Councillor Feidl? Yes. Councillor Hawke? No. Motion passes five to one majority.
All right. Thank you very much. But we're gonna still stick with the clerk because we got ongoing business.
So 8A is where we are headed.
Okay. Council, as a reminder, this item was tabled from the January 27th meeting. I move to approve
the clerk's request and fund 1215-0062 election fund election board. An additional appropriation of
$221,106 in the personnel category and $21,675 in the services category for a total appropriation of $242,781.
second all right and welcome good evening president crossley members of the monroe county council thank
you for the opportunity to speak with you this evening two weeks ago my election supervisor appeared
before you in my stead regarding additional appropriations she was to present with the chair for the
monroe county election board my understanding is he was not able to end up joining her for the presentation
i would like to make clear
that I was told that we were not only invited, but expected that the council had simply been waiting
for us to submit a request. And that in fact, if we could get that request in prior to 11 o'clock the
next day, we would be placed on the council's agenda. And so I completed the request to be on the council
council's agenda agenda with the election supervisor and chair presenting as it stands at this time.
We do not have enough in the election budget to meet the statutory minimum hours of early voting in
election day for the 2026 non-presidential primary in the general election. Also, to be clear, all members
of the election board were provided with the numbers that were not only requested, but an explanation
of the shortfall. One board member was apparently confused about the format, but failed to either ask
clarifying questions about the numbers received or make an appointment to review documents with the
election supervisor. Regarding that allegation, the maya culpa is not on my office or staff. I received
a lovely card from a voter who made public comment at last Thursday's election board meeting. I asked
her if I could share a portion of her note with the council and she said that I could. She writes,
I am wondering whether members of the public might be able to raise additional funding to cover election
shortfalls, whether you would accept in-kind donations of, say, printed signage for polling sites, whether
people are legally allowed to volunteer their time and forego payment. In short, I want to help if it
is legal and appropriate to do so. I think there are many, many people I could mobilize to help.
I have never met this person, but her heartfelt correspondence resonated with me and reinforces the
message that free and fair elections are not free. The more you want from elections, the more you have
to be willing to pay. I absolutely have regrets that I did not request the same budget I did for the
presidential elections as my clerk siblings threw out
the state did and their councils approved their budget request. Had I done so, we would not only have
the operational budget we need, but we would likely return money back into the election budget. I know
that at least one member of the council is cognizant that we will have to prepare as though there will
be a 100% turnout for both elections.
At this point, I'm not prepared to grovel for election dollars. My staff and I stand ready to give you
the elections you paid for within the parameter you provided. But with that, my election supervisor
and I are happy to respond to your questions at this time. Thank you. Thank you. And I also just want
to note for the record that I do see
Ms. Penny Giffins, that is joining in the back. Since she is a part of the election board, I just wanted
to acknowledge, and just in case you needed to come and speak as well, and along with election supervisor,
Kylie. Welcome. All right. Is there any questions or comments from council on this item? Yes, Councilor
Hawke. Yes. Generally, maybe.
Everybody thinks this budget is different from every other budget, but you have dollars that's already
appropriated, and generally we ask the departments to spend out of what has been appropriated, we're
not saying hire extra people because we're in hiring freeze, but to proceed with your normal business,
and come back to us if things run short, if you spend more than what you've been appropriated. So maybe
this is different. Have I missed something somewhere? Why would this be any different? Thank you for
your question. This is the first time that I can recall, after having presented at the budget hearings
late summer, early fall, that
the budget, the numbers were then sliced after I left the table for the budget hearings. So this is
the first time I've had to come and say, can you please put some of that money back? I've always asked
for a budget that reflected the two elections that we would be having. And I believe the auditor told
you at that time that I typically return money. I'm not out spending money willy nilly.
do what needs to be done to cover those two elections and the cuts that were made to the budget after
I left the budget table leave me as I indicated with not enough to meet the bare minimum, the statute
minimum for the two elections. So we're going to have to come back anyway. I've met with my liaisons,
they were aware
and they told us to come back. And as I say, when my election supervisor was here two weeks ago, I was
told that she was invited, that we were expected, that they knew they had not given us the money, enough
money to run both elections, and that is why I am before you today. I just wanna make it clear
to you and to the public, surely you know, that there is money in the fund to do if you run out of money,
then you come back and do an additional appropriation. But we also have to recognize we're trying not
to spend that down because every year we're supposed to be trying to grow that balance so we'll be ready
for the presidential election. But to ask for
whatever you feel like you need to get all the way through the full year, mercy. I mean, we have a lot
of departments that like to do that. We would have just skipped budget hearings and just went, you know,
diddle and everything. So, I mean, I don't think anybody's asking you not to do your statutory duties.
It's just use the money that's already been appropriated. If you run out of that money, then it's the
time for you to ask for more money that's left in the fund.
I don't understand why it wouldn't be that way. But as you say, in the past, you've been given the kind
of appropriation you needed to do the whole year. So it was kind of a shock when you didn't see the
whole year. But many departments didn't get the whole year. And that's what we had to do to try to get
through the budget. And we still spent way more than we should have in all of the budgets. I think we
recognize that now.
I just want to make sure that the public understands. No one's telling you not to run a good and fair
election. And my point today, and if you happen to watch the election board meeting last week, is that
elections are as critical to Monroe County's infrastructure as your highway, as your sheriff, your fire,
et cetera. And so when I look at other agencies such as my dear friend,
the sheriff who received not only what he asked for, but $155,000 in overtime to make sure that operations
continue even at the end of the workday. You don't stop a homicide and say, I'm sorry, we're only, you know,
We're done working. We'll come back tomorrow in the highway department who between the snow bonus, regular
over time, double over time in stormwater received $209,540. I asked for $25,000 for two elections to
take care of the 10 to 20 people depending on the turnout and how busy we are. I asked for that money
because otherwise they're going home at four o'clock. Nobody is going to
leave their dinner table, leave homework time, bedtime, bedtime for evenings and weekends to do the
poll worker training, help with all of the things that we need to do after four o'clock for less than
one hour of compensatory time per day. And you don't ask that of any other infrastructure person like
the sheriff or the highway. You don't ask them to work for 40 hours of compensatory time. I certainly
don't believe that that's what they got for this disrespectful weather that we just had a few weeks
ago. But we're prepared, again, to give you the election you paid for. I saw you had your hand up, and
I just want to jump in for a second, because I really feel like to compare with the highway department
and the sheriff's office, I understand
I understand where we're going with that, but I think those are completely different things to say that.
And so I'm looking and just going, I don't know. But if we're going to compare those departments, and
the comparison that I think of is,
When those departments, I can think of the times where those departments have used their money and they've
also come back to council and they've also said, hey council, we're out, can you please help us? And
they've made that case. And so I guess with councilor Hawkinson and I bet money, all seven of us,
even though Councilor Iverson is not here, as Councilor Hawkins mentioned, and I look around and I say
that I think everybody is definitely concerned and want to make sure that we, the voters of Monroe County,
every single person, I have a new voter that gets to vote this year, that is able to participate and
do the democratic process that we have as our rights.
But I don't think that it is fair to put this on council, especially because I think the biggest thing
that we keep saying, and I know folks have said that they don't want us to kind of come back and forth
and compare, but SEA 1 literally was the first year last year that we had to, you know,
look at how we can rob Peter to pay Paul to make sure that all things are happening. And we definitely
don't want to be in that boat with you all, but I guess for me, it's a little baffling that we're here
because as it's been mentioned, and I'm sure other folks might mention this as well, and I think,
you know, to Ms. Ferris when she was here earlier, and I appreciate Ms. Ferris coming in, you know,
a couple of weeks ago and taking the questions, even though
uh, the election board president, I didn't show up and I reached out to him and I expressed that,
you know, we could bump him up, but I digress. Anyways, and that's fine. It's neither here nor there.
But the point of the matter is that I think we're all making is if there is funds that are here,
can you, because I heard you just say like, you'll have to come back anyway. So to that point, if you
have to come back anyway, then why can't you come back during that time frame in which
Like and ask for that because I know folks are here and they probably want to you know Tell us all the
things about making sure that we fund this and to those people watching and and here and then at you
Hill room That's what we're trying to do. That's what has been expressed countless times and we are
definitely telling that to you I'm here in person. I just wanted to make it abundantly clear that I
Don't want us to play chicken with
the voters, and if this one doesn't balk up, and then this one doesn't balk up, because in the end,
we're hurting voters. And all we're saying here as council is use what you have, because we're in a
new era. And I hope that folks can understand that. As dismay as folks might be, that's fine. But use
what you have and then come back. And so, Madam President, thank you for your thoughtful words. And
most people in the audience
certainly not my election supervisor, who probably wasn't even born when this quote was said. Some of
you may remember that there was a show, and the gentleman would say, if you'll give me a hamburger today,
I will gladly pay you on Tuesday. And so that's the optics that I feel. I think the optics are bad in
terms of I'm looking at my budget where there are lines
that were zeroed out. I look at comparable infrastructure budgets and do not see zeros. I am saying
we will do, if that's what you want us to do, we will do what we have with the money that we've been
given. It does not seem right, fair, or appropriate in this instance, and it isn't as though
My liaisons did not. They started early last year telling me about the ramifications, which was why
I gave myself haircuts before I ever came to you last summer, early fall. I started giving my, I used
less of a budget than the presidential. If I had realized that, you know,
other clerks throughout the state were going ahead with and just asking for that presidential money
because it means we prepare as though every voter is going to show up in the same way they would the
presidential. If I had realized that that was the trend, I would have done that and then these haircuts
would be easier to take because I would already be working with
at a level that made me comfortable because it was the same as the presidential. Does that, I'm hopeful
to have made that make sense. I haven't eaten today. Of course. And I'm so sorry. I know counselor Henry
had his hand raised and I'm seeing I'm filling all the questions coming from this side as well. But
in watching the election board from last week, I guess I know that you all have
a special meeting this Thursday to kind of go over this very thing. And so help me to understand because
it seems to be that you'll vote on the hours this Thursday, is that correct? Correct. And that also
has to be unanimous, is that correct? So the hours, the statutory minimum is what will be to extend
the statutory minimum to
what Monroe County has become accustomed to will take a unanimous vote. So that's what we've been accustomed
to. And that's the hours that are eight to six. That's right. Right. And so with that being
and my understanding that there could be a potential that if we don't give you all what you're asking
for right now and you get to your meeting on Thursday,
And because what we didn't give, although it's there and you could choose to, somebody could, if you
don't have a unanimous vote on the hours from eight to six, then it defaults back to eight to four.
Okay. But that's where I'm saying, that's a slippery slope because again,
we should not be playing chicken with things. It's like the chicken little scenario, the sky is falling,
and it's really not. The funds are there, we're just simply asking for y'all to come back. And I think
that's the bottom line that we are simply saying. I think we've heard Councilor Hawk, I'm sure other
people will have the same sentiments, because I heard it a couple of weeks ago. But that's the bottom,
that's what it is. And I would just hate because,
I've actually had to answer constituents' emails and phone calls on this very issue, where we got an
email about this. And it's like, I don't know what else to say except for the funds are there. And so
I've just been like, well, that's where you have to go talk to the election board and figure this out,
because we're saying that it's there. We're not cutting anything, because it
It's being presented to the public that we are literally not, because of the budget cuts that we sustained
for your particular budget, and we did that for other people as well, that it seems like the council
is just, the council will be responsible for whatever happens regarding primary day, and that's not
okay to say that
because we didn't give what you need right now or what you are requesting for right now that it's our
fault and eight to six isn't going to be a thing and that's going to be on council because I don't want
that to happen because that's not fair. So I'll go, I'm sorry, I know everybody's coming so I'll just
go to Councilor Henry and then I'll just go all the way now. Thank you Madam President.
And I appreciate you cutting in line. No, it helps to clarify a lot. I really appreciate you getting
ahead of me on it. I have four points of information before I go ahead and start with some questions
here. First, maybe Michelle or Ms. Woodruff, can we verify the sheriff's and jail budget for last year?
My understanding is we cut the budget by about $2 million during the budget process. But I just want
to make sure that we're honest in the room
We did some significant cuts to the sheriff's office. Second point of information is I just want to
make sure that I heard that Indiana code says there was a unanimous vote required. Mr. Cockerill, can
we take a look at the code on what the unanimous vote or the vote process is for the polling locations?
Just to be sure, I just want to know chapter and verse where that is coming from.
I just want to ask my peers before I get into other questions, because I'm sure you have your own. Was
another member going to ask about overtime, because I can withhold on those questions? I have other
things I'd like to talk about. So I appreciate you coming in. I wanted to maybe walk through some things
for my understanding of the public. And I agree with both my colleagues to the right and left here that
we have some misapprehensions. So I just want to ask some basic questions. As of right now,
your appropriation line would fund the primary.
that don't worry about the general election, but the money that's in the account lines would fully fund
the primary, isn't that correct? With reduced staffing, which would cause me great pause, we could do
the statutory minimum. Let me ask it again. I mean, the budget that we provided, and maybe Ms. Schell,
we're going to need to see the budget up. If the argument was it was set at
the 2024 level before the adjustments by the commissioners and the like. That was a full year we budgeted
for two elections. Are you saying that the appropriation you have right now would not cover one election,
the primary and full? I don't, because I'm not seeing those same numbers. I think you would probably
have an election and a half right now based on what we appropriated in the fall.
So what I have is that it would cover the primary with us moving funds from different lines in order
to cover the early voting costs. That would be the in-house transfers to the appropriation you have.
So every other department of the county uses their account lines and they come back and ask for additional
appropriations. What's different, I think, and we all agree that maybe in previous years we've done
an entire or attempted to do an entire year. But that gets us to maybe the second point. And maybe this
is a misapprehension. I don't agree that a reversion is savings to the county.
A reversion is encumbered money that has been captured by the department for future use and house transfers
moving things around.
What's being described as a give back is not a give back. It's money that was basically over appropriated
and not used in that cycle. And to Councilor Hawke's point, it's what we use to bank up to the four
year presidential based on a long history of Councilor Hawke being here and building that fund.
So that to me, I just want to be clear that if the public's listening to this and thinking that there's
a quarter of a million dollars that moves back every year, which is about what it was, right?
You know six figures that moves back from the clerk's office to the election fund that is that reversion
is not savings it's it's over appropriation now I understand that I'll give you a chance to reply to
that is that it's. If i'm taking the face value the idea that you're planning for the maximum election
each time.
And we're not using that proceeds and it comes back to the fund. I mean, that's one way to look at it.
But in no year have we actually hit the ceiling on a full election cycle. That money keeps coming back
to the election fund for the following. President Crossley put it right. I mean, it's Senate Bill 1
that's driving us to being incredibly scrutinizing of how we're using funds in the future, including
saving up for the presidential year in 28 that we have to start thinking about. So I think those are
just I want to get that on the table.
I have three I want to talk about this budget here because in October as a liaison we did talk about
the fact that I agree to this and we've conceded it in public that when we did the budgeting we didn't
account for the commissioners raises you know the adjustments between the primary and the general election
in twenty twenty four so when we budgeted we knew that was shorted a little bit and that's what I thought
we were fixing at the time we talked about I'm going to talk about absentee workers A B and C here because
this is what came up in the last meeting.
We talked about some October numbers for early voting 28 days, the regular EV hours, and a deficit of
$68,880, which is in our packet for tonight. Absentee worker B, when we talked about it in person back
in October, we saw a regular EV hours at a $32,400 deficit. Tonight we see a budget number of $41,300
for that line.
absentee see when you and I sat down in October I was staff was a deficit of twenty four thousand four
hundred thirty two tonight we see absentee see at forty nine thousand four sixteen in our last meeting
we had asked
to understand this change, because this is really important. I mean, absentee C is almost a $25,000
difference from what we thought we were going to fix in October. And so when I look at that and say,
you know, these are 20 to 100% increases in account lines, this is way more than what the commissioners
approved in their adjustment. Can you help me understand just those three account lines and why, especially
B and C are off by 8,924,993 respectively?
So on ABSB, there was originally just travel board that was accounted for that line. It was then determined
that reconcilers who also worked during early voting should have been included into that pay line. So
their total payments would be coming out of that line as well. For them running a regular election with
the eight to six, it would be $15,600 to cover them.
So just so I'm clear, are we talking about funding for the primary at this point or the entire election?
That is for the entire election. Okay. If it was for just the primary, it'd be an additional $5,200.
In absentee C? Absentee C, I believe it was the absentee leads in the back office that were left off
of that one. Those are the individuals who are in our office starting in March, and they are the ones
that process all of the absentee by mail military overseas. They also have
their time that had to be added in, but the leads from early voting, they also do a recruiting for the
poll workers on that. So there was an additional 50 hours added to their pay in order to cover them
for what they do. So I just got the time. I wanted to make sure I got the timeline right. So we went
through the budget process in October. Yep. None of that was accounted for in October. No. We went ahead
and made cuts as we've made cuts all over the county to try to account for future spending.
We had a conversation in October about adjustments, and then we now have an additional adjustment. Is
that a fair way? So in between the conversation that we had with you and Peter Iverson is when these
were found. Peter Iverson and a commissioner received these numbers, and these are the exact same numbers
that the election board received in November. The numbers in our packet are the ones I just read out
that were from our conversation.
the packet that is not from our conversation. So somewhere between October and last meeting, we ended
up with these increases, none of which was accounted for in the budget in September. Okay. Well,
that's a lot. I'll turn it over down the line here. I'm sure there's more to talk about that. Okay.
All right.
Thank you very much for coming in here. And I want to thank the election supervisor for taking my call
earlier. I had some questions for her. And clerk, I want to commend her to you and her passion
for professionalization in that office because she cares about her job. We don't always see that in
everything in public service. If we saw it at every level, we'd be in much better shape here. Here's
where I'm worried about all this. I'm worried that we are having a fight
that is putting the voter at jeopardy and may not be actually, we may not actually be that far apart
on anything at all. And if there's anything in public service that puts me through the top of the rotunda
in any building, and I've watched it for 20 some odd years, is something that gets the public perhaps
unnecessarily
and probably on our side and all sides, there's a little bit of this that has done this. But if I'm
looking at what I'm looking at, and I know that made a lot of sense, but if I'm looking at this, we
could fund the traditional primary now with a little bit of that, a little bit of this, just like every
other department above me, below me, and across this county campus,
we could fund that primary just as normal in what will be a robust year. If I had to bet my mortgage,
I would say we will have voters of every political stripe coming out for various reasons, and they'll
all think they're right, which means they're gonna be lined up and determined. But we could fund that
now, and then I'm trying to figure out when our first meeting is in June, but we could literally, well,
late May, we could come off the May,
that we have a robust primary come back in late May early June and say okay now where's this where these
dollars kind of following I know you have some after connection where the dollars following following
how do we have a robust fall in the same way we had a robust may what I've never heard one counselor
say appears I'm against. A robust primary in a
What I am hearing is our financial situation means we've got to watch everything and talk about it and
hope that somewhere in that between the primary in the fall you save us twenty dollars and make us all
look good but we don't sacrifice all the folks that are
I don't think we have to take too much of time to do it. I know that it means.
a little bit of this and a little bit of that on the ledger of the election supervisor. But I think
that would go a long way to calming this because I always have people that come up and they're like,
why do you want to cut elections? And I'll say I spent four and a half years as our state election director,
a bipartisan. I want nothing to do with that. Show me who's doing that. And they say, well, that's you,
Deckard. And I'm like, no, that's not me. So I just I think we could calm this down, bring this back.
have a robust primary. There's no reason we can't do that and not discourage things from happening and
then just do what we always do. We were, Kate and I, when we were in council leadership, we were in
here at some ungodly hour for the fall election dealing with those levels, ABS, A, B, and C, trying
to get a classification because there were some
HR, employee services had something, but we were doing that and we got through that. I just think that
this is doable. I think this could calm it and you get a robust primary. You get a robust fall. Voters
of every strike get what they want and then down the road we go.
think the world of you. And yes, I rely on the fact that you do have the bird's eye view of what we
are facing with respect to election. You know, compromise means that nobody gets everything that they
want. And I certainly am open and have an open heart to compromise. And so I get if tonight it gives
you heartburn for the entire amount of appropriations that we've asked for. I get that. But also in
good faith, I would ask
that you consider some of the lines, and then that way we will be back, we will be back, but it would
help me to feel better about a more robust primary to get some of this. So if we could agree on some
lines that you're willing to appropriate, it doesn't have to amount to the 242-781, but then good faith
on both sides,
Is that fair? I'll let others comment. I'm open to anything, but what I'm not open to is not having
a robust primary or robust fall. And as a Democratic clerk, I don't want to give you a less than robust.
I mean, it's one of those, we got to live within our means. Everybody has to, but we want more.
If you want a limousine for the primary and the general, you're gonna have to give me a little bit of
limousine money. Otherwise, we rolling up Pinto, sir. But they take car payments for that limo, too.
Okay, well, I'm coming back to ask you if you will work with me and finance at a lower rate than we
might have otherwise came here intending, then I will be back to upgrade the car later with a little
bit more money. Is that fair, counselor?
I think it's fair, but I'm only one of seven. Yeah, so we're going to go down the line. I just have
a point of information. I just want to maybe get back to the data for a second. Were they able to get
the information I asked for earlier? Mr. Cockrell, you have the Indiana code that we were talking about?
I think we were talking about Indiana code 3111026.3, establishment of satellite offices.
And in that, it indicates that in E2B, it includes if a resolution is adopted under this section for
a primary election, and that is establishing a satellite voting site, the board may, by unanimous vote
of the board's entire membership, amend the resolution to modify for subsequent general or
municipal elections, the location of the satellite office, and the hours at which absentee voting may
occur at the satellite office. So I think that's where we're at. And we also spoke with our good friend,
Matt Kochivar, to make sure that I would never come here and speak out of turn. It would be the eight
to four unless, by unanimous vote of the election board, we voted to extend the hours. So they're referring
to the satellite office.
you know, early voting is a satellite office and it functions under the hours of the clerk, which are eight a.m.
to four p.m. That that's where we are. So I understand you still have a point. Yeah, I just want to
actually want a clarification on this now. So that's not what the code says. It doesn't say shall. It
doesn't say that the hour shall be the same. That's not what you just read. I pulled up.
Yeah, but I didn't hear the word shall. I mean that that would infer that there's opportunity to adjust
the hours. I'm a lawyer, but that's why I'm asking you. Says the board may by unanimous vote of the.
Of the entire membership amend the resolution to modify. For subsequent general municipal elections,
the hours and I think above that in a section.
It says a resolution adopted under this section. So what I just read was modification. This is a resolution
adopted under the section. A resolution must be adopted by unanimous vote of the entire membership of
the board. A resolution adopted under the section must do the following. State the locations of the
satellite offices. State the hours at which absentee voting may occur at the satellite office.
The other point of clarification, the information earlier was just the clerks or the sheriff's budget.
Did we get that number pulled up? I know it's almost panantic, but we did suggest that there was no
cut in that budget. I just want to make sure it's in there for the record. That budget was cut. Getting
an exact answer is a little hard because there were so many changes, but whenever I look at the levy
fund locations, that $2 million does seem accurate. Fair.
Is that it for your point of clarification? Yeah, I'm good, thank you. Okay, appreciate that. All right,
Councilor Wilts. Thank you. I feel like my colleagues have made a lot of good points and Councilor Deckard,
in the spirit of working together to get what I think we all want, kind of hit that home. I want to
be very clear
that I do not see anything about what we are doing as underfunding our primary. You have all of our,
if I may, support to run your election as robustly as you have in the past, and always do, because you
do. You run great elections. I have a great team.
We are not saying back off of the quality. What we are saying is we have to be watching every penny.
And if we can give you enough to get by for the primary so that we can look at how that money was spent
and really take a close look at what's needed, that will help us be more accountable to the public
as well as ourselves. We took a look at last, at 2024, 2025, up to a point, we looked at how the spending
in all of the departments was. Budgeting, expenditures, reversions, we took looks at all of that across
all kinds of different things and we had down to the micro level what
was an outlier in expense for that particular year. What was the trend? We looked for hours at everybody's
budget, and when we made cuts, it was not out of any favoritism or to punish any one office over another.
I can promise you, we're really trying to be fair. The couple of departments that you've referenced
that have large overtime for their employees,
have representation. They have union representation, negotiated amounts that they get. And good for
them for that. Sure. And I want to be very clear for my dear friend, the sheriff, and for the head of
the highway department, I do not one bit begrudge what they have. I asked for a small fraction
of what they were given in overtime. This money doesn't go into Nicole Brown's home. Nicole Brown gets
money out of a totally different budget. This is to make sure that my staff has what they need and it's
10 to 20 people depending on, things can change on a dime. I can think we have enough people, something
comes up and we have better than expected turnout and we've got to maneuver and get people in place
and everything and I just want to feel comfortable. I am not,
asking anybody to rob a bank. I am asking for enough money to feel comfortable that we don't have to
come back here before June 1st. And so in the spirit of compromise, and because I consider you all to
be incredibly capable people as far as what the budget is going, I regret again that I didn't ask for
presidential money because I think I would feel better with what I was dealing with
If that if if I had had that Some of my clerk brothers and sisters did that and the council overwhelmingly
approved it for the same I don't think we would have so don't regret anything That would not have changed
the way we made our decision But i'm saying the haircuts that I would have taken still would have left
enough. I don't know about that money that we were basing it on Looking at the trends and the individual
expenses. I promise you we were looking at over time and who?
Who got that overtime payment on your staff? And we've got lots of information. We want to see you making
an effort to just make smart decisions. And I trust that you will do that. You have the money to pay
people what they deserve to do the work that you need done. I would suggest looking at comp time as an option
In addition to overtime, I recognize that, because I've read some of what was said in the election board
meeting, I wasn't able to attend. I know that that's a point of contention. And we do use overtime.
I don't want you to feel like they don't accrue overtime, because you have to get from that 35 to 40
hours. The limits were put on the compensatory time. And I can tell you right now, you correct me if
I do not have one person
that is normally someone we can count on to their, having worked in elections before, having the skill
set to help us get through this very busy time to, they are not going to give up evenings, bedtime,
bath time, weekends for less than one hour. We got 60 days ahead of the election where we're getting
ready, including that 28 days of early voting with the two Saturdays and then election day. So 60,
You know, I took algebra twice, but I can kind of do enough of math to balance the checkbook. 60 days,
40 compensatory hours before you start getting the nasty grams from the courthouse. They are not going
to work for less than one hour of compensatory time a day, 12 to 16 hours. They're not.
I'm open to compromise. I'm saying I get that it's not palatable for the amount requested. I'm asking,
can we do something today so that we each leave feeling like we want a little bit of something? And
if that's not where we are, that just disheartens me. I'm not opposed to looking at partial, just in
good faith. I'm not opposed to that.
I do think that there's some mischaracterization on how comp time could help your office's situation.
I mean, once they get to 40 hours, they do get the time and a half comp time. So that is accruing at
a higher rate than just one for one hour. And then you have the summer where people can
spend down that calm time and then they can build it back up. And I get that that might not sound like
your delightful bankers hours kind of job. That's not what any of us have signed up for. Councilor vital
I think you had your hand. So I think this is for me when I'm hearing a lot of and it feels like this
is a timing issue.
You've got a proposal here. You want this much money. But I also hear that this much money will fund
both elections. Am I under that? I'm sorry. Will this much money you're asking for fund both elections?
I thought we talked about we might have to come back. So the money that we have asked for would fund
both elections with us transferring in-house. So I really want to know what it would cost to run the
primary. Can you give us a number?
of these numbers you've given us, what's it going to cost to pull off the primary? I am not comfortable
giving a number. Or a range. Is there a range? Is there a range between x and x? Do you have a range?
You could lowball it. And what would be the maximum you think you would spend for the primary?
I used to be the League of Women Voters service chair. I want to fund it. And I need the numbers. I
think most of us need the numbers. Please give me a moment. That's fine.
I am going to suggest 600,000, maybe a little less. But again, I expect to have to fund, I'm sorry,
to prepare for,
Some of it, I'm not gonna lie, would be waste. We have to print 100% Democrat ballots, 100% Republican
ballots. We have to act as though, and staff as though 100% are going to, we've made the cuts. The general,
of course, a lot of people don't like to vote in the primary. The general, of course, will be, you're
asking for even more robust, so to give you the election that you want.
And obviously, if I'm wrong, you asked me for this number. I gave you what I think today. If I'm wrong,
we're going to have to do exactly what you said, which is, hey, we did not realize that this many people
were going to line up.
You know, we were more than a little surprised during the presidential when an average of 1,000 voters
showed up every day of early voting. We are watching the news just like I'm sure you are, looking at
the trends, seeing what's going on. And people are turning out, and they are voting, and they are sending
a message. And so we need to be prepared.
The primary could be a total bust and I could be back here saying, I'm so sorry. I didn't know it was
only going to be two people voting in the primary. But right now, for me to feel comfortable as the
person who has to sign at the bottom line of the election, I want to prepare for the better than expected
turnout trends and so I will.
I am prepared to compromise with you tonight. If you're prepared to work with me, I'm prepared to work
with you. If not, we can move forward. So I'm not trying to take up your evening. Counselor Henry's
point about the money in the fund now. Is there enough money in the fund now to perform the primary
election? We do not have money in the overtime line. And again, we're talking 10, 10 to
Would you say 10 to 15? So 2024, we had 10 individuals who occurred over time from that entire election
cycle, and it was a total of $20,603. Me, honestly, the one thing that I am worried about is making
sure that we have this over time in the line for the individuals in the office who are able to occur
this, which are three people in my office right now. The other individuals are
from the clerk's office who come down to help mostly on election day. But I mean, myself, I'm okay with
if we dropped it down to 10,000. For now, yes. Let me ask a practice question here on how the county
operates. I've been here a year, right? Not forever, I know that. But I have a question. So let's say
the clerk's office or any department overspends what it is
they need to do and they owe something and they come back and do counsel. We can pay that. Is that not
right? Right. Exactly. Say that again. You can't spend more than what you've appropriated. So we're
not doing that. So we don't do that. We have a practice of that.
Correct. Okay, thank you. So that's why we have them do in-house transfers or category transfers. Okay.
So would there be money to do an in-house transfer? Yes. That's what they have. Right now in their election
fund that I've pulled up for today, right now, the unexpended amount in the election fund,
which is $1,215,000, they have $1,355,620.
I ran a primary election with that, this primary election with that upcoming. The only thing that they,
I mean, so they can do in-house transfers and category transfers. If you want them to be able to have
overtime because we have that resolution, you would have to approve this department to be able to transfer
in a certain amount of money.
So they, yes, within their budgets, they have plenty of money to be able to transfer. Thank you. But
to that regard, again, it has to be like, in good faith, it has to be used. And then if there is the
transfer that is needed and we have that freeze on the overtime, that's when council can come, that's
when the ask is to come back to council.
Right, so if they've used this entire, let's just say $1,355,000 in primary, they have to come back
and get that exact amount for the general fund. So I would think that's the compromise right there.
I think that's the compromise is, again, it's in there.
You didn't even leave me a dollar in there so that I would I could do it. But I think the kind of I
wrote this down because I kind of wanted to go back to to kind of reiterate what Councilor Wills was
saying. I think, again, as we went through with the pond tooth comb for everybody's budget and including
yours, I think the idea and the intent was to see what we are spending.
I know that the idea is the fact that if we didn't spend it and it went back into reversions, that to
me tells me that we need to look at how we are spending and try to finesse so that in this day and age
after SEA 1, that we are really truly spending what we are needing at the time there. So again, that
was the idea and the intent of us doing that is to look at the trends,
to figure out what it's been, and as it was mentioned so many different times tonight and back at the
budget hearings, it's to come back for those additional appropriations. And so I understand that you're
looking for a compromise, but I think we just heard it with what Michelle was saying in terms of, which
was the question that Councilor Feidl had brought up, you used what you got. You got a lot, you said 600,000,
and you got over a million as of like what is needed right now, you use that money and then if there
is an opportunity because that resolution, like again, we put that in there to, or the freeze in there
to really kind of put a stop to using that, then you come back to us and then you say, after the transfers,
can I transfer to this? And as it has been said so many times tonight, like we are asking for you to
use it and then come back.
That's it. So I'd like to think that that is the compromise that we are saying. Nobody is saying no.
At least I've not heard any of us say no. I think the idea is use what you have, use in-house transfers
as so many other departments have, and let's try to come back. That's it. So to be clear, Madam President,
We can move money into the overtime line to take care of the staff. We can't because of the freeze like
we have to approve that and its entirety. What we're saying is use what you have. And if there is a
necessary for that.
then just as you all have come to us previously with the hiring freeze exemption, that is something
that you could possibly come back to and talk to us about. That's what we're saying. So you would be
paying overtime out of the regular salary line if you chose to do that? Oh, sorry. No? OK, so how in
the world would she do overtime without coming to us first?
wouldn't be able to. That's why it's written the way it is. So it would be comp time and then it would
only be comp time. It would only be comp time. They could come back. What we've done in the past, but
we haven't done it for a long time, was when somebody accumulated a large amount of comp time, it got
paid out. Okay. But if you want them to get it right now during this process, you would have to approve
them being able to transfer money in, but it cannot be paid out of the same line. They have their salary
line and then they have an overtime line. Is there any problem? I'm looking at the attorney in the room.
Is there any concern around going forward with the understanding that we may need to pay out comp time
that was awarded?
Because I'm familiar with that process when a job is, you know, someone leaves a job, but I'm not familiar
with it in the middle of two. I think our policies say you get comp time, right? You earn comp time
if you work over 35 hours and you're a 35-hour employee, you get hour for hour to 40, and then anything
over 40, you get time and a half because that is federal law, right? So I guess I want to be careful
because there is an upper limit, right? I think it's like 320 hours.
or something like that. If you get over 320 hours, you have to pay it out, right? Because the feds say
you are supposed to go above that. We've ran into that in the past, but we haven't in a long time. So
absent that caveat, I think you could put it into a comp time, and then they could come and ask you
to pay it out. There's nothing illegal with that. That would fit with all our policies and the code.
I just want to say for reference, I'm currently sitting at 49.30 in my comp time. And in 2024, I occurred
287.28 hours of overtime. This is where like, we need to know where that threshold is going to be of
where the payout is going to be because I have two individuals who are full time in my office currently,
and they're estimated to get about 60 hours of overtime next year.
Well, not next year, this year, sorry. I mean, right now we had the moving companies in the office until 7 p.m.
Monday, and I was the only one there because none of them wanted the comp time, that they are only able
to get one hour per week, one hour per day for the week to meet that 40. After that, they're expecting
to be able to get their overtime that they're not gonna be able to now.
But they get comp time. They get time and a half. Correct. After fourth. Yeah. But for us, between the
primary and the general election, the close of the primary and the beginning of the general, there's
very minimum time. And with there only being three individuals in my office who are full time, it's
hard for us to delegate weeks of being able to be off, especially in an election that could be bigger
than what we're expecting.
Thank you. I appreciate everyone's energy here. There's a lot of line items to work through. It's part
of the discussion. I have a question for Mr. Cockerill. So Fair Labor Standards Act, the appropriate
use of overtime, is it meant to be a subsidy or a compensation for salary or is it meant to be paid
for hours that are performed? How does that work usually?
Well, unless you're an exempt employee, you're not exempt employee, you're not exempt from the Fair
Labor Standards Act. Overtime is every hour after 40 hours you work in a week, you get paid one and
a half times your salary. And that is to compensate you for working over, and it's really to incentivize
your employer for not making you work over 40 hours, right? Because that's how we've determined is a
standard work week and we want to keep that standard work week.
So I guess the answer is if it's over 40 hours, you are compensating them a time and a half, one, because
they're working over a standard work week, and two, as an incentive to keep you from having people work
over a standard work week. So it's there for both reasons. Well, I appreciate that, because one of the
challenges why we're talking about this line is that during the budget cycle, it was suggested in the
room that overtime is being used for something other than that, that it was a sort of addition to salary.
And I don't want to speak for other counselors, but I know that's why I think
holistically over time or the whole county was looked at at that point to make sure that if we have
structural problems with the job classification and we have department heads that are using overtime
as a means to sort of bump up the salary, that's just not how overtime works. And that's part of the
challenge we're having with this particular line item. But thank you for the clarification. Yes. Thank you.
I do want to clarify. The ordinance says that only certain departments are exempt from the ability to
get overtime. So if you were to offer overtime to the clerk's office, you would have to amend that resolution
to then mirror what the actions are. Okay. Is there any other questions or comments from council?
I've exhausted all, oh, sorry, Councilor. Right, maybe it just doesn't work for your staff, but instead
of cutting the hours from eight to four, we have to remember we're not doing it just to be easy on employees.
We have to remember we're doing this for the public and not all public is going to be available to come
in for early voting before four.
I mean, not everyone's retired. So I would suggest that your office hours should just be different or
split up the ones who are going to stay over. Or do something. Do something, just like you would do
with any other budget. If you've got to figure out how you're going to cover somebody until 6 o'clock
so that voters can actually get in there to vote, that's the point.
then rotate who's going to stay until six or something of the sort. But do whatever you have to do to
make this work. And I think that there's a lot of concern that you will leave here and say to the public,
oh, we can't have this election the way we wanted because they won't give us the money. I mean, that's
what's in your minds, folks. I'm a mind reader.
And that's just not the way it is. The money is there, all you have to do is come when you're out of
money of your appropriations and get another appropriation, just like every other department in this
county. And you've been here long enough, you know how the budgets are supposed to work. Now, I'm not
saying that about you because you're fairly new to this, but you're going to catch on. Marty, I just
want to add on to what you had said.
We have been told that we should try to alternate of who's going to be where and when. The only issue
with that is it has to be a bipartisan team. We have to have a bipartisan team at all times, especially
when we're handling the ballots at the end of the election. Sorry, at the end of each day, especially
at the end of the election. But if I only have two full time employees,
If I'm alternating those two, that means I'm one short on either the D side or the R side. It's two
full time myself and two part time. My part time employees, they are there to help prep and get everything
ready for election day. And they are very busy within that timeframe of them being there that some days
there's not enough time to get done their tasks for that day that
I'm the one that's stepping in and finishing up those tasks or one of my full-time employees is helping
with that task until they're needed over early voting. I also do want to say that there was many of
times that I would stay instead so that they could go home and be with their families, but also there was
some instances where we were at the early voting location way past six o'clock because we were counting
up the ballots and say, for instance, two or three of them got stuck together. We have to make sure
every single ballot from that day is accounted for before we can leave. So that's just one of those
moments where we're not wanting to use overtime as a way to make up for the money that we're not getting
Like I could use me, for example, the next highest paid, I'm the lowest paid election supervisor in
the state. The next one makes $15,000 more than I do. I could be using that as an example. I could be
using that as a, this is why we need overtime, but instead it's to ensure that everything is being done
transparently and legally.
That's where I'm at, and that's where overtime has came into effect. That's why my two full-time people
only occurred, one occurred 59 hours and the other one occurred 57 hours in 2024 for the whole election,
where me, I was at 287, but that's also, we have training that has to be taken care of on weekends and
at nights. That's my overtime of the month of March, the month of February, trying to get everything
prepared and ready.
I mean, trust me, I have two kids at home. I want to be with them, but. I know this is going on long,
but I think you just triggered something I just need to ask. So when I hear all that, my contracting
life, and I don't want to go on about biographies. I know that we do that up here sometimes. But I worked
on contracts where I had to figure out full-time employees. And at what point is 1.25, 1.5, 1.75 somebody
a new person that you hire?
Are you taking on responsibilities that are typically reserved for the voter registration director is
why your, your hours are over. Because we have that position as well. And I guess my question is,
you know, they're in that court brown that's a question to you because you were two hats in this county
and and it's important for us to understand that that second hat voter registration director of those hours.
If we're not using that FTE's time, and we've got three employees that are overburdened and underpaid
from what I'm hearing, I just need to understand how that office is running. Because somewhere we're
losing a human that should be an FTE. We are losing. If we have that many hours of overtime being conducted
by three personnel. We are losing a human. And the people who work in Kylie's position also have an
assistant in other parts of the state. We have tried to come to PAC and get an assistant.
for the election supervisor and to no avail. In addition to the money, as she said, being the lowest
paid in the state, I know that you recall my efforts to try and get more money for the election supervisor.
We also tried to get her an assistant because that's what's done to keep all of this going and have
that extra human.
With all due respect, that wasn't my question. I asked about your second hat that you wear as an employee
of the county as the voter registration director, of which you're compensated above your elected clerk's
salary. So my question is, in that role, those hours, are they being conducted by staff to cover for
time that's not spent in the county? And that's what I'm trying to, I mean, because this is a lot of
person. I mean, Kylie, I will say this and I'm getting a little emotional because I've been a county
employee and there's nothing worse than having your salary laid bare in this room.
Okay, so I just want to honor that. But this is a serious question because we've identified a person
and a half here that in all this conversation, I can't figure out where that human is. So respectfully,
is that voter registration director role, is that work being delegated down to personnel to conduct
that activity in your office? The voter registration role, no. Election, yes. She's out of elections.
I think I'll leave it hanging in the air from there, but thank you, Madam President.
And I guess all of this kind of triggered one more question that I had for that. And then I'll look
to see if other people had any. Because I hear what you were saying, Kylie. But I guess also thinking
about my 8 to 5 job and thinking about if other people aren't available and we kind of get bare bones
in the office,
Is there a way, and I mean this in no disrespect, is there a time where you, Clerk Brown, fill in for
that office since they only have three? Because I feel like I just, I hear what she's saying, and I've
seen the other two employees, and when things happen,
She's has her back against the wall and trying to do everything and y'all just moved offices yesterday
right and so working and you know having you're giving time off to other people and you're staying late
but then you have little people at home too and so that's where that's
I would hope that somebody is helping to fill in for you as well. So I guess my ask is, is there other
people that can come down and help with the situation? Because it sounds like she needs help. And that
absolutely happens. And typically, the chief deputy, we kind of divide and conquer. And the chief deputy
will go down and help with elections where I am more in the office. But I also do send staff from
my office to help take some of the load off of the people who are working there. Are you okay? Who are
working down there? All right. Councilor Decker. I just want to say there's a point where the budget
shark helps the county and then the budget shark
might start eating the people. And I don't know where we're at, but I wanna get us to a little bit of
a resolution if we can. And I say this as a kid who sat inside the justice building at the bottom of
a desk while my mom did anything she could to get transcript money and overtime. And then sometimes
she took on things that really were beyond it. I'm always sensitive to,
our discussions here about over time that at times can get a little bit casual for the reality and the
experience and little ones at home or little ones at a desk or or what have you. And so with that in
mind council I I do think that I think we've heard a lot there's a lot to process we've talked a lot about
the you know how how does that office work through that but I do think that I will offer a motion that
in that line 17 101 on overtime that an amount of $10,000 be inserted and that legal direct resolutions
and anything else that needs to be addressed with that offer that motion.
I'm open to an amended version of that motion. How do I, can I second and then offer to amend or do
I? But in second it and then you would just make another amendment. And I didn't hear a second. I'm
seconding it then. And then I'll make an amendment. Okay. I second it. I would like to amend that to
a total of $5,000.
or you can do a friendly amendment too. I'll accept the amendment. And then it is a friendly thing.
So we got a motion and a second to make a, an open up the line item for overtime for $5,000. Counselor
Hawk. Well, I thought I heard her say for, so I thought she meant the bottom line was going to be 5,000.
The overtime line.
Yeah, and none of the other stuff is on the table right now. It's different, yeah. And so do we know
what you project one half of the year, supposed to be $12,500? Can you repeat that? Sorry. What? Can
you repeat that? I didn't hear you. Sorry. OK. Well, the overtime line they're asking for is for $25,000.
And they've told us this is for a full year.
So one would think that one half year would be one half of that, right? And so yours and what has what
has Sherry been budgeted? Nothing. What has she been budgeted for over time? Zero. So. OK, so you're
saying five.
I mean, I'll go along with that. I just wanted to make sure we weren't doing five on top of another
10 or 15. Okay. Okay. So anybody else have any other questions to the amendment of 5,000? May I just
say one thing? Yeah. I fully expect that comp time will be utilized and then
we can talk about that. Our meeting in June, I believe is June 9th. So let's plan to hear maybe even
just a debrief from you. You can come in and department update as we then, you know, talk about what's
happening. And if you need an agenda item where you make a request, that's fine too. But this allows
you to have some leeway with the overtime line. I never wanted to come across that we do not utilize
comp time.
We do. We can't just utilize comp time and expect people to be good. In fact, they've shared that they
are not and would not be good with that. I also want to add that in June, I will come back in June to
give an update, but we also will be moving to the permanent location in June.
That's another place that we're seeing some of the overtime as well is with trying to get things back
in order for the office to be ready and be prepared for this primary election that we have coming up
very quickly. I mean, even being informed just last week at the election board meeting that we may or
may not have the space for the public review of the ballots and might have to have it actually in this
exact room, which not sure how that will look or go.
As always, my office is constantly trying to make things work with what we have. And there's just a
point in time that it comes to we can't anymore. So thank you. So any other final questions or comments
on this amendment? I have a final comment. Yes, go ahead. I just want you to know that I believe that
you have a great staff.
uh mineral county is very fortunate to have a great staff there i agree and uh so one would not want
uh you to think or the public to think that you're not appreciated uh we're just trying to figure out
a way that the budget works for you just like it's going to have to work for all of the departments
you were not used to having been cut before because oh county hadn't done a good job of doing any budget
cuts for years because we didn't have to
we have to now. Agree. Okay. Any other final comments? All right. Councillor Decker. I'll be quick.
I just want to thank again, the passion towards the election administration that goes on in that office.
And again, I share that on this end, as we go door to door or not door to door, we go hand in hand towards
find the doorknob in a dark room. And we'll get there. We'll stay in touch on that. And let's let's
move forward with this, keep talking, adjust as necessary, whatever that might be, and we'll get there
together. All right, thank you. All right, so I'll go to public comment on this item. This is only for
the amendment on the floor, which we heard. So again, if you have public comment, you can come forward
to the lectern here in the Nightingale room. You'll have up to three minutes and then just state your
name. And we will go to the lectern here.
Good evening, Lisa Ridge, Highway Director. I just wanted to correct a couple statements that were made.
Our guys would have loved it if they would have received over $200,000 in overtime. That is inaccurate.
When I gave a storm report and gave out the numbers, I believe it was $297,000 for the total event.
That's materials, that's equipment, that's gasoline, that's repairs.
That's overtime and it's double time. There is no snow plow bonus paid for that event. The guys have
a contract. They are paid in the month of April, $1,300. That is for being on call 24-7 from December
1st to March 31st. That's four months. And they get $1,300 for doing that in the month of April.
So it is not, they were not paid a snow plow bonus for one storm event. They were not paid over $200,000
in overtime and double time. They would have loved it. And they earn it. They work hard for it. But
that's not how our budget works. They put their lives at risk for it. Thank you very much. All right.
It looks like we have an individual who has a phone number
with their hand raise again will ask that you state your name for the record. Well, I meet yourself
first state your name for the record and you have up to 3 minutes. Hello, can you hear me we can hear
you please state your name for the record you have up to 3 minutes.
Hi, my name is Garrett Figg and I'm a clerk's office employee. Just watching live and I just wanted
to say with the comp time thing versus overtime, with comp time, I think one of the latest things that
I believe the council had done, they put a cap
with the 40 hours and if you go over 40 hours, you can't use any other time until that's back under
a 40 hour thing. And I just felt that that's a bit constricting when it comes to being able to like
use a sick day or use some of your personal time, you would have to use comp time. And in the event
that you left the county or got let go from the county,
you would lose all that personal slash sick time and only be able to take your comp and vacation. So
obviously overtime is much better and comp time's great. It's just one of those things in the meantime,
I just wanted to say that just in support and I really appreciate your guys' time and everything you
do. And obviously the clerk and everything the elections do as well. So thank you all so much for your
time. Thank you. All right.
Is there any other comments from the gallery here regarding the amendment to add the 5,000 for overtime,
either here in the NatU Hill room or via Teams? Raise your hand via Teams. And seeing none, we can do
a voice vote for this amendment, correct? Yeah. Okay. The amendment, yes. Okay.
So all those in favor of voting to approve the 5,000 and overtime signify by saying aye. Aye. All those
opposed, same sign. Okay, motion carries. Okay, so coming back to the overall conversation here, is
there any last minute conversation or questions or comments from council on this item? Yes, Councilor Frydell.
Considering we just heard some discussion about the comp time. I wonder if somebody could reread the
policy we have on comp time for the county. Is that possible? I'm not sure I'm going to reread it because
I'd have to find it but I think he is essentially correct. You can after you're in over 40 hours of
comp time you're required to use that before you can use any other benefit time I think with the exception
of bereavement. So it's a way to
What I said, we no longer have people with over 300 hours anymore. That's one of the big reasons is
how we manage that situation. So he is correct that if once you get over 40 hours, you have to use that
time prior to using any other benefit time. That's in our personnel policy. That's the board of judges,
county commissioners, prosecutor who approved that. All right. Any other comments before we go to the
public on the overall conversation here?
All right. Yeah. Okay. Uh, I'll go Decker and then Wilton, then we'll move on to. All right. So I, two
things I've, two things I've heard this evening is the overall, we had the original overall motion.
We had the amendment to approve the overtime, but those are, they don't seem to be sitting in congruence
with kind of what has been discussed, which is this notion that we
Go robust, primary May as normal and in late May, June around the relocation, come back and figure out
fall for amount needed. And so I think that's got to get reconciled here so that we're not doing something
weird or incongruent with where we've been or where we're trying to go with all this.
Council so I would like to make a motion to zero out the law all the lines in the original request,
except for 17 101 over time which we will keep as amended $5,000.
Okay we got a motion and a second to zero out the line items as presented except for 17-101 which is
the overtime which is what we just approved. Is there any additional questions or comments from council?
Councilor Decker. I would just clarify that that allows unless I'm saying this wrong that allows the
clerk's office to again use within the lines they have move within the lines they have and
for the primary and then in the May, June-ish time around that, we would come back in and look at where
they're at, where they need to be to guarantee the fall at a robust level. I have a question about that.
Are they allowed to move into the overtime line? No, per the ordinance, they have to come back and ask.
So that's all they have to do is make a request to come back and ask to move money in there.
I just wanted to clarify. Okay. Beyond the 5,000. Beyond the 5,000. Beyond the 5,000. Beyond the 5,000,
yes. Okay. So... Okay. Councillor Henry? I'll support the zeroing out. I mean, another way to go would
just be to divide the question, but how are we at there at this point? But I just want to be abundantly
clear. I mean, we seem to have a notional agreement that the expectation is we're going to have a fully
funded 29-poll location election tonight.
And we will talk about it in May. But at that point, I hope that we all walk out of here with
that understanding. Because I think that's my understanding. I think that's the public's understanding
at this point that this is a fully funded infrastructure robust for the primary. And that's where we're
going to be going into the primary. I mean, I'm walking out with that interpretation. If anyone has
some alternative view of that, I'd like to know before we take the vote.
Well, yeah, because I mean, to that regard, look how much time we spent in going back and having the
compromise here. And so I just hope that all of this wouldn't be for nothing if we get to the election
meeting on Thursday and find out that we just sat here and tried to compromise and do everything in
good faith. And then it just went down the drain. I will say that the election board has not looked
at 29 polling locations for this election at all. They've only looked at 22.
and one of those locations did back out, so it would be 21 currently. Again, Madam President, if I may,
just to understand though, I'm walking out of this room with an understanding that we can fund a 29-poll
election with what's here, and I hope that the election board will take it to its 29 or have
that consideration. The budget's here, so I don't know what's holding us up. They don't have to. Obviously,
they don't have to. We're just saying that why would we need 29?
Yeah, we haven't reached out to all of the locations we've only reached out to that list of 22 and have
gotten confirmation from all but one. So then that would be adding the calling the other locations that
had not been contacted. And we're looking at approving this on Thursday in order for us to meet deadlines.
So, okay, point of information, I'm sorry. So in the past, we've had 29 to 31 locations. And so you've
said that you've been reaching out since October to only 22, 21 have been confirmed. We can fund what
we use to a fully, the Monroe County way, the fully funded election that we all expect to have at least
29 poll locations. That's what we've been negotiating all night. So I just wanna be clear on that, because
like that's been, to the clerk's point,
the expectation of the public is to have those locations. If I'm hearing now that, well, at best we've
provided funding for either, but, you know, because one of the arguments was the reduction of this,
right? So the expectation as far as the robust was the 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. as opposed to 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.
It's the early vote. So are we going to come back to talk about the actual election day? Because we
didn't get into sheriffs and judges and clerks and all that.
that wasn't on this agenda. As I said, when I gave the two lists, the 22 and 29 to the election board,
they had moved forward with the 22. Maybe I'll rephrase. My expectation walking out of this room is
that early voting will be the robust eight to six. It sounds like we're still not clear on the staffing
with poll workers for election day and whether that is a full Monroe County way 29 or something less.
And to the election board, both the 22 and 29 with how many workers we would need at every polling location
and the cost of both 22 versus 29 primary and general and full year. So, I mean, moving forward, it'll
just be the election board. Thank you for that. Okay. I have no issue with 29, but I am one of three. Okay.
I just really hope I don't get disappointed in the meeting on Thursday after doing all of this and then
we thought that what we were given from eight to six turns out not to be a unanimous vote. I really
hope that we did not just sit here and go at it for almost over an hour and a half plus.
and tried to compromise and had the amendment and tried to listen to everything and have Ms. Spears
literally pour her heart out here for nothing. So I really, and I'll watch, but I really hope we aren't
getting to, I'm gonna have good faith that that won't happen. I know Positive Patty Jen keeps, that's
my theme. I had it yesterday and I'm still gonna keep having it.
You know, it could have been part of the motion that the 5,000 was in order to cover an eight to six
primary. I mean, put that in the motion so that we don't have to worry about them fussing about it at
the election board meeting. Why should we go, you know, why should we go and be disappointed? Whatever.
I mean, that's,
She could make a friendly emotion or make a friendly amendment, right? Yeah. Well, you've already voted
on it. You would have to like do another motion because you're right. You're right. You're right. There
could be a new motion. We had it. So originally we did. No, we did the 5,000. We're on the overall overall
right now. Right. And there was a motion to zero out all lines except for the overtime line.
that's where we're at right now so somebody can do a general okay so yeah i'll just do counselor decker
i don't know if you might be knowing where i'm going but go ahead i move that in addition to the lines
as they have been adjusted in the amendment and that was adopted in the overall second amendment that
took the other lines down to zero with the understanding that council and clerk's office will revisit
may or june
I would add to that, the sentiment of this council, we do this with the understanding that robust primary
includes early voting hours of 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Second. All right. Any clarification from council? Any
questions, comments or concerns? I think it's been banged out enough. Okay.
Any public comment on this item? You can come forward to the lectern here in the NETU Hill room on the
overall or on the motion or on the amendment to have an eight to six early voting time frame. You can
come forward to the lectern here in the NETU Hill room or raise your hand via Teams. I'm graduating
from Clearwater appropriately speaking now. So I'm happy to hear that we're going to have an eight to
six election. That's really important.
And I think we should also be thinking about other contingencies that might happen, that might need
a lot more money. This is gonna be a, we could have ICE at these elections. And we have to prepare for
that kind of, what are we gonna do if ICE comes to the election polls and tries to stop people from
voting? And what I think is the November election starts the day after the primary.
because everybody's gonna be thinking about it. And I think the election board and everybody's gonna
have to really start thinking about what we are going to do. Todd Rokita has given all of our voting
records to the federal government. How many people are not on voter rosters anymore? How many people
are gonna be surprised when they go to vote in the primary and their name is not on that list? I think
this is something we have to think about.
And I think it's critical that we think about it now and plan for what we're going to do. It's,
and you know, when I was thinking about budgeting, I can't really, and I understand your nervousness
about not getting the money now. I can think, well, I hope I'm going to have enough to pay, I hope I'm
going to have to have enough to pay all my bills. I have to have more than hope.
And so hearing you all say that you're going to give this money, I really hope you do because, and we
may need more than what's being asked for. So thank you. All right. Looks like we have somebody next.
Again, state your name for the record and you'll have up to three minutes. Oh, yep. Thank you.
Can you hear me? Yes. My name is Susan Brackney. Thanks for the opportunity to address you. I think
this is going to surprise some of you, maybe. I hope not, but I think it might. This is not business
as usual. This goes well beyond just making sure folks in Monroe County have access to early voting
and extended polling hours.
is now in a full-fledged authoritarian slide. Historians, political scientists, and even the NGO Human
Rights Watch all agree our upcoming elections are gonna be one of the only opportunities we have left
to shore up democracy itself.
It will be one of our last chances to restore some much needed checks and balances that have been missing.
I'm not the only voter who understands this, and I think voter turnout is expected to be at presidential
election levels for primary and the whole enchilada, really. I see this as a legitimate emergency, like
a hurricane, or it's not your usual day-to-day thing.
one that deserves not just ample funding, but also extra planning and preparation. And to that point
before, what if DHS sends their masked ice squads to protect the polls? We need plans put in place to
manage this contingency and ensure the vote is not suppressed. We probably should have some kind of
voter intimidation reporting
Pipeline in place and and have that be stress tested beforehand before it's needed. I hope we don't
need this stuff I really I really hope we don't but it's on my mind It's also worth noting that the
old Napa building doesn't even exist anymore and there will be a new location to figure out and and
there are many many many candidates running like more than normal as I understand it
The other thing is some laws have changed that will probably lead to confusion and maybe some anger
at the polls, like the student ID stuff. There are students who maybe are used to using that and now
they're going to find out you can't. What are they going to do? Finally, if the ironically named Save
America Act passes,
voter roll purges and new ID restrictions will throw up some extra barriers, especially for women who've
changed their names and that kind of thing. So how many previously eligible voters will show up at the
polls only to discover they've been disenfranchised? Oh, here's your provisional ballot. You know, that's
a bummer. But that also adds friction to the system. And it's already a pretty strange system from what
I'm hearing. So I guess I would just say,
All of this is going to be extra complex at an absolutely critical point in our nation's history. And
that is your time. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Are there any other takers here for public comment
on this item? You can again, raise your hand via Teams or come to the podium here in the night you whole room.
My name is Tanner Dale Branham. I just want to make a comment in support of the additional funding,
particularly in this amendment. I just, as others have said, this is a very important election, and
it's important that we maintain our full early voting hours. And additional funds to support the overtime
is very important. I trust that the council will make the best decision balancing your desire for a
successful election and your fiscal responsibility. So yeah, thank you very much.
Thank you. All right. I'll go to teams, because it looks like we have somebody who has their hand raised
by the name of Sally Ledzinger. So if you can unmute, officially state your name for the record, you'll
have up to three minutes. Hi. My name is Sally Ledzinger.
I would just like to encourage you to flex a little bit with this budget to give assurances to all voters.
You've said that the clerk's office has enough to get by, but confidence requires at least an impression
of abundance. And you've said that you have to be accountable to the public and mentioned that
that the Sheriff's Office and other departments have union representation, but I'd encourage you to
please consider the registered voters of Monroe County to be members of the most important coalitions
of this county. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Any last minute takers again, going okay. And if there
are more, you can go ahead and start lining up and come into the podium here.
Good evening. I'm Penny Githens. I serve on the election board and I've always supported the eight to
six hours with this. And I had the impression at a recent election board meeting and perhaps my impression
was wrong, but I had the impression that Mr. Shields also supported those hours because of the convenience
to voters. And so I hope that Thursday will turn out the way that those of us in this room hope it will.
But also it is also my impression
that the training hours do not have to coincide with the hours that the clerk's office is open, and
that is not, I'm not sure, but I do not think that takes a unanimous vote, and there's also a trainer
who's responsible for that, that is B, so that not all the responsibility falls on Ms. Ferris, and that
is in a different line item, it's not even in the election.
board budget for that kind of thing. So anyway, I thank you for all the time and that you've devoted
to this. I hope that this is a compromise that will work for people that we get the hours that we need
for the voters of this county. It's what they deserve. Thank you. Thank you. Any other public comment
on this item?
will the screen name of Hillary please unmute yourself and you'll have up to three minutes. State your
name for the record and you'll have up to three minutes. Hi, thank you for letting me speak. My name
is Alda Hillary and I appreciate that the council is vocalizing support for the full eight to six voting
hours and that you put that in the record. I understand that it's hard to trust that the money will
be there in the future if you don't have it in your hand.
I want to emphasize the first two speakers' points about the tenuous nature of these upcoming elections.
And so I won't repeat what they said, but I fully am concerned about that. I'm also concerned that the
new location is going to create a lot of confusion for the public. I am a
high consumer of local news. And I only just found out this week where the new location is. And so that's
very concerning to me, that that's not being publicized. In one of Dave Askin's kind articles, he noted
that funding was denied for actually publicizing the new location. And so, as a communicator myself,
I find that really a problem, because the public is having a hard time paying attention because of the
firehose of things that are coming at them. And so I think we will need
need to be very targeted in letting them know where to go. And then I'm also concerned that if this
is the north end of the showers building, those parking lots are traps. So if we do have ice coming
to those buildings, people that are there voting are going to be trapped in those little parking lots.
And that is a real concern for me. So I think logistically, you need to think about how you're going
to protect your constituents. So thank you for the opportunity to speak. Thank you.
All right, any other questions or I'm sorry, any other comments rather from the public on this item?
I see another hand raised, nope. Anybody here in the NatU Hill room? And I guess I'll just do this as
a point of clarification here. We originally said no to those things because there was a budget,
There was no need for that because it was already in like the response that were there. So to be clear,
the council did not deny funding for advertisement because there was already money in that budget. And
in the spirit of conversations that we've said so many times tonight, departments such as the clerk
can always come back and ask for additional appropriations should you need it.
However, at the time, it was not needed because it was not spent. So I just want to clarify that for
the public comment. All right, now that we've gotten that, we need to vote on the amendment. So I'm
going to ask for a roll call vote on this one, please. Can we restate what it is we're voting on? Yes,
I'll have Michelle do that. Thank you. I'll do the best I can. So this is a motion to zero out all account
lines except for the account line
17101, which is overtime that is set for $5,000. It's not to zero out those lines in the budget to clear
clarify request. Yeah, that has been presented. Yeah, that was also but that was no because we with
Councilmember Decker that was to add the eight to six.
Yeah, I haven't got there yet. Oh, I'm so sorry. That's OK. I'm sorry. That's OK. I thought we got there.
Sorry. And then, OK, so this is just to zero out the additional appropriation account lines that had
been presented by the clerk, except for the $5,000 of the overtime line, and that to ensure that this
is to have a robust, robust
primary with the voter early voting being scheduled from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. yes so is everybody clear
and with that amendment okay all right oh and also that the legal will prepare an amendment to the overtime
ordinance that was part of the okay so is all of that clarification maybe please have a roll call
Councilor Henry. Oh, I'm sorry. Hi. We're in the middle of a roll call vote on the amendment. So are
we after that? Yeah. I mean, we can come back for the overall word. It's on the amendment here. Sorry.
Sorry. Councilor Henry. Yes. Councilor Decker. Yes.
Councilor Crossley? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Hawke? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Motion on
the amendment passes unanimous. Okay. So now we come back to the overall, but there's really not anything
to do because there is no, we've already done what we needed to do to satisfy that.
But so I'm sorry, did you have public comment? Cause we were asking for public comments. So I wasn't
sure. I'm sorry. Oh, okay. I'm so sorry. I missed you. So I will, as the chair, I will allow you to
have three minutes to have public comment. And then we will move on from this since we already voted.
So if you want to come up and quickly make your comment. Hi, my name is Jana Perot.
And I agree with previous comments that this could be a disruptive election. It could be disruptive.
It could be sabotaged. And I'm hearing from these people that they're already almost overworked, that
they can't almost get their jobs done now. How are we coping with what these other issues
that may arise. There needs to be planning. There needs to be people and money dedicated to thinking
about what we can do to protect our election. I think that's just absolutely necessary to do that. We're
a little blue dot in a red state. So we're going to be targeted if there's any targeting going on. So
we need to think about that and we need money
and we need people, experts, people who care to make sure that we actually have the election robust
that we want. Okay, thanks. Okay, so now that we have exhausted all of that and we are now done, thank
you very much. Thank you, thank you, thank you. We look forward to watching your meeting on Thursday.
Did somebody have a clarification? Yes, Mr. Cockrell.
When you say you're done, you mean you're ready to vote on the overall motion because we've only voted
on amendments so far. Right. Yes. Right. Yep. Right. We're done with the amendments. That's what I was
saying. Thank you. So this is for the overall vote on the final decision of the additional appropriations,
which is a total of $5,000 only in the overtime line.
Councillor Deckard. Yes. Councillor Crossley. Yes. Councillor Feidl. Yes. Councillor Hawke. Yes. Councillor
Wilts. Yes. Councillor Henry. Yes. Motion passes unanimous. All right. Thank you very much. Have a good
night. All right. Next up is item B from the Youth Services Bureau.
As a reminder, this item was tabled from the January 27th meeting and moved to approve the Youth Services
Bureau's request and fund 4100-0000 donations, youth shelter, to create account lines 21110, shelter
resident supplies,
3-0 supplies and two three zero zero three grounds and simultaneously approve an additional appropriation
of $2,500 in the supplies category Second all right. We got a motion in this second, and I'm gonna look
to miss Woodruff for this item hello So this is pretty straightforward. They're just wanting to use
their donation funds that have been given to them and Just let me know okay
Council, do you have any questions on this particular item? I should not call for the vote. Okay.
All right. Nobody? Anybody, Bueller? Okay. So no questions on this item. We're gonna go to the public.
Since everybody really wants to come talk about this item, you can come forward to the lectern here
in the Net-U-Hill room or raise your hand via Teams. And seeing none.
in a dark room here. May we please have a roll call vote? Councillor Deckard? Yes. Councillor Crossley?
Yes. Councillor Henry has left the meeting for the moment. Councillor Feidl? Yes. Councillor Hawke?
Yes. Councillor Wills? Yes. Motion passes five to zero unanimous. All right.
moving this county council train going, we will go to new business and we will go back to the coroner
here. Council, I move to approve the coroner's request and fund 1000-0007 County General Coroner to
create account lines 17801 part-time and simultaneously approve an additional appropriation of $8,612
in the personnel category. Second. All right, we have Mr. Hall joining us again. Thank you for your
patience. Yeah, thank you for having me back. And you may go ahead and get started. Sure. So this is
just to get this new account line established for the newly elected part-time position for my office.
Since there's not an existing account line, this would need to be established so that I could get this
individual paid. And then as Kent pointed out to me,
FICA also needs to be covered just because it is a paid position as well. All right. Questions or comments
from council? What have you? This is a part-time. There's no other benefits available. Correct. Yes,
ma'am. Other ones? Seeing none. And we have Mr. Henry back in the building.
All right, so public comment would say you on this item, you can come forward to the lectern here, raise
your hand, be your teams. And seeing no takers, may we please have a roll call vote. Councillor Crossley?
Yes. Councillor Feidl? Yes. Councillor Hawke? Yes. Councillor Wilts? Yes. Councillor Henry, would you like to
Stand thank you. I wasn't in the room. Yes. Motion passes 101 or sorry. Five to zero one abstain.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you counselors. You're very welcome. Next up on at the table coming to the
table is the highway department. So I will be combining items. BNC.
into one motion. I move to approve the highway department's request and fund eight one seven six zero
zero zero zero eagles and bridge number nine twenty two to de appropriate account line three seven four
one one construction of eight hundred fifteen thousand six hundred sixteen
and 92 cents and simultaneously approve a fund to fund transfer of cash of eight hundred fifteen thousand
six hundred sixteen dollars and ninety two cents from fund eight one seven six dash zero zero zero zero
eagles and bridge number nine twenty two to fund one one three five dash zero zero zero zero cumulative
bridge second all right we got the fearless miss lisa ridge back good evening
So actually, if you've read the narrative, we took over this project. Actually, we were reached out
by NDOT a couple years ago. IU actually owned this bridge. It needed replaced. If we took over
the construction for this project of 20%, then they, NDOT, stepped up and helped fund 80% of our karst
farm trail extension that we completed. So we did that deal. So we were set, the bridge went to letting
on the middle of January, our local match at that time would have been just under a million dollars.
We were prepared, we had it budgeted to pay that. I think it was January 16th, NDOT called me on a Friday
and asked if I knew how the letting went and I did. And they were going to go ahead and lower our match
to about 3% instead of the 20%.
and they were gonna fund the rest of it through a transportation bill. They saw that Monroe County had
stepped up, took on the project. We didn't have to, but they wanted to go ahead instead of utilizing
that money and spreading it out amongst three bridge projects across the state, they just went ahead
and sent it all to Monroe County. It just goes to show the relationship that we have with NDOT. They
didn't have to do that. I would have never even known the money was there. I was prepared to pay my match
It also just goes to show that all of our projects aren't 80-20 split. They're not always 90-10. So
it can change in a heartbeat from just one phone call. So that's why we're doing these transfers and
putting the money back into Cume Bridge for our other, like Rockport Road is going to Leading tomorrow.
So that's why we're back to move it back. Congratulations.
All right. Look at you. All right. Any questions or comments? Councilor Decker. I just want to praise
Lisa Ridge on this. Not me. It's a team. It is a team, but it's got good quarterback. And everybody
knows around here these days that a good quarterback can go a long way. And I'll just make this comment.
I've said this probably about five or six years now. Not all of us call up to Indianapolis and get what we want.
And Lisa Ridge not only gets a lot for the people that we represent, but she gets it.
in style and this is you know when I was first looking at this I was thinking you know all the things
we've done what a good gamble it pays off it's not a good game when you have good people and they run
the play so thank you for all that and all the stress and also like our election director for the passion
that you bring into your job that you care about our you know when we see that it just it makes me feel
better as a taxpayer and as a person on this side trying to figure out how to help you.
I have to say, if any county in the state gets as much help as we do, it is only because they have cloned
Lisa Rich and moved in there. You don't have a clone. Because she really has made, you do. I mean, everybody
knows you at the state and if you ask for something, they know you figured it out and you'll make it work.
And I can remember the time that we weren't real sure we would be able to get a lady in that member
when she got that job and she did and she's rocked it. But with the help of all her great team, because
she likes to say that she didn't do it on her own. Her team did it. So congratulations. Thank you. And
I just want to stay for the record.
After tonight, I definitely would like a clone of Lisa Ridge. That's all I have to say. So, that being
said. Any other questions or comments from council? Seeing none, we'll go to public comment. You can
come to the lectern here in the room or you can raise your hand via Teams. So funny. And seeing also
none, maybe please have a roll call vote. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Councilor Feidl, would you like to?
I know enough information. Yes. Councilor Wilkes. Yes. Councilor Henry. Yes. Councilor Deckard. Yes.
Councilor Crossley. Yes. Motion passes unanimous. All right. Stay in with the Highway Department. Let's
roll on down to Highway D. I mean, item D. Really hard.
So I moved to approve the highway department's request and fund one one three five dash zero zero zero
zero cumulative bridge for an additional appropriation of six hundred three thousand seven hundred ninety
seven dollars in the services category. This project was awarded last summer but actually we put the
project off due to the city having a project in that area. We didn't want to have too many detours and
too many road
roads closed. So we put our project out into the 2026. So we didn't budget for it back in the summer
because we thought we might have had it done. So this is just to appropriate the project that's already
been awarded for the bridge replacement. And this is the area by Jackson Creek Middle School.
That's right. OK. I thought that was a headache over there. But yeah. All right. And you'll be a headache
again. I mean, it's OK. It's OK. It's all right. So.
Any questions or comments for Ms. Ridge on this item? Seeing none. Public comment, yes. If you have
it, come forward to the elector here or raise your hand via Teams. I'm slap happy after tonight.
All right, and seeing none, maybe please have a roll call vote. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Councilor Wilts?
Yes. Councilor Henry? Yes.
Councillor Deckard? Yes. Councillor Crossley? Yes. Councillor Feidl? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. Thank
you very much. Have a good night. Now we are next up on the amended portions, which was item A, which
is the transit conversation. So I will look to Councillor Deckard for that. Hi, council.
perhaps not the best person to talk about this, but again, in the spirit of this evening, want to do
something so that we avoid any any bad things happening in this community. And some of you may recall
last year or in the last year, we were able to support through ARPA dollar use. I believe I've got that
100 percent right. An expansion, I think for the first time of the county in the
the public transit system, specifically with Bloomington Transit. We were able to support Route 13 that
is a pattern that goes between the city of Bloomington and Monroe County destinations, specifically
Ivy Tech, Park 48 Businesses, and obviously as that area continues to expand into
26 with the Westgate housing complex and centers expansion, we will continue to see additional development
there. But the point being is that the county match needs to be fulfilled in order to continue that
route. And we have heard from Bloomington Transit that unless the county commits to that,
The transit will not be able to continue that route past, I believe it's March 3rd. I may be wrong on
that day, but it's early March. Transit's having two meetings this month to discuss this. But I think
that, you know, if I were a wagering person, transit's looking over the county to kind of step up. The
commissioners worked with us on this expansion in the past with ARPA. They've indicated through
Commission President Julie Thomas, that it's to council to figure this out. We can't appropriate tonight
because we're not following the law and guidelines for an appropriation, but it is my recommendation
that council consider at our next meeting an appropriation out of ED lit. Am I saying?
You wouldn't be able to appropriate it at the next meeting. So it would be. It has to be 10 days. Yeah,
it would be March the 10th that we appropriate the March 10th meeting or early as possible in appropriation
to fund that with our Bloomington Transit partners. The amount that I have on that maybe transit will
correct this if I have it wrong.
is one hundred and seventy seven thousand eight hundred eighty five dollars. And I know that right now
we're in a time period between what. I had that email and I it's that was this year's number and it
had gone up slightly I think it's a it's around a hundred eighty four for next hundred eighty four around
that thank you.
While these are not ideal times with our fiscal uncertainty, as has been said numerous times, the only
way back for us is putting people into work, putting people into education to get to work, and getting
families kind of moving about the county. As I often say, there's probably more transit in our future
than less. I don't know how it goes backwards, and I think the county
we need to do our part on this and not lose the route. There's been some arguments out there that route
usership is small, but I want to point out that they had 12,857 passengers. Now, I don't know how many
among the populace makes up that role, but that's 12,857 trips going to a place that needed to go to.
And we have heard repeatedly from Ivy Tech and the folks on the west side
that getting people out to these areas, which are one of our highest or developing highest job centers
and particularly in the life science is crucial. So my recommendation to council is that we jump in
here with a robust commitment to transit. We certainly cannot do that tonight, but I think that this
is an example where council needs to lead. Commissioners have said that it's up to council to figure
that out. To me, that council's got to lead here and point that way.
and I'll be quiet at that. And seeing that we are at a bare minimum for quorum here. No, no, no, we're
still good. We got it. So, Councilor Henry. Thank you for bringing to our attention. Of course,
you know, I think we just went through an hour and a half of talking about scrutiny of line items and
budgets. And so I'm trying to wrap my head around some stuff. So, Councilor Decker, you said 12,857
trips. Yes. Divided by 365 days. Yes. Divided by
Roundtrippers is roughly 17 and a half people a day, is that? I don't know, that's your math. I assume
you're right. I mean, because it's trips versus humans, right? So I think it's trying to figure that
out. Look, I live on the west side, I get it. And of course, I'm hopeful for development out our way,
but that requires some significant work of the Planning Commission to start doing such a thing. But
in the meantime, yeah, things are moving out there. I guess my question is, this is ARPA funded, right?
So that was 2021, 22. Why wasn't this brought up during our budget cycle to try to get an appropriate
line? This had to be like we knew the bus was coming in, I guess, to use the metaphor. I'm just trying
to get my head around why now and not back in October when we assumed that funding would dry up. I think
you've expressed a sentiment that I agree with. I think traditionally things work better on these parts.
when a department is bringing the item before us. And as you can tell from that table right there, that
table is blank. It's not normal, I think, it's not normal for someone to say council has to figure it
out. So for example, if the clerk would have said tonight in her office, council's gotta figure this
out and kind of just lob the ball, not anywhere, we probably would have a lot of angry people over there
not doing anything. But the commissioners have,
indeed done that. And we have had occasions where we've had to kind of step into the role and say, here's
how life's going to be or not be. And I think this is one of those times for that. It would normally
come under a budget, but we didn't get it in that. Well, that's fair. I'm just trying to understand
that you mentioned there's an email. Can we get the correspondence on that? All I have on this in full
disclosure is email from
Cook a group and Ivy Tech about it. I've not heard anything from county is that something that can be
shared with all of us, whatever the correspondence was. So we can all get a look at it. I might not
have it but I just have stuff from outside partners. You want it displayed right now or either way but
I mean it just nice to look at what we're looking at.
Um, so the edit, did you mention, so, so the edit requires an amendment from the commissioners to, because
we just went through that whole process with using the edit for the jail. Mr. Cockrell, is that the
intention of the commissioners to amend the edit plan to allow for 180,000? I believe that plan already
includes funding. For this? For transit. Yes. Was this the intent of that? Because I mean, I know when
we were editing the plan, if you will, I don't remember if that was the intended use was this line for
this particular line. Was that?
I'm not a commissioner or council person, but I think it fits the category. I mean, it would either
be for this or something with rural transit. I think we left it fairly open. I'm only asking because
I remember how long it took us to get our appropriation and then the edit plan amended. There's a little
back and forth there, so if it sounds like it's already in
appropriate use of the edit. It really just sounds like the appropriation. Is that your interpretation,
Councilor Decker? It's just the appropriate? Yeah. And in fact, when I began to get worried about this
not coming to us, I verified with legal that this would fit in the edit plan, and they indicated it
would by the amount. Is it OK to share the correspondence from Bloomington Transit with the body so
we have it? I mean, just send the email to everybody. It's been sent. Thank you. That's it. It sounds,
I mean, it's one of those things where, look,
buses are subsidized, that's how we do transit, right? I mean, it's not, we're not gonna make money
back on this, but it probably takes a very long time to get the culture around taking a bus through
Whitehall on the way to Ivy Tech there, so yeah, it's gonna take time to grow it, it'll probably take
time to get that ridership up. I appreciate it, yeah, thank you. Councilor Wilts. Can someone clarify
for me, because I don't think we've been running this route for,
Five years. It's one year. So it's only, we only have one year of ridership. That's not long to test
out, you know, whether or not this is something that the people will climb onto. And yet it sounds like
it's a regular, a regularly used route by at least some people.
We heard that with the North Park, the failed North Park proposal that it takes a while to plan a bus
route. And then because there's years of planning for what that route looks like and where you stop.
And then once the bus is live, then people start using it. So I guess maybe that's really quite like
it might not be a question of matters tonight, but was ARPA funding used for the planning and preparation
of the route, like to think through stops and acquisition of service or is it just we just it just started
going and.
Sorry, that's okay. Yeah, I appreciate it. Okay, that's it. I think it was a route that we just extended,
right? To go out beyond city limit. Yes, because it was to go to Ivy Tech. Yeah. That was the big thing
is that we didn't have anything that goes to that area and everybody was asking for it and such. So,
yeah. This is, I mean, I'm sorry, may I please? Go for it. Go for it.
Sorry, I'm blocked. This is a discussion. Go for it. That went out the window earlier. If I may.
Go for it. I think this is I agree that public transit is something that we provide and we subsidize
because it is a public good, especially when this one in particular is
I think long overdue, it should have been in place years and decades ago with Ivy Tech being out there.
So I really, I am very supportive of offering this. And I think in a couple of years, funding mechanisms
are gonna be so different that it almost doesn't matter, but for the good of the order, I think it would
be delightful if there was
more communication and support across governmental sectors, quasi-governmental bodies, but also private
and educational institutions on how we can better find efficiencies in these, in public transit
in particular. So I've said that, with all the changes coming, those conversations maybe will be timely.
Generally, I support this. I thank you for bringing it up. Yeah. And of course, yes, thank you to Councilor
Decker to bring this up. But I don't think this should be incumbent upon you as a council member to
have to bring this up. You know, I am thinking about a lot of things that we've gone over the past few
weeks and in particular yesterday. You know, we have department updates for items not on the agenda
for a reason.
And that would have been a fine opportunity for, you know, our commissioners or at least someone from
the commissioner's office to come and speak with us about this very item. It also makes me think too
that as Councilor Wilts was saying, you know, the across
across Kirkwood and Morton Street that we would have these types of conversations as well because I
as council president was not privy to These conversations until it was brought up. So I appreciate counselor
Decker doing that but it should be incumbent of other people who are not in this room and who were once on the
Teams link here but seem to have dropped off so we get asked to explain ourselves oftentimes I think
this would be a fun time to ask for other folks to explain as well also I think to.
you know, to that point of, you know, low ridership, I think it would be a great, I'm curious to know,
like, what is the advertisement of letting people know that there is a bus route? As a mom of a child
that goes to Ivy Tech, my kid didn't even realize that there was a thing besides me having to express
to her, get out the house, go catch the bus and go to,
campus instead of being at home. So, you know, I'm very curious to know how we are getting that information
out, how is Transit working and how could they work with us to make sure that we get that advertisement
out to let people know that this is a big thing. People were talking about this for years, even before
I was on council. And so this would help tremendously to get the word out and spread so that we could
get that ridership up.
So I appreciate the discussion here. Yes, Councilor Decker. One thing I just would add to this is, look,
I want to make sure that we're doing everything we can to keep that route. If I've got to go, you know,
paint somebody's fence to get that done, we'll do it. Also, though, we are still, and this has come
back to us a few times, we're still dependent upon, you know, the realities that
If there's an MOU involved in this for a new year or the last one expired, we need commissioners also
to adopt that. And so I would just ask that as this moves forward, everybody with good nature and good
heart moves forward on the route because these are people that need access to route services. And the
way life is for a lot of things, the county, the city,
the towns, fire protection, townships, definitely, transit, all that between now and wherever we're
going in four to five years. There's like a bookend and who knows what's in the middle, but I suspect
the bookends are a little different. I think we're gonna have to lean on each other through that period
and even some awkwardness. I know this is much later than transit would like it.
But we need them to do it. We want commissioners to agree with it if the appropriation passes. And it
sounds to me like folks have that sentiment here. So I'll be quiet. Thank you for that. Councilor Hawke.
Right. So obviously I missed the beginning of this conversation.
I wonder if we have looked at, can we draw this? I don't know what the, is there a motion on the floor?
No, it's just a discussion. I just remember a time when at the, just last year, I think, that at the
state house that they wanted the commissioners to support allowing Ellisville to have their,
what would be their portion of the food and beverage tax that is collected in that area to be used for
transit. Oh, but the commissioners didn't want them to do that. But they don't mind using public dollars
for transit. I don't mind using public dollars for transit. But I mean, maybe the commissioners could
work with the food and beverage money.
certainly Representative Mayfield did all she could to try to help get real transit dollars. And this
county would not help her. So I'm just, I just had to throw that in. I think it's a part, it's all transit.
But the other thing is, and maybe you've already discussed the fact that with Senate bill one, the point
two, have you already discussed that? I alluded, but no.
Well, anyway, we know that it's right now until they change it because they were discussing it just
today and yesterday about being changed and people from the city, not our city, but just the city. They
were just like, oh, crap, they're all going to go broke and whatever. But the representative from the
counties was saying, you can work well with the cities, but
Sounded me like what she was suggesting. We would do it like more like on a one time like it as you
were saying like a contract or something so that was not permanent would not be expected to be permanent
because We know that that point to has to be for the library the Bloomington Transit for the townships and
What am I leaving out? Anyway, and we might not even be able to do point two. We might have to do point
one because the total between the county and the city cannot be more than 2.9. So I don't really know
what they're going to do about Bloomington Transit, but the county cannot take on Bloomington Transit
permanently because we'd have to do it in part of our 1.2.
even if we get that, because AAM wants us not to have 1.2. So I'm just throwing it out there. This is
not something that's going to be fixed tonight. If I may. But you know, Marty, you watch all that up
there closer than we do. You have more influence with some of those folks than some of us do. I would
suspect it's all right every once in a while to tell them
It's not the state driving that bus. It's not the state responding to these homes. It's not the state
sitting in here right now trying to figure out this in this madness on what they're doing. I mean, we're
ripping each other apart just trying to get two people on a bus and then make sure there's a pyramid.
We still need to get more ambulances in this county, but I don't know where those dollars will come.
And so for any of us that have any influence with that on our friends up there,
This is where government actually happens and schools where kids get educated. And so some of this folks
may have to ease up a little bit on the sugar or the miles they're traveling on these changes because
literally we are not going to be able to do certain things that have got to get done. And I just offer
that kind of frustration. I said, feel like sometimes we watch them like it's tennis. These are people's
lives here.
and I just offer that. But if I just throw this in here because I heard you mention ambulances and because
that is part of what we're working on with the legislative group is to get emergency EMS covered under
that point four that's for fire and EMS so that we and that it would be able to go to the county to
help with ambulance services. Anyway, I'm sorry.
sort of interrupted your bus transit. I mean, that's part of the discussion. So you're fine. It's OK.
All right. Any other discussions related to transit? This will be an item on our March whatever agenda,
and it'll be presented to us by ourselves.
All righty. Just clarify. Thanks. All right. Well, moving on to the 10B, which is the, I wanted to open
up a conversation to allow people to have thoughts after our joint meeting yesterday. What say you,
you autocrats? Sorry.
I'm sorry, I'm just saying. I told you I was slap happy. Okay, so I'll just say the reason why I say
that is because there was a comment that was made during our meeting yesterday where we were addressed
as being autocrats. And so when you look up the definition of that, that basically means that we took no
No input from anybody at all. And I take issue with that because I think we did our due diligence. We
did everything that we needed to do. And no is no. And it was a unanimous no. But again, we have a deadline.
And instead of folks going back and trying to figure out what we did,
and how we got to the point in October. I just hope that we can move forward with trying to get towards
the finish line, because again, April 15th is coming. So again, it's coming, but I think the progress
has to be made and we have to continue to move forward. And I will continue to say that it is kinda
disappointing that we continue to keep bringing up North Park as a thing and no other options.
or options that are being brought that seem to just kind of be dismissed as well. I just really think
that we really need to look at what we already have and continue to move forward. I think that is progress.
And that's all I'm going to say about that. And I'm going to look to my council and I already saw Councilor
Hawk moving. So you go. Yes. This is something that
We're all getting gray hair. Mine's growing out. Underneath this? Talking about the jail. And it seems
that the other partner doesn't want to listen to us. Or maybe they think they can talk long enough and
we will get tired and just give in. But it seems to me, but see, I'm afraid every time I open my mouth,
say anything, I'll lose my
I know what my point is, but I don't want to lose it. Don't want to lose votes for it. I'm just saying,
if we make it clear to them, let's look at, give them two options. Right now, I'm thinking the two options
is probably Fullerton and Thompson. I don't know. Give them whatever, two. And then say, commissioners,
which of those two will you go for? Then we have made a decision.
They can't make a decision. Let them talk to Mr. Faulk. We've done our part. I mean, that's negotiation.
You know, when you get ready to sell real estate and you've showed them five houses, then you say, let's
get that down to what's your top two. And then let's do the Ben Franklin T-clothes. Over here is all
the reasons why you would, all the reasons why you wouldn't make a decision.
I would have made a dime selling real estate if it took me five years to get somebody to buy a piece
of property. This is ridiculous. Great, thank you. I agree with you. You are spot on, as the kids say,
clocky. All right, Council Henry. Thank you, Madam President. I really want to say first, I appreciate
those that were able to be at that meeting and speak your mind there and representing us at the table.
You know we have a habit and maybe this is inside baseball but folks should know that you know a lot
of these meetings are scheduled around the availability of one person and we all kind of have to schedule
around it so Mondays are when I teach, I guess I'll just have to tune in from class but I'm glad you
all were able to handle that.
In my observations, I agree a lot with what Councilor Hawks said. I mean, in a resolution that we start
to define what it is the council's tolerance is, locations are one thing, price point is another. And
I gotta say, my reaction to listening to some of the commentary, especially from those that are not
elected in this county and don't answer to voters directly, is a seeming idea that we have infinite
resource. And I know I'm a little more pedantic up here than most, I'm in the Excel sheets,
trying to get us on votes here. But the truth is that those of us that went to AIC last two weeks ago,
we sat in a meeting that talked about future projections for what our local income tax will look like.
It is my belief that what we got and what's coming in the next two or three years was an estimate that
50% of the local income tax, half of our local income tax moving forward will be required to keep us
revenue neutral in the county. That means not raising taxes but maintaining our budget as we have it,
just half of the lit there.
Now, FSG's last numbers that they gave us before SB1, before all of this, suggested that we would need
0.41 of the 1.2% to fund the debt service, which is roughly like 38% at that point. So we're now up
to 88% of our LITs going to bond debt service and funding the county government, which leaves us, I
like key lime pie, this is a real thin slice at this point, of trying to figure out over 20 years,
how we deal with cost of living adjustment, inflation, and any other projects that pop up like
what we've heard this evening, a desire for things like an emergency medical service for the county,
or potentially due to the decisions of the Supreme Court today building a Monroe County water system
because we may have challenges connecting to the city of Bloomington in places that will not be annexed.
We have 20 years of forecasting that we have this very small slice to work with. Or, as I think Councilor
Wilts raised during the meeting, I heard you loud and clear on my phone at IU, that what is being suggested
is a tax increase to cover some of this.
We answer to the public on this. And the numbers confuse people. It's all plaid when we're talking about
it. But it's just amazing to hear decision makers in this building not get that there is not infinite
money. And so that takes me back to a resolution that says some of this needs to be in a resolution.
And maybe another analysis from FSG. I mean, our auditor has already projected what some of this cost
could be in the 26 and beyond, so we need that. And to really get back to what this lawsuit was about.
which is capacity and programming and space for recreation. I will say that I said this on social media
and I meant it and I'll bring it up again here. The project at inception, we don't have a shared goal.
In fact, DLZ was selected in a process that was cited by the office with the open data or the open access
counselor is problematic. The selection process from the jump wasn't very clear about the RFQ.
The public has a lot of questions about this. I have people question our autocracy up here. I'm answering,
this is the most democratic thing we've done in the county in a year, is being responsive to voters
in the community that are afraid we can't afford it, or that the choices we're making to expend this
kind of money are not actually keeping our jail empty. If we build it, are we gonna fill it? We don't
have guarantees of that. We have a change management problem. For all those reasons, I think we need
to vote on a thing, we give them the choices, define the terms and parameters, explain that this is
the real budget. I know, Mr. Cockrell, you're in the room. I don't want to put you on the spot, but
you threw out a number, I think, the other night of jail only or small version. I heard you say around
100-ish million. They asked me, and off the cuff, I said 150 million for a jail. And so to that point,
I'll just give it up in a minute, we still have no
No data points or display of the direct versus indirect costs of the facility. If Councillor Iverson
were here, and I will put words in his mouth, he's asked for those since last year. What is the operational
cost? We have speculation about what those will be from people, but that's not accurate. We have no
projection of future cost. We know what it is now, but we expect overruns, and really no understanding
of the impact on the lid at this point.
aiming for what the ACLU is requiring of us is really important to me. But I didn't get to be here to
say all that, but thank you for letting me go a little longer on that. Does anybody, Councillor Decker?
I do, but I think I'll defer to others. I talked a lot about that. Well, we'll go Councillor Fiddle
and then I'll just come back up. All right.
So I didn't talk much yesterday, but I'm really committed to getting something done, but not enough
negotiations to understand the 11th hour principle. I understand we're getting down to the wire.
Not really. April 15th is still a fair amount of time off. And so I think it's a game, in my mind. In
some ways, it's a game. So what does one player or a player
Multitude of players wants what does the other ones want and how can we come together and figure out?
What we can live with together to go on to also appease the public not just the ACLU We have a public
here to appease and they expect us to do all the things that make it important county business work
and so I'm committed to
working together for however long it takes and however many times it takes to get something in place
by April 15th. I just want to go on record and say that publicly. Yeah, thanks. I agree. I'm with you.
I think I said that last night. I'll show up whenever, wherever. Let's work on this. I do have a couple
of, well, I have one specific
question, which is when we ask for information, who are we asking to provide it? Because getting these
operational costs or the transportation-related costs, should we not co-locate? Those are important
things, but if we keep just asking the ether, we're not going to get them.
Something that I took away from last night is that perhaps we need to either have existing staff assigned
to figure this out and present us with information or ask someone else outside of current staff to contract
and provide us information. But I don't think it's coming.
even though we keep asking for it. And so I just, I'm not sure who can advise us on where the best place
to, I mean, I think obviously the sheriff would need to be involved in figuring out operational costs
for his own office, but I don't know that he has the staff capacity to really provide us with that kind
of detail. So I guess I want to acknowledge that
We probably need to be specific and involve specific people to get the answer to that question. Since
I raised this, can I try to take a shot of this? Of course. I mean, we're in a public space. I'm just
going to say what I want to say. This is a project with a project manager that is leading it somewhere.
And I got to say, I can pour, maybe it's in the DLZ very thick book they gave us in February or August.
I can't tell you by name.
The individuals that are making decisions on this path. I know some of them because we see it occasionally
where, you know, county legal may say a thing or the commissioners may say a thing. I couldn't tell,
if a voter asked me, who's really deciding this stuff? I mean, I guess Mr. Gibbons gave us a little
bit of it yesterday when he spoke. But like, where's the list of the five or 10 people that have been
meeting ever since CJRC?
And which who is the person making the decisions about if it is DLC as the vendor that is leading the
project it'd be very nice if we could speak directly with them but that has not been the case for us.
If it is somebody in the commissioner's office that is hosting these meetings and having these weekly
discussions it'd be really nice to know who that individual is. But maybe I missed it somewhere.
And if I did it's possible we get a lot of email. But I couldn't I could not tell the public. These
are the five people that ever since this council in November or October 24 decided on the process to
move forward. Who has been behind closed doors making those decisions. And so to my answer that Councilor
Wilts is I mean I think those individuals would be the people that would produce that information for
us. And if we don't have a workflow or pathway this is one of the reasons why things have to change
across the hall.
But this is a serious thing. We're talking about this project ballooned to a quarter of a billion dollars,
and I don't know where to direct the question. It kind of goes one way and then here, and then we've
been in this room where it's been kind of by revelation. We find out, oh, we're still talking to the
owners of North Park. Oh, we're still doing these things. Councilor Feil's point, you asked for a weekly
report from whoever it is that's behind the door making these decisions.
This is just basic stuff. We do not have a shared understanding of who's driving the bus here. Just
a brief update. And we haven't gotten it. No, nothing yet. So if I sound exasperated, it's because I
am. And that's my only, I mean, I don't know, I mean, I hope that brings some clarity. And no government
project I've ever worked on, do I not know the name of the human being that is making the call on where
we are in the process and where we are in the timeline and where the milestones are and where we are
if we're over or under budget. I don't understand this piece.
So I want it. So that whoever that is, and maybe Jeff or Mr. Cockrell, I don't mean to be any of you.
If you know those humans, could we get that list of people and then perhaps have a conversation with
them at this table to begin the meeting so we can get there? Because that would be helpful. Well, because
also to that point before you go, Mr. Cockrell, no, no, no, that's fine. Because I wrote down in my
notes, we got asked to do the cost risk.
cost assessment of what that would look like if we wanted to do things, particularly in phases. And
I do recall, according to my notes that I have here, it was asked for maybe council staff to do some
of that, and I don't know how that's something that we could do. Like, we got enough going on in our
office, and so I guess, again, to that point, and I guess we look to you, like, yeah, would you like
to answer that?
And I hate to put you on the spot, but I guess I'm going to turn this way. I mean, you act like there's
a group of people who are making all these decisions when really it's Scott or friends at DLC are working
with each department that's affected. You know, the sheriff has a has the transition team that's really
worked a lot on the jail and the sheriff's space. Each of the other departments, the courts, the
prosecutor, public defender, they all had individual meetings with each one of those. And then taking
all that information, DLC comes up with the design. And then they come back and we say, too expensive.
And then they go back to all the departments again and say, hey, what about this? What about that? And
then it gets presented to you and move on. The other question I think you're asking is about the transition
if we didn't do co-location,
Well, up until October, I think everybody just assumed we were going to do colocation. So I don't know
if we ever really worked out dollars and cents exactly what that was going to be. To everybody. I mean,
this is a serious question because you just described a thing here where DLZ does things, but that's
not where we had two meetings on it in February and August. One meeting the commissioners didn't come
to. So somewhere there's who's the we and who's everybody is by name.
When we went through and it started at the CJRC, which during that process, I would ask you to look
at the website and look at the CJRC and go through that. That was kind of a consensus of the sheriff,
the board of judges, the commissioners, and the council that co-location was preferred. I think that's
curious. With all due respect.
Who is picking up the phone from DLZ in this building when they call about adjustments to the schedule,
the plan, where they are in the progress? Is it the county legal? Is it the commissioner, county
administrator? Who's the human that has the direct interface with DLZ? I think Angie Purdy and I have
it. So if that's, then I would say, okay, thank you for that. So now I know where to go with that question.
Okay. I'll go to Wilton, then Decker next. Thanks.
So I appreciate you're providing that perspective. I feel like I am going to say something that I've
said a hundred times, and I hate to be that person. I don't think that the process of having DLZ meet
with all the different departments
and put something together and then just show it to us twice in a two and a half year long relationship
is working. I mean, if the budget is important at all, wouldn't we be one of the groups that they would
talk to? And we were prevented from talking to them specifically when we asked for them to come talk with us.
What you're hearing, unfortunately, you're getting kind of a bunch of frustration, and it's a process
that is frustrating. County government is set up to kind of be this way. I do understand that. It is
truly unfortunate, though, that we haven't figured out a way to take the contracted project management
if you will, and really have them be a project manager that we can all rely on to get regular updates
and provide us with information. Just the fact that we don't even get meeting summaries when we have
these joint meetings. There's nothing to take away unless we
call up Dave and see what he wrote about it, which thank you, because it's helpful. But I guess I'll
stop complaining. That's what I got out of it. Before anybody puts a motion on the floor, I want to
say something. Is somebody about to put a motion on the floor? I don't think you can put a motion on
the floor. I'm not going to put a motion on the floor.
make sure I get to say this before this is a discussion. So you go ahead. I don't want to jump ahead
of anybody. Okay. So then I'll go Decker and then I'll come back to you. Yeah. If there were a motion
that would fix this sucker, man, I'd read that son of a gun till six AM. Um, here's probably take that
long. Here's what I'll say. I got a comment from someone who kind of watched the meeting last night
out in the public. And it's something that I pick up a lot.
And it's that sometimes this gets to be a circular firing squad. And the guns seem to point inwardly.
And the thing that's in the very center of that is the project. And I get the consternation that everybody
has. I bet the staff alone, the consternation they have when those garage doors close at night and they
pull in, I bet the swear words couldn't be printed.
that we're going to have to do- legally. But what I will say is. What we have before us. Is a deadline
that looms. Around whether or not the ACLU. Will move forward with the responding party here- every
indicator looks like that would be we have a deadline to show. Some sort of credible action so I
in the world that could help with portions of that, but those have to run their course. One thing I
would say is we heard from a lot of stakeholders last night about things that concern them. So I think
that for me, my priority, and I said this to someone today, I was the last to say that, I believe I
was the last counselor to say that phasing may be the option.
It's probably pride. Pride goes before the fall. But I thought we had a plan. Legislature changed things.
I know that people disagree with elements of that plan. They will disagree with the elements.
By the way, counselors have the plan that comes out of this. If we have no plan, they'll disagree with
that, too. So everybody get ready, because that happens. That's life. And I can tell you that from being
on this council and in government for a minute. But to me, the goal is,
that we hit a facility that has constitutional care or that we say, here's how we get to that facility.
That's part one. Part two is that we begin to account for some of the things that members of the public
who intimately watch the court system and the justice system, I should say, have already talked about.
And that is how do you operate that in some semblance of it's not co-location, but it's attempting to
mimic, approach, ignore. How do you do that in a feasible way? But to me, the first thing is, what is
your place? What is the money required to have a constitutional care jail? That's bare minimum. And
then around that, you figure out the secondary things. And then you start to figure out a couple
you know the other incidentals that happen and if we're planning right you can say that well some of
these co-location things start to get taken care of through the phasing that folks have talked about
for a long time and that I was literally I was the last to go to that because I like I like the the
plan of having everything together. The last thing I'll just say is I think there's always going to
be continuously be communication issues in our system.
As long as there's humans ego and other things. But ultimately that goal that deadline that's the guide
because if we don't hit that and there's a lot of people to say that we will not. I'm not ready to say
we will not but I'm you know the but if we do not we then begin to plan for appropriation lines. We
took an hour and 20 minutes to figure out overtime lines on a clerk's office.
Can you imagine the overtime hours we will have to figure out on staff processing to deal with the legal
ramifications on this? So I just think that that's kind of our goal. It would have helped in the beginning
if we would have done what I teach my undergrads, a team charter, who's responsible, who's at the table,
who's all that. Maybe it was done. Maybe it just gets hardened with practice. But the ultimate goal
is to figure out
constitutional. And I think that we've got to be very careful getting so into processes that we start
to choke the actual process that's got to occur. Because ultimately, folks kind of watch this and say,
you know that you have to do something. Folks that are on both sides of that, they know something must be done.
I think that there's hope through certain solutions out there. I don't necessarily say that you say
these two properties, take it early. I think that might work in real estate. I think in the government
nuance with all the headaches and divorce we have amongst various bodies, I don't know that that'll
work here. So anyway, that's not much, but that I think is where the focus is. Yes.
Generally, when you get ready to buy a property or build a house or whatever, you say, this is how much
money I have. This is what we're going to have to work with. Now, I understand. I heard Mr.
Cockrell mention, oh, we've got the money. I want to see the hands of, well, you don't have to admit
if you don't want to. The folks who have read the information from AIC
representing the councils that made it clear that numbers that had been used before were in error. And
so I don't know whether county legals read the AIC information. I don't know what the commissioners
have. Hopefully the auditor's office has. I sent them copies, I keep sending. Look at this, this is
really important.
So what we might think we had before does not mean that's where we are now, at all. Because we have
to look at how much our property tax is, the growth in property tax is coming down when you've got the
income taxes going up. And further, just because we could, and let's say if we could figure out a way
to come up with a quarter of a billion dollars from the people who live in this county, who has the
gall to do that?
hopefully no one on this council. Because that's just too much, too much. Okay. So thank you all very
much for those conversations. I think the other thing that I would add to that is
Council will said something that kind of jarred my memory here because if I do recall, I do think that
Council had been trying to figure out how to get DLC in here to speak to Council, and it was said to
us by Commissioner staff, and maybe even a commissioner.
and I stand corrected, but I swear it came from the office, that because the contract is with DLZ or
through DLZ is through commissioners, we had to get permission to have conversations. Let that sink
in because if we are also the other half and deciding body of that, I don't think that it is appropriate
to say, mother, may I?
It should be, hey, we have a question, and we'd like to have them to come in. And so I think if we are
going to do this together, then I think we need to have some type of ability to understand it.
Thank you, Councilor Feidl. And to, I'm not even gonna say a compromise, because that's not
even a compromise. An ability and understanding that if we have to ask,
for updates and things like that, and DOZ to come in to have conversations. It should not be an ask
of Mother Mayor, Council, or Commissioner, whomever, can we have them come in? It should be, hey, we'd
like to have them come to the meeting. And the next step is, okay, what date? And so I would just recommend
to anybody listening, I don't know if Mr. Cockro, if you could take that back, or if we need to send an email,
of some sort and make it abundantly clear that that is something that we would like to have as well.
The other thing that I want to say, and I said this yesterday too, as we were kind of recapping and
kind of going over this and Councilor Henry said it as well too, we got our marching orders.
We heard what we wanted to hear and we got all the things. And I think now it's time for us as county
council members to, the ask is, you tell us, you tell us what we need to do. Okay, so we're gonna stay
in our council lane. You know, I say it every meeting. And so we are going to do that. And I ask that
we come prepared on what, February 24th?
to put forth a resolution, to give out, to let folks know since they are asking and looking at us to
figure out, make next steps. Bob's in our court, Commissioner Thomas Todus, so now I'm dribbling, and
now I'm gonna pass it to everybody else on this council dais right now to figure out how we can make
this work. Yes. I have a procedural question about that. Sure. So it's been my experience sitting here
that resolutions are generated by our county legal person.
and then we sort of make edits on the margins on a screen. Is that the only way to go at that? I mean,
I'm thinking that we would probably need to submit our own whereas clauses and expectations into either,
I don't know if it's sending it to, you know, the attorneys to polish for, you know, votes, but I want
to make sure that it's,
that all of our voices are in that document with different ideas. And I don't think we've created resolutions
in that way in a while, right? Usually the resolutions present an almost 80% baked. So do you have some
thoughts about how we can assure that the document is capturing all of the things we want to see and
then we can amend it? I'm just kind of curious what your thoughts are. I do. And I think with that being said,
Kind of like with the next item, because we got one more item before we wrap up, we have the higher
end freeze resolution amendment. And so I know that Ms. Turner King, who looks like she's online right
now, had sent us an email to ask us questions of what we want to see in that. And so I think that could
be of the same sentiment that whatever we think of,
could be sent and have a reasonable deadline to give to Ms. Turner King to provide. So if there's anything
that folks are very much interested in wanting to have that we collaborate, send that to her if that
is okay. And then on the 24th, we can come prepared with
looking at that in real time and if there's any types of things that we need to do to make right then
and there instead of, cause we've done it before, but we've tried to do it on the fly and it just kind
of went kaput. And so I think it would be, I stress highly to all seven of us, cause I'm sure council
Everson will watch later that myself included that, you know, we send any suggestions to Ms. Turner
King and we make that available and ready to go on the 24th.
as we talk about that resolution. Does that make? Okay. Any last minute thoughts, questions, comments,
concerns? Yes, Mr. Cockerill. And I heard what you just said, and I think the important thing there
was setting a deadline to get that information to her. So I think that's, I mean, if we receive stuff
the day of or the day before, it's hard for us to process it. It's true, it is.
So if you guys want to discuss what that deadline would be, I think that would be great. Anybody got
a deadline that they'd like to throw out? Because we have, what, the 24th? So what I will say is the
meetings, you're going to discuss this on the 24th. We need to have what you believe you want to look
at for the packet no later than the end of the day Thursday, the 19th. So if you want her to be able to,
get everything together for that it you know I mean earlier in the week would be better so instead of
waiting until because she may need to ask you guys questions well maybe she's not understanding or something
so um that my my recommendation would be at least by the end of the day on the 17th I mean next Tuesday
17 at the latest yeah okay
So is everybody good with the 17th? Molly's got her hand up. Ms. Turner-King. Hi. Kim said exactly what
I was going to say. I was going to suggest the 17th. Thank you. All right. 17th it is. And yes, Councilor
Fido. So just to clarify what we're sending Molly with the goal of a resolution that will say what we
want. Yes.
for we need to spell it out for the folks in the back and anybody else so that we can present because
as we again as we heard they are looking to us to figure out so if that means we give a set dollar amount
of what can needs to be spent if we say a location and that I know I'm just throwing all things out
not saying that that's what we know all the parameters that might impact the jail is that what we're
talking about in the project yep I've got you
asking ye shall receive. That's what the good books say. All right, so that being said, I appreciate
that. And moving on. Okay, last part of the meeting, we have some county council business, which is
something that Councilor Woltz made. Council, I move to open for discussion and possible approval the
legal department's request
to consider the possibility of an amendment to the hiring freeze resolution that would implement probationary
period exception. All right. We got a motion and a second and Mr. King is online. Hi, can you hear me?
Yes. Okay, so this is a discussion regarding hiring freeze amendment to address the possibility of adding
a probationary period for employees. So in essence, our, our personnel policy says that newly hired
employees are probationary periods or probationary for 90 days, unless you're a transfer firm, another
department, or if you're transferring part time to full time. In essence, what has occurred in a couple instances
relating to the hiring freeze is that a department will hire someone. They'll come to council, follow
the procedure, get permission to hire a position, and then for some reason, whether it's an involuntary
or voluntary termination, the person that they hired in that requested position doesn't work out within
those 90 days. So the question is, if a department follows the procedure, comes to council, gets permission
to hire someone, but then
you know, that position becomes vacant again in 90 days, is the department expected to come back to
council to ask again to hire the same position in short session? And so I think council has three options
on how to deal with this situation and I proposed a minimum. The first option is leave, do nothing to
the resolution. And yes, the departments have to come back a second time. Option A is to,
make a probationary exception and make it follow our personnel policy, which treats transfers slightly
different. Or the third option is to create a probationary exception and just say for everyone, including
transfers, there's this 90-day period. Thank you for that. I'll just say this out loud.
I think personally, departments still need to come back to us because I will just say this, and I was
planning on saying this in council comment, but I'll say it now since we were doing this. The freeze
ain't freezing, y'all. It really is not. We really had the intent to really try to get underneath, to
hold on as much as possible to do what we need to do. We said that in last budget.
last year in January, February, we really need to start rolling out ways to really tighten our belts
when it comes to spending. And we, honestly, we got to get a better grip on it before this year gets
away from us. We're already midway through February. And before you know it, spring will happen. And
then it will be time to think about budgets again.
I personally think that we should have departments come back to us. But I also want to throw out there
that we need to also figure out how we can really work on this higher-end freeze. And so I'll go to
Councilor Hawkins just kind of going down. Well, I think you pretty much said what I was going to say.
I think if a lot can happen in three months, they're saying it'd be 90 days. So a lot can happen. And
we've been learning more every week.
And we're watching, well, I'm watching because that's what I do, what's going on at the state. And if
that's not enough to wake you up, folks, and I don't think, we have to be really firm so that they don't
come and think that we're being mean to them if they understand we're being mean to everyone. I mean,
we're doing our job.
So no, I think if somebody comes and they stay for 30 days and they leave, the department needs to come
back because something might have happened in that 30 days. Something else might be higher and better
use for that dollar amount in the personnel. So that's my thoughts before I go home. I appreciate Councilor
Hawke's comments and President Cross's comments there too. It's interesting because we just had this whole
conversation tonight. I mean, and I did raise this during one of our items that, yeah, I was calling
around the county today and I bumped into three different ways people pick up the phone around here.
One was automated, one hasn't, yeah, it's a voicemail that hasn't been emptied in a while, apparently
another office has three people that pick up the phone. And we haven't, I mean, I think part of the
reason why my vote's when we have people come before us and
you know, appeal the hiring freeze and ask to fill a position comes from the fact that we haven't been
absolutely clear yet about what's coming, right? And so, you know, we have this, but then, you know,
when we've had staff mention to us, well, you know, I don't know what council, but they think what programs
are going to cut or what personnel are gonna cut, it's like, well, it's not gonna be us. It will have
to be department heads that will have to figure out the world of work that they live in, you know, how
many hours is required to run their office, and it will be those things that say, well, maybe that's the,
this position is an attrition position. Filling that part-time role, even though it's been customary
to have it, that might be the give back to the county. And we just haven't been crystal clear with that
yet. But that has come, especially once we've learned, I think what really is coming from the State
House, and as Councilor Hawk mentioned, the AAC numbers we had were vulnerable. We have to get amended
numbers, even on the estimates of revenue.
So I mean, I know that's a little bit of a tangent on where we are, but this is serious stuff because
we are doing serious stuff. It's not aspirational and visionary. It really is getting into the weeds
of saying, you know, there's a finite resource to deliver services in the community, and we're going
to have to get creative as a community. But we haven't messaged that yet to the departments. This is
part of that messaging. So that's my thoughts on that tonight. Thank you. Down yonder to see if anybody
has any questions.
Yes, Councillor Feidl. So I think the only thing I was concerned about, and I go back to my labor roots
here, and that is that I would just want to make sure that we weren't talking about having the employees
serve another probationary period. And I don't think that's what we're talking about. That's right.
I just wanted to make sure of that. Thank you. So, Councillor Wilson, did you have your hand raised?
No. No, I know. OK. So what I gather from my colleagues is that we are OK with this hiring freeze as
it stands right now and that there is no other amendments and that we will have to have people continue
to come back to us. OK. Pretty much. OK. Well, that's cool. But I also think one thing I'll throw out
there before we move on for a final comment is I do think that
it might be something that PAC could look into. I know last year there was a conversation that was supposed
to happen related to PAC in terms of looking at how we could go about the hiring freeze to like bring
back to the full council to come, because I know it was like, you know, before we do a position, let's
hold off for 60 days and whatnot. So I think that would be something to my PAC colleagues here to figure out like,
maybe at a next meeting of some sort to try to think about that and bring that back to the full account.
So. Pack isn't meeting. Pack is on a pause, so you would have to approve. I've been asking for us to
meet. Yeah. My bad. No worries. I would love for us to meet. That would be great. I think that is a
thing that I would like to see how we can do that. Pack's not supposed to do budgetary things.
That's not PAC's role at all. That's true. Okay. Well, I stand corrected. PAC is to decide what the
class, you know, to get the job descriptions together and for them to decide whether or not they even
want to do it, to send it on to WIS. But it is not, they are not there to make budgetary decisions.
unless you want to change the rules, Pat. I don't care. I don't want to do any of that at all. Yes,
Councilor Decker. Sometimes I get frustrated on process discussions, particularly around PAC. When we
talk about PAC is like a different body than us, technically it is a different body, but it's three
of us in a meeting. So there's three members of this council that do it. And look,
If we were to assign PAC something or three members of this body, they could go work on something. And
the other thing I'll just say about PAC, and I served I think two years as PAC Chair, right? This is
the hardest work of my, no, roofing was the hardest work of my life. But the PAC's pretty tricky. And
the three members that are on there now and in the past will know this. PAC is notorious for saying,
That's for counsel when they don't want to touch something, and they're also notorious for saying, we'll
take that when they do want to touch it. Look, we can get into all that process, but we're talking about
three people from this body and all that. If the council president says, what if they were to look at
it, or Kate says it, or I don't know, somebody, they could go off and do it because usually they're
pretty smart folks.
because they come from us now. I think we got to be careful on that rigidity. There was a couple of
times where we started hitting the third person kind of references on PAC, and it's just three of us
doing something so that seven of us are not, and that might be the model that you use for something
that we can't do out in open court like this. Usually, and this has just been my observation since 2019,
when something's not figured out,
And kind of like there's a solution to that change or edit. Council will sit with it for three days
and struggle in the in the moment. So that might be something that they were somebody long term.
I don't know. Somebody goes after. All right. Well, because there was no motions or amendments or anything
to that, then that conversation is done. OK.
next up council liaison updates and comments and I will look to my right at miss Hawk you got any updates
besides legislators if I don't say anything you think that I've not been doing anything all this time
let me tell you I am working at this but you don't want to hear all of it so so next week or in a couple
of weeks you'll give it to us okay got it
Well, you know, I mean, it is 60. It was 62 today. I mean, that's enough hot air, I think, for tonight.
I have an EMAC meeting next week and we have planning commission next week as well. I'm happy to report
back on outcomes from there. Thank you. Looking down, just going on down. Yeah, Councilor Decker. I
attended the Bloomington Chamber's legislative committee where certain
entities, business owners, the superintendent, other public bodies. They get to go in and hear
our legislators talk. Many of us didn't get it on Saturday mornings here, there, and everywhere else,
but I attended that. I do want to say really quick, I was able to kind of sneak into a meeting of our
local NAACP, and I would say that I appreciate very much
the way the members of the NAACP figure out all the things in the community that kind of run in circles
around what we do. I also want to congratulate the city of Bloomington on a very beautiful, robust,
and packed Black History Month kickoff that had some of the finest music I think I've ever seen in my
life. And it blew my mind. It was so good. Some of us almost passed out.
Anyway, congratulations to the city on doing that. I think we need to have some of those words in this
chamber a little bit more often First of all, I would like to thank tic tacs for supporting this meeting
and getting me through No in in all seriousness
I was able to attend the AIC legislative conference with Councillor Feidl and Councillor Henry attended
as well. And I haven't done many of those. It was actually I think the second time in the entire time
I've been on council that I've gone up to one of those. And I really appreciated the time to focus on
these issues because I think, you guys, this is a lot. I don't know. It's a lot. And it deserves our
focus. And I don't know about y'all, but I have a lot of other things going on. And this is a part-time
gig. And sometimes it feels like I'm not giving this enough attention.
sharing to kind of, I don't know, make that confession and maybe hold myself a little bit accountable
for taking time to focus more often and not just waiting for someone to drive me to Indianapolis and
stick me in a hotel conference room for a day. This meeting in particular, I think, has highlighted
for me the
just that there aren't too many things that county government does that are optional. We have so many
different responsibilities and every single one of them deserves everything we can give them to to go
out there and make our community safe and productive and
healthy and Involved and so I guess I just want to I just want to say that you know, I really appreciate
all of the county employees that work really hard at trying to do more with less because I I feel for
them and It's certainly something that
that I think on and don't take lightly, so. That's where I am, thank you. So, I might have a list. And
just about the meetings that I attended in the community, I did go to the Monroe County School Corporation
forum they had on the H-Team building, what they were gonna do.
There weren't many there at the public meeting that I went to. However, they did say that they got about
350 responses electronically. So they'll be processed forward with that, either to renovate it,
to sell it, whatever they're going to end up doing. So I look forward to hearing about that. I usually
participate and did again on the legislative updates that the league does. There were two state elected
officials there from our area and we heard updates.
most of the things we've touched on. Like Kate said, I was with her at the Association of Indiana Counties
Conference. We heard from the governor and numerous other elected officials up there. But one of the
biggest things I think I enjoyed was going over to the state house and seeing, we saw the treasurer's
office and interacted with that person. We saw the secretary of state's office.
We saw the attorney general's office and the comptroller's office and it was just all fascinating to
be in that one of the best safes I think I've ever seen most antique and best looking not looking but
very impressively designed safes that house the money you know I think at some point. So that was really
cool to get to see. There's lots of
Interest I know in data centers around the state and that continues to be a controversy and Coming into
terms with it positively some were coming to terms with it negatively I don't know what will happen
if we have to decide one here. We'd have to decide Then locally again also I've been attending almost
all well if not in person online all the meetings with the Ellisville Richland Township
or potential merger and the postcards did go out that one myself I live in Richland Township and at
the last public meeting they had people had gotten their postcards and they're showing up now so we're
getting public input so I'm excited about that. There'll be also meetings coming up about the fire district
there before meetings and I intend to go to that so that's kind of where I'm at.
Thank you for that. And a couple of council liaison update and committee assignments. Councilor Wilts
mentioned this and I totally spaced it at the last meeting that remember the time that the commissioners
a while back recently just convened a working group to have stakeholders come to talk about issues related
to homelessness. And it was asked by Commissioner Madera because she is also head in that group to
Since somebody from council and I had mentioned that councillor Woods Would be able to go to attend
and so I'm assuming we've not had any of those meetings just yet But I know that in good faith as soon
as we know you'll know because you will come back and report during council updates So all of those
things are true. Yes, I have received a communication that we will have a meeting I
So I'm looking forward to that meeting. And the other thing is, Councillor Iverson and I are trying
to give up some things off of our plates as we head into year
to for president and pro tem. And so I have decided to step down from being on the long-term finance
committee meeting. And because he wants to have emphasis and wants to be able to do that, I am letting
Mr. Iverson go ahead and take on that as we kind of give up some things here.
And then the last thing is we have been asking for Sophia Travis grant applications and we got some
and we need to do some applications. However, we need to make sure that we do that without a quorum
of council members. And so I as chair and as president of council would like to designate two people
that are not quorum related to be able to do that since because
If we were going to do it the way, like it would have been a really bad thing and we'd have to notice
it and we didn't do it. So. And this is to do what? To interview for Sophia Travis grant committee people.
Oh. So I would like to designate Councilor Vidal and Decker, would you be okay with doing that? If not,
I know there was a schedule in conflict, but if you can't then,
he or I will be able to do that. So we'll work it out. So we will hope to have a Sophia Travis grant
committee community member join us very shortly. Yeah. And so I said all I needed to say today, I'm
looking forward to the election board conversation, a meeting, and I hope they will deliver on the promise
that took over an hour plus. Sorry, are you going to have a third person on that? Just two.
Yeah, it's just two because yeah. So that being said, I appreciate all the conversations and everything
that we did tonight and nothing else that needs to be said except for we are adjourned. Thank you.