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Welcome, everyone. My name is Gene Hamilton, chair of the Orange County Board of Commissioners, and I call this July 28,

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2026 business meeting to order.

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So as many know, this meeting was called in order to fill the vacancy after the death of Commissioner James

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the appointments first and then follow with the other items in order I do not

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need a motion just if there's no objections I check the rules and

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procedures okay so then as I want to say first that this first item is to

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make an appointment for the vacancy I want to start by thanking all the

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folks who put their name forward, all the candidates,

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Ronnie Dossy, Leah Bergman, Maria Palmer, Pam Hemminger,

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Renuka Sewell, and Eric Valera.

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Thank you so much.

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The strength of this county is the strength

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of the people who step up to serve.

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I also want to thank the Orange County Democratic Party

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and for really driving this process and we appreciate the applications that we received

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and for working together on this.

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So is there anyone signed up to speak on this topic?

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No.

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Okay.

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Yes.

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One person, one.

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Yes.

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State your name.

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Good morning.

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Apologies, Madam Chair.

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My name is Brian Link and I'm the President of the Chapel Hill-Carborough Association of Educators.

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On the one hand, I wish I wasn't here this morning.

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It's with a heavy heart on behalf of our organization that we send our condolences to the Bedford family.

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Jim Zeta Bedford was a champion of our community for all aspects of our community.

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She was a wonderful individual and human being.

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She was a great champion of public education,

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and she's someone who our organization proudly supported.

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I can think just, it's still shocking to me.

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It was on vacation when I saw the news,

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just having been with her in the last months

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over this very difficult budget.

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And of course, she was always the person

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who was the most prepared, literally brought a binder

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this thick of all the items in the budget

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when she would agree to meet

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and sit down with constituents.

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She was just a lovely, lovely person and human being and a great public servant, and I am sorry to all of you to have lost such a friend and colleague, and I'm sorry for our community.

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The good news is that I also get to stand here this morning on a much more positive note.

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As you noted, Chair Hamilton, our community is a strength. We have wonderful public servants, and I want to be very clear.

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I am not here to say anything else about any of the other individuals who you name, but

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I'm here this morning to strongly endorse the candidacy of Ronnie Dossi to become the next

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county commissioner. The Orange County Democratic Party has spoken and spoken clearly. She will

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be the candidate this fall. She's running unopposed. She will be joining you all on

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the board, right, come the end of election season. And I think in this perilous time,

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time. It's all the more important that we begin the process now to begin building those

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important relationships so that Ms. Dossi can hit the ground running and work with you

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all to meet the needs of our community. I've known Ms. Dossi for a long time. Our arcs

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in public service have overlapped in terms of she started on the board at the same time

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that I became an officer in this organization. For the past 12 years she is championed,

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right, notions of equity. She is championed being an independent thinker. She is someone

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who will ask questions. She is someone who is not afraid to take a stand. She embodies

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all that is good in our community. And while I understand that this board, excuse me,

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this commission ultimately gets to make the decision and you merely take the recommendation

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of the party under consideration, I think the majorities that she achieved at the

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party meeting, both for the candidacy going forward and for filling the interim vacancy,

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recommend her to be supported. And in my remaining time, I want to thank you all

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in a difficult budget season for coming up and stepping up. We are very

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appreciative, thank you, and we look forward to working with you as you

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continue to do this good work. All right, thank you.

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All right. Commissioners, any

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discussion. Are we ready to vote? I just have a brief comment since I missed our

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last meeting. Today I just wanted to briefly share my deep sadness and the

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reason why we are here today, the loss of our dear colleague and friend James

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Etta Bedford. As mentioned, she served the County Commission with integrity,

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compassion, and very little fanfare. James Etta cared deeply about education,

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mental health, folks with disabilities, and folks whose lives presented challenges.

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She served as chair without arrogance, but with a mission to do the work of the county.

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When she left the chair, she did not take the easy way out, but signed up for more committees

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than ever.

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And she was deeply engaged in those assignments.

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And I am going to feel her absence every time I drive to Whitted because she and

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Jean and I used to carpool.

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So today, although I recognize my and everyone's individual talents, I dedicate

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myself and hope that we all strive to be more like Jamesetta in our service to

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the county and I hope that Jamesetta's successor will also aspire to those same

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qualities and care for Orange County. Thank you.

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I will just I mean it was

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already stated but just remind that what we're doing today is to fill the

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vacant position to the end of Jamesetta's term and as we know Ronnie

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Ronnie Dossi has been chosen by the Orange County Democratic Party to be on the ballot

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in November.

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So we have ballots in front of us, so we will go ahead and vote.

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We'll have our Lord Jensen to the board collect our ballots and read out the results.

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Thank you, commissioners.

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I will read out the name of the person voting and who their vote was for.

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We have one vote from Earl McKee for Ronnie Dossy,

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one vote from Gene Hamilton for Ronnie

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Dossy,

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one vote from Sally Green for Ronnie Dossy,

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one vote from Phyllis Portie Ascot for

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Ronnie Dossy, one vote from Marilyn Carter for Ronnie Dossy, and the final vote from

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Amy Fowler for Ronnie Dossy.

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Congratulations, Ms. Dossy.

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Congratulations.

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Congratulations. Thank you so much, Ronnie, for stepping up in this really hard time.

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I know your background will fit us very well. I look forward to working with you.

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We know that you can – we will talk more about when you will officially start and take the oath of office.

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In the abstract, it mentions August 25th, but, you know, there is some flexibility, certainly

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over the summer we do less, but definitely when the fall comes to be ready to take on

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the duties.

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Thank you.

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Do you want to make any comments?

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Yes.

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Come on up.

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Good morning, everybody.

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Thank you so much.

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I always like to start with a huge gratitude for what you all do, the sitting board members,

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not just in hard decisions like this, but in the way that you lead for the Orange County

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residents every day.

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So thank you, and thank you to the county staff for all the work you do.

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Sometimes until things are visible to people, they're not aware of how hard the work

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is behind the scenes and I want to lift that up today and offer gratitude for everything

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you do. I want to also thank my family and friends and supporters and folks who've been

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with me along my growth journey. When I started this work, literally when I thought about

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joining the board and about 20 school board, Chepo-Carville City School Board in 2015,

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the first person I met with was James Eddabedford. And I remember her, we sat at the coffee

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shop down the street and I offered to buy her coffee and she said, you can't buy me coffee

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because I can't accept anything and I was like, it's $2, like let me buy you coffee.

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And that was my first lesson from her of like the integrity and the commitment that even

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when nobody's watching, that the way you behave matters.

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And so her shoes are too big to feel.

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I'm not going to try to do that, but I will commit to serving in a way that honors

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her legacy and I hope that she can look down with pride at the service that the board continues

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to do in her absence. So I don't have a lot more to say than thank you and I look forward

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to joining you and learning from you and thank you for all you do.

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Being efficient we have other items on our agenda and Commissioner Carter.

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Madam Chair, thank you. I would like to ask the Board to agree that I withdraw from the

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meeting now that we've had our consequential vote today. I'm taking an economic development

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class at UNC School of Government, and this morning they're talking about economic development

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strategy. So in progress, so with your forbearance, I will withdraw from the rest of the meeting

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if that's consistent with our rules of procedure.

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All right, so everyone in the discussion, anyone agree?

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All in favor?

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Aye.

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Any opposed? None.

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Thank you, Marilyn, for being here.

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Go learn about economic development strategies.

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Gratitude to all.

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Next up we have a public comment for things not on the agenda.

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Is there anyone signed up?

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Being none, we'll go on.

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announcements, petitions and comments by board members, can we? I'm seeing none.

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Okay, sorry. Commissioner Green. Yeah, I just want to remind everyone that

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the Arts Mill is going to be reopened officially on Friday, August the 7th.

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It's going to be a grand reopening with galleries, tours, food trucks, beverages,

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which is art making activities and our own legendary band High Funk Motown inspired liquid

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pleasure.

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So it should be great fun and when I saw Katie last a couple of days ago, she particularly

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wanted me to encourage all of you all to try to attend.

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All right.

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Thank you very much.

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And best of your fellow?

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Yes, briefly.

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Since our last meeting I did fill in on my newly assigned DSS board and Lindsay Shoemaker

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shared on how the burden that SNAP changes at both the federal and state level will negatively

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impact the county budget. She also reported that the idea of a consolidated human services

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department had negatively impacted morale at DSS. And along those lines, the DSS chair

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Oscar Fleming sent us the BOCC an email outlining their opinion and opposition to such a consolidation.

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All right. Thank you. We, I'll just say again thank you to all the candidates who submitted

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applications for this. They can see. Thank you for the comments. We have our regular,

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or we have a business meeting on August 25th in which we will be back to our regular amount

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of issues in front of us.

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All right, there are no proclamations,

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resolutions, special presentations,

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we have no public hearings,

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no other items in the regular agenda,

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no reports, we do have a consent agenda,

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and any removal of any items from the consent agenda?

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No, I approve all of this.

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consent agenda. So Vice Chair Farrell moves approval of a second. Commissioner Portiasca

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seconds it. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? None. That passes 5-0. Moving on to the county

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managers report. Nothing today. Nothing today. County attorneys report. Nothing today. Just

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note there's information items about follow-up. We have no closed session. Do I have a motion

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to adjourn. Second. All in favor and opposed none. We are adjourned. Thank you very much

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for taking time in the middle of summer for this meeting.