[0:04] Okay, I'll call to order the Tuesday's preventive meeting of personnel, ways and means. I have a one request to speak to the commission on an agenda item. Todd Gilman.

[0:23] Good morning. My name is Todd Gilman. I'm from Cambridge Township. I'm also a sitting member of the Michigan Republican Party and the President of Illinois County Conservatives. I would like to speak today about the administrator's contract.

[0:36] I don't believe since we are less than 60 days from the general election I don't think

[0:42] it's prudent for this board to take up an expense like this I believe it's supposed

[0:51] to be for three years I don't think it's physically responsible for the board to vote on this

[0:57] as we are going to be getting three minimum three new members or the board and I believe

[1:02] that would be handcuffing the future board I believe this administrators contract should

[1:07] be pushed back to at least January to allow the new board members to be seated and to

[1:12] vote on them because it's going to handcuff them for future budget proposals.

[1:17] I also believe it's such a bad precedent for the rest of the county employees that if

[1:22] we give one employee a three-year contract, I believe all the other employees will then

[1:26] have reason to believe that they deserve a three-year contract.

[1:30] This has nothing to do with the abilities of the county administrator.

[1:38] She could be doing a great job, that would be awesome, but a three-year contract handcuffs

[1:44] the new board that's going to be coming in in January, and I don't think it's physically

[1:48] responsible to vote on such an expense right now with three members of this board that will

[1:53] no longer be a part of the board come January 2025.

[1:57] five. These take that under advisement, as this is something that you should leave to

[2:04] the next board that's going to be sitting for four years, not two. So, thank you very

[2:08] much. Thank you, sir. I will move to approval of the minutes from the previous meeting.

[2:18] Some of what was part of the range of discussion. Very not all of them forever say hi.

[2:23] I, I, both same sign, Ocean Carey's.

[2:27] We'll now move to personal business.

[2:30] You all have a copy I believe or it's in your packet

[2:34] of the employee, employee changes within the county.

[2:38] Are there any questions, comments, concerns?

[2:44] Every nun will move to next item on the agenda

[2:46] the administrators contract.

[2:49] I'll open the floor for discussion.

[2:58] Mr. Chairman.

[3:01] So the reason I asked for that to be on the agendas because as we all know, there's an evergreen clause in the contract for six month notice and I just wanted a commission to be aware that the contract automatically renews without any action on that part.

[3:19] So it's actually an action item under paragraph two so that's the reason I had to put on the agenda. I have no problem with the commissioner or excuse me.

[3:29] The administrator having a contract for

[3:35] the discussion.

[3:40] Mr. Martis.

[3:43] I want everybody to be aware that I did take the time to call administrator Murphy before I went on vacation to let her know that I have no issues with the performance.

[3:50] And my only concern with the contract is the evergreen clause.

[3:54] I think it's bad policy to for the county or anybody in their own business for that matter to enter into a contract that automatically renews without affirmative action.

[4:03] But I don't intend to make any motion at this point for

[4:11] the discussion or request for a or make sure to tell us.

[4:18] Well, I don't see any reason why we ever had to ever green part of the contract.

[4:31] I said here and listen to all nine commissioners give her an outstanding review.

[4:40] And then is outstanding as that review is have a concern because we would have a

[4:51] contract for three years, I think it's really foolish because number one, you can look all over

[5:02] Midwest to come up with a person that has done or would do equally as well as she has.

[5:10] And I really think that I don't think a three year contract is long, long, long at all

[5:19] in that particular instance, either I misunderstood this board when she had a review.

[5:33] Everybody gave her an outstanding grade.

[5:40] So I just, I think really, we just need to, number one, I'd like to get rid of that, that evergreen clause, but I think a three-year contract is to our advantage as well as it is to her advantage, and I don't know where I would go out and find somebody.

[6:04] She got any more capability than she has, and she showed it.

[6:09] This isn't something you just thought about for three months.

[6:15] She showed that she has that ability, and today's world, when you got somebody that does

[6:23] the job the way you need it to be done, it's a situation where why is anybody trying to

[6:31] to fix something that ain't broke.

[6:33] I just don't understand that.

[6:37] Maybe the rest of you people can explain that to me.

[6:42] Mr. Stipson, because members of this board, Ralph,

[6:45] went about, and their campaign

[6:47] about cleaning up corruption in the Administrator's office.

[6:50] They made speeches about it.

[6:52] That's why we're here today.

[6:53] There's nothing to do with Administrator Murphy.

[6:57] Because they're here because they're trying

[6:58] to fulfill campaign promises that they made.

[7:00] Every green clauses are in almost every executive contract I've ever reviewed over in 20 plus years.

[7:08] They're standard clauses and they made promises they were going to get rid of this Murphy.

[7:14] So they're here to try to do that.

[7:16] Now they're not making a motion because they know they don't have support.

[7:21] That's why.

[7:22] That's the plain simple truth.

[7:24] This is the fourth time members of this board are trying to bring this contract forward.

[7:29] cost in the taxpayers hundreds of thousands in legal fees because they don't like it, but it is

[7:37] the contract. Any action on this contract, quite frankly, would open us up to some significant

[7:43] liability. If I were to counsel Ms. Murphy as an attorney, I would tell her that she has significant

[7:50] causes of action against those members.

[7:54] But that's the truth. They want to talk about transparency,

[7:57] They want to talk about how we're going to do things this way, but that's not how they act.

[8:04] So yes, I'm being a little bit chastising of the people who brought this forward because it's ridiculous.

[8:11] It's not being open and honest.

[8:14] They have grudges to bear, and they're trying to bear them out.

[8:19] So it is ridiculous.

[8:20] I will not vote in support of changing any aspect, and her contract should be renewed.

[8:24] Mr.

[8:28] Bales. Thank you. And I have to say this contract has been repeatedly

[8:33] attacked for two years, reviewed four times by multiple attorneys, and they found

[8:40] it legally found and bailed every time. Yet some continued a question

[8:45] administrator Kim Murphy's contract for what logical person would say as a

[8:49] personal vendetta. And they do this at the taxpayer's expense. We you know ask

[8:56] yourself how many times that went to the attorneys to be reviewed and the taxpayers paid that.

[9:03] We run and take political office, our constituents have a place,

[9:08] have placed the power with us to make decisions that impact the residents of Lennwy County.

[9:14] That role is powerful and vital in our governmental process. When we violate that trust by making

[9:21] our personal agendas, the forefront of our plans for the county and not what is best

[9:28] interest of our residents. We not only violate the very principles of our country was founded

[9:33] on, but we violate our friends, neighbors and the very people that we care about and trust.

[9:39] I can no longer sit idly why this continues to happen. Some of the Newark commissioners

[9:45] ran their platforms on transparency, why challenge them in that transparency as they are the

[9:52] same commissioners who continually challenge the administrators contract and ran their own

[9:59] political platform on reforming the dysfunctional administrators office. You beg the question,

[10:06] are you doing what Lenway County residents need or are you self-serving your own propaganda,

[10:10] and thus far it proves the letter.

[10:14] Thank you.

[10:17] For the comments, discussion,

[10:22] Mr. Bolton.

[10:24] Thank you.

[10:25] I just want to say we are not a lame duck commission.

[10:30] Kim Murphy has had an open to her policy

[10:32] for all of our commissioners, for all of the employees

[10:35] to come and talk to her on any issue

[10:37] and I truly appreciate it.

[10:40] She has brought consistency not only to the board,

[10:43] but to the employees of the county as well as the constituents and that is very

[10:49] important for continuation and planning for the future. We have momentum

[10:54] through Kim. One of the things that I have stated earlier is that I have sat

[11:01] with four different administrators for our county. I am the most excited at this

[11:08] time for the future of our county because of her administration.

[11:15] Her review was great

[11:17] and I don't know why this question has come up, but we need to give our administrator confidence

[11:23] in her job without continual questions on the contract and leaving her up in the air or time

[11:30] and time again. Thank you.

[11:36] Mr. Bandoorn. Okay, this is my second time, so I know it's my final time,

[11:42] I'm a little perplexed here, I don't know what you wanted me to do.

[11:48] I mean, there's an action item in the contract.

[11:51] So I just brought it to everyone's attention.

[11:54] I agree, Administrator Murphy has done an outstanding job.

[11:59] I think she had a great review process.

[12:02] I think that speaks for all the commissioners

[12:04] and how they rated the administrator and the fact

[12:08] that they addressed any issues and gave her high marks, so I'm just a little befuddled

[12:16] while we've taken this so personally here and defensive because we're all in support

[12:24] by the review process that we appreciate everything that she's done. She's done an outstanding job.

[12:31] You know, there's I can I can name the action items. I mean from Marie Spira campus to the budget to the personnel adjustments and wages to all the studies. I mean phenomenal job. So please. I mean don't take this that there's some sort of berating of the administrator in this action. It's an action stuff that you put in the contract.

[12:59] That says that six months ahead of time, the contract, if you want to do something with

[13:06] the contract, you should do with it, otherwise it automatically renews.

[13:10] So I just brought that to the attention of the commissioners.

[13:13] So please don't take it personally, you're doing an outstanding job.

[13:18] Thank you.

[13:22] Mr. Murph.

[13:23] Which is precisely why I took the time to preemptively reach out to Administrator Murphy on this very

[13:29] issue to explain that I simply had one concern, and that's that I don't think auto renewing

[13:35] contracts are good policy. And to continue to hear allegations that were seeking to do other

[13:41] things, some sewing seeds of discord and distrust is frankly beneath dignifying with a response.

[13:52] The comment, discussion. I too had some concerns about this when I heard it was going to be on the

[13:59] agenda. One, it is not a rarity. It exists in several contracts. The county

[14:05] to our immediate east, Madrow, has such a clause in the administrator's

[14:11] contract. I have looked around and such a clause exists in many county and

[14:16] city administrators contracts. This is not rare. This is not uncommon. Let me pose

[14:23] the question. If in fact we don't have such a clause, the six month notice. And we wait

[14:31] till the final hour and say, we're not renewing, you're done. That gives us virtually no time

[14:38] to find a new administrator. That gives the existing administrator virtually no time to find

[14:44] other employment. I think the six month clause is adequate. Secondly, I don't see it as an

[14:52] action item. It's not an action item unless we're willing to to take advantage of it. So I've no

[15:00] Nobody here, and I'm not hearing anybody. That says they have an issue with Administrator Murphy.

[15:07] Why they need to speak up now at the final hour. The six month notice is in the contract.

[15:14] The contract has existed for two years. In that two year period, it has not been bought

[15:19] up until the final hour. If someone wanted to terminate the contract, it should have been

[15:25] discussed and bought up, then we could bring it up. I'm not hearing anybody saying they

[15:30] wanted to eliminate the contract. And I'll sound a bit redundant because this contract

[15:39] has been under review multiple times, multiple times at significant expense, and multiple

[15:45] times has been shown to be valid and legal.

[15:51] I think administrative move we have done an

[15:53] outstanding job as administrator, as everybody else has said. I see no reason to take any action.

[16:02] The only reason to have this on the agenda would have been to take action and to say,

[16:07] well, it's an action item so the commissioners need to know. Is there any commission here that

[16:12] doesn't have or hasn't had a copy of this contract?

[16:17] If there are none, why didn't they read that?

[16:20] Why didn't they know that before?

[16:22] It's not all of a sudden actual action item.

[16:26] It's an item that has been in existence for two years.

[16:31] To say that we burden a future commission with the non-action,

[16:38] if you would now, because we are lame duck,

[16:42] then why are we voting on that budget here shortly?

[16:45] Why are we voting on a multi-million dollar budget

[16:48] and that will affect the next commission.

[16:53] That doesn't make sense.

[16:54] That's to say lame duck commissioners

[16:56] that just set their chairs,

[16:57] have a meeting for the rest of their tenure

[17:00] and open a meeting, close a meeting, go home.

[17:04] If your lame duck commissioners can vote,

[17:06] you still have a responsibility.

[17:08] So I, for one, I'm angry when I saw it,

[17:11] I'm angry now that it had even was even bought up

[17:15] unless there was gonna be some action taken on it.

[17:22] We're the comment.

[17:26] Okay, here you go. I got a question. Yes, sir. Minerow, what's the extent of the

[17:32] I don't know the length. The length of it. I don't think it's the entirety of the contract.

[17:39] Administrator Bussamick has a three-year contract and every year upon his evaluation another year is

[17:46] added. So his contract continues to be a three-year contract. Is

[18:00] there any other personnel business

[18:02] we bought to this committee. Any other personnel business,

[18:09] very none, we'll move to ways and means

[18:11] for the finance report.

[18:15] Okay, the finance reports here in your packet and they are as of August

[18:21] 26th. I will start with the governmental funds and within that is the revenue for general fund.

[18:27] And currently, to date, we have a budget of 37 million for the revenue totals, and we

[18:34] are at 14 million 137,000.

[18:37] That is approximately in total, 38% of the budgeted revenue.

[18:42] As you all know, tax bills are going out and over the next few months, you're going to

[18:46] see that revenue total climb.

[18:49] As we move on to the expense, you can see that against a budget of 37 million, we have

[18:57] have a year-to-date actual expenditures of just over $23 million,

[19:02] which is at about 63% of the budgeted expenses.

[19:06] As we move on to the Fund Equity Changes Report,

[19:09] again, just as a highlight of the governmental funds,

[19:13] General Fund have year-to-date revenues of $14,137

[19:18] against year-to-date expenses of $23,299,000.

[19:23] Moving on to your special revenue funds.

[19:25] You have year-to-date revenues of 17,882,000 against year-to-date expenditures of 18,094,000.

[19:37] We continue on to the debt service funds, which show year-to-date revenues of just over

[19:43] 1.4 million against year-to-date expenses of 1.5 million.

[19:49] The Fund type capital projects fund have year-to-date revenues of $791,000 against expenditures

[19:57] of $1.1 million.

[20:00] Moving down to the Capital Project Fund Special Assessment Districts, we have year-to-date

[20:06] revenues of $4.2 million with expenditures of $3.6 million.

[20:12] So total for all of your governmental funds, you're showing year-to-date revenues of $38

[20:17] $8,498,000 against expenditures of $47,687,000.

[20:25] From here we'll move on to the proprietary funds, more specifically the enterprise funds.

[20:31] These are more of your business-like funds for those of you that are wondering.

[20:36] These show revenues of $21,273,000 against expenditures of $15,996,000.

[20:45] Our internal service funds are showing revenues of 216,000 against expenditures of 321,000.

[20:54] So your total for your proprietary funds to date is 20,490,000 in revenues against 16,317 in expenditures.

[21:06] grant total for all county funds at a beginning balance of 96,694,000 year-to-date revenues

[21:16] are currently at almost 60 million year-to-date expenditures are just over 64 million.

[21:23] And with that, if you have any questions, I will try to answer those.

[21:33] As I mentioned earlier, the bulk of the revenue that we're going to be seeing will be coming

[21:38] coming in in the next couple of months as tax bills are paid.

[21:44] Questions, comments,

[21:52] the fourth quarterly, allotment of appropriation,

[21:55] Senator Murphy?

[21:57] So moved.

[22:01] Spoons and supporters are in discussion.

[22:05] They're not known for every say aye.

[22:06] Aye.

[22:07] Most same side, motion carries.

[22:10] Review of the 2025, Illinois County budget.

[22:15] So you may I'm going to come up to the podium.

[22:18] It's

[22:32] been a while since I've been on this side.

[22:36] So all of you have been made aware.

[22:38] We have a draft budget we're going to be talking about today.

[22:41] Some of you as commissioners have requested the budget workbook.

[22:45] So if you requested one, it is at your desk for your review today.

[22:49] If any of you decide after hearing this proposal and some of the proposals that are coming forward

[22:54] after this, you want a printed copy.

[22:57] please let us know and we can get you a copy for your review.

[23:03] This is a PowerPoint overview of a very detailed and lengthy process that the county has been undergoing as we have gotten to today's ability to present you with our 2025 draft budget.

[23:18] So we can move forward with the slide.

[23:20] There's a, we're going to be highlighting a number of things.

[23:23] You have a table of contents as you can see it in your presentation.

[23:27] This budget has been put together through a team work of people.

[23:31] I would like for these individuals to stand if they are in here to be recognized.

[23:36] Shannon Elliott, the deputy administrator.

[23:39] Daniel Zamolzac, who is our new finance director.

[23:43] Bev Aillers, our HR director.

[23:47] Tracy Stase, our budget analyst.

[23:50] And Jennifer Ambrose, our communications and marketing coordinator.

[23:53] All of these individuals are responsible for working with all of the departments and do a large amount of analysis in order to get what we are doing presented to you today.

[24:03] So I just want to thank them.

[24:12] So what does county government do?

[24:14] For those of you that are commissioners, you're pretty much aware of that.

[24:17] As residents, oftentimes, our residents are not necessarily as familiar with what lunaway county government is.

[24:23] So county government provides some oversight.

[24:26] We work with public works we obviously we have elections which we're in the thrust of right now

[24:32] We have courts public safety emergency management health. There's so many different departments within the county

[24:37] It takes all of these departments the ability to work together to be able to provide the services that our residents are able to enjoy

[24:47] As we go on to the budget process there's a lot of collaborative effort that happens

[24:52] I just mentioned some of the individuals that are responsible for helping put this budget together,

[24:56] but it also takes all of the departments, those leading the departments,

[25:01] and their ability to understand what they have going on and what their needs are moving forward.

[25:05] We work with them in great detail to make sure that we are able to identify their needs

[25:10] and quantify the expenses associated with that and the determine if it's something that we can do moving forward or not.

[25:17] The budget timeline, if you recall, you approved a budget calendar back in April, which is when

[25:23] the budget team was formally put together. Through the months of May and July, the human resources

[25:31] was putting together what we call personnel projections. This is looking at average single

[25:36] position within the county, both elected and non-elected, understanding where everyone is in the

[25:45] wage and compensation study, a step increase as a result of an anniversary date, assigning

[25:51] a COLA adjustment in January, and taking a look at anticipated insurance increases and

[25:58] guesstimating what those are.

[25:59] It takes a lot to understand the largest expenditure of the county and our largest asset, which

[26:05] is our personnel.

[26:07] So, there's a lot that needs to be done there before we can move it on to finance.

[26:11] In the meantime, finance is working on revenue and working with the Equalization Department

[26:15] to determine what does that look like for our biggest resource is our property taxes and trying

[26:21] to figure out what does that look like because we have to have an idea of what our revenue looks

[26:25] like before we can then put the final budget together. So once we've gotten through all that we begin

[26:31] working with the department to find out what their needs are and working all that we've put it all

[26:36] together into a budget document which is a document that is several hundred pages long

[26:41] And for those of you who are interested, it will be on our website so you can look at the detail behind it.

[26:47] We are currently at the admin draft budget timeline on here, where we are present.

[26:52] Well, excuse me, we are actually at the Board of Commissioners, but we have put together in August this draft budget and are presenting it to you today.

[27:00] The hope is after reviewing the budget, you've had a copy to look at and talking about it today that we will be moving this budget on to the Board of Commissioners tomorrow.

[27:10] and asking that the Board of Commissioners set a public hearing in October to be able to approve

[27:15] the budget. This goes along with the timeline that the Board of Commissioners established earlier

[27:19] this year and then will then allow us the ability to publish this and have it available for public

[27:24] inspection. The hope is then in October we have the hearing and it will then be adopted and then we

[27:31] can move on to regular business as we close out the end of this year.

[27:37] So moving on is an overview

[27:39] for what you were looking at for the 2025 budget that is balanced, this is a budget that is $41,662,899.

[27:49] Of that, we have planned to use $4.6 million in fund reserve.

[27:55] A large portion of that is going into our capital fund.

[27:59] We have heard the commission indicate that they want to make a priority of looking at our building infrastructure,

[28:04] our technology needs, our vehicles, and make sure that the fundamentals of our ability

[28:10] to operate are addressed.

[28:12] So we are including a $3.5 million into our capital fund we're in the past that was

[28:16] only a $1 million expenditure.

[28:19] We also have a healthy contingency built into the budget of $1 million.

[28:24] This is a take care of any unexpected expenditures that we may see in 2025.

[28:30] And last year was the first year that we moved the debt service payments out of delinquent

[28:36] tax and into the general fund.

[28:39] So you will see $1.2 million for those debt expenditures in the 2025 budget.

[28:47] In order to kind of project forward, we also look backwards.

[28:50] We look at trending and what have we seen.

[28:53] And you can see here what the trending has been with revenues and expenditures.

[28:59] we just heard the audit report for 2023 and so we are able to actually formally identify the actual amount of revenues and the expenditures.

[29:08] For 2024, which is where we are working at right now, we are working with a budget of approximately $37 million.

[29:15] And next year at this time, we'll be able to see how that actually computed out with revenues and expenses.

[29:21] There's a few things I want to point out that we have seen over the last few years with our revenue and expenses.

[29:26] So you may recall, in 2022, we did make a $9 million transfer out of delinquent tax into the capital fund.

[29:36] In 2023, we saw increases in revenue as a result of some COVID funds that were coming in.

[29:44] In 2024, this year, we're starting to finally see our revenues and our expenses normalize to our new normal post-COVID.

[29:53] And as I said, in 2025 we are increasing the amount we're putting into our capital fund.

[30:00] Investments, meaning our infrastructure, by another 2.5 million compared to what we have been

[30:06] doing previously. So as we move on to the 2025 revenue considerations, I wanted to point

[30:15] out that overall we are anticipating in 2025 about a 4% increase in revenue. Where does

[30:21] that come from? The biggest portion of that as I talked about in our finance reports earlier

[30:27] is from property taxes. We are expecting an increase of about 3% in property

[30:33] tax values in 2025. We do try to budget conservatively to make sure that we

[30:40] are not overestimating revenue coming into the county. It's also included

[30:45] includes revenue from the state which is part of our revenue sharing and then we

[30:54] We have state and federal grants that remain consistent, and as a reminder, we manage just

[30:59] over 120 state and federal grants in the county.

[31:05] So getting into a little bit more detail of what that revenue looks like and how it's

[31:09] broken up, there are some main classifications in which revenue is identified.

[31:14] And as you can see in the top line, the property tax is a count for the majority of what we see

[31:20] in revenue.

[31:22] I want to point out the very bottom line here where it says other financing sources.

[31:27] You're seeing 5.644 million.

[31:30] That is, the revenue that comes in under other financing sources is the transfers in for

[31:36] indirect cost, as well as the transfer in from fund balance to utilize towards the capital

[31:43] fund that we were talking about earlier, so that $4.6 million in total that we're bringing

[31:47] from fund balance is reflected in the other financing sources.

[31:52] So you can see over the last few years, we have been increasing that transfer in from

[31:57] indirect costs and other sources to increase our revenue.

[32:02] As we move on, there's some other items that are typically talked about and when we hear

[32:08] annually from the Equalization Director, what that report looks like for our property

[32:13] values.

[32:14] And I wanted to include this screen so that you can see the breakdown

[32:19] between real property and personal property, as well as the priority of where

[32:23] the bulk of our revenue comes from and you can see that the bulk of our revenue

[32:27] comes from residential classifications, the second largest one is our

[32:31] agricultural classifications. One of the questions that comes to me quite often is

[32:36] when we had the pipelines go in, where's the pipeline money go? Is there a line item

[32:40] in our budget for pipeline money? The answer to that is no. There's not a line for

[32:44] pipeline because that is considered property that is identified in this screen. That is considered

[32:51] and it goes to not only just the county but to all of the tax and jurisdictions where that pipeline

[32:56] runs. So I wanted to make sure that was identified here. As we move on to some of the other items that

[33:03] revenue comes from, there is something that came around a few years ago called the local community

[33:09] stabilization fund. This is a replacement form of revenue that the state is

[33:14] providing us as they have allowed small businesses to increase their

[33:18] exemption in personal property tax revenue. This is fairly consistent and we've

[33:23] budgeted about $1.1 million in revenue for this purpose. Anyone who's been

[33:30] watching what's going on at the legislature you can see where MAC has been

[33:34] advocating on behalf of county governments to come up with a better formula for

[33:38] revenue sharing. Currently, we have received our funding notification from the State of Michigan

[33:45] that we will be receiving about $2.6 million in revenue sharing, which is about a 7.9 percent

[33:52] increase over last year. And the other big one that we're asked about a lot of times is the

[33:59] marijuana tax revenue. Well, I'll indicate there are two forms of marijuana money that comes

[34:06] in the first is medical. That was when people had their medical marijuana cards. That funding

[34:12] that comes in is dedicated specifically to the Sheriff's Department. However, that funding has

[34:17] gone down drastically since recreational marijuana became allowable, I will say, in the state of Michigan.

[34:26] So we are budgeting conservatively of about $801,000 in revenue. We are waiting to see how this revenue

[34:33] may be impacted as Ohio has started to change their state laws and since we are a border

[34:39] county we're waiting to see what that will look like going forward.

[34:44] So as we move on to some of the 2025 expense considerations, on the expenditure side we have seen

[34:51] an overall increase of about 11% in increases compared to last year. That is a result of a number

[34:58] of different things. Personnel is a large portion of that. It has increased by about 2.25 million.

[35:05] And if those of you that have a workbook, if you look under tab six of that workbook,

[35:09] you're going to see where a lot of those positions and stuff are coming from.

[35:13] Because we have done some additional staffing, some additional staffing is included

[35:17] in the 2025 budget.

[35:20] We do have a few positions.

[35:22] We also have a couple of offices that are going through a total reorganization.

[35:26] Those are included in your, in this budget.

[35:30] That only did we have a wage and compensation study, which the first year took effect

[35:35] in 2024, and so it will be the second year of those changes in 2025.

[35:41] We also did a study on all of the elected positions, commissioner positions as well

[35:46] as the other elected that we have in the county.

[35:49] Those recommendations that were voted on earlier this year have been included in the compensation

[35:55] study for 2025, and not only is that for as commissioners, not only the wages, but any changes

[36:00] that we made to produce or anything else that would have happened throughout that recommendation.

[36:07] Also, we have budgeted an increase in our health insurance premium. When we were preparing

[36:13] the budget, we did budget a 10% increase in that premium. Good news. You will be getting more

[36:20] detail on this next month, but we have preliminary numbers that it looks like the overall blended

[36:26] increase for the county is going to be just under eight and a half percent.

[36:31] So we do have a little bit of extra budget in the budget.

[36:35] We also are seeing some increases in non personnel expenses.

[36:39] As I mentioned, we're putting extra money into the capital fund this year.

[36:45] That amount will be going directly into the contingency fund,

[36:48] that extra to allow the full board to use that funding for any kind of infrastructure

[36:53] improvement that it has, as well as we walk through the considerations of what we are

[36:58] going to do with the judicial building. We know that we're going to have some expenditures

[37:02] there, so that is what we're trying to plan for through the budget process. And then, of course,

[37:07] we do have our normal inflationary cost of operations.

[37:14] General fund is also divided into various

[37:17] functions of government. We've got the legislative judicial. You can read these up here. One of the

[37:24] questions that are often asked is what is under the health and welfare because that's a big number?

[37:34] And under this function you're going to see the medical examiner, the health department,

[37:38] veterans affairs, MSU extension, department aging, some of those offices you're seeing contained in

[37:46] that line item. The other one is community and economic development. Although we don't have much

[37:53] there. I did want to pull that out. That is actually more of the land bank and housing and

[37:58] stuff like that. That's what's classified in the community and economic development right now.

[38:04] So I just wanted to kind of point out that the fund expenses are contained in all these various

[38:11] different functions, which is bringing us to our $41,662,000 2025 proposed budget. As we move on to

[38:21] the debt service. This is where we have, we currently have two bonds that we are continuing

[38:28] to pay on a few years ago. We did some improvements to the Sheriff's Office. So we do have a 2018

[38:35] bond for that. That final payment will not be until 2038. And in 2020, we implemented a bond

[38:45] for the restoration and renovations of the old courthouse. That final payment will not be

[38:50] until 2040. I am very excited about the due diligence on behalf of the commissioners

[38:58] that we are able to do a $20 million improvement to Morisphere Campus without incurring an additional

[39:06] bond on behalf of our taxpayers. So we will continue with these two bonds as we are able to make

[39:12] major improvements at Morisphere Campus. As we move on to basically a summary of the budget

[39:23] The 2025 budget is balanced, although we are using some of our fund balance.

[39:29] You did also hear that we did put a little bit back as part of our audit process, and

[39:34] we are trying to use this to look forward to our infrastructure improvements that we know

[39:38] that we have.

[39:40] We have worked with every single department within the county.

[39:44] We have held meetings with almost every single department brought them in, reviewed their

[39:48] their budgets line by line to make sure that we are all on the same page. We're

[39:53] appropriate and we're helpful to the individual departments. We have added more

[39:57] detailed account numbering so that we could identify costs more easily. All of

[40:03] the personnel projections that I have listed earlier have been included and all

[40:09] non-general funds appropriations have also been considered and included in your

[40:13] budget. If you have any questions, I will try to answer those. Oh, I'm sorry. I have one more

[40:21] screen or two. I got excited. Future considerations. This is important. As we move forward, we were just

[40:27] talking about the board that may be coming on in January and what they're going to be looking at.

[40:33] This Human Services Committee has actually brought forward the thought of doing a

[40:38] Lennon Way County's strategic plan. This is for Lennon Way County government for 2025.

[40:46] The administrator's budget does include $50,000 to put towards that sort of planning.

[40:52] So we will look to see what that looks like as we move forward into 2025.

[40:57] We have considerations that the Rex B. Martin's judicial building.

[41:01] We did have a study performed and evaluation and some ideas of what that could look like,

[41:07] But what we will move forward doing is yet to be determined, but we do know that whatever

[41:12] we do is going to cost money.

[41:17] The collective bargaining agreements will still be impacting the budgets going forward.

[41:21] Those were brought into consideration for 2025.

[41:24] They were three year bargaining agreements that were settled in 2023.

[41:29] So we will be dealing with those collective bargaining agreements over the next few years.

[41:33] And of course, as we continue to look at infrastructure and you're going to hear me say this, we will continue to build what we can into the capital fund for those improvements.

[41:45] I don't know whose telephone that is, but you might want to get it.

[41:51] So the next steps, as I mentioned earlier, would be if this commission would so deem is to recommend the 2025 draft budget to the board of commissioners for publication.

[42:03] and to hold the public hearing on Wednesday, October 9th, 2024.

[42:08] And with that, I will answer any questions that you may have.

[42:14] Before I begin discussion, I'll ask for a motion to accept and forward it to the full board and then we can have discussion.

[42:22] Full motion.

[42:23] The motion is supported.

[42:25] Now is your discussion.

[42:26] Questions?

[42:28] Mr. Martin.

[42:29] I just want to say again, I appreciate the time you've taken with us in the last two years to review the budget.

[42:34] I think that's been very useful to give us a good baseline of understanding as we worked on that together.

[42:39] It's been a very collaborative process.

[42:41] I'm also very pleased with your plan to try to forward budget for the any improvements to the courthouse.

[42:47] I think that's very sound policy and I'm glad we're taking that approach.

[42:51] For

[42:55] the questions, kind of, Mr. Stimson.

[43:00] Again, I echo the commentary that you've done an excellent job, your staff has done an excellent job, and the departments have done an excellent job.

[43:08] I want to point out one particular fact that if you look at that budget, you're a little over 2% of debt service.

[43:15] That's it.

[43:16] Meaning of all the county funds going back decades,

[43:21] This administration, these commissioners who have been here for decades, have been very, very responsible with money.

[43:28] If you look at most private enterprises or even governmental enterprises, they have way more debt service than 2% of their total dollar.

[43:37] That's amazing.

[43:43] Questions, comments?

[43:44] that's being done. All those in favor say hi. Oh, same side motion carries.

[43:53] Moving down to the E at 911 five years strategic plan. Everybody has received a copy of the capital fund.

[44:02] Oh, I'm sorry. Let's keep my record. We're at the capital improvement plan by mistake.

[44:09] That's okay. It's a tall order to follow the administrator.

[44:13] I'm warning commissioners, you will find in your budget books should you have one under tab seven, the capital improvement plan, the proposed capital improvement plan, excuse me.

[44:23] The capital improvement plan projects out five years in areas such as infrastructure, IT, county vehicles and department projects.

[44:31] Creating the capital plan assists the county in future forecasting and allows for a more seamless resource delivery service to the residents of Lenaway County.

[44:38] The 2025 capital budget proposes a $3.5 million allocation from the general fund with a 216,500 coming from other funds for a project total of just over $3.7 million.

[44:52] If you're looking at your budget summary, you could move down to that.

[45:00] The operational budget for 2025 is broken down by division. You will see the building and site division has a total of $654,985 with $200,500 coming from the meeting from the human services building, fund for the lot, seal, meeting and panels and interior and a capital distribution in the amount of $454,485. This distribution will cover various building infrastructure needs throughout the county and can see into $20,000 contingency.

[45:30] As well as two department requests for the jail, a control center, and the amount of $50,000,

[45:35] and a restructure of the emergency operations center for emergency management in the amount

[45:39] of $24,500.

[45:42] Moving down to the risk of your campus division, you will see that is a request in the amount

[45:46] of $200,119, again, with the $20,000 contingency bill to end.

[45:52] This request will cover things for the administrative building, exterior border, cocks, seal, things

[45:57] of that nature as well as roof replacement for the existing detention facility. Nothing to do with

[46:03] the expansion or remodel of Reese for campus. The park division has a division total in the

[46:09] amount of $105,606 with a building contingency of $5,000. This will address various projects in

[46:16] Garber Park as well as the basketball slash pickup ball resurfacing at Medina Park. This total also

[46:22] So as an 8,606 dollars to the fund balance for future projects.

[46:27] As we're again, we're forecasting out her parks.

[46:29] We recognize that there is a need to put more funding into our parks, as well as for our parks survey and our parks plan, which we've heard from our residents.

[46:36] They would like some more infrastructure built into our parks.

[46:40] The IT division has a total of 235,000 with a $25,000 contingency for several projects such as computer replacement for accounting employees.

[46:50] Excuse me, not all county employees, but it's a rolling replacement for county employees

[46:54] and departments, as well as several projects such as Cisco agreements and replacements.

[47:00] The Sheriff's Vehicle Division has a total of $405,200 for the purchase of four vehicles,

[47:06] and then we have our lease obligations, as you can see for the years 1921 and 23.

[47:11] We are moving towards no longer leasing vehicles, just purchasing them outright, so we will see

[47:16] those legacy costs continue to fall off,

[47:18] allowing for a little more flexibility

[47:20] in the purchase of those vehicles.

[47:22] Building and grounds vehicle division has a department

[47:24] total of 78,590 with a capital distribution,

[47:28] the amount of 62,590.

[47:31] There is also an allocation from parks

[47:34] and the human services building in the amount of $16,000.

[47:38] And again, the allocation is utilized because those two entities

[47:41] often utilize the building and grounds vehicles,

[47:44] bills, plows, trucks, all those kinds of things, if you will.

[47:48] Vehicles other department has a proposed distribution of $20,000 for the replacement of vehicles

[47:53] within other county departments.

[47:54] You will see that there's not a request there currently.

[47:57] However, we do have some aging vehicles in some of the other departments.

[48:00] Again, those departments are trying to be as frugal as possible with expenditures, but we

[48:05] do want to make sure that we have some money in case something should happen in the interim

[48:08] of the capital plan.

[48:11] To come see products, division has $17,000 for grounds keeping throughout the year.

[48:16] We've been monitoring our expenditures at the Come See products site and we feel that

[48:20] $17,000 is a good place to stay or bush hogging, mowing, all of those kinds of things.

[48:26] And lastly, we've been discussing an administrative murky, took a lot of my thunder and that's

[48:30] when she talked about the capital improvement plan, but we've talked a lot about large projects

[48:34] in the horizon for Lenaway County and again, she's specifically called out one of the judicial

[48:38] additional building, the rest of the martin judicial building.

[48:41] We know that something must take place there.

[48:43] We had a need assessment that showed that there are significant operational deficits within

[48:47] that building.

[48:48] And so something will have to take place in the future, whether near or the next five years.

[48:52] And so what we were able to do is put $2 million in the contingency component of the capital

[48:57] fund to plan for those large expenditures that we know are on the horizon for Lenaway County.

[49:03] And that reduces what we'll have to put on our taxpayers.

[49:05] So, again, having that too many contingency allows us to plan, utilize different mechanisms for example the needs assessment in itself was really helpful to understand where we have those deficits in the judicial building as opposed to just kind of going in and starting to build and make additions.

[49:20] Now we actually have an idea, if you will, of where those deficits really lie and how do we address those deficits, not in the short term but in the long term.

[49:28] So that can be really helpful for us moving forward.

[49:31] You will also find in the appendices of this plan, you will find the airports five-year plan from 2025 to 2030 with expenditures as well as funding sources for what the airport plan would look like.

[49:45] Previously, this mission had asked that we blend these two entities and we have one place for our projected long-term plans, our capital plan, our airport plan.

[49:53] and then the following will kind of see B,

[49:56] excuse me, appendix B, you will see the 911 surcharge.

[49:59] That is an executive summary of that plan

[50:01] as you will, that plan will be presented to you.

[50:03] Immediately after me is Commissioner Collins

[50:05] called that, called for that.

[50:08] There is no action requested of you today.

[50:10] As you know, you heard from Administrator Murphy

[50:13] that this, the capital plan is built into the overall 2025 budget

[50:17] and upon should you adopt the 2025 budget,

[50:20] you will be adopting this capital improvement plan as well.

[50:22] But I can answer any questions, or I will attempt to answer any questions, should you have them?

[50:28] I think it's better require the action.

[50:31] That's correct.

[50:37] And stated before, this does not require action at this time.

[50:41] So for any questions or comments, that was the time.

[50:48] During that, thank you.

[50:51] We will now, to the E-9-1-1 strategic five-year plan.

[50:55] I assume you all have a copy of the plan. I've received it a chance to review it.

[51:01] I'll entertain a motion before we have discussion.

[51:07] Report.

[51:08] It's moved and supported. Now is there any discussion or questions?

[51:17] During none, all those in favor say aye.

[51:19] Aye.

[51:20] Oh, same sign. Motion carries. Thank you.

[51:23] All right.

[51:24] I like those.

[51:25] Yes.

[51:29] We move now to the Mr. Michigan Neighborhood Grant, Mr.

[51:35] Murphy.

[51:40] Sorry, that is off of the agenda.

[51:44] The reason for that is that there was some confusion between the granting authority and

[51:49] the county on the documentation that we needed in order to act on that today.

[51:56] So we are working with Mishda today on that my neighborhood grant application to try to get the appropriate documentation if we do get it.

[52:05] It will be on your agenda tomorrow for consideration for those of you that are not aware.

[52:12] We have verbally been advised that we may have a $75,000 grant available to us for Gerber Park.

[52:20] work. So that is something that we are working towards. We just need to get the finalized paperwork

[52:25] so that we can get your authority to approve that, to accept that grant and to move forward

[52:31] with the process. So more to come on that tomorrow.

[52:37] Questions, comments? Hearing none, we'll move to the energy efficiency request.

[52:57] Again,

[53:04] are we not being asked to act on this today?

[53:07] That's what I thought.

[53:09] I'm sorry.

[53:10] It's a review and it's not in time.

[53:12] I'm sorry.

[53:12] Okay.

[53:13] I move that we reject the solar part of this proposal.

[53:16] Support.

[53:18] I'm sure you say that you reject the solar portion of the solar part.

[53:21] Is that too?

[53:22] Is that to say except the...

[53:24] No, I'm husband.

[53:25] I just addressing that one part.

[53:27] Okay.

[53:29] Mr. Simpson, I just a point of order.

[53:32] I think the proper process would be to either approve positively a motion forward on what you do except

[53:40] rather than a

[53:42] negative motion that elicits some sort of other aspect because that's that's the typical manner in which you would do it correctly under Robert's rules

[53:50] You can check with our parliamentarian if I'm out of order, but I think that's the proper way to do that. I'll turn it a little

[53:56] And my within legal balance with my motion.

[53:59] I believe the commissioner Stimson, the way it was presented in the agenda packet is that the request was to review and consider the specific proposals generated.

[54:09] You are certainly within your right to move to reject the proposal submitted.

[54:15] And then it would be much more feasible, so to speak, to go back to the drawing board and consider other options.

[54:23] questions. Do

[54:28] we have a motion to reject the solar portion, other proposal, Mr. Stemson?

[54:34] I think just what I'm trying to get at is what should be said is that if you want to reject

[54:38] a proposal fine, then you need to put for a positive motion of I wish to accept X, Y,

[54:43] and Z Commissioner Mardis. That's really where I'm getting at. So there's a positive motion

[54:48] on the floor that can be voted on. When you say something as big as the solar part, you're

[54:54] unclear in your motion, which is why I'm asking for clarification and point of

[54:57] point. Again, attorney Galuli, is my motion clear? Is it legally defensible?

[55:09] Your motion is clear to me without a doubt. I still think it would be better,

[55:16] sort of as an in-between to both proposals. The proposed recommendation was to vote on the

[55:22] proposal generated by Verigee. If you're not satisfied with the proposals generated by Verigee,

[55:32] my recommendation would be a motion to decline the proposal submitted and then bring up a motion

[55:41] to that which you would approve. If I may amend my motion, is that acceptable now? Does

[55:49] does not have to withdraw his second.

[55:53] You can amend it with approval of the supporting individual or you can withdraw your motion.

[56:01] Can I amend it with your approval, Commissioner Crandy?

[56:04] Yes, sir.

[56:06] Thank you, sir.

[56:07] I amend my motion to say I move that we reject the solar portion of this proposal and delay

[56:13] any action on the lighting portion until we receive two additional bids from local contractors.

[56:19] support.

[56:23] Been moved and supported that we reject the proposals as it relates to the solar

[56:30] portion and defer the request on the lighting and tell such time as we have two competitive

[56:39] bids. My question I would submit is what is your most to say if we don't get to if we

[56:48] one.

[56:51] I stand by my motion and I can answer that question.

[56:58] Mr. Vendorn.

[57:01] Thank you. We have some discussion about this prior to the meeting. So did you have a chance?

[57:09] Administrator Murphy looked at the contract to see if there's any clause in there about getting additional people to bid on it.

[57:17] I'm sorry. Did we who's we and when did we recognize the administer recognized? I'm sorry.

[57:22] All right. Okay. I'll clarify that. The administrator and I.

[57:28] So should you decide not to go forward with this project, there's a letter in your packet.

[57:33] It's called the letter of intent. We will need to repay

[57:37] Verigee for the worth that they've done, and that is the amount of $29,250.

[57:43] As it applies to the bidding, I think it's important to recognize that this project as part

[57:50] of variegies, due diligence, did bid it through what's called, I'm going to get this

[57:56] wrong, GP1-1GP, okay, which is very similar to the Michigan Mydeals that more of us

[58:05] are familiar with, where the state does receive bids and then they post the low bid and that's

[58:11] how we oftentimes purchase vehicles or other services. There is a very similar service which

[58:16] the county is a member of or these types of services and it has been vetted through that service.

[58:24] So any vendor who wishes to bid on projects, lighting projects, solar projects,

[58:30] anything that falls into the realm of what we're speaking of today has the ability to submit

[58:35] bids on what their prices would be and then to be considered. So although we did not specifically

[58:41] as a county go out and ask local bidders to bid specifically on a particular project,

[58:49] much like we have done with other projects where we purchase vehicles and don't put out an RFP,

[58:55] it has been vetted through this agency.

[58:58] So I'll follow up on that, sorry, just so basically my understanding of what you just told me

[59:04] is that our liability is the extent of the original liability where we said that if we reject the project we owe 30 whatever the amount is that's the amount of our liability.

[59:18] That is the amount we would owe back to Verigee correct.

[59:21] Otherwise, if we accepted it, then that would have been included in the bid process and absorbed within the bill, right?

[59:29] That is included in the cost that we would have to pay for the project, yes.

[59:33] Yes.

[59:33] Thank you.

[59:36] Let me boil the stock order further.

[59:38] Obviously, to reiterate what Ms. Radorn said, if we refuse in totem, then we have to pay

[59:45] very GD $30 plus $1,000.

[59:48] And let me go further and boil the stock if I can.

[59:52] Other entities have had the opportunity to bid on this.

[59:58] So, I want to make clear, we did, we, it's-

[1:00:00] The county did not put out an RFP saying Lenaway County may have this project and may be looking for bidders. However, we don't do that with vehicles either when we are considering the mydeal contract because the state already bids all of that out and says, here's the product it has been vetted and this is the best price available to you. That is the same situation with this organization in that for the lighting or for the solar or for any of the other types of services.

[1:00:29] that are providers of this contract, they have already bid out the specific product and so if we

[1:00:38] were to go with what Verigee is quoting, they are pulling that bid from that particular program.

[1:00:45] So, in a sense, we would not have to do another RFP because it's already been vetted by another

[1:00:52] this other agency. Mr. Martin. Just to be clear, I have no problem with Verigee doing the lighting

[1:00:58] base of this project, I simply want a couple independent vids to prove that we're paying fair market value, and it may be entirely possible that a couple of local contractors can save us the $30,000

[1:01:11] dollar feasibility payment that we're at risk right now. And until we ultimately reject the entire project, I don't believe we're going to be encumbered by that, but right now we don't know.

[1:01:22] We don't have any competitive bids on the lighting side to know whether or not their numbers are as good as we can get for the taxpayers.

[1:01:34] I think what I understood Minister Murphy to tell me is that it has already been vetted to know that this is in fact the best pricing for this specific project through the third party agency, which is pretty commonly done in projects like this.

[1:01:46] Not to mention all the aspects that are associated with our past dealings with Verigee and their

[1:01:52] predecessors and interests in the work they've done all over the county as a preferred vendor.

[1:01:57] We could all vote no on this particular motion and then we have the opportunity to turn around

[1:02:03] and offer a motion approving the lighting portion of this without all the conditions

[1:02:07] that were proposed by the motion in support. That is something that would still be allowable,

[1:02:13] would avoid any of the penalties associated with it, and we can move forward right away

[1:02:17] and try to get those done with the incentives that are in place, which is a big part of this.

[1:02:21] This feels like a delay tactic in order to just push it off to another time period.

[1:02:26] This project was before us two, three months ago, and we wanted to make sure it had as due diligence

[1:02:31] and some people had time to look at it. And what we found is it has been embedded and has gone out

[1:02:35] for the lowest bid, and we're still here today to move forward on the project one way or the other.

[1:02:40] I mean, I know that I will be voting no on this motion and then if it fails, I will be offering a motion to approve the lighting portion of this contract immediately.

[1:02:50] So let me, let me ask her, you know, I'm not so much for clarification, maybe just statement.

[1:02:56] If in fact, we neglect this, excuse me, refuse this, because we don't have competitive bits,

[1:03:04] We're going to do so also when we buy vehicles off the statement, we're going to ask local

[1:03:10] car dealers for competitive bids, but it's the same thing, it's the same comparison.

[1:03:18] Mr. Krasnick.

[1:03:20] That comparison to a labor-filled project to an item that is commonly purchased by local

[1:03:27] units of the government, like a law enforcement vehicle, is not even close to being germane.

[1:03:33] When you're talking of millions of cars that are produced and put out there has nothing to do with how much it's going to cost to change a light bulb in different facilities.

[1:03:43] So I do not accept that association at all.

[1:03:47] We don't buy millions of cars and I will stand by my position even though this is labor intensive.

[1:03:54] It is vetted through the state program much the same as a vehicle purchase.

[1:03:59] You

[1:04:03] should tell us.

[1:04:04] A question.

[1:04:07] Locally, we all like to be involved as much as possible.

[1:04:15] Under the state guidelines,

[1:04:20] does people in our local Lenaway County

[1:04:26] and engage with the state as to bidding situation like this.

[1:04:37] Arditelle.

[1:04:40] It's my understanding that that is available to anybody within the county.

[1:04:44] As it relates to vehicles, for example, I can tell you from previous experience.

[1:04:49] The state that's out the vehicles.

[1:04:53] and let's say, well, back to the older days, it was a Chevy Caprice, and they will pick

[1:04:59] dealers who will submit bids also. Those dealers would have to comply with the state-bid

[1:05:05] program, and all dealers will. In fact, most dealers won't, because that's a lower price.

[1:05:10] So the opportunities exist there for them to make sure to tell us about that.

[1:05:17] And that's what I'm trying to find out

[1:05:22] is to local people have to belong to this state organization

[1:05:30] in order to bid and rat.

[1:05:35] I just don't understand.

[1:05:37] Mr. Mandor.

[1:05:38] I think it's a much like the process

[1:05:41] where they put this out Ralph and everyone has an opportunity

[1:05:45] to do it.

[1:05:46] but they just put a general RFP out and bring them in,

[1:05:51] but I happen to agree with Commissioner Crazney

[1:05:54] to some extent in the fact that automobiles

[1:05:58] versus getting down into electrical suppliers

[1:06:01] here in Oneway County, they probably,

[1:06:04] there's so many of them that they probably

[1:06:06] don't even get involved in the state building.

[1:06:09] Maybe that's their fault, maybe they should

[1:06:10] and then they've been involved in this, so.

[1:06:12] but the fact that, you know, the state knows that they contacted every one of them to see if they wanted to bid on it, probably in most of them in Loneway County or not.

[1:06:28] For the questions, comments.

[1:06:31] We have the motion read again for clarification.

[1:06:36] Do you have it?

[1:06:42] The original motion.

[1:06:47] by Commissioner Morris was to reject the solar portion of the proposal. The motion was amended

[1:06:55] to reject the solar portion of the proposal and change the current proposal to obtain two

[1:07:02] additional bids from local contractors. Is there any question on the motion? Is it cleared everyone?

[1:07:09] just to be clear, are we voting on the amendment first?

[1:07:17] That's the only motion that's pending is the amended motion.

[1:07:20] There's no other motion available.

[1:07:22] It's not an amended to the first motion.

[1:07:25] It is. It's an amended motion.

[1:07:27] The first motion was amended.

[1:07:29] That means the first motion was taken off the table.

[1:07:32] Okay.

[1:07:32] The only thing you're voting on is the.

[1:07:35] With you.

[1:07:36] Thank you.

[1:07:37] For the questions.

[1:07:37] There's an indication, there ain't none, nor a roll call vote, roll call.

[1:07:46] Commissioner Bales,

[1:07:50] Commissioner Bolton, no, Commissioner Collins, no, Commissioner Crasney,

[1:07:59] Commissioner Jenkins Arno, Commissioner Mardis, yes, Commissioner Simpson,

[1:08:09] Commissioner Tillerson,

[1:08:25] We move forward with the lighting portion of this contract while rejecting the solar portion.

[1:08:31] I

[1:08:39] don't hear a second support.

[1:08:43] It's moved in support that we move forward with the lighting portion of this contact and reject the solar portion.

[1:08:54] If I might have a friendly amendment to just approve the lighting portion and then address

[1:09:00] perhaps the solar portion on a third motion, I would be up to that.

[1:09:04] If there is so inclined, otherwise again, I will be asking to vote no, and it will offer

[1:09:09] a motion following that, if it's defeated, to simply pass the lighting portion.

[1:09:17] There's caution.

[1:09:18] So

[1:09:21] I guess I'll move to amend the motion at this time to remove the provisions associated

[1:09:27] with solar and adopting only the provisions associated with lighting.

[1:09:33] If that is an amendable motion in that form, it could be contradictory to the entirety.

[1:09:37] I go to Mr. Lulee as it relates to that aspect.

[1:09:42] He rejected your proposed friendly amendment.

[1:09:44] amendment. I think your proposed motion there needs to be a vote on the maker's original motion.

[1:09:52] So no vote back to what I was discussing and then I could offer another motion.

[1:09:56] You could. We'll call vote please.

[1:10:01] Well, we were not over discussion. Commissioner, tell us.

[1:10:05] Before we vote, I would like to understand the motion.

[1:10:11] The motion before you is to move forward with the lighting portion of the project and reject the

[1:10:15] solar portion of the project.

[1:10:17] That's correct.

[1:10:18] Yes, sir.

[1:10:19] You want to see.

[1:10:21] You have some.

[1:10:23] You want to say commissioner?

[1:10:24] No.

[1:10:25] Somebody here.

[1:10:26] All

[1:10:28] right.

[1:10:28] Let's roll call vote.

[1:10:31] Commissioner Bolton.

[1:10:33] No.

[1:10:35] Commissioner Collins.

[1:10:37] No.

[1:10:38] Commissioner Cresney.

[1:10:39] No.

[1:10:41] Commissioner Jenkins.

[1:10:42] Arnold.

[1:10:44] I'm sorry.

[1:10:46] Commissioner Martis.

[1:10:48] Yes.

[1:10:49] Commissioner Stimson.

[1:10:50] No.

[1:10:51] Commissioner Tillerson, Commissioner Vandoren, and Commissioner Bales.

[1:10:59] Eight knees, one yay, motion, Bales.

[1:11:02] I move to adopt and approve the lighting portion of the proposal.

[1:11:06] So far, smooth and supportive to accept the lighting portion of the proposed misery of discussion.

[1:11:14] Mr. President, by all that grandstanding that we just saw wasting everybody's valuable time,

[1:11:21] all we did is negate local companies from being able to bid on this project.

[1:11:27] For the public that's viewing this, for the people in the audience, that is all that took place

[1:11:31] through all those shenanigans that we just saw.

[1:11:37] They're all the shenanigans we just saw, or it currently saw.

[1:11:43] Mr. Stimson, echo that statement, that's grandstanding. What took places,

[1:11:48] is what we asked for. You could have avoided that. That's just

[1:11:52] grandstanding and blowhardness. And it continued. You do a

[1:11:58] wonderful job at Commissioner Mardis.

[1:12:03] Volkhovo. Volkhovo.

[1:12:06] We have a motion to continue with the lighting portion of this

[1:12:09] project only. Commissioner Collins. Yes.

[1:12:12] Commissioner Crasney. No. Commissioner Jenkins Arno.

[1:12:18] Commissioner Mardis.

[1:12:20] Commissioner Stimpson, Commissioner Tillerson, Commissioner Vandoren, Commissioner Bales, Commissioner Bolton, six years, three days, motion passes.

[1:12:36] Mr.

[1:12:40] Stipson? No, no further motion at this time.

[1:12:46] Any other motions to be offered?

[1:12:51] Thank you, sir.

[1:12:52] Thank you very much.

[1:12:52] Thank you.

[1:12:53] We'll do a good job for you.

[1:12:55] Thank you.

[1:12:57] Okay, we move down to committee referrals and recommendations.

[1:13:02] There's a request for the Exxon Taser Time Track.

[1:13:06] Sheriff Guillaume.

[1:13:11] Everybody has a copy of this request.

[1:13:13] The request is the approval of the axon with the axon for the upgrade of taser 10 devices.

[1:13:23] Just, I thought it, when I first looked at this, it's not 10 tasers.

[1:13:27] This is the taser 10 project.

[1:13:30] That's your sentence.

[1:13:31] Move to approve the request.

[1:13:33] Support.

[1:13:34] Support is a rain discussion.

[1:13:38] Any none?

[1:13:38] I would never say aye.

[1:13:40] Aye.

[1:13:40] For the same side, motion carries.

[1:13:42] Thank you, Sheriff.

[1:13:43] Thank you.

[1:13:45] Yeah, you're articulate today, Sheriff. Both counts.

[1:13:53] Have we have a request for military grounds, whether approval to accept Adrien mechanical

[1:13:59] quote of $65,780, or the installation of eight electronic shower controls, 11 lavatory

[1:14:08] controls, and programming of controllers contingency of 15% over $9.87, $67.

[1:14:17] doubling amount of the request 75,647.

[1:14:22] Oh my name.

[1:14:23] Support.

[1:14:26] Motion support is a discussion.

[1:14:28] Mr. Crasney.

[1:14:29] Did we put this out for an open bid?

[1:14:33] Building and grounds did bid this out.

[1:14:35] I think we don't.

[1:14:35] Just check it.

[1:14:36] They attached some of the bidding attachments were included in the physical resources meeting

[1:14:40] which I believe we had last week.

[1:14:42] Right.

[1:14:43] Did I share it?

[1:14:44] Thanks.

[1:14:44] That's because it's not a car.

[1:14:49] It's enough.

[1:14:50] I'll see.

[1:14:50] Both of you.

[1:14:51] That's enough.

[1:14:51] All right, we move now to the request for the MSC Extension Project Noob Fiber 2.

[1:15:08] All those in favor say, hi, motion carries, we start up here. Now we will ask for the MSC extension project, Mr. Mayor Murphy.

[1:15:27] This project was recommended also through building insight, and this is to recommend approval.

[1:15:31] So for an allocation of funding to put in a new fiber runs from MSC administration building,

[1:15:37] to the old detention and chapel to the things in the amount of $26,329.

[1:15:43] Oh.

[1:15:43] Sport.

[1:15:45] Sport is a very discussion.

[1:15:49] During non-nose and paparazzi, I, both same sign, motion carries.

[1:15:59] Is there any other business or ways and means?

[1:16:03] If there are any other business or ways and means,

[1:16:10] any additional items for the consent agenda, any additional items for the consent agenda, any none out of the board of public comment?

[1:16:26] I just want to comment, although the budget did receive a unanimous motion to move forward

[1:16:32] to the Board of Commissioners, it will be shown as a separate line item on your agenda

[1:16:37] to take formal action for the setting and public hearing.

[1:16:42] I'm on the table.

[1:16:44] My name is Todd Giltman, again, Cambridge Township.

[1:16:48] The few things I'd like to talk to, John, a few of the commissioners talked about transparency.

[1:16:52] I would like to know about the lack of transparency with the sale of the to come see products especially after it was just brought to my attention that we spent $17,000 a year to maintain grounds on a piece of property that we should have sold already.

[1:17:07] Where was the transparency when we started when we approved cutting down trees around the airport.

[1:17:13] Those people in that area did not know about it until the last moment.

[1:17:19] I'm kind of really taken aback by we're going to use a bidding system out of Lansing and we're going to box out our local contractors and we're going to spend this kind of money.

[1:17:30] Why don't we give local contractors the opportunity to do the job and keep the money in Lennon Way County.

[1:17:37] There was no transparency on that you're just going off some system up in Lansing and now we're going to send that kind of money out of our county when we could have kept it in our county.

[1:17:47] We struggle to provide jobs in this county as it is.

[1:17:49] We've lost a lot of businesses over the years.

[1:17:54] Where was the transparency when you guys voted to take away the road commission's health insurance.

[1:18:00] And then provide health insurance to the pay raise to yourself.

[1:18:03] There was a few members of this board that were upset that their names were going to become public.

[1:18:07] We're taking taxpayer funded health insurance.

[1:18:09] They did not want that information to be known to the public, no transparency there.

[1:18:15] We're the transparency on Commissioner Stimson's property that joins the

[1:18:22] dependency products. He stands to personal money, personal gain, when that

[1:18:28] property is eventually sold, but it doesn't, they don't want, you guys don't want

[1:18:32] to sell it for the next four years.

[1:18:36] I don't understand why you guys are doing

[1:18:40] some of the things you're doing. You don't have a problem spending other people's

[1:18:43] money. If you're going to spend our money, give it to people that live in the county.

[1:18:51] Going through some bidding system out of Lansing is unacceptable.

[1:18:57] Casual Republicans, act like it. Thank you.

[1:19:10] I have everybody. My name is Deborah Comstad. I'm the editor and publisher of the Lentaway

[1:19:15] Voice. One of the reasons we started this paper was because we needed objective news,

[1:19:21] good journalism, and we needed to heal this community with good information.

[1:19:28] It's tough to build a team. It's tough to find talent here. I haven't had a terrific

[1:19:35] team that puts out a paper that goes to 19,000 people in this county, and we haven't

[1:19:43] even reached our one-year anniversary. My comment is about him. She's put together a

[1:19:50] terrific team here. Not hard to do. I mean, it's hard to do in

[1:19:54] Illinois County. We just don't have talent. And in terms of

[1:19:58] bidding on projects, sometimes we don't have the talent required

[1:20:02] to do these big projects. We have to rely on

[1:20:05] Lansing, just like we have to rely on Lansing now for solar,

[1:20:08] because our local talent chips were not competent, making good

[1:20:11] decisions. So here's my thought about it, my takeaway. When

[1:20:15] you got a good team, and you got good talent, and you got good

[1:20:20] people, you reward them, you protect them, you keep them because you know what? In this county,

[1:20:29] you may not be able to replace them. My thought is I value my newspaper team more than I can tell

[1:20:35] you because they're exquisite in their talents and we have the same thing here. I think we should stop

[1:20:41] quibbling about silly little contractual things and get down to the business that's in the best

[1:20:46] interest of this county and what's in the best interest of this county is economic development

[1:20:53] bringing in solar, bringing in new corporations so we can have good jobs and when we get those jobs

[1:21:00] and just like Adrian and Sienna has the biggest class this year ever we need to figure out how to

[1:21:05] keep those kids here because if we don't it's a dead zone you've got a good team I'm not here to

[1:21:13] recommend anything. I'm here to say when I got a good team, I take care of them.

[1:21:21] Any further public comment?

[1:21:25] Any further public comment?

[1:21:29] I'll go to Commissioner's comment.

[1:21:32] The Commissioner's having comments to make.

[1:21:36] Commissioner Bolton.

[1:21:38] I'm just extremely disappointed in myself and other commissioners not to bring up

[1:21:45] the motion for the solar because that is something that is the future of our community.

[1:21:55] And I really think that that is something that will be savings to us.

[1:22:02] And I think it's something that is important, especially for the human service building.

[1:22:07] If we can reduce the rent because of the energy that is being saved there.

[1:22:12] If we can put in charging stations for the employee's vehicles to encourage

[1:22:21] clean vehicles, if we can put one in in the Sheriff Department area to encourage the

[1:22:28] clean vehicles in that.

[1:22:31] I really think that this is something that we are missing out for our future.

[1:22:38] So I just want to say I'm ashamed of myself for not bringing that up at that time.

[1:22:44] Let me pose a question for council at this time.

[1:22:48] There was not a motion that passed that negated the solar proposal, by correct?

[1:22:56] Correct.

[1:22:57] So that's going to exist, the proposal is going to exist.

[1:23:00] The proposal exists, so it would have to be brought back to the board for deliberation and vote.

[1:23:06] So subject to the contractor willing to abide by the same terms.

[1:23:15] Any further partner, excuse me, commissioner coming.

[1:23:21] We're in now, now we're going to entertain the motion to adjourn.

[1:23:23] Hello.

[1:23:24] The board.

[1:23:25] Moving supported.

[1:23:27] The board will never say hi.

[1:23:28] Hi.

[1:23:29] No, same sign.

[1:23:30] Motion carried.

[1:23:31] We are adjourned.

[1:23:33] Thank you.

[1:23:35] That's it.

[1:23:36] That's it.

[1:23:36] no barriers in the bedroom.

Personnel/Ways & Means Committee Meeting

Transcript