[1:23] I'm going to call our Montgomery County Board of Commissioners' regular session, August 18th at 6 p.m. to order. And our first line is for our invocation. And Pastor Tony is supposed to be here, but he had some family sick, so he's not able to be with us. So I'm going to open this up in prayer tonight. And so let us pray. Heavenly Father, we do come to you, God, and we thank you for all the many blessings. And God, we thank you for this great nation.

[1:53] that you've given to us. We thank you for this great county that we live in. And God, we come here

[1:58] tonight to do your will and to serve you and to serve this community, Father. And as we come

[2:03] together, we ask for your guidance. God, we ask for your wisdom. And we ask most of all for your

[2:09] unity, God, to work in this meeting. Have your way tonight. We thank you for each one of these that

[2:15] are here to serve. And Father, God, we thank you for this great county that we get to do it in.

[2:22] And

[2:23] tonight and continue to guide us and we ask it all in Jesus' name and everybody said

[2:28] Amen.

[2:30] Alright, let's stand for our pledge tonight.

[2:32] I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for

[2:41] which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all, may be seen.

[2:52] all right we'll get started here looks like we need approval for an agenda for

[2:58] our agenda there need a motion and a motion got a motion got a second all in

[3:04] favor all right and Commissioner Shaw will not be with us tonight he had some

[3:11] other things to come up so he did let us know that and I guess right now Frank

[3:17] time for our public forum. Indeed. Um, we do not have anyone signed up for public forum. Okay.

[3:23] Anybody here that didn't get signed up that would like to real quick for you any further.

[3:30] There you go. All right. All right. Frankie, uh, let you have it here for the agenda.

[3:36] Let's bring this to the people's agenda. Um, we have a handful of items here, about a half dozen.

[3:41] We have the approval of the regular session minutes on July 21st, a budget amendment number two

[3:46] for a memorandum of agreement for grant funds with Richmond County and this is from the Health Department.

[3:52] We have the juvenile Crown Prevention Council 2627 funding plan, resolution and support of tobacco of 21.

[4:00] This is the resolution that was presented last month.

[4:03] Fireworks Permit Application and the Register of Debt Report.

[4:09] All right, looks like I need a motion.

[4:11] I'm making motion.

[4:12] All right.

[4:13] We've got a motion in a second. All in favor?

[4:15] All right.

[4:19] I might be wrong to say this, but that tobacco 21, I think it's a good idea, but if someone's

[4:24] active in military here would be able to smoke cigarettes and come here at least 20

[4:27] euros.

[4:28] I'm sorry.

[4:29] The old school would be there.

[4:30] If he's active in military, he would be able to have an exemption.

[4:32] Yes.

[4:34] We're all.

[4:35] I see where you come in from.

[4:37] Yeah.

[4:38] It's a good job for his country and our country, you know what I mean.

[4:41] I believe he did.

[4:42] He might have felt like that too.

[4:43] I'm sure.

[4:44] I'm sure.

[4:45] I'm sure.

[4:46] All right, Frankie.

[4:49] All right, I do have a few items here on our county manager's report, a couple that

[4:53] needs some action.

[4:54] The first would be the consideration of a budget amendment to provide funding for retention

[4:58] bonus for Montgomery Community College.

[5:02] Typically those bonuses are accomplished through a budget amendment at the end of the fiscal

[5:07] year.

[5:08] We did not do that this year and last month we discussed briefly the given additional

[5:14] consideration to those employee retention bonuses that MCC has given out for the last

[5:20] couple of years or so.

[5:21] And to accomplish that this year would require, in the current fiscal year, would at this

[5:26] point, would require budget amendment, and that's what's before you tonight.

[5:30] It would seek a budget amendment and approval of retention bonuses, and I would add that

[5:36] we also discuss distributing those in some sort of uniform fashion across MCC employees, and

[5:42] that would be included in the recommendation for you guys tonight.

[5:47] All right, so we need a motion that would be

[5:50] giving out wind.

[5:55] I did not specify this here. I would have to coordinate with them a little further

[5:59] to know when they would disperse that.

[6:01] I would like it to go ahead and be sooner or later

[6:04] if you can put that in the notes.

[6:06] I can I'll convey that to them.

[6:08] We can get it transmitted to them quickly.

[6:10] Okay.

[6:12] I'll make a motion.

[6:14] All right.

[6:14] Got a motion?

[6:14] Need a second.

[6:15] I'll second it.

[6:16] Got a motion in a second.

[6:18] And all in favor?

[6:20] All right.

[6:21] Motion approved.

[6:24] Uniformly.

[6:25] Uniformly.

[6:28] Second item I have for the board's consideration is we have an interim vacancy on our planning board.

[6:34] And I'll rewind just a little bit.

[6:35] But the board usually gives each member a nomination for a planning board member and the

[6:43] political courtesy is for the board to approve the nomination of each individual member.

[6:47] Mr. Schaul's not seeking reelection and the appointment where the nomination is his and

[6:54] he's deferred that to the board to make the official appointment.

[6:58] We have one individual to consider, Mr. Jonathan Sedbury, and if Mr. Sedbury's application

[7:08] is agreeable, a motion to approve Mr. Sedbury to the plaintiff board would be in order.

[7:13] All right.

[7:14] I'll make a motion.

[7:15] All right.

[7:15] We've got a motion.

[7:16] And got a second.

[7:17] All in favor?

[7:18] All right.

[7:19] Motion passes.

[7:21] Did have one thing I'd like to mention, and this is a little less for the board and more

[7:26] for our audience that may be joining us out there on YouTube or

[7:30] and or through our website. The county is in the process of updating our

[7:34] website, our agenda software, agenda management, minutes, all those

[7:39] things wrapped in the one. Part of this is, you know, some of our

[7:44] technologies in the life, some of it's to comply with the new 88 federal

[7:48] 88 requirements for our website. Tonight for the first time there's access to

[7:54] the general public and you guys and everyone else to some of our agenda items and what the

[8:00] new look will be. For those folks out there to access the information through our website,

[8:06] you'll see the exact same thing our board is seeing. You have the ability to even ask

[8:12] a few questions, put it in more of an accessibility mode, and I believe there's even an option

[8:16] to get some assistance for those that may be impaired. But look for this to evolve as we

[8:23] go forward. We are pointing folks to the website because there's more opportunities to interact

[8:28] with our agendas and minutes and historical documents through the website. So any feedback

[8:35] is appreciated as well as this is still new to us.

[8:39] And we continue to update upgrade and I like that. I mean we always need to be doing better

[8:43] looking better. You can't do much with this anyway so make it look as good as you can.

[8:47] I mean, all right, before beauty, right, didn't say beauty was a horse, though, so I don't know.

[8:56] Anyway, it's ain't comedy hour, sorry, I was waiting for a little, but it's okay, go ahead, Frankie.

[9:01] And I will mention that I've had some feedback about flock cameras or automation license plate readers.

[9:08] The one that's in the county does not belong to the county and there seems to be confusion

[9:15] about that.

[9:16] We do not own or operate any license plate readers.

[9:19] Yeah.

[9:19] We'll have anything to do with it.

[9:21] And any that have been placed in the county have not been placed by the county commissioner's

[9:26] or any county entity.

[9:30] Correct.

[9:30] Yes.

[9:31] Okay.

[9:31] All right.

[9:34] All right.

[9:37] Is that it?

[9:38] That's all I have.

[9:39] I've got something to say.

[9:40] All right go for it. Our election is coming up in November 3rd and our community building

[9:48] out in El Dorado. The concrete is just the concrete needs some attention really bad.

[9:55] Safety wise, I would appreciate it if we could get into that.

[9:58] Okay, definitely get that on the list. Move it up to the list. Thank you.

[10:04] you buy out? I got three things. First of all we discussed previously maybe

[10:12] getting a contract where you literally get to northern end of the county some

[10:15] fire protection help. I want us to try to move that along and see what we can

[10:20] work on. I got citizens up there that still concerned so we owe it to them to

[10:26] give it our attention. Second thing is solar water. I'm ready to see a new

[10:33] building, sitting out here with the eggs, with the clothes to Christie and them, let's get

[10:38] so on and more out of this building out here, get rid of it, whatever they need to do,

[10:42] but let's get them down there and get a new conference room built so they'll have somewhere

[10:46] to do their meetings.

[10:47] I concur completely.

[10:50] And my third thing is the hardest part.

[10:52] I just want to, as a commissioner, thank you for the job you're doing, thank you for any

[10:57] time I call this man, he gets me that I don't know anything, but I can call him again.

[11:03] get the answer for when the citizen calls me and asks me something. I'm going to call

[11:08] you back shortly, but then I'm going to press for him. So Frankie's the next number you

[11:12] got. For me, I appreciate you. We give it to him. He has all the answers because he has

[11:17] the money and all the ordinances and we cannot get a good answer and a fair answer. I try

[11:23] to give an answer. They not be the ones who want to hear always. But it's not going to

[11:26] always be. Well, is it right? I don't care if it's the ones who want to hear or not.

[11:30] The right one, always right one, that's it, that's it.

[11:33] And one thing I'll say about Frankie and I appreciate even

[11:37] before I came on the board is Frankie, he's like,

[11:41] we may not can fix this, but let's get away through where we are.

[11:45] He tries to get us through what we're going through,

[11:47] get us the end result.

[11:49] And like you said, it's not always what we want to hear,

[11:51] but you give us a path through it and we all appreciate that.

[11:54] Dan has a saying in the planning department,

[11:57] trying to get you to guess.

[11:58] Yes.

[11:59] Is that how you say it exactly?

[12:02] How's that?

[12:03] I mean, you're way, but we're going to get there.

[12:05] Yeah.

[12:06] Trying to get you to yes.

[12:09] It's my share of questions, too.

[12:11] I mean, he asked questions made when he interned at 12 years ago.

[12:14] He asked me questions.

[12:16] Well, and I'll say this.

[12:18] There you go.

[12:19] But to have folks that work here, but not only live here, but grew up here, and I think it's

[12:26] an honor to be able to serve in your home. Where you live, where you, we know folks that

[12:33] live here. I mean, I care about this place. I live here. I'm not just trying to make

[12:37] decisions on, you know, to make me better off. I want this place to be here for my kids and

[12:43] my grandkids. I think we share that. I'm grateful to work with commissioners like we have

[12:50] But now I think we do real well together and I appreciate the opportunity to do this.

[12:57] There's been a lot of good folks before us that have made some strides for us to be able

[13:03] to be where we are.

[13:04] I can't take credit for a lot of what's going on now because it's previous commissioners.

[13:10] You still talk?

[13:11] I can't.

[13:12] I had a supervisor tell me if I put my hands in my pocket, I couldn't talk, but anyway.

[13:20] It is comedy hour tonight, and I have to start a show.

[13:25] Frankie, if that's it, I'm going to give a couple of folks an opportunity if that's all

[13:28] right.

[13:29] I'd like to give Superintendent Wade Almond a chance here to give us a little update

[13:36] from school.

[13:37] School started, and now it's in full swing, hottest blue blazes out there, Mr. Almond, and tell

[13:44] us how it's going.

[13:47] We are up in rolling and that's one of the first things I've got on my little list here is that

[13:54] again I always like to thank you guys for everything y'all do for us I mean because we couldn't operate if it wasn't for y'all support

[13:59] so but we we have had a good start to the school year we're we're up and running always some little issues

[14:07] there were some little issues with transportation we're getting all that kind of stuff worked out

[14:10] It's always kinks but, you know, we're committed to doing better and that's what we're working on.

[14:17] I also wanted to kind of let you guys know because you're kind of tied in with us on this one.

[14:22] The school resource officer grant is open. It's due Monday, Dr. Jack Kegel and I are working on that.

[14:29] So we're in the finalizing process of that grant so we should hear some feedback on that in the next, you know, maybe 30 to 60 days after we get that submitted.

[14:39] because I know you guys are committed to the SRO's been in all of our schools but predominantly at the

[14:44] elementary level where this grant kind of fills in. So I'll have more information on that after we

[14:49] get it all submitted and we get feedback on it. So that's in the works. Our finance department of course

[14:56] they just finished up their audit last week. Everything's kind of looking good there.

[15:00] I won't have the number until they present our report to us and that should be at our next board meeting, which will be on the 14th of September. But I should have you guys some numbers looking at how much we actually used out of our fund balance this year, because that's part of that audit process is getting down to the actual nuts and bolts of what we used and down to the penny. So I'll have some information on that. But they are working on keying all the raises that were awarded to the state.

[15:29] because we got our first payroll for everybody this month, so I know that they're working

[15:34] very hard and I just appreciate our finance office for everything that they do.

[15:38] The last thing that I wanted to kind of touch on today was we actually are in the process

[15:43] of finishing up our five-year facility needs assessment that's required by the state.

[15:49] It's required that we get signatures by you guys and all that.

[15:53] It is due by the end of the month, so I hope to have a finished copy for you guys soon.

[15:58] And I actually would like, if I'm able to get on the agenda to actually present that

[16:04] to you at next month's meeting, I know that's after I need your signature on it.

[16:09] But it's kind of where we're at in the timeframe aspect of it.

[16:13] But we just, we met on it this morning.

[16:16] It's looking like right now the company that we're working with to do the needs assessment.

[16:22] They look at everything.

[16:24] Now, that includes like deferred maintenance and things that we can kind of push down the

[16:28] road and they look at the most critical needs, but they have assessed all of our buildings

[16:33] and they have projected a $48 million needs comprehensive package again. It's not going

[16:40] to require $48 million because some of those things can be kicked down the road, but that's

[16:45] what they have assessed. But again, I'll come to a presentation on there. We're going

[16:49] go through after we get the finalized product and everything is set in stone and we're going to

[16:55] prioritize that and we're going to again use some of those funding sources that we've got through

[17:00] the lottery R&R funds and some of those core scent sales tax money, all those kind of things,

[17:04] but we're going to start addressing those most critical needs and kind of moving forward on those

[17:08] things. Sounds good. Yeah, I have any questions for you. I appreciate you getting a good

[17:13] higher over the transportation department. Jamie's a good fellow. It was good to bring somebody from

[17:17] here home and I kind of concur with what Mr. Pope said I'm the product of the county and I am

[17:24] very honored to be able to serve. And Jamie says he's not scared to be his hands breezy.

[17:29] And he is not. He's not. And I have met quite a few times in his short two weeks of being with

[17:34] this guy. It's pretty smooth out in the high school for transportation. It's one of the two buss

[17:38] that may have a few extra people on there. But everything's going to smooth in the top

[17:43] It's my fifth year driving out in the high school, which is pretty smooth.

[17:45] Well, we appreciate you doing that.

[17:48] One thing that one thing I'll add is we still are in that 10-day window of where we're

[17:54] seeing what our ADM is and that's what the state uses to kind of base all of our funding

[18:00] off of.

[18:01] But one thing that Jamie and I've already talked about from the transportation perspective

[18:04] is we're going to start looking at consolidating some of the bus routes to try to take some of

[18:09] that fuel off because he's already identified a couple schools where we may be able to take

[18:14] a bus off which would help. I don't want to make the bus routes too long so we're going

[18:18] to evaluate all of those things before we make a call on it but he's got some ideas

[18:23] and we're going to be meeting on that. One thing I like about the next budget is there

[18:26] a better route and system than the teams. The team just 30 something years old and it's

[18:31] such. If y'all can talk with our state representatives because they're the ones that kind

[18:38] We've got to meet Monday, don't we, so we can see them still on the table.

[18:44] Yes sir.

[18:45] So many kids we've got, how many people in school this year?

[18:49] The last I saw, we are right at where we were at last year, and that's just under $3,500,

[18:56] about $34.50 from a student, and that's pre-K-12.

[19:03] We have had some hiccups, and we have not officially started the Head Start Classroom that

[19:08] I mentioned last month at Mount Gillian, yes, I'm not exactly sure what the hold up is,

[19:15] but it's on their end.

[19:17] We have done everything that we have committed to, but they have said that they're going to

[19:21] start on September 1st.

[19:23] Now, originally it was supposed to be August 10th.

[19:25] Now they've pushed it to September 1st, originally we had 10 kids signed up, and now we're

[19:30] up to 12.

[19:31] So that is a positive that we've got two more kids signed up to do it

[19:34] But we are going to be kind of three weeks into the year before they officially open up

[19:38] Okay, and you guys he just had a birthday. I

[19:42] Did it. Thank you from a phone call. I'm sorry

[19:45] Happy birthday. You've been covered up. It's okay. We'll forgive

[19:49] Again, we appreciate y'all support. Thank you for the opportunity to meet with you guys each month

[19:53] Absolutely, and I'll work with Frankie about trying to get on the agenda to present that five-year needs assessment

[19:58] Thank you guys all right

[20:02] All right, and got a little time here for our sheriff and sheriff handler.

[20:06] If you got something for us, I know you always come with prepare for something, I'm sure.

[20:11] He always told me to keep it 10 minute in my billboat.

[20:15] So, I want to bring to your attention something that's really troubling to me and it's broad

[20:21] and scams.

[20:22] And as you all out and about, I'm sure that you get phone calls from folks in the county

[20:27] I'm telling you about folks that they know have been scammed or they've been scammed

[20:31] themselves.

[20:33] I do want to share with the National Sheriff Association and I did a public service

[20:36] announcement on scams.

[20:38] I take it so serious that on our Sheriff's app, and if you go to Montgomery County Sheriff

[20:47] NC on your app store, you can download our app.

[20:50] Now there's plenty of Montgomery County's around the nation, so you've got to make sure

[20:54] where you put the NC in there and on there we've done videos and we also do a news feed.

[21:01] So if we hear about a scam, we'll push that out on our news feed right away so if you

[21:07] have that app, you can find out real time what scams, what frauds are going on.

[21:14] Just today we had four folks come into the Sheriff's Office that were scammed today.

[21:19] So look, what I want to tell you is to tell the folks that talk to you, folks that you know

[21:24] and just get the word out to them, is that the Sheriff's Office and no law enforcement

[21:29] agency will ever call them asking for money, never email them, never text them asking for money at all.

[21:37] Today, their folks portraying themselves as being the bank, they've called folks and told them

[21:44] there's something wrong with their account and that they need to transfer their money

[21:50] out of their account and of course they're transferred into a different account.

[21:55] Hang the phone up.

[21:57] When you hang the phone up, call your bank, ask them if they called you, there's something

[22:03] wrong with your account.

[22:05] You have the right to hang up on somebody, you don't have to talk to them.

[22:10] If someone is pressuring you, hang the phone up, they're trying to scam you.

[22:16] If someone calls and tells you that they're a deputy from the Montgomery County Sheriff's

[22:20] Office or any other law enforcement agency, you can hang the phone up and you can call us

[22:26] at the Sheriff's Office and ask us, did I get a warrant from my arrest for not being in

[22:32] jury duty?

[22:33] Is there a warrant from my arrest?

[22:35] And we'll be able to tell you that, but we'll never call asking for money.

[22:38] I love the folks in Montgomery County and they have worked hard for their money and I hate

[22:44] to see money stolen from them by scammers so I'll continue to be as proactive as I can

[22:51] as a sheriff getting the word out and I'd love to y'all to partner with me doing that and

[22:55] I know y'all will.

[22:56] What do you mean?

[22:57] Man, I thank you guys for the opportunity every month to come and speak to you.

[23:01] Thanks.

[23:01] Thank you, Sheriff.

[23:02] Thank you very much.

[23:04] And, you know, any kind of money online, I'm old school, I got to shake some of my hand.

[23:11] I need to see him face-to-face.

[23:14] All right, I think that's it, Frankie, let's see it, right?

[23:18] I need a motion to adjourn, I make a motion, I need a second, I've got a motion in a second,

[23:25] all in favor, I'm meeting in adjourn.

[23:28] Thanks for coming out guys.

[23:29] Thank you very much.

Board of Commissioners Meeting

Transcript