[0:00] Good morning and welcome to our North Utah Valley Animal Service, a special service district board meeting. Today's date is Thursday, March 26th, and it's just after 10 about 10 o' 5 a.m. We're here at Pleasant Grove Police Department, and we're grateful to be able to use the facilities here.

[0:23] Before we get going with our agenda, I don't see any new board members.

[0:30] that we need to introduce, would anybody be willing to offer a prayer or a

[0:35] thought as we begin our meeting today? Thank you, Chandler.

[0:43] Our father had a program for this opportunity to be able to gather here to discuss the community needs.

[0:47] A plus is the reason we do so in my program, the aim of doing the best for the animals and for our

[0:53] bris and enemies that we represent for the program for this opportunity, we do so

[1:06] I don't see that we have any work session items and we do not have any public hearing items.

[1:13] So we'll move on to our general meeting items, our regular agenda.

[1:17] Welcome to the public.

[1:19] Is there anybody that was intending on speaking today?

[1:23] Any comments?

[1:25] Did you fill out a form by chance?

[1:28] Okay, if you would, if you would fill one out real quick, that would be awesome.

[1:34] And in fact, if I'll just suspend that kind of technicality, if you want to,

[1:40] I'll give you your time to make your statement, but if you'll fill the form out right after that would be awesome.

[1:47] Okay, and please introduce yourself since we don't, you're welcome to start.

[1:51] Awesome. Thank you. My name is Kate Hall and I

[1:56] just wanted to introduce myself. I've been with

[2:00] best friends for about four months and so it's my first four meeting and I just want to

[2:05] introduce myself, offer us any support that is needed. We may be happy to be a partner or

[2:11] anything you guys are working on. And I just really grateful for all of you guys do. All

[2:16] the animals you save every year is really great. So, keep it grateful for yourself. Thank you so much for the time.

[2:21] Oh, thank you so much.

[2:23] We're there any other comments today?

[2:27] Okay, well thank you public for visiting, we're always happy to see our interested public

[2:32] care with us.

[2:33] So we'll move on to our next item which is I think we now have a call to review and

[2:39] approve the minutes from the February 26th meeting.

[2:42] Have all the board members had an opportunity to review the minutes and do they see any need

[2:48] for changes. Are we satisfied with those? If we're satisfied with them, I'll

[2:55] entertain a motion to approve those minutes. I'll make a motion. Thank you, Scott.

[2:58] We have a motion. I move that we approve the minutes from February 20, 2016. Okay.

[3:05] Do we have a second? Second. Thank you. All those in favor? Say aye.

[3:11] Aye. Any opposed? Indicate by saying no. Okay, motion carries unanimously. Thank you.

[3:17] So our next item on the agenda is our agreed upon procedures audit and you have the floor.

[3:25] Thank you so much.

[3:26] I'd like to thank the board for inviting me today to go over the agreed upon procedures in the form for the animal shelter.

[3:34] This is not a full blown out of where we're given an opinion that say the financial statements that Tucko was over with you

[3:40] a bunch of actual every month are barren and balanced.

[3:44] What these procedures do is they, there are a list of things that we do to help ensure

[3:50] that the information that tug is getting and the records that are being kept by

[3:55] Orb City and the communications that go on here are all the same so that the

[4:01] information you're getting is the same as everyone else is getting and there's

[4:05] anything else, there's kind of no gaps in between that.

[4:09] This does this in a more economical way than an audit.

[4:13] As you can see, as you go through the report,

[4:16] there is nothing that needs to be brought to the attention

[4:19] of the audit, so we didn't, not of the audit of the board.

[4:23] So we didn't have any findings that went outside the parameters

[4:26] of the agreed-to-proper sheeters.

[4:30] And so that means that the tug is giving you

[4:34] financial information that's the same as Lehigh City is the same as what's

[4:38] hitting the bank and there's nothing outside of those normal parameters. If there

[4:43] were something that needed we brought to your attention we would do at this

[4:46] time but nothing at this time. Okay do any of the board members have any

[4:51] comments or questions for Ian? I know in the past like if we hit a certain threshold

[4:57] of revenue we have to do a more comprehensive follow-up. Yes. Are we still on that

[5:01] threshold so you're you're right at the door and I've been in the very I've been in that in contact with

[5:08] Brennan of Nelson up at Orange City that threshold is a million dollars worth of revenue

[5:12] so I think that we were real close last year 995

[5:18] My guess will be over that this year, but we'll possibly we'll take a look and if that's the case

[5:24] We'll be going on and I'll go with that

[5:27] We'll know

[5:31] for a more robust audit than anticipation of that.

[5:37] These are the costs a little bit more.

[5:39] Yeah, dig deep, dig deep.

[5:41] Yeah.

[5:42] Right, thank you for that.

[5:43] Thank you.

[5:44] Any other comments or questions?

[5:46] Yes, I think so.

[5:47] Well, thank you, Dan.

[5:48] Thank you for your help.

[5:49] We appreciate your work.

[5:50] And we'll talk to you later.

[5:51] Thank you, buddy.

[5:52] And then I'll send you a copy of those.

[5:55] I'll send you a copy of everything.

[5:57] Can I make some of these in your agenda?

[5:58] Okay, our moving on with our agenda, our next item is to review the financial report.

[6:05] Will you go over that with us please?

[6:07] Yes,

[6:11] so you should have a February check register as well as the March financial.

[6:20] The check register, we have two relatively big expenses, both of those utility-related

[6:28] I did Rocky Mountain Power and Ampric gas.

[6:32] That's what nothing to do.

[6:34] And our gas bill, it's still cold even though it didn't snow.

[6:39] But it wasn't that cold, and so it's actually

[6:40] better than it's been in previous years.

[6:44] We kind of skipped over winter this year.

[6:47] Maybe that'll get us when we have to run

[6:49] so much air conditioning in the summer room, but we'll see.

[6:52] But other than that, there's not really huge expenses,

[6:54] and none that were unanticipated.

[6:56] They were business as usual and paying our bills our check register on

[7:06] the financial statement

[7:08] 72.9 is about 73% of the year is passed

[7:13] We'll get close to the end

[7:17] If we look at our

[7:19] Income as a total we're at a 3.7% which is above 73 which is good and

[7:26] Expenses is at 63 which is so they're about 10%

[7:29] in the right direction, both of them, which is good.

[7:33] Now you can't draw complete conclusions from those totals

[7:36] because there's some things that you pay all at once,

[7:39] some things that you pay at the end,

[7:40] you know, that kind of thing.

[7:43] But our animal sales and adoptions is actually about 80%.

[7:49] So that's above 73 as well, which looks good.

[7:52] We like that, although we didn't budget a lot for that this year,

[7:56] And we'll probably be able to budget for higher next year.

[8:00] And on the other hand, our animal boarding fees and our surrender for adoption fees are below in the 50s.

[8:09] And that's because as we've been reviewing every month that our animal numbers have been so low.

[8:16] So obviously, we're going to have less boarding fees,

[8:19] unless people are running for adoption or have that hamster into production.

[8:25] So those are why those are so low.

[8:27] But if you look at the rest of these, everything seems to be,

[8:30] I didn't see anything of concern.

[8:34] Our salaries and wages for permanent employees is at 67.8 and for temporary,

[8:42] is at 68.4.

[8:44] or the temporary on this is really just part time and that's why that's something.

[8:53] So both of those are also below, but that's also somewhat misleading sometimes

[8:57] if this statement comes out right before a pay rotation, right, that may be bigger.

[9:04] Anyway, but it looks good. Things are looking good.

[9:07] Any questions from the board members? Any concerns that you know that we'll move on

[9:15] to our next item which is the Shelter Progress report.

[9:19] Both

[9:23] the building and the facilities are doing well. We've replaced some things last year

[9:29] and we're happy that they're still working. So that's good, all systems are good.

[9:35] And, uh, person now, we just are in the process of bringing on board, uh, animal care attendants,

[9:41] porttime position.

[9:43] It's not a new position.

[9:44] We're replacing someone who just left to accept a full-time wildlife, um, position in Alaska.

[9:52] And so, he just left, and we believe this new person, if everything goes well, we'll be

[9:57] starting on Tuesday next Tuesday, so we're excited about that.

[10:05] For animal numbers, so this is where we had an house, dogs 34, cats 37, I don't remember

[10:13] where we were last month, but it was in the 20s for the cats, but still that's very

[10:20] small numbers and we're very pleased, we'd like to work our sales out of a job, but not

[10:25] quite there yet.

[10:28] So our, for February, redemption rates for dogs was 67 percent, for cats was 8 percent,

[10:38] library lease rate for dogs was 93 percent, and for cats was 60 percent.

[10:44] So that's actually a really good library lease rate in ratio to an 8 percent redemption rate,

[10:51] meaning 8 percent of the cats that came in were brought back to their owners, and we had

[10:56] live release rate of 60 percent still. That's really pretty high in relation to that number.

[11:02] We certainly like to see that above 90 so that may change with this new law that we'll be going

[11:09] into effect which we'll talk about here in a second. We've also are continuing to receive

[11:15] owner surrenders on a limited basis so if they call us we check and see what our volume is

[11:24] and decided we can receive an animal and then we let them know and you know

[11:30] we're getting the animals out pretty quick we had this last weekend we had

[11:35] 12 dogs come in and some cats and I think every single one of those dogs are

[11:40] at least close to that we're gone on Monday so people neither dogs were missing

[11:44] came and gone we like that and that's why we get a higher-life release rate when

[11:50] people redeem their animals.

[11:52] On partnerships with their community and those type of things, we haven't had any...

[11:57] So like I think we'll ask two months, we've reported five, six, seven, eight events each time.

[12:04] We didn't really have an event to happen, we did have some donations brought in.

[12:08] We continue to get lots of donations.

[12:10] We have one rescue bring us a 17 bags of calculator, which was nice.

[12:15] We do have an upcoming event with evening arts and accessories.

[12:19] This is the Shelter Support Program they did it for us, maybe six months ago, and this

[12:25] is when they had about 40 volunteers there, they bathed in groomed dogs, they took professional

[12:29] pictures for the dogs, they painted our front windows, they brought in a bunch of donations,

[12:34] they walked and exercised the dogs, not just the dogs, the animals, I speak in dogs, much.

[12:42] Anyway, they kind of take over the shelter for the day and do all this stuff for the animals

[12:46] there and then help us with some nice pictures that we could put on our website and those

[12:51] type of things. So we're excited that they want to do it with us again and so in April

[12:56] I believe we're going to be doing that again and that will be a big event for us.

[13:02] What's the name of the group again? We're going to find an evening arts pet accessories.

[13:08] So they make, I believe they make like bandanas and things for animals and I don't know why

[13:17] or where their shelters of pet support program was started, but we're glad it is and we'll

[13:25] do another event with them.

[13:28] Legislative Lee, legislative session is now over.

[13:32] The Senate Bill 201, one that requires a few things of animal shelters.

[13:37] There's, regarding animals that would be utilized at past, and so we'll go into law on the

[13:43] 6th of May.

[13:46] So I just want to read this part, this is basically what it does for animal shelters.

[13:53] Animals shelters may euthanize an animal only after notified animal shelter and rescue

[14:01] groups that have expressed interest in receiving animals at risk of euthanasia.

[14:05] So, any animals we're going to utilize, we have to let those that express an interest

[14:09] know that we're going to use an animal shelter or animal rescue group.

[14:17] We can use an animal if no animal shelter animal rescue requests the transfer of the animal

[14:22] within two business days after we've notified them.

[14:25] And we can use an animal after no animal shelter unless we collect the animal within the two

[14:31] days of being notified.

[14:33] So basically what it's saying is, and as you read down further, as you guys know, we only

[14:38] euthanize animals that are ill or injured beyond medical repair, right, or it's in their

[14:45] best interest that way, or that we believe are dangerous to the community.

[14:50] And so as you read further on in this bill, initially it said all the animals, which would include

[14:58] of dogs that were dangerous.

[15:00] We had to let people come and get those, which we thought was a horrible idea. They changed that language, and now it excludes them. It says, if the animal is a dog, that has been determined to be dangerous or vicious, understated or law, then we can use the knife. It doesn't accept stuff to catch that same way. So cats that are that we deemed dangerous, we are now going to be putting back into the rest of the group's hands for them to go and release whatever they're going to do with them.

[15:28] And so that's where this ended up.

[15:33] So we have to do a few things now.

[15:36] Operationally create a notification system.

[15:39] I think what we'll do is create a Google Doc that's send out

[15:43] to those places that want to be notified.

[15:48] And we'll just update that.

[15:49] They can check it every day.

[15:50] And they have two days to come get it.

[15:52] And they'll take that tab out of our facility.

[15:57] operationally in-house, that's great for us in the sense that we don't have deep

[16:00] nice cats nearly as much. Depending on how this goes and how many are picked up

[16:06] and that kind of thing, that remains to be seen. So that's a good thing whether

[16:11] not we agree with if they go and release those into the community, that wasn't

[16:15] addressed at all in this bill. So that's where we're at. But you should know it's

[16:21] past, and that's where we sit.

[16:27] Our volunteer program continues to do well. We're

[16:30] rotating through volunteers, and as we stated last time, we're doing group volunteer

[16:34] programs, our projects quite often. Any individual one time, somebody wants to

[16:40] volunteer in their in town or whatever we're making that work as well. So that's

[16:45] awesome. Our rescue group program, we're continuing to collaborate with 78

[16:50] rescue groups currently, also fantastic. Our social media page, which is our

[16:57] Facebook page, we continue to update that and that's going well. We're making a

[17:02] place in the shelter where we can take pictures of those who adopt the pets, if

[17:08] they would wipe, with those standing in front of this backdrop and take a picture and

[17:13] now we've been doing that already, but now we'll have a place for that to take

[17:17] place that will look kind of nice, and that's kind of nice. Most of them want to do that.

[17:23] They like to be recognized as saving an animal. It's kind of nice.

[17:30] Regarding the RFP for operational assessment, that contract still going back and forth,

[17:36] we're just about done with that, and we'll send that out. Our final draft to them if they

[17:42] agree with that then that'll commence that assessment.

[17:51] And we talked about the

[17:53] Orange City in a local agreement last time and that's just that they provide HR

[17:57] and accounting services and payroll and those type of things for us have done

[18:02] it since we started. In fact the first two years I believe we were actually

[18:07] Orange City employees and then they finally diverged from that and so it's a

[18:14] contract is $3,000 a year which saves probably 10 times that much for whatever cost that we

[18:21] want to got those services elsewhere. And by saving, in fact, in the contract it mentions

[18:27] that by saving us money it saves them money, right? Because they're paying into this thing

[18:34] just like all of your cities are and of all sudden we add a $50,000 bigger bill instead

[18:39] that would affect them and them being the largest city.

[18:43] They're about 25% of the total, yeah.

[18:50] And so that would affect them.

[18:52] So this is a win-win, right?

[18:54] It costs us less, which will then cost them less.

[18:57] So we're happy to do that.

[18:59] So the contract now signed, and will be sent back

[19:01] to them to find life.

[19:06] I will mention that next month, January, March, April, next month will be the 10th of the

[19:12] budget hearing.

[19:13] So, please make sure you hear it down and takes place in the same place and in the same

[19:20] every 10 o'clock, but it will be the 10th of the budget over the present at that time.

[19:31] Any questions, comments from the board?

[19:37] Concerns about anything?

[19:39] No?

[19:40] Okay.

[19:41] Our next item is to discuss our legal council representation.

[19:48] So where are we?

[19:48] Can you give us an update on?

[19:50] Sure.

[19:50] So our firm has now moved locations.

[19:54] We're still doing business under handsome lot, getting all the various

[20:00] insurances and set

[20:04] up for merit agner law, which it'll be within the month we

[20:08] anticipate. We thought it would be done by now, but it's a bigger job. And so the

[20:14] contract isn't ready because we want it to be with merit agner law when it's all

[20:20] set up. But what's proposed is we keep the race the same this year, which is one

[20:26] 50 for attorney time, 100 for paralegal time, but with the understanding that if it continues

[20:32] and it would still be up to the board but if it were to continue another year, that

[20:37] would be 250 attorney time and 150 paralegal time, which is still about a third off, most

[20:44] attorneys are charging up to 350 an hour here.

[20:47] So that's the general anticipated provisions of the contract.

[20:53] So, obviously I wasn't here last month.

[20:59] Was there any discussion about any obligation to do an official RFP process, what are our

[21:07] thresholds?

[21:09] Are we okay?

[21:11] We've talked about making that decision to go to RFP based on a contract proposal.

[21:17] We're saying, okay, one of these breaks look like compared to what we can get on a responsive for other purposes.

[21:24] Gotcha.

[21:25] Right, so I think to make that decision, we've got to just put a pin in that until we see a proposal.

[21:29] Okay.

[21:30] At that point, we say, okay, we come from all these terms, these rates, who are we?

[21:35] My question is, is there a degree upon rate of poor litigation in the service?

[21:44] In the past we haven't done litigation, we've contracted that out, we've been minimal.

[21:52] It depends on being a small firm.

[21:56] If it's very significant litigation, we're better off to.

[21:59] to contract with, it's a sort of stat,

[22:03] contract with a firm that has the staff

[22:05] to handle that litigation.

[22:07] So no, we've had that on an ad-hop basis in the past then.

[22:14] Okay.

[22:15] So I think we at this point in board talk about just waiting

[22:18] till there's a contract,

[22:19] and deciding whether or not to return.

[22:22] And that was my understanding as well.

[22:23] Okay.

[22:24] Sounds good.

[22:25] Tugged, do you know, does our procurement process allow us

[22:28] to do professional services without doing an R.D. Oh, I have to look at that. I think it

[22:36] does, depending on the amount, and I can't run with that is right now. Yeah, that's a good

[22:44] question. Any other questions for Laramie, regarding the proposed contract? Okay. Well, do

[22:55] Do any of the board members have any other business that needs to be presented today?

[23:02] Just a question in the minutes mentioned the RFP, is that starting this month, since

[23:08] starting next month, were they're taking advantage of the agency, contract agency evaluation?

[23:17] So are you talking about, yeah, the assessment of the RFP, yeah.

[23:20] Yes, so the timeline for that is going to start whenever we finish the contract with them.

[23:27] I just wanted to make sure that.

[23:28] So we've sent the contract back to them.

[23:30] We've been heading back and forth a few times.

[23:33] I just wanted to make sure that.

[23:34] Just to clarify the status, they sent back the latest red lines that they wanted.

[23:39] And we didn't disagree with any but one.

[23:42] And I've worked out some compromise wording for that as to which we'll control in the event of a dispute.

[23:50] and that's really the only thing holding it up.

[23:53] Okay,

[23:56] any other questions?

[23:58] All right.

[24:00] Our next meeting will be Thursday, April 30th at 10am.

[24:05] It will be here.

[24:07] As Doug mentioned, we'll be going over our tentative budget.

[24:10] So that is worth our time to be here if we can at all.

[24:15] And beyond that, there is nothing else.

[24:17] So that concludes our meeting today.

[24:19] Thank you so much for participating.

[24:22] Thanks guys.

[24:25] Look.

March 2026 Board Meeting

Transcript