All right, we are gonna go ahead and get started because who do we think we are? We are the Monroe County
Council. All right, so today is Tuesday, July 14th. The time is 5.02. And this is the Monroe County
Council. We will call this meeting to order. Present and then historic, Nattie Hill Rome. We have counselors
Hawk, Henry Decker,
Wilt and Fiddle and we do not have Councilmember Iverson. Oh okay so everything we do today,
thanks Peter, will be a roll call vote since we have a member participate in virtually. So with that
being said we will get to the Pledge of Allegiance so all those that are able to stand please stand.
like a vacuum from up here, but it is very warm in here, and some of us are feeling the challenges of
life and heat at the same time, so we will go ahead and get started. All right. And I've had sugar,
so y'all are welcome. All right, so we will move to the adoption of the agenda. Is there anybody that
would wish to make amendments to tonight's agenda? Yes.
So the auditor's office has requested that items H and I, ARPA appropriations and deappropriations be
pulled from the agenda as the commissioners approve the ARPA amendments as presented at their July 9th
meeting. Council, I move to table indefinitely the auditors item H and I. Second.
All right, we got a motion and a second to table items H and I. Are there any questions or comments
from council? All right, seeing none, are there any other amendments to tonight's agenda? Okay, and
seeing none, may we please have a roll call vote? Councilor Crossley? Yes. Councilor Hawk?
she say? Yeah, we're we're mimicking. Okay. Yes. Councilor Henry. Yes. Councilor Wilts. Yes. Councilor
Deckard. Yes. Councilor Iverson. And we need to see Councilor Iverson on the screen, please. Thank you.
Motion passes.
Unanimous, okay. All right. So we have adopted tonight's agenda as amendment as amended All right. Next
up is our public comment So if there's public comment on items that are not on the agenda You can come
forward to the lectern here in the room or you can raise your hand via teams Looks like everybody coming
in. So again, you'll sign your name or state your name for the record and you'll have up to three minutes
My name is Jamie Ford, and I'm a Monroe County resident. First, I attended yesterday's jail subcommittee
meeting, and I agree with the two choices that were selected. One is a remodel of the current jail with
an expansion of the Curry Building, and the second is a building of a new jail on the Thompson property
as a backup. However, given the predicament the county is now in, I believe that the best way forward
is to work on them both simultaneously. Contract actual experts to conduct the necessary analyses and
studies in addition to updating the PUDs for each respective location concurrently. Do the work on both
until one or the other is no longer viable or needed.
Should it be determined that a remodel of the current facilities is in fact not feasible, work will
already be in progress on the Thompson property, thus preventing more delays. Plus, that work will at
least be something to present in court.
If the remodel is doable, then the work on Thompson will give the answers the county lacks and will
be valuable if the county wants to do something with the property or sell it. Second, I believe that
discussions about the jail need to continue. The current jail facility is the biggest issue, but according
to the new lawsuit documents and the criminal justice studies, it is not the only issue. For example,
inefficiencies in the court system leading
Sorry, I can't read my handwriting, is leading to longer jail stays need to be addressed. Additionally,
I remember seeing the before and after photos of Sheriff Marte's efforts in cleaning up the jail. Policies
and procedures need to be put in place to ensure conditions never get that bad in the future. I appreciate
the proactive work and collaboration that this council has done. And I've come to you first because
I trust you guys more than I do the current board of commissioners. So I hope that the collaboration
continues in the future. Thank you. Thank you.
If you can't read my handwriting, let me know, I can rewrite it. Okay, thank you. All right, is there
any other public commenters that would like to make public comment on items not on tonight's agenda?
You can raise your hand via Teams or you can come again to the podium here in the room. We will move
forward. Thank you again for your comment. All right, next up we will have department updates and these
are usually set for 10 minutes for each department that would like to make
an update and these are for items that are not on tonight's agenda. So I see some department heads here
in the room. You are probably here for other things, but in case anybody has any updates, you can do
that at this time or you can raise your hand via Teams.
I want to note for the record, Jordan Miller is not here tonight, but I did forward your second quarter
commissary report to the entire council. Thank you very much, Michelle. Welcome. Hello, counselors.
everyone else who's here. My name is Amy Swain. I'm the Monroe County Recorder. I appreciate this time
because I wanted to let everyone know once again about the property monitoring system called Property
Watch that is offered free to property owners in Monroe County. It does not cost
the county anything or the property owners. It's done through our business partner, DocsPop. You can
go to the recorders page to visit that link. It's the first box that comes up underneath our hours of
operation. Again, it's called Property Watch. The reason I think this is so important is because I myself had
property transfer to me following my brother's death in another county. And I received the same letter
that one of our property owners in Monroe County called in a couple of weeks ago, wanting to charge
$285 for a similar property monitoring system. And I think it's important that people know that we offer
that service for free.
While I have the floor, I also wanted to let people know there are companies out there wanting to charge
more than $100 to get a copy of your deed. We have those in the recorder's office, and according to
state law, we charge $1 per image or page. Most deeds are three pages or less, so you can either pay
$1, $2, or $3 or you can pay more than $100 to an outside company.
There's one final thing that I wanted to talk about, and that's companies that are targeting our veterans.
They're wanting to charge, again, more than $100 to expedite the processing of getting their DD-214
or their military discharge papers. Those are available from the recorder's office at no charge to the veteran
or their immediate family. A lot of times the immediate family will need that documentation for scholarships
and other things, and as long as they show the proper ID, we will provide those. We will also record
their DD-214s
at no charge. We work together very well with the veteran service office here in the county, and we
always encourage people who go to you can go to either office to get your DD 214. If they come to our
office, we always encourage them to go and visit with their veteran service officer because they can
learn about updates like the new
property tax credit. So thank you for giving me this time so that I could let people know about these
important issues. Thank you very much. Real quick, does anybody have any questions? Yeah, thank you
very much for that. That was really helpful. All right. Any other department updates? Seeing none.
And again, thank you so much for that. We will move on to consent agenda items.
I move to approve the following consent agenda items for July 14th. The health department's request
and fund 8112-9626 STD strengthening prevention grant for a category transfer of $956.65 from the supplies
category to the services category. And the approval of the summary minutes as presented for June 11th, 2026,
joint special session of the County Council and City Council. Second. All right, we got a motion and
a second. Yes, Councilor Hawke. Yes, I'd like to split this vote because I have questions on the first
one with Health Department. So is that your motion Councilor Hawke? Second.
Okay. Okay. Do you want me to ask questions now? I'd be happy to. Yes. Go ahead. Since we... Okay. Well,
my concern is when you look at the fund cash balance, it shows they're in the negative $51,805.97. Remaining
cash, remaining balance available is in the negative of $52,612.47. Okay.
I mean, why are we considering moving money around when we're already in the negative? I mean, has everybody
looked at that? They say they're in the process of receiving grant amendments for additional funding.
But the process when it comes to getting grants is not a guarantee. You might be in the process of asking for it.
I mean, I don't want to put my name just saying, yes, we're going to let you go ahead and move around
and start spending when it's in the negative. I didn't pull up those budgets. I just am believing what
was put on there. Perhaps the auditor has some advice for us. Gregory? Yes, this is a reimbursable grant
fund. So it's typically in the red until reimbursements come through, making it whole to zero it out.
However, when they say it's in the process, have they approved, have they indicated or certain that
we are going to get a grant? They tell you what the grant's going to be, then you spend it, then they
send you the money. Yes. Correct? That's true. My team has been working closely with the health department,
though, and they are comfortable.
told me that the process has been completed. However, I don't have that documentation in front of me,
but there's communication back and forth establishing that this is okay to proceed. No documents.
Conversation. No, no, no. I stated my team has the documentation. I do understand that many of these
you have, you had to spend the money and then you get it.
Once you spin it, you get it reimbursed to you. But that's what the grant says you're going to do. But
if we don't have grant documents, this verifies that at this point. The verification necessary was approval
from the granting agency to spend it a different way. So you see that they're moving categories, and
that approval has been established. And we do have the documentation, however. I do not have it available
to provide to you right this second, but my team can forward that on.
So I guess, in essence, what you're saying is you feel comfortable with this because, in essence, it's
red right now until we get that reimbursement back. That's exactly right. So every agenda, the general
ledger and grant manager goes through in detail, asks these questions to the departments to ensure that
we are following our internal policy and procedure and best practice.
So the funding, the funder is the Indiana Department of Health, and the email in our packet from Darren
Foltz, budget and contracts manager, saying you can move the funds accordingly, is the documentation.
That is thank you. I wasn't aware it got into the packet. Thank you, Michelle. You're welcome. I didn't
see it, but thank you.
Councillor Henry. Thank you. I would just say I did speak or communicate with Ms. Kelly about this particular
item and the second piece being the health department coming back to us with the appropriation in August
is the second turn of the key that I didn't flag this myself. So I was fine with knowing that we have
the proceeds are coming in our next meeting.
And I just, there was a lot of crosstalk when this, we're kind of going back and forth here. You say
that you got the documentation your office needs. And your office has, you know, been notoriously detailed
about this, maybe more than any of your predecessors, which I'm sure a few department heads out there
could back me on that, right?
I think we ruffled a few feathers, but we're trying to be, to always err on the side of caution, always
have that documentation necessary to ensure we're following best practice. So yes, thank you.
And on this one, you got it. You're good. Yes. All right. Madam President, I want to make sure, because
there is, in the world of this county, there's a lot of talk out there, particularly on social media,
about trust and mistrust.
And I want to make sure that people watching understand that this is nothing extraordinary is going
on here. This meets the standards of this auditor, who's been extremely stringent on that, which has
made for easier days sometimes, and not as easy days on others. But this is meeting her thumbs up approval,
at least to be before us, as something for consideration. It's important right now that we kind of make
sure that trust is there. That's all I'm going to say.
questions on this item. Seeing none. Are we voting on the whole thing or the split? It's the split.
On the category transfer for the Health Department. Councilor Crossley? Yes. Councilor Iverson?
Yes. Councillor Fiddle. Yes. Councillor Hawke. No. Councillor Wilts. Yes. Councillor Henry. Yes. Councillor
Decker. Yes. Motion passes six to one. Thank you. And next up we have item B which
is the summary of the approval of the summary minutes for the June 11th, 2026 meeting. Is there any
questions or comments on this item? Maybe please have a roll call vote. Councillor Iverson? Yes. Councillor Feidl?
Councillor Hawk? Yes. Councillor Wilts? Yes. Councillor Henry? Yes. Councillor Decker? Yes. Councillor
Crossley? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. Thank you. Next up we have the hire and freeze review items
and first up is from the Highway Department.
I move 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 1176-0000 Motor Vehicle Highway at 80% and fund
1173-0000 Motor Vehicle Highway restricted at 20%, one full-time traffic control technician slash laborer
position. Second.
We got a motion and a second. We are joined here by Ms Lisa Ridge. Welcome. Good evening. So we had
a traffic control tech provide us his notice at the end of June to go to work for a Bedford utility
company. So we're just here to request to be able to open that position up and fill that vacancy. Any
questions or comments for Ms Ridge on this item?
Oh, I'm sorry. Councillor Williams. Yes. The position is split between the two accounts, right? 1173
is a sub account of 1176. So you are, you are, and so much of your fund, half of our funding is split
between the restricted and the 1176, 1173. And then you can spend a percentage of those expenses out to show
where you're using those funds at. Thank you. I didn't even get to ask the question. You answered it.
Thank you. Yes. Can you tell us where the insurance is paid from? Will it be paid from in this fund
or? It's paid from 1176. And have you heard any more about when we might get that
money back. The state is promising, and they're saying some people are saying, well, might not get till
next year. Do we know? Well, I, um, when I think it was the last time I was here, the governor had put
out that day and a timeline. I believe the state comptroller has also put out a news release. Um, their
specific dates mentioned in there in July and then that the local entities would be reimbursed those
funds from the gas tax by November 1st.
And I have not seen any changes since that. But I'm counting on you because this funding is set aside
from the other funding. And if something should happen that you're going to have to pull back on something
you're doing, we know you will do that. Correct. We do have a cash balance that we know we don't want
to touch. But we do have that in case we need to
to come back to the council for an additional to move funds around, or get additional and appropriation
to keep all of our resources going, all of our employees, and keep business as usual until we reimburse
those funds. See any other questions or comments for Ms. Ridge on this item, so 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 room
or raise your hand via Teams.
Okay, please have a roll call vote. Councilor Iverson? Yes. Councilor Pytel? Yes. Councilor Hawke? Yes.
Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor Decker? Yes. Councilor Crossley? Yes. Motion passes
unanimous. Thank you.
I just put up the email from the state Comptroller's office for the period of April 8th through May
31 That gas tax amount will be presented to the State Board of Finance on July 21 for approval following
approval it will reach Government units five to seven business days after Okay, so August Up is from
the planning department
until I move to open for discussion and possible approval of the Planning Department's request to be
exempt from the hiring freeze and be allowed to hire and fund 1000-0079 County General Planning, one
full-time planner to position. Second. All right, we got a motion and a second, and we are joined by
Ellen virtually. Welcome. Hi. Can you hear me okay?
I'm gonna share my screen really quickly. Okay, thanks for hearing our request this evening. As I mentioned,
this is for a vacancy of the plan or two position in our office. Just some quick information. We did
have another vacancy late last year
for the same position. Both people that are leaving this position had received offers from the city,
and they have taken those positions for a lateral position move that's paying $18,000 more. But this
position that we are trying to fill is a Patsy classification that is 40 hours a week. We're requesting
the minimum salary, so the
Financial impact summary that was in the packet is showing a savings of about $8,500 in total. We do
have job duties based in the state statute. We deal with several different types of petitions. Those
include but are not limited to read zones, variances, conditional uses, etc.
And there's also been a lot of state law changes recently, including some requirements for our office
to approve permits in a certain number of days. So on average, our Plan R2s in our office receive or
respond to 510 calls or emails every year.
And in one instance in 2024, we looked at the case management of one of our plan or two's and they reviewed
and approved 28 cases in a year. These cases can include evening meetings. They include reports oftentimes,
reviewing technical drawings and surveys and communication back and forth with oftentimes an applicant
and their design professional.
We also, the reason that we cannot fill this position with a part-time position is because we're often
synthesizing complicated information. We take about six months of training to really get someone off
and running on their own. We do get questions from the public that require quick turnaround times, such
as I'm closing on this property in two hours.
Do you think I can use it as a tourist home? And we do try to respond to those questions as quickly
as possible. And then we're also helping people with their building permits and their locations for
their sheds, garages, even their homes, things like that. As I mentioned, there are some state statute
changes that you need to be aware of. I think that there were some email correspondence as well.
one of the statute changes does limit our ability to charge a certain amount for residential construction.
However, we believe our fees are in line with that state code change and we're making even more changes
to be aligned. But these bills are requiring us to have faster timelines. They're limiting what we can
and can't do.
And they're also requiring, for instance, House Bill 1037, remove the ability for our stormwater team
to review things such as some grading and logging projects and brought that back to planning for us
to take that on. And our plan or two is helpful in that regard. And then we just have some sample agendas.
These are the types of cases that our plan or twos are taking. They split amongst
three different planner twos, and then we have a senior planner as well. But one planner two could take
up to three, maybe four cases in one evening on a long agenda. I've just highlighted one case just to
give you some insight on the depth of review that we have to do for certain cases. So this was a case
with several variances. And so we go out to the property,
We do aerial review comparisons. We also review surveys, as I mentioned, against the code. So the planner
too has to see what on the engineered survey or on the certified plot plan is different than what the
code requires and then apply those variances. So in this instance, for instance, a side setback was
required because there's only one foot of distance between the property line
in the building. So they would have to present to the public, to the applicant, and to the board of
zoning appeals what the person is asking for and present findings of fact to either support or recommend
denial for that. And then we have updated our fee schedule as of December 1st of 2025.
We did a quick calculation just to July 1st and we're seeing fees increased. We see an increase of $24,169.20
from last year and the CDO was adopted before that. So we're seeing as a good comparison just the difference
and we hadn't changed our fees in a very long time. So this was warranted and
The way that we assess our fees was to look at a labor analysis of the number of hours that we're reviewing
each case. So we did this with the plan commission's assistance and we believe the fees are much more
fair. And we haven't really heard any negative feedback from the public on this. So we do believe that
it was time and we can do so again under that state law. We're gonna review it again one more time this year.
before we aren't allowed to change it for, I think it was five years. So just a rehash of vacancy for
our department, what that means, it can mean slower response times for our office. We would not wanna
not meet statutory timelines, but that's something that we consider when having multiple vacancies in
our office. The burnout of our remaining staff, so we only have eight people total
four planners, one of which is a senior planner position. So we do have a lot to do with a few people.
And we just want to have a good rapport with the public, keep up with the response in a timely fashion,
give people accurate and timely information, and also enough detail that they can make big decisions.
So with that, I'm happy to take any questions.
Thank you very much, Ms. Jelen, for that. Any questions for her colleagues? Yes, Councilmember Henry.
Thank you, Madam President. Thank you, Director Jelen, for your presentation.
For those of us up here that don't get to hear from you often, you're always so thorough, and I appreciate
the work you bring in. This is what the Planning Commission looks like twice a month with the staff
doing the hard work. I think it's important to point out two things which the Director had mentioned.
First is, Director Jellin, correct me if I'm wrong, when was the last time we raised the fees in the
county prior to the Planning Commission doing that earlier this year?
It was, I believe it was 2011 or 2012. It was some time ago. And while some folks might look at that
and say, wow, the fees doubled, it had been the first time in 15 years we had touched the fee structure,
which has generated revenue to cover some of this cost here that the department is back into the fund.
So that's important. And thank you on that.
And then secondly, to your point that, yeah, the delays that add to the cost of construction in the
county, anything we can do to eliminate that through having a well-staffed department that doesn't require
things to go to appeals because we had things we had to do, like issuing a permit without the time to
investigate or the variances that are required, this is just one of those important positions. It might
not sound it on paper, but it really is. So I'm happy to support it. Thank you, Madam President.
Yes. This, along with the building department, these two departments have to be fully staffed if we
are going to encourage new growth in housing. Because if they have to mess around here to get an answer,
these developers, the contractors, they're going to take it, oh, where did they take it just recently?
Out of county. A big subdivision going in.
out of county, and we don't want to be a part of sending the people away from this county to in order
to have. So I think that we do have to watch this very carefully. However, because if the merger happens
with Ellisville, then they're going to need more planners and we are going to need less because that's a big
You know, Richland Township is a big growth area. So those are just things that we'll look for in the
future. But right now, we don't know. Right now, we just don't know. So I want to do whatever we can
to encourage growth for people to have housing here in Monroe County. Anybody else? Any questions or comments?
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 room. Or raise your hand via teams. And seeing none, may we please have a
roll call vote. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Henry? Yes.
Councilor Decker? Yes. Councilor Crusley? Yes. Councilor Iverson?
Yes. Motion passes unanimous. Thank you, Mr. Allen. All right. Next up is item eight, which is county
council business. Council, I moved to approve resolution 2026 dash 23 B part two approval of tax abatement
for. I'm not sure how to pronounce it. Is it Cynthia? Cynthia is is my understanding, but they. OK.
public hearing. We got a motion and a second and we'll have Mr Cockrell person. Yes and this meeting
has been noticed for a public hearing. So when it gets public comment if we could open that public hearing
and close it, that would be great. The presentation was pretty
Essentially, what we're looking at is the company that currently has 40 employees making $4.2 million
is looking to expand and add another 30 employees to make approximately $2.315 million. This is to expand
their capacity. They're expanding their building. So this is only a real estate tax abatement request.
And so they did the preliminary approval
two weeks ago, and this would be the final approval for the council to make on this. If you have any
questions, I'm more than happy to answer them, otherwise. Thank you very much. Any questions or comments
from council? Council member Henry. Thank you. Easy vote today. Last time I think we discussed this,
I abstained because I had to do some homework as a federal contractor to make sure
I've never met you before or had a relationship with this company, but I have no fiscal relationship
with the company or ownership interest and happy to support you in our county. So thank you for that.
I'm excited about the expansion. Is there anything that y'all wanted to add to anything before we move
on? You don't have to. I don't mean to put you on the spot. Just wondering if you wanted to add anything
since you're here.
I just wanted to thank you again for considering our request and I really appreciate the support that
you've provided us thus far. This will help make a viable project out of this and we've got all our
fingers and toes crossed that we will be able to achieve the growth that we're looking at. A lot of
that depends on how our government, it's the funding that we need to be able to do that but we are very
grateful for the opportunity here and
We're going to stay in Monroe County. Give us a lesson again on how to pronounce it. I want to get it
right. Well, the Latin pronunciation is actually Shencha. Oh. Only two syllables. But we figured in
southern Indiana, we couldn't probably get by with that. So we pronounce it Skientia. Thank you. Is this the?
I'm happy they're on the west side. Thank you. Yeah, I do. Thank you. All right. And, um, yeah, sounds
like colleagues are.
Very much excited about that, but we gotta get to the vote first. And before we do, I appreciate that
you are expanding. I wish that we can also expand in the county as which we talked about with affordable
housing to go along with that. Just the same so we can keep those dollars here in Monroe County too.
Again, like I always try to plug, I want to mention the BDC. Clark Griner is here and their partner
with us on all these things, on answering all the tough questions that we have, on answering all the
tough questions I'm sure that Scantia had as well, but also in keeping that look out there so that we
can say to our constituents that we are doing everything we can to bring as many jobs here as possible
that will do well by them.
And that's not always been the case in this community that we've had those, but we need those. So thank
you so much and make lots of jobs and success and we'll grow with you. No other comments. I don't see
council member ever since hand raise. Um, so we'll move on to public comment. If you'd like to make
public comment on this item, you can come forward to the lectern here in the room or raise your hand
via teams.
Would it would it be possible for me to make a public comment from here. My name is Clark Greiner. I
am the interim CEO for the Bloomington Economic Development Corporation. First of all thank you for
taking a close look at this organization. I wanted to point out as you know Doug is an upstanding citizen.
of Monroe County. His employees go through a rigorous background check because of the security that
they're involved in and the organization as far as what they do for us on a broader national security
basis is very critical to our troops abroad. And so we hope that there is a favorable support of this
on the tax abatement request. So thank you for your time and consideration. Thank you very much for that.
Is there any other public comment on this item? See any more here in the room or hands raised? The public
comment is closed on that item. And next up, we will go to a roll call vote, please. Councilor Hawk?
Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Decker?
Yes. Councilor Iverson? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. Thank you very much.
Thank you. And is it Shinsha? Did I say that right? Scantia. Put the Latin first. Shinsha. Okay.
All right. We've got some practice in it. Thank you very much. All right. Next up is item eight.
public hearing, does she not have to announce the public hearing as they're closed? She did say the
public comment section of the hearing is closed. I don't know if she used the actual term hearing, but
I think the case law indicates as long as you provide the public with an opportunity to comment and
you announce when it's closed that that is sufficient. Remember what we used to be told. It had to officially
be closed. All right. Next up is item B from the recorder's office.
Council, I move to open for discussion and possible approval of the recorder's request to be exempt
from the hiring freeze and be allowed to hire and fund 1000-0004 County General Recorder, one full-time
recorder deputy position. Second. All right, we got a motion and a second. We are still joined by Recorder
Swain. Welcome.
Thank you, President Crosley. As you know, the recorder's office is a small office. So all of our positions
are kind of essential to daily operations. We stagger lunch hours so that we don't have to close during
that time when a lot of people can get off work to come over and to our office. Plus, we have to cover
vacation, illness, meetings,
It responds to assistance from people via email, electronic recordings, in-person, over-the-counter,
and mail. With it vacant.
We have been somewhat understaffed at some times. Just today, we had both counter computers working.
Another person came in that I was helping at one of the public computers. We had a phone call come in.
We had another person come in the door. We had a title searcher in the office. And that's not unusual.
So we have been busy. We are one of the few revenue producing
departments in the county, and I don't want anything to get in the way of serving the people who use
our office. I also wanted to make you aware that the most significant federal housing package in nearly
20 years became law last week. It was the bipartisan 21st Century Road to Housing Act. It includes nearly
50 individual housing measures that are designed to remove barriers, increase supply,
expand home ownership access, improve access to capital, and support veterans. And so I expect us to
be even busier, which is good for us, good for the county, good for the people of Monroe County. So
I would ask that you go ahead and allow us to fill that vacancy. The money is already appropriated and
it will actually be less because there will
be a new person. The previous person would have reached their one-year step increase. So with that,
I'm open for any questions. For that, any questions? I'll come back to you, Councilor Hawke,
here in a second. Councilor Wilks? How many deputy recorders do you have? We have four.
So this is one position out of those four. Got it. And also, on the fiscal impact statement, it says
fund cash balance $24,691. Is that right? It's probably the remainder of the year. Correct me if I'm
wrong, Auditor Gregory.
You're looking at the recorder's records perpetuation? No, this would be county general. Oh, apologies.
Okay, so the current cash balance as of today is $23,659,566. That's just a typo, or is it
not the information that I'm thinking it's supposed to be? I'm thinking that's a typo. Because the numbers
are kind of similar. Okay, but way off by order. By a decimal point. Okay, that's all cool.
Can I ask one more? Thank you. So it says that you'd like to allow for some overlap in the positions
so that there can be some onboarding. It looked like it was going to vacate later than you would hope
to have someone in. Is that correct? That would be an ideal for us to have time before the previous
person leaves if we know they're leaving. In this case, we did not. Oh, OK.
that. Okay, never mind. I misread it, I think. No, but if the council is ever open to that. We don't
usually do that. Thank you. Yeah. Councilor Hawke. Yes. First of all, I'd like to say that when I go
in and out of the different departments, yours is the department. I know you're always there. You are
there at work.
They're not expecting to be gone all the time. You are here and carrying the load as a person actually
working there. And that is something that we really need to expect from all department heads, because
when they come in and say, we're short staff, then I'm going, well, where were you when you go in there?
And I'm not just making this up, nor do I mean it to be.
Because always before, you know, elected officials, they don't have, they're not on a time card. They
really aren't. So I'm just saying kudos for you that you're doing that and you're carrying your own
fair share of the load of your department. And that's what I expect out of you because that's what you've
always given. And that's what I'd like to expect out of all department heads. Thank you, Councillor Hawke.
Any other questions or comments from Ms. Blaine on 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 room or raise
your hand via Teams. Seeing none, may we please have a roll call vote? Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor
Henry? Yes. Councilor Decker? Yes. Councilor Crossley?
Councilor Iverson? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. Thank you.
Next up is item C, also from the recorder's office. Council, I'd like to move to approve the recorder's
request and fund 1189-0000 Recorder's Perpetuation Fund for a category transfer of $35,000
from the supplies category to the services category. Second. All right, we got a motion and a second.
Ms. Swain. So I'm coming to you again for phase two of our digital scanning project. We talked last
year about doing this. We still have about 300 books in
physically in the recorder's office with the rest being over in our archives. The fire suppression system
in the archives, just to remind you, is a dry system. The one in the recorder's office is water-based.
So even with a false alarm, should the sprinklers go off, the books would be affected. So we want to
make sure and get all of those documents scanned, at least, and have them accessible in a digital format
in a worst-case scenario.
The I want to. I'm sorry. I wanted to add. Um, I included the, uh, commissioner's packet so you could
see a, um, copy of the contract, which they did approve at a meeting earlier this month for that. Yes.
Councilmember Decker and two questions. Those records are going back 200 years, right? We have records
back to the beginning of the county in the 18 hundreds.
And then the second question, on this fund, and tell me if I got this wrong, this fund, what you do
in that, the recorder's, I never can say it. Perpetuation. Perpetuation fund. When we vote on that,
that's a courtesy, but really that, the recorder's got discretion.
You're being kind and coming to us. Yes, and it is a category transfer. The Council of Spoys requested
a proposed budget line item-wise so you can see how money is being spent. But the stated purpose of
that fund is to preserve those documents in perpetuity and also to increase public access, which digitizing
the records absolutely will do.
It meets both criterias. And so this is the perfect use of those funds. I always just like to say I
appreciate very much the ability, one lunch hour myself, I went into the recorder's office to get, like
most people, to get my grandfather's DD-214 because I needed it for joining something or doing something.
It's probably the VFW auxiliary at that time.
and out they come, they have this process, you go get that, there's other people getting those things,
but those records are precious to families at a time when they need them, and it's always pretty precise
when they do, recording the deeds for property, all sorts of things that come in there, so thank you
very much. Yes, we take our part in that process very seriously. Yes, Council Member Woods. Regarding the
hard copies themselves. You have room in that archived area. I think it's in the showers building, is
that right? It is. Do you have room for the remaining books to be kept there? It's not only used by
the recorder's office, it's also used by other departments within the counties. And one of the things
that is still on my to do list is to reorganize that.
And to, because there were some shelving units, there was a deep freeze, chest type freezer for a mold
mitigation project that had passed. So that is now out of there using the proper procedure. And so I'm
trying to find as much room as possible so that we can continue for historical records, the way things have gone
In recent years, even more so accelerated by COVID-19 is everything is now being entered digitally.
And so with the records retention guidelines by the Indiana Archives and Records Administration, if
the documents were born digital, they can remain digital. And we do have all of our even digital records
backed up as well.
So we're fast running out of room there, but maybe if we can reshuffle some things, the remaining records
that we do have in paper form for all of the departments can be accommodated a little bit easier. And
I'm welcome to have any of the counselors who would like come over and look at the archives at your
convenience.
the Jim Fielder room? It is. That's what I thought. It's the Jim Fielder archives. Seeing no other further
questions or comments on this item, we'll move on to public comment. You can raise your hand via Teams
or you can come here in the room and make your public comment. And seeing none, may we please have a
roll call vote?
Councillor Decker? Yes. Councillor Crossley? Yes. Councillor Iverson? Yes. Councillor Feidl? Yes. Councillor
Hawke? Yes. Councillor Willis? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. And we still have one more item for the
recorder's item or the recorder's office, which is item D. Council, I move to approve the recorder's
request and fund 1,000
for an additional appropriation of $400 in the personnel category. Second. All right. We got a motion
in a second. Miss Wayne, what would you like to add to this item? Just the fact that this budget, this
line item was under budgeted for 2026. I don't know if I didn't tab off of the cell that it was in.
I overlooked it. I don't have a good explanation, but I hope that the council will be
um, agreeable to making sure that this employee gets their longevity pay. Great. Any questions or comments
on this item? Yes, council. Is that for the whole year, the 400 for the whole year? It's just the balance
of what wasn't there. So yes, it's a one time payment. Okay. On their anniversary date. Thank you. Council
member. You have a heavy cash balance in that.
perpetuation fund. Could you, can you legally cover longevity out of there for, we used to have personnel
in there. We currently have three salaries in there of the eight in our office. Two part timers, I have
kept them in the budget in the hopes that
we're going to be able to do that. Um improvements in our software will allow access to the records
which we don't have remotely right now. So we have the two part timers. They're working on back files
as well as one full time deputy recorder in there. Everything else. For our.
including six-digit contracts, one of which you just approved. All of our software, all of our office
supplies, all of our printing, everything else comes out of perpetuation. I appreciate that. I'm just
thinking $400 if we could take it out of there, since you do have some personnel there. I don't think
we would be against regulation. I wasn't sure.
If you listen in at future meetings, you're going to see, we're not going to have to watch for every
$100 and every $400 we can find. And I don't think it would hurt your operations to do that. I wouldn't
want to take it in the general fund because you made it there in the general, but the remaining balance
of $1.4 million that we have not
appropriate, except this last $35,000. And that will continue to grow. I'm spending about $178,000 on
this scanning project, and that's just for phase two. Just as an example. Plus, I cannot spend beyond
the sworn statement of the total amount budgeted
for things other than the purpose of the fund by law. Other questions or comments on the item for Ms.
Wayne? Seeing none, we'll move on to public comment on this item. If there's public comment, you can
come forward to the lectern here in the room or raise your hand via Teams.
May we please have a roll call vote? Councilor Decker? Yes. Councilor Crosby? Yes. Councilor Iverson?
Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Hawke? Yes. I think we should take congratulations. I'm sorry,
I didn't hear you with everything going on. It's my fault. Councilor Hawke, what was your vote?
I said no. Thank you.
I already had the conversation why, so. Councilor Wilts? Yes. Councilor Henry? Yes. Motion passes, majority
6-1. Thank you, Councilors. Thank you very much. All right. Next up, we have item E from the courts.
Council, I move to approve the court's department's request and fund
Court interpreters for an additional appropriation of $7,000 in the services category. Second. All right.
We got a motion and a second. We're joined by Ms. Chandler. Welcome. Hi. Hello. I just wanted to let
you know that the courts received a $7,000 reimbursable grant to help offset the cost of our interpreter
services needed for our court hearings. And we're just asking for those funds to be appropriated. Self-explanatory.
Congratulations on that. All right, any questions from Council on this item? Yes, Councilmember Decker.
I just always like to take the opportunity to thank departments for looking for outside grant dollars.
Those are dollars elsewhere that come home to help us do something, do a service. Probably not easy
to always go after, but I'm glad for them. We are not, if we have to replace them or if we lose them, we're not
always able to do all that. And that's a whole discussion on its own. But thank you for the courts for
going after this and being a model on how to do all those things. We appreciate it much. And congratulations
to you in your new role. It's good to have you here. Thank you. Council Member Henry. Thank you again.
Thank you. I echo Councilor Decker's sentiments there. So because the fund balance is in the negative
now, the 7,000 less, does that put us at
like roughly $4,600. Yes. Is there another increment or opportunity between now and the end of the year
that would come in, or is that? So we can pay that also from our special services line. Yeah. But anytime
we can get a claim turned in to the state and get those funds reimbursed, we're going to do that 100%.
Expect any more from the rest of the year, or is this? Oh, yes. In terms of the state? Oh, funding from
the state. They actually have contacted us, and they said they're willing to work with us on any emergency
funding that we might need. Great. Thank you.
we're excited about that. Well, you're required to have court interpreters. So if you got $7,000 to
help pay for it, I'm ready to say yes. Thank you. Besides, it's just hot in here. Yes, it is. Well,
before we say yes, we want to make sure that any other comments from council members are warranted or
necessary. And I don't see any, so then we'll
Also go to public comment. If there's public comment on this item, you can come forward to the lectern
here in the room or raise your hand via Teams. And now we will go to public or no, we already did that.
We will go to that roll call vote. Councilor Crossley? Yes. Councilor Iverson? Yes. Councilor Feidl?
Yes. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes.
Councillor Henry? Yes. Councillor Decker? Yes. Motion passes unanimous. Thank you. Thank you. Next up
is item F from the Board of Commissioners. Council, I move to approve the Board of Commissioners request
and fund 1186-0000 rainy day for an additional appropriation of $1,605,464.84
in the capital category. Second. All right. We got a motion and a second. And I believe Ms. Purdy online.
Other is going to present. You can go ahead and do so.
I'm not sure this is terribly difficult to explain. I'm reading the summary. It looks like the insurance
has reimbursed us or fronted us $1,605,464.84 for expenses dealing with tornado damages that we're having.
And so this appropriation is to, or this request is to appropriate that amount so that it can be spent.
And then clearly the funds from that check will go into this fund.
Okay. All right. And that's something that we talked about a while ago and doing that, but I have to
go through commissioners first as the good old checks and balances the county government goes. Okay.
Any questions or comments from council on this item?
Yes, Councilmember Henry. Thank you. And I agree. It's been a few months since that happened. It's remarkable
that February wasn't that long ago when we had that happen. I just wanted to check in with the auditor
that this arrangement still matches what we all discussed back in February in terms of how we're moving
this money around. It does. It matches perfectly. They're following the procedure we put together. And
I think this is a really good process, a nice way to deal with emergency events that are bound to happen.
Thank you. Appreciate it. And thank you for that work, again,
her staff and county attorneys in the auditor's office and the airport. And I think the partridge in
a pear tree, we had everybody involved to get this tidy. So thank you for that effort. And I would just
note that Commissioner Administrator Purdy is online. She is having trouble on muting, which is why
I'm stepping in. That's what happens when. All right. So thank you, Mr. Cockrell, for that.
any other questions or comments on this item? Seeing none, we'll move to public comment. If there's
public comment on this item, you can come to the lectern here in the room or raise your hand via Teams.
And seeing none, may we please have a roll call vote? Councilor Iverson? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes.
Councillor Wilkes? Yes. Councillor Henry? Yes. Councillor Decker? Yes. Councillor Crossley? Yes. Motion
passes unanimous. Thank you. And on the Board of Commissioners train, we have item G. Council, I move
to approve the Board of Commissioners request and fund 8106-0000 world transit for an additional
appropriation of $1,706,000.
$1,814 in services category. Second. We got a motion and a second. And I see Ms. Purdy is, our video
is working. So are you able to talk to us? I think so. We can hear you. Yay. Wonderful. Wonderful. And
thank you, Jeff, for handling that first one. I was just like, I can't make anything work. I apologize for that.
This particular request is specific to the rural transit grant and it's just allowing us, if you approve
the appropriation, allows for the expenditure to be made when what happens is rural transit submits
a claim, they submit it to INDOT and then when INDOT receives that claim, they send us the funds.
And without the appropriation, we're unable to provide the funds to rural transit. Okay. Thank you very
much for that. Any questions from council on this? Councillor Hock. I mean, this is the way we've done
it for years with rural transit. And I'm always happy to see what we can do to support
transit for the rural areas. And this again is for a year, right? Am I? Yeah, this is, so it's going
to get a little bit difficult or confusing, but this is for the 2026 grant.
Is this a conversation that we'll have to revisit here in the next couple of months for budget to figure
out? Okay. Okay. I just wanted to make sure. Okay. All right. Sounds good. Well, we appreciate this.
All right. If there's no other further questions or comments from council on this item, we'll move on
to public comment. If there's public comment, hi pups. You can come forward to the lectern here in the room.
nice to see little furry animals on teams. Oh, can you see him? Yeah, I have to hold him because otherwise
he will talk. All right, so we will move on to a roll call vote, please. Councillor Fiddle. Yes. Councillor
Hawk. Yes. Councillor Wilts. Yes. Councillor Henry. Yes. Councillor Deckard. Yes. Councillor Crossley.
for Iverson yes motion passes unanimous thank you thank you very much for that all right as we recall
items H and I were tabled and so we will move on to item J council from a recommendation from the auditor
I move to ratify the approval of additional appropriations for the waste reduction district that was
approved at the June 23rd
2026 council meeting in fund 1215, cumulative capital, account line 44220, building improvements for
$45,199 and fund 8210, general operating account line 40450, machinery and equipment purchase for $69,000.
This is due to changes in the Department of Local Government Finance advertisement requirements for
binding units.
second all right we got a motion in a second miss Gregory what would you like to add yes this should
be very familiar to you you've recently approved this however due to
a glitch essentially with advertisement. We're asking you to re-approve, we re-advertise just to ensure
and to err on the side of caution that everything is done correctly. So as you noted as you were reviewing
this, the new advertisements go through Gateway and there's different
different areas for different units of government. So rather than being under the county umbrella, they
have the waste reduction district has their own area. So we have, there's probably a workaround that
the DLGF could assist with. However, they're consumed with other things at this time. So we're just
proceeding this route. Thank you very much for that. Any questions or comments from council? Yes. I
just wanted to kind of
Let everyone know that Mr. McGlassen offered to be here this evening, but since this was more of a auditing
kind of issue, I suggested that that was not necessary. Great. Any other questions or comments on this
item? Seeing none, I will move on to public comment. If there's public comment on this item, you can
come forward to the lectern here in the room or raise your hand via team.
Seeing none, maybe please have a roll call vote. Councilor Henry? Yes. Councilor Decker? Yes. Councilor
Crossley? Yes. Councilor Iverson? Yes. Councilor Feidl? Yes. Councilor Hawk? Yes. Councilor Wilts? Yes.
Motion passes unanimous. Thank you for that. We have no presentations and so, wow.
We will move on towards the end of our agenda. I do want to note for the record that Council Member
Hawke has given her resignation for the Long-Term Finance Committee. We appreciate her service and efforts
on that committee and Mr. Henry is going to be filling in and taking over the spot for the rest of the year.
So that is noted. And again, Council Member Hawke, we thank you for your service on that. And we look
forward to seeing Council Member Henry serve on the Long-Term Finance Committee. All right. And with
that being said, I'm going to go ahead and start off with Council liaison updates and comments to my
right, starting with Council Member Hawke. All right.
Recently, and I've sent out this message to some of you, and perhaps you've all remember receiving the
state review of our jail. They came back with glowing reports just a couple of months ago. If you go
through it, you're going to think
Were they someplace else other than here? We didn't see anything coming back from the sheriff or anybody
saying we disagree with this report. This report was a report from the state after they had reviewed
and gone through our jail. And they sent the report out as they're required to do.
I didn't hear anything from the commissioners saying, well, this report's all wrong. No one said the
report's wrong. But clearly, it says something very different from what's being presented as though
the council knew something different. I'm saying that simply because when you receive a report, they
send it to you. Many of us rely on what that report says. And I was really pretty proud.
So I think that's something, if you haven't looked at it, I would ask the auditor to please resend it
to everyone. Send it to the press so they can see it. Because it is time for us to look at what we were
told. And we need to do it now. And I know everybody says wait until you go to court. But no,
I think we, this is legal information.
public information that we received from the state. I think his name was Mr. Groh, G-R-O-H, with the,
with that Department of Corrections, and it's required by the state to do this. So either regulations
changed drastically in the two or three months, that they say, okay,
Things changed as of July 1. Okay, send us proof of how it changed. But some of the other things, we've
all seen what the report said. So that is the report that is the official report that we should be relying
on. Or we need to ask the state why they made such an egregious error in sending us something like that.
Since we didn't hear that from anybody else, I think it perhaps was accepted as being truthful. There's
a lot more I could say about that, but I think that's something we all need to review. Okay, how do
I follow up? Thank you, Madam President.
I'd echo Councilor Hawke's sentiments on that. I think we're probably going to be talking more about
that in the weeks to come in terms of what constitutes an emergency and the state's view on that between
May and July, but thank you for your insight. I wanted to thank, and I'm sure we'll all do this eventually
this evening, Councilor Feidl for your leadership of the subcommittee and our community to evaluate
some different opportunities to keep the jail and city limits.
And all the members of that subcommittee, I don't think I've ever seen a group of people work harder,
faster to have that many public meetings in a five-week span and actually produce a result. And that's
not, that's uncommon. So we really need to celebrate that. Thank you for shepherding that through. I
look forward to when the council president here calls us all back together to talk about it. Again,
I'm sure we're going to be talking about that quite a bit, but thank you again for leading that up.
Councilmember Decker. I'm going to list of things here and I'll try to be pretty quick. Number one,
I want to congratulate the Monroe County Fair Board for running another successful, if not sweltering,
fair. I want to congratulate also the volunteers that were out there doing wondrous things, including
Kayden Smith back there being a judge for 4-H extension entries and including all those
different people in the community that submitted things into the fair to be judged. I had a kid do that
as well that's heading to the state fair. And I know that's an exciting time. So congratulations to
everybody involved. It was another great production during a holiday week. And with that, I want to
add congratulations to
the city for a tremendous Bloomington Fourth of July parade. Looks like the numbers were down a little
bit based on the weather, but that is just an awesome thing in our family. It was awesome also to be
with everybody at that. Earlier today, I had a chance to spend a little bit of time out at Cars Farm
Park as there was an official ribbon cutting on some of the new field area and lighting.
that was able to be put out there due to the county's use of ARPA dollars towards that project. As many
counselors that were here during that will recall, that was a use that was made possible due to ARPA
dollars and probably would not have been possible in that way without ARPA dollars. And already the
youth out there playing enthusiastic cutters
and the folks from downtown Bloomington or visit Bloomington pardon me that we're talking about things
that are booked there bringing again people doing business here interacting here enjoying our amenities
on the west side, east side, you name it, right? That's a good thing. And so congratulations to Kelly
Whitmer and all the folks at the Parks Board for getting that done and the cutters for already being
out there sweltering and practicing today. I also want to say that we had a dedication here at the courthouse
on Saturday, alongside some of the counselors were there, some commissioners were there in honor of
our Revolutionary War.
that are buried in the community. The Daughters of the American Revolution led that kind of
plaque dedication. You can all see it downstairs, including those buried in the county. But more than
that, over at the History Center, one block off, they had a real celebration of free press. And they
had a celebration of civil liberties.
And the one thing I've noticed about our history center, I want to really compliment them on this.
You know, for years they've had tremendous displays, but in tremendous contributions of folks in the
community. But I've noticed more and more increasingly, their displays are telling the story of the
community as it was, not as we often sometimes put with some rosier glasses.
they tell the story of our community really well. So a big shout out to them. Please go check out some
of their displays and support history center because as I said on Saturday, if we close the door to
our history, we will keep repeating the same mistakes over and over and over. I do want to say kind
of my last item here and a lot of a lot of different things going on. I want to commend counselor Fidel
as well and every person
including our county folks, the city folks, every person contributing to that, I called the subcommittee,
and that's not its name. That's what I called it. You called the subcommittee? It was a lot shorter.
And they did move, Councilor Henry. They moved at a rapid pace. It reminded me a lot of the CIB, to
be honest with you, in having a goal and moving towards that. And here's the thing I love about it,
they're still
Lots of messiness. And I appreciate Ms. Ford's comments earlier that were strong advice. I appreciate
also that she's shown up to that and all the community members that keep showing up to things to say,
we're not letting this off the hook. Here are things to remember. Here's what I appreciate. You have
non-traditional folks sitting at some of these non-traditional desks collaborating towards the better
public good.
And I spent a long time talking about collaboration. Nobody wants to hear any more about that. But friends,
we're going to have to hear more on that, because it's the only way it's going to work in a community
with this many overlapping jurisdictions, this many problems and headaches. We'll be back talking about
the Street to Stability Program, which is going to require, it is going to require literally that the
city, the county, and everybody else and their sister hold hands towards goals.
All these projects will never get done unless we have that collaboration beyond our egos. And I truly
mean that. And I say that with all respect. And again, no one wants to hear me do the math of the four
in one body, two in the other. But that's the only way it gets done, at a table where people
start collaborating. Because as I tell my students, and every other instructor tells her, you know the
best idea in the world, if you can't get it done, that's great.
That's just copy paper. And so I want to salute Councilor Feidl for her patience on that and taking
all of our phone calls and the public phone calls and everybody's idea and moving the ball forward.
And now I think it falls to the rest of us to pick the ball up. But it also falls to everyone coming
to that table, whether or not that is the medicine that you want to give the community, you want to
take. For instance, that's the only way it gets done. It's the only way.
It's basic civics, it's basic how humanity operates, and I like the example that was set there. You
saw folks doing that together, and that's what we need. All right, I'll stop. No, no, no, no, no. That
was good. I appreciate that, because that is definitely something that is important and needed.
Yeah, I had just a couple of things, but most of them have been hit on. So I'll be very brief on those
topics. I was unable to attend the Karst Farm ribbon cutting today, and I was sorry to miss it. It's
an important project, and I'm excited for new things to come at Karst and on that side of the county.
Thank you to Liz for all the reasons already stated. And I was going to mention the street stability
program that was recently announced about how our community can work to address street homelessness.
And there have been so many great conversations and
whether or not it's the heading home organization, whether it's the advisory group that I think is heading
up that program. I've had conversations with other electeds as well as with faith-based community and
some of their interests in helping out. And this really is a time where I think the more we can sit
together and talk together, the more we will get done.
I'm not always feeling that. Sometimes I feel like we sit together and talk at each other, but I've
heard so much positive support and ideas and real practical thinking that I'm excited for what's to
come. So I just encourage everybody who's been
touched by these conversations to make sure you're reaching out beyond those normal channels to include
others who may be interested, because that, to Councilor Deckard's point, is what's going to get us
there. The last thing I wanted to say was a month or so ago, I heard from the
campaign treasurer for Cheryl Munson's campaign, who wanted to know if the family could request that
the remaining funds in her campaign account be donated to the Sophia Travis grant fund. And just as
of a couple weeks ago, that was done. So there's a little boost from the
close out of Cheryl Munson's campaign finances that you'll see in the Sophia Travis Fund. And I think
that's a fitting way to have spent that last bit of money. And I wanted to publicly thank both Cheryl's
family and her treasurer, Tina, for thinking of that and making that happen. So that's it.
Yeah. Yeah. Whoa. Who's cutting on it? Counselor Feil. Well, on that kind of touching note, since I
serve on that committee, it is really an honor to hope to try to fill some of her shoes in that capacity
and other capacities. I thank you for your encouragement and support leading the subcommittee. I'm not
going to the whole name.
It just got long. So we had six sessions and we worked very well together and did our homework in between.
That was just really rewarding and refreshing to work with folks who were committed to work together
to produce what we needed to produce in the timeline that we had. So I was just very impressed with
everyone who served on it and that we can come to terms
building something somewhere that we recommended, you know, the current building, the Curry Fiscus site.
I haven't heard from anyone who really doesn't want it there, ultimately. So I think that we're on a
roll, and I look forward to making that happen. I did also meet with the new HR director, Melissa Waddell,
I think is how you say her last name.
And I'm looking forward to getting to know her a lot better. We clicked. It was just really cool. And
so then the 4th of July parade, I was there. I got to be a judge. It was really a fantastic experience.
It was just lovely. I did the Ellisville Chamber Picnic in the Park last Friday evening. Marty, counselor.
was there with me, as well as former counselor and Commissioner Joyce Poling. We were all three there.
We all sat together. It was just a really lovely time. And we all won something. So that was kind of
cool in their drawing. I did also at the courthouse and went to the history center. That was just a
really nice ceremony. There's a new plaque downstairs, updated plaque, I should say. And so you can
see it all updated and everything. It was just a really lovely ceremony.
So I'm thankful that we got our sixth committee meeting done, and I look forward to not having those
for a little bit. Thank you all. Thank you. And I think some of the staff here does too. I
think Councilmember Iverson said he didn't have anything. So he has his, yep, he's shaking his head.
it does not have anything. So much has been said again, but I want to kind of reiterate because there's
a lot going on and happening in our community. But to the subcommittee, I just thank you, Mayor Thompson,
City Council Vice President Sydney Zulek, and of course, April Wilson, Karen Wernbrick as well, but
definitely
Councilmember Fiddle for doing the job. I think you were a little nervous at first on taking it on,
but you did fantastic and it did not show. And thank you to the staff that also put in some hours as
well. I know city council attorney, Mr. Leary Allen, also helped out Mr. King, Mr. Connor, all of you
all for your help on that. And so while I continue to drop my notebooks here,
you know, I've been thinking a lot about how things are going on and really kind of thinking about things
that have been said. Um, and you know, in this meeting and other meetings, um, and you know, what, what
have you, and I guess, you know, and thinking of the spirit of what, um, Councilmember Decker and Wilton,
others have said is it definitely takes all of us to come together.
and it would be really helpful for all of us to come into a room instead of speaking at a meeting at 10 a.m.
or speaking at a meeting here during this meeting. We have to get, I agree with you, I think we have
to get off of the way of talking at each other and talking to each other and talking with each other.
and I can really imagine what would happen if we stopped going out into the community and talking to
other groups, but really come in and that call and response and really do that together. Man, I think
we could do some really good stuff. I really like, I watch South Park a lot. I'm a little ashamed to
say that, but I think we have to get out of the mindset of the Cartman, respect my authority kind of approach.
and really move beyond that because we all have checks and balances and what it is that we do. So while
those that question, who do we think we are, I think we think that we are and we know that we are because
the folks elected us to do that, is we have checks and balances in this county government. So as I continue
to say and as our colleagues have said,
We appreciate the conversations, but you know the marathon and the work continues. Obviously we saw
what came to us as a Friday and the work does not stop.
I know that we have a commissioner that is watching virtually right now, and I will still request, like
I did back in May, to come to the table and to talk with us, because the public is asking that. We heard
from Ms. Ford earlier, you know, people are looking forward to having those conversations together.
It's always our group that continues to ask, can you please, can you please? And it's better for us
not to just plead, but just to do. And so I think
Yoder, somebody say that. So I'm full of quotes tonight. But I really wish that we can do that. So again,
that extension for the conversation, that will happen. I'll work with staff to kind of reconvene and
get the larger group together. But that invitation, Commissioner Thomas and anybody else that is watching
is still open. And we invite you to join our table to talk with us, because that's what folks elected
us to do, not just to talk, but just to do.
That being said, I thank you all. Stay cool. Major shout out to the fire protection districts for keeping
those cool. And there's one on our street that has also been utilized as well. So with that being said,
we are adjourned. Thank you.