e e e e e e morning everyone it is Tuesday June 4th at 9:00 a.m. we'll call the right County Board of Commissioners to order we'll begin with the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all so with so many people in attendance either there must be a Hot Topic or we're honoring someone today so uh I'm hoping it's the latter of the two at least the way I'm seeing it I think that's what it is so uh first item here today is to uh dispense with the minutes from uh the sorry Committee of the whole on on 5:17 the minutes from the county board meeting on 521 and the M Personnel committee minutes from 528 they can be approved you uh collectively or individually uh stand for any modifications Mr chair I'll make a motion to approve those minutes second all right motion by commissioner catchmark second by commissioner Dietrich any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I oppose same sign all right minut it's approved unanimously uh second item here is to approve today's agenda uh we have a few modifications here the first item that I'm going to ask for is that under items for consideration the uh backfill of the procurement analyst analyst position be moved to next week's Workshop so removing that item and moving it to the workshop next week for uh bigger discussion uh the second item is to add a uh moment to honor a dedicated uh service contractor for the county uh which will be put at the right before the 905 item and is there any other items that need to be added to the agenda um yeah I would commissioner chair uh I would like to uh pull off um from the Personnel committee um two items uh so you uh the person the those ones will be discussed we'll go through them individually so those ones you don't have to actually pull um you did mention I think you had some warrants you wanted I would like there's three warrants that I would like to discuss uh coming up and uh where would you like to have that done so I'm going to add that so there's time if anybody needs to get here uh the three warrants they're regarding the where what department the sheriff's department sheriff's department so that they have adequate time to get staff here if they want to answer them otherwise we'll leave Finance to their best abilities uh with that that'll be under items for consideration five uh warrant discussion thank you Mr sorry I'm just taking notes here okay is there any other uh items for the agenda that need to be added or modified if not I'll stand for a motion to approve today's agenda as modified so moved motion by commissioner Shane second second by commissioner Dietrich is there any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I oose same sign today's agenda is approved unanimously uh today's consent agenda would anyone like to remove any items from today's consent agenda for further discussion Mr chair I'll make the motion to approve the consent agenda all right motion by commissioner Dietrich second second by commissioner Shane to approve today's consent agenda as presented any other discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oose same sign consent agenda approved unanimously now at this time uh I'm going to ask Jamie come forward as we are going to honor uh a couple individuals for their uh great service to the citizens of wri County yes thank you board um I'm here with uh delightful duty of um introducing to you Diana Tracy terson there are um their Foster Care Child foster care providers I know at least two of you on the board have experience working with child foster care and the trials tribulations Joys and you know satisfaction that can come with that so at this time I'd like to invite to the podium Dan and Tracy terson also with me I have a number of our licensing um folks if you guys would just like to stand for a moment so they can see who youu are that work closely with our um both adult and child foster care um providers so this is our licensing um and our skills unit and with me is um Christine Traer and Marissa Ferguson um who work very closely um with Dan and Tracy so if it's okay I think I will read through um the information I have and then Christine will present them with the plaque everybody ready um Dan and Tracy terson have been licensed for foster care since 2011 with re County and with a private agency path they have had over 70 children come through their home they have provided respit care interim care shelter care and back on track foster care Dan and Tracy have adopted two boys from Foster Care they have also shared their experience as foster parents by mentoring new foster parents and sharing their experiences at a support group and new provider orientation they have filled a big need by taking mostly teen placements throughout the years and as you know that's always one of our most difficult areas um to find families right County Health and Human Services is grateful for their years of service to foster children and we want to thank them for all they have done and we wish them the best in their newly found retirement thank [Applause] you thank you thank you would you like to say anything to the board um not I no okay thank you so much it is a Delight to have you here and we really appreciate everything you've done for over 70 children that have come through our doors and now yours thank you that's impressive that's impressive if it would be okay could we have a couple of pictures for sure that would be great okay and Dan Tracy on behalf of the board and the citizens of right County we can't thank you enough for all the years of service and to all the lives that you've changed may God bless you and thank you and I hope you enjoy uh a little bit more relaxation I'm sure you've had could we just ask you just to stay on thebe right over here and shall get a picture of come on up right over here here right in the middle center of attention thank you so much [Applause] and now we'll move on to honoring another uh some more individuals here uh at this time I'm going to call Taylor forward as we uh adopt the resolution Pro uh claiming the farm Family of the Year all right thank you Mr chair and members of the board um I would invite our farm family to come stand and join me up here I'm just going to say a few words about um the farm family and the program uh so the University of Minnesota farm family recognition program honors Farm families from throughout Minnesota for their significant contributions to the agriculture industry and their local communities this program has honored Minnesota Farmers since 1979 and is coordinated by the University of Minnesota extension the College of food and agriculture and natural resource sciences and the College of veterinary medicine the families are recognized Statewide and at local levels including farmfest and then the right County Farm family will also be recognized at the Wright County Fair during the open Dairy show so come and join us on that day um honored families are chosen one per County by the local University of Minnesota extension committees based on their demonstrated commitment to their communities and to enhancing and supporting agriculture Dusky dairy in Waverly has been selected to be the 2024 Wright County Farm Family of the Year Garrett and Amber Dusky and their family are the third generation to run their family farm Garrett and Amber purchased the farm in 2015 and currently rais a 120 head Dairy herd and a 300 head feeder cattle along with a growing beef herd they also raise corn soybeans and Alfalfa Dusky Dairy is a true family operation their four children are also very active on the farm EMT helps with field work Hazel takes care of all the chickens and colon and Charlotte help with calf chores and I also heard that Charlotte takes care of all the farm kitties Garrett's father and Uncle also help with everyday chores and field workor Garrett Amber are also active in their local FFA alumni chapter which serves their local um community so I believe now we would like to vote on the Declaration to make them our farm family Mr chair I'll make a motion to approve that's a resolution for the Dusky Family Farm of the Year I'll second that motion by commissioner catchmark second by commissioner detri uh to pre uh proclaim the Dusky family as the 202 for R County Farm Family of the Year uh any discussion all right resolution commissioner catchmark i i i i i all right motion passes unanimously congratulations congratulations thank [Applause] you we'd also like to get a picture if that's all right I feel like I'm h good job Garrett thanks you guys keeping it in District Five again see you at the fair yes all right and now we are up to the 910 item uh we're keeping right on time here as Matt dchen makes his way uh to the podium one of the hardest working men in Wright County we have the approval of the low quote of Moors engineering for Engineering Services for County ditch 19 yeah and I just want to take a second I've worked with Garrett quite a bit on one of the county ditches and just wanted to say thank you for all the work for for everything we're still working uh so yeah I do have a different ditch on today U so if you remember back May 8th we had a special meeting to discuss a repair request or multiple repair requests on County disch 19 um after that meeting we determined that repairs were required for County dish number 19 and the next step was to uh solicit engineer for the services uh required under law uh that's Minnesota statute 103e 715 U we also determined at that time that our records for that ditch system are our loss or otherwise incomplete um so we determined that a reestablishment of Records process was also needed under Minnesota statute 103e 101 um so the requests for proposals for were for both of those Services um we solicited proposals from Houston engineering and more engineering more engineering was the low bid in this case for Engineering Services on 19 so I believe this is the first time we've had uh worked with more engineering at least in in my tenure so yep yeah first time there a little bit um so obviously there was a lot of background um we saw a presentation for them at AMC um that kind of started conversation uh Tara endorf another engineer from more attended one of the soil Water Commission meetings uh and discussed some water quality opportunities on projects so we kind of began discussions on that uh in this case they were the low bid for for this project and obviously check references uh they do a lot of work um in the Red River Valley and and really reached out to references I know in boy to sue um to see and they were very satisfied with the work that they've been able to do on their ditch systems so very good so at this time I will uh look for a motion to approve the low quote for more engineering for Engineering Services on County ditch 19 Mr chair if we could make that motion subject to um revisions from the county attorney's office sure okay I'll make that motion Mr chair with all right review of for revisions by the county attorney's office all right motion by commissioner catchmark second second by commissioner Dietrich any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oh same sign motion passes unanimously thank you Matt thank you and now we are still right on time and Barry's going to make his way up to the podium here we have action on ordinance uh Amendment 24-4 for R county code of ordinances chapter 155 zoning this feels like The Price is Right what's my uh what am I bidding on Bob right uh Commissioners this is a culmination of a long process that started in the late 2000s um as a flood map modernization project uh initiated after the county flew the lar elevation data for the first time um we were worked in conjunction with the DNR and FEMA on the modernization project and fortunately it took a lot longer than expected uh FEMA had some issues with contractors and vendors um there a bunch of federal stuff that went on and we finally gotten to the point now where we have the Revis maps that we need uh as part of that process we were instructed to update our ordinance to match federal and state regulation this ordinance is the result of that uh the D sent us a a sample model um Council and I went through it and and made it so it it fit with what our framework has been and will be going forward um DNR has then reviewed that those changes and have approved it uh it was before the Planning Commission at their last meeting and now we're just looking for approval from the board for the revised ordinance thank you Barry and thank you uh commissioner catch Mark and Holland on reviewing this you know I'm going to be disappointed after we approve this I'm going to stop getting my fan mail from FEMA so Mr chair I was going to note that I read the feedback the comments from the other townships that we had I assume all the townships were asked to weigh in right yes we send out that uh that response form that you see with uh within the packet that goes off to all cities and townships so we had five townships that responded one was a no decision that's like a boxing match I guess they didn't want to weigh in there were three yeses and one Township said no cuz it was too restrictive and the DNR was okay with some bookkeeping thing and then the FEMA was okay and they commended Mr chair for his efforts so uh I just want to note that that was I looked at that to see you know bother to look at it because they bothered to fill it out but uh commissioner Holland and I sat through it and seem to be reasonable does anyone else have anything to Mr sh just um are there any significant changes to what we had before other than the actual flood plane designations I suppose not so some real significant changes um it's it's a little bit different than most of the framework of our ordinance where we're keeping definitions in that specific subsection because we only want them to apply within that subsection or they only apply within that subsection but there were some definitions that we thought were written really well and so we modified some of our existing definitions to include some of the language that the the the DNR and the model ordinance had for us um overall there's there's some areas that are are maybe a little more restrictive in flood plane but that's the direction from uh federal law and there are other areas where it's actually a little bit less restrictive where it gives us a little bit more uh leeway regarding the need for public hearings and the amount of fill and those types of things so we have a little bit more leeway in portions of it uh where we can be a little bit less restrictive than what our current ordinance reads so it's a it's a little bit of both and then not it's not real substantive changes I think the one thing that'll help the public a lot is we are including some uh uh tables and some visual examples of how things are are defined and what that looks like all right thank you at this time I'll entertain a motion to approve ordinance Amendment 24-4 I'll make that motion Mr chair second tap motion by commissioner catchmark second by commissioner Holland is there any further discussion all right um Ser this one would be resolution so the resolution would be the second part be the second part okay so the publication is the resolution all right all right so we have a motion have a second no any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oh same sign all right yes Mr chairman the second part would be a res resolution uh for the publication of summary language of the ordinance that way we don't have to publish the entire ordinance only summary language of it in the paper oh we didn't want to use up like two pages of the newspaper and spend like [Music] $10,000 Mr chair I'll make a motion to approve that resolution I'll second that all right we have a motion by commissioner catchmark second by commissioner Holland for action on resolution summary language for publication for uh ordinance amendment 24-4 is there any discussion hearing none resolution commissioner Shane I I I I hi resolution passes unanimously thank you very much thank you now we are up to the 920 Health and Human Services portion of the meeting we'll put our health and human services hat on here and we'll begin with the first item would be the approval of the Health and Human Services consent agenda uh there is uh nine different items on there would anyone like to remove any of these items off the consent agenda for further discussion Mr chair I'd like to remove item this is is under the staff requests six through n for discussion okay and then you would make a motion to approve the other ones I'll make a motion to approve the the rest of the consent agenda with those items removed all right a motion by commissioner cat Mark to appr approve consent agendas 1 through five I'll second that all right second by commissioner Holland any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I post same sign motion passes unanimously all right uh starting with uh the first item on the consented agenda for discussion would be item number six the approval requests to rehire one uh full-time eligibility specialist um these are kind of almost probably all in conjunction six seven and eight right Mr chair so thank you um well I think we we've heard about this since I came on and maybe it was before but the U in ability to retain these eligibility Specialists for different reasons but we have what we have now before I just want to give the okay to throw more bodies there is we've H we have a engagement survey and we have exit interview information that the staff and Clays worked very hard on and I'd be okay with filling these on the condition that the staff work within the next couple weeks to go through that data and figure out what kind of plan they can come up with going forward to help retain the staff and commissioner catchmark because I just want to make sure that that's made very public is that your argument isn't that there isn't a need for these positions because you you agree that there's the need for the positions your your your concern is that the high turnover rate we've had uh dozens of people that have turned over in that department uh for a variety of different reasons and the needing to pull them is to articulate that we need to do better in trying to keep to retain employees as there's a high cost to turn over yes and so make it a a conditional approval I'll call it but using your words uh when we approve the survey is that's fine as long as we do something with the information when we get it now we have it and I have to hold the people to task to say we're going to do something with it Clay's got 300 and some surveys on his desk and 30 people that are going through it so uh that's what I would run past the decision makers if there's a consensus to do that for those three the item six seven and eight that are all called eligibility specialist and Mr chair if I could comment as well just so just so it doesn't look like you know there's a big void or something like that Health and Human Services has been doing engagement surveys for the past seven or eight years we do drill it down by division all of our supervisors get the responses which are fairly candid um we do make we make decisions all the time based on feedback from staff right now our training the way we operate the training and the training we provide um is based on feedback that we've re received from staff I did look at our financial services areas um engagement survey that was that we just collected just recently over 30% of staff I think close to 35% were extremely satisfied with working with right County and that's about as far as I went um because it was just this morning um so I do believe and then I think over 52% were have been here more than 5 years and the less have been here I totally acknowledge that we have a high turnover rate I also want to mention that that's a very similar to everything we're seeing across the state we're running into I would say Dynamics we've never seen before over the since the pandemic um with lack of training lack of access um from the state um so they you know in order for them to do the job we need help from the state to get them on board to be able to do the job internally it's a frustrating job and it's very high volume High turnover very transactional um we have about 188 ,000 cases in the in the county but it's not a static number I mean we get about a 100 applications a week I believe that need to be processed so I just wanted to be clear that um absolutely we can do more we can do better however I do feel like eyes have been on this over over time we have made lots of um you know things that it's not been um it's not been hey just carry on carrying on I think we've made a true attempt to handle the things that are controllable that we can handle with the with the high volume ever since the unwinding started um but I'm certainly willing to and we have we we do our own internal exit interviews that we review I just reviewed um the ones that the the four positions that are here right now um one of the people left because of retirement two were promoted to lead eligibility Specialists and one left as a resignation stating that the stress was too high and she also said that she was very supported by her supervisors and felt like she really liked working for right County but it was just um at her place in life it wasn't what she wanted to be doing with that high stress load and that high workload and it's hard because when you get into a predicament that we're currently in when you start having high turnover the the job itself inherently is very rule driven and and it's a steep learning curve to understand all the rules and then you have what I'm going to call an Antiquated technology system that you have compiled with a a really Ru driven uh system and you can't learn it fast enough and because there's so many open spots you have high case load it the trajectory builds it to be a I could go on and on I would add two two items so one item I think that lends itself to the stress is the fact that this isn't like other areas we can't create a weight list every application everything needs to be processed within the time frames so there is no I mean it's whatever comes in the door we need to deal with and I would say recently the state and the county has made an attempt to make um potentially mostly medical assistance but most of our programs more accessible so we're getting higher numbers of applications because they don't need to come in they can apply online we still need to treat all of those just like we would if we were sitting face to face with somebody so the the demands are high I totally acknowledge that so Mr chair could we have Administration work with HHS and maybe a two week time frame to come back with the board with some type of plan that's going to come out of these recent surveys and I can appreciate all that Jamie said but uh sources tell me that there's other things that we could do here that wouldn't take a lot of effort that have come up over and over and I won't get into it here those that are here know what I'm talking about well and I do know having had conversations with the administration that Administration currently does have a plan working with HHS to bring forward to uh hopefully curve this I mean it's not a silver bullet because I think we are over the hump but time will tell you know Mr chair and Commissioners so we will have a report out of that engagement survey some of it will pertain to things that are going on in HHS as well as across the county regarding this specific situation Kim Jamie and our HR Director Sean and I met and talked about this and we have talked about some of the things that we need to do I can certainly summarize that in one of our bi-weekly updates and send it to Commissioners to explain what we're doing I would say largely probably 80 85% of this problem is the high case loads when you look at the exit interview surveys pretty much every one of them mentions that in some form or fashion so by hiring more people and bringing that down hopefully that helps with the stress there are a couple other little things that we've looked at um that we can maybe help people understand that job better before they get into it we've heard that comment in exit interviews as well or but it I mean largely again it's the case loads that are the primary problem here but certainly would' be happy to summarize the things that we are doing have done and will do to to help us chairman v i I too was alarmed by the four and I did have a conversation with Jamie yesterday because um onboarding costs the county money um and I do agree with wa watching the exit interviews and I'm grateful for the staff input for filling out those surveys so is there is some deep digging to do but what's hard is um there the state mandates that uh they have to get a code in in order to work and to get that code Jamie can you explain it takes um I was just saying I was explaining yesterday that like not approving positions is this compounds it because we need to have the person hired so we can get them on the list to get the training and get the access which is already way behind so we do our best in that interim when they have them at their desks and we're still waiting for State access to the systems which as you can imagine is pretty Paramount to doing you know everything else so it um for us to be able to hire allows us to get the them on the list to get the access that they need to do the job and in the slots for training down at the state we've ramped up our training internally that I think is helping we've made changes to how we as again how we train staff and things like that I do think it's been helpful lately that we I think the last time we hired three eligibility specialists at once that are kind of going through training together and now with another larger group um for eligibility training I think it's uh it's kind of nice that they can come through it at the same time and so they're learning from each other as they're going through but yes we need to have the names to provide the state in order to get them on um a fairly significant list to get access I'll just say one more thing as long as I'm up here the two OT positions that are directly after these both of those OT positions in that leave they were both promoted into es positions that we already had so the OT positions are due to Promotions which I think again the engagement survey and everything else is we're wanting to promote people within that are great workers to do the you know the high level jobs so um it's not always a bad story when we have turnover sometimes the story is a good story and Jamie are we utilizing our overc comps that the board approved for the eligibility Specialists we are just at the point that I think we are having them hired with this group yep couple of these are the overcount positions depending on how I mean there's kind of that whole effect but yes we are like I said I think the board may be reacting to things that were they've been dire for a good year now but I think we're just over that hump where things are coming along our supervisors are very much in touch with the staff they they talk daily I talk with staff you know I think um kimberry handson as far as that goes I feel like we're open to hearing whatever you know um clay and admin can come up with but I think we'll probably get there ahead of them because I think we are really kind of in tuned with what's going on and we hate losing staff you know we don't want to lose staff either well at this time uh I'm right now I'm going to take two seconds to thank all the men and women on that second floor that are doing amazing work at a very challenging time so I want to give a hats off to all those eligibility Specialists on the second floor uh but at this time looking for a motion from the board to approve these uh four uh eligibility specialist positions I'll make that motion motion by commissioner Holland second second by commissioner Shane any further discussion Mr chair just with that little footnote that we get the the completed survey information and how that'll be implemented and is there a time time frame Administration is within two weeks reasonable Mr chair if it's agreeable I can just work with Jamie and Kim to come up with the things that they have been doing and will do and then submit that in my bi-weekly report in a couple weeks if that's agreeable to Commissioners and then you'll have a you want the copy from is that the report copy is that what you wanted well if you can give a copy of what the survey showed and a summary and then in turn what you're going to do with those results you know how they going to implement that yeah and that's agreeable too we can break that survey down and show that as well and then I can again work with Jamie and Kim to figure out what okay plan is any other discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I post same sign all right uh positions approved unanimously and item nine uh just I know that there's an inquiry going on with uh oh how practical and useful this Genesis 6 $11,000 phone system is and administration is working on that I'm wondering about uh waiting until that's done to see about the actual need and the workload of these two office techs since that project is not completed sure I can speak to that um it is an expensive um system um we've had it for it's not new we've had it for a couple of years now um it's something that certainly helps us with our workload that was the whole idea we used cares funding through the pandemic to implement it in the first place not all County dollars actually a very small portion was County dollars um and then with our OT staff so over the over time I would say and I probably commissioner vet has been here long enough to see us turn over several OT and case Aid staff into case management staff and not asking for additional um case managers because it has alleviated some of the support required the two positions in question question I asked um uh business manager Jim Odell for some background on the information as far as what these two positions specifically do there are two OT positions again these two people were promoted into the es um rol so the two of the four positions you just approved they've answered about 4,000 calls this year coming through the queue that would direct people to talking with financial services so they can initially do the triage at the beginning of the phone call to see whether that call would need to go to the um go to the uh the case manager the eligibility specialist or if it can be handled change of address new job things like that that they would handle they do a lot of applications but um I would say in this respect I we're we're excited to see what the project results come out but I think it really hamper I'm not sure who's going to take those 4,000 calls if it's not these OT staff because it would then be our front desk staff who are also Fielding different lines and they're also doing all of the support staff for 250 people I think if you break down our OT staff between I I think we have about 16 across the entire agency with 258 staff in HHS um and we really we leverage them um to a high degree um so it's always I always say if I don't come into work for two weeks nobody might might not notice if our OT staff isn't there everybody thinks the place is coming apart at the seams so they're integral to how we serve our customers Mr chair yes I'd just like to ask clay and administration if can you weigh in on the timing with your stud I think you're heading this up and if you've got any kind of estimate or how you think so far that that would impact these positions that are requested to replace yeah Mr chair and board members we're sort of in the middle of that project right now we have a survey that just went out yesterday to all HHS staff to ask them about the usefulness of Genesis so I don't know the exact timeline but I'm going to say probably within a month that'll be concluded as far as how it impacts these positions I don't know that switching a phone system would change the necessity for these positions um commissioner Holland and I when we were talking to Jamie yesterday went up and spoke with some of the staff who do this work up there and a lot of what they do is not all predicated around the phone system a lot of it's scanning documents a lot of it's um intaking and routing people as they come into the office either on foot or via the phone so I don't know that there's going to really be any change that's going to come out of the Genesis system that's going or that that study that's going to impact these two particular positions commiss V yes um uh in observing what the office Tech does this just pounds of paper that they have to scan in and so they're just hustling back and forth and knowing that they're these people didn't quit that they got promoted uh made me feel better and they're really not doing a lot of phone calling phone triage stuff they're really doing a lot of just paperwork mindless paperwork and so I appreciate them and I and I think they need it needs to be filled because it's just a constant um there's people constantly up at that front desk bringing things in so unfortunately tax returns don't come on two pieces of paper they come in and on a stack so somebody's got to stand there and uh scan them all the way through I think what they witnessed yesterday too was some medical information for probably a smurd or a disability type of request that was I mean literally the stack was this high and that's one one individual we work with hundreds if not thousands every day all right uh so with that I'll entertain a motion to approve the rehire of the two uh ot2 positions I'll make that motion motion by commissioner Holland second second by commissioner Shane any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I post same sign all right positions are approved unanimously the timed agenda item is to adopt resolution 2406 adopting May 224 donations yes we have had a $11,000 donation from the annandelle um Lions Club for our Wellness on Wheels program all right thank you to the Lions of anandale yes we uh appreciate their support and at this time I'll entertain a motion for the resolution 2406 for the, donation from the anandale Lions I'll make that motion motion by commissioner Dietrich second second by commissioner Shane any further discussion hearing none resolution I vote i i i i i resolution passes unanimously thank you board no director comments today thank you Jamie thank you all right uh moving on uh we are up to committee recommendations as we move on to the items for consideration uh so the next item would be approve the recommendations from the committee of the whole County ditch 33 emergency repair uh coming out of that meeting we had uh staff to contract engineering for the repair of County ditch 33 not to exceed the 175,000 and work with projects Administration uh on splitting up ARP funds between 33 and 38 for engineering and other applicable costs uh do note that don't get feared the $175,000 uh was nowhere near uh the cost enging was nowhere near coming to that uh threshold so at this time I'll entertain a motion to approve the uh recommendations from the May 17th emergency ditch 33 meeting so moved motion by commissioner Shane I'll second second by commissioner Holland any further discussion hearing none I'll in favor say I I I close same sign all right recommendations are approved unanimously and now coming up to the next one would be approve the recommendations from the Personnel committee uh we have a variety of recommendations uh the first one was the vacant position Board review uh that would be regarding the elected offices uh and whether the uh backfill of positions from the county attorney's office and the sheriff's office would be coming forward forward as other departments for the Board review and per the county attorney's uh recommendation that those would not be uh as it would be a statuto conflict uh the next one was the midyear Personnel requests variety of them and then there's a policy on 307 for the employee of the year is there any items within the Personnel committee that anyone like to discuss or otherwise I'll entertain a motion Mr chair um commissioner Dietrich then commissioner catchmark thank you than you um I would like to um pull the over comp for the building inspector um and refer that to a workshop for next week okay please thank you commissioner Dietrich move to workshop and commissioner catchmark yes uh well I could take this uh let's see item the first two items the vacant position and the midyear Personnel request and make a motion to approve those two recommendations get that out of the way okay so you're doing the sure M your request Personnel request so that would bring us all the way down to only item not being approved would be the Personnel policy 307 is that correct no there's others so you want you're saying you want the item one the uh vacant position review approved and item two and item uh 2 a pargal and that's it for okay I have a motion by commissioner catchmark to approve the vacant position Board review and then the midyear Personnel request par legal reclassification uh do I have a second I'll second that second by commissioner Holland any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oose same sign all right items one and 2A are approved unanimously and Mr chair so Item B the technical support specialist recl I I read I wasn't at the meeting but I got the minutes here and it basically says challenges with the employment market and with that as the reason I'm going to say I I think that the recommendation should be to let this go through the natural order I'll call it for reclassification for staff in right County and not make an exception or exemption for this or have the staff look into it any further that would be my my motion so um I guess this is what I would that's kind of what the recommendation is the recomendation is more research done by two offices and I just I'd say that's not a good use of time um that's what guess okay I see what you're saying with it um our always was the recommendation from the committee was to give the sheriff's office as well as any Department the same latitude as when they feel that there's changes that should be at least talked about that they have the ability to talk with HR and work on it um whether something comes from it that would have to come back at a later date there's there's no articul articulated change or approved change at this time they just want to be able to have continued ongoing conversations as to uh does this TSS position still uh their work what they currently do as technology shaping still meet it and when and if needs to change when that should happen it's not saying that they are bringing forward a change at this time it's it's essentially a no change it's just informative that they're going to still have ongoing conversations with human resources on this so a question about procedure Mr chair what why wouldn't this go to a closed session because this seems similar to something else that's being requested and going on that's in a closed session to deal with something similar to this this is not this is not uh this is about a discussion of the job descriptions of the TSS positions and does that job description meet the workload that they are currently doing as well as they had cons they had discussions about market now if you we had a discussion about the market and we have as is noted under the item uh 2A that uh there is a county we intend at some point to do some sort of a compensation recalibration which may this TSS issue but we don't know that we we we're guessing that this recalibration will fix some of these things but may or may not happen um so at this time the with the I would say if you want to change the recommendation is that the I would change a recommendation to say that the TSS position should have the same recommendation as 2A and that the uh TSS position to be included in the county uh recalibrate and compensation and classification project planned for 2025 to me that would be a better recommendation than what is what I would what I'd like to see on this one is do a hard hold on this until Oracle comes because I don't think that that position from what I'm told is going to change uh exponentially and until Oracle here we won't know how this uh Position will morph into something bigger um we cuz and we don't know when Oracle is going to be you know with all the body cams when that's going to be coming forward so I would say instead of wasting all of our staff time I say we put a hard hold on this until oracles here then go so we're not doing this twice so ultimately looking at this there's likely to be no change with it and if you you wanted unilaterally kill it or let it die I I I I having had discussions with HR and the changes to the job description uh likely or not to yield any kind of change to it but you want to at least for the due diligence let the process play out and let that let let the third party review it and if it comes back to no change which I which is likely to be the case Mr chair I can maybe clarify a little bit what the intent is so normally when we do a process like this the way that it starts is HR and the department have a conversation about what the position is what the qualifications are and if it merits us to take a look and take it to Personnel committee and I think the intent of the motion was for HR and the sheriff's department to do exactly that so I don't think it was be above and beyond what we would typically do it was just saying go back have the convers ation do your further due diligence and see if there is something that merits us to take another look at it I don't think that it was outside of what the scope of what was typically done and that's where we referred it back to just follow the natural process of more discussion and so essentially it got a do not come forward because the request was for us to actually make a modification in that Personnel committee and we said no you guys can have continued conversation as standard practice that doesn't even have to come to the board so most of the time they have conversations with HR and it comes forward after they actually have a solidified recommendation we didn't feel that they had a strong enough recommendation at this time we sent them back to the drawing board that's what the recommendation reads to me correct it just seems like this then is an open invitation to the rest of the Departments and offices that hey if you just throw the employment Market challenge out there that you'll then get get your day with uh your St and HR staff to get the okay to spend time and then come to the board I then we're introducing recalibration it started out reclassification now we're adding that other step I I just don't like the route that that this is going I I get where your concern is and I mean I'd love to just sit there and say I don't want to hear from any departments I'm just going to say blanketly say that you know what we're not going to change any job descriptions we're not going to change any employment terms we're just going to just say Hardline that's what it is but the reality is we have a very versatile economic uh situation here especially from an employment perspective there are winners and losers there are jobs that are more sought-after than others and we have to be able to deal with them on a case-by casee basis on on a day-by-day basis and we've even shrunk down that day-by-day basis we've already put it down into three times a year that they can actually even make these requests so we have honed it down it used to that they could come on any board meeting with these but these now can only come on the board three times a year but Mr chair isn't this one making an exception and exemption and taking it out of that natural order that three times a year or that rotation where we have certain offices or departments take their turn Mr chair maybe I can address that so the requests we at the staff level we reviewed all the requests that were made and then we made recommendations to the Personnel Committee of how to proceed and that point specifically was made and that's why this was referred to the Future recalibration was because it we felt that it fell outside of those bounds of it was an urgent need or whatever the criteria were that we laid out and if you look at the recommendations from the Personnel committee a lot of them I mean that was the reasoning why they were recommended to not move forward or to move forward with the recalibration or with the budget process was for that specific reason so we are trying to honor the intent of what the board has asked us to do in that those requests only come forward under certain circumstances that we've all agreed to chair v um but what I've learned is that when Oracle starts this position is going to change uh it's going to be different so that and I I would rather wait and do all this work once that once we know what's going to transpire with Oracle which we still don't know when that's coming from where Sheriff once start the position no where where have you learned that from because that's not accurate it's a records management system to another records management system with an addition of body cams but the job itself is not going to tremendously change in any scope it's still going to be the job the reason that we brought this forward was because of to commissioner uh vet's point the the market right now is uh is favorable to employees that want to make a move and there's actually an offer on the table and we're saying hey this is a very valuable employee we're doing our due diligence uh to try to keep a a valued employee and if there's some change that can happen in there then fantastic if not we'll go back to the drawing board and we'll we'll take other means but in the meantime we lose a valuable employee so we're just doing our due diligence but for the comment that this job is somehow going to miraculously change it's a records management system to another records management system it's just not accurate Mr chair yes I appreciate the honesty sheriff on the the point that there's an offer on the table to potentially lose someone but then we're going down that slippery slope that any one of us could go to a private sector even another government and make more money and that then says if you can make that case then walk it through the system I mean from commissioner on down I could move to hopen and make six figures you could go to any private business and make more money but there's other advantages to working here so if we're going to rewrite and change the rules to keep somebody then it's it's a slippery slope with uh double digit offices and departments and 8 to 900 people and do note that we as a Personnel committee we did not approve any modifications and and we we warranted that that's where we said there is no information here that warrants us to be able to take action on modifying that job description we said go back to the standard process of having more conversations with uh HR and is if there is something in the future that would be articulable for us to review with changes bring it back that is what this recommendation is saying we are not saying that we are modifying that job description uh we are not say we're we're sending that to give them extending to same process that they have had even if we deny this they can still have those conversations so Mr J a question since this came up here and I wasn't at your meeting but did the Personnel committee Commissioners have the information that there was an offer on the table for one of these positions was that mentioned they he did mention that there is a competitive uh in the market that are other counties are trying to siphon off some of our those sta from us yes we were aware of that and we said that we are aware of that in many aspects of the county it's not immune to just the Sheriff's Office uh we do know that there at some point we will have to do a market recalibration because certain Counties have already done it and when they've already done it they're siphoning off employees from us and once we do it then it's we siphon from them because that's what employees are doing in this market now they're always looking to see who's paying the most money for their talented skills and I at some point we hope levels off but in the meantime that's not the case but as we articulated to the sheriff we understand his his situation and we and I respect him uh doing his due diligence for his employees he feels he has great employees and I think he wouldn't be doing his job if he didn't come forward here to advocate for that we respectfully said back that we have a lot of other employees in this position we in due time will do something to fix it but it will not be happening here in the immediate month or two months it is probably a uh a six to 12 months out I'd be okay with 6 to 12 months well we're not doing so I think there's a confusion on what's being asked here so what's being asked here is that we're saying we are doing this TSS position stays exactly as it is we as what the approved by kisher catch mark on item 2A was that we articulated to the county sheriff as or to the county attorney as well as the county sheriff and all of the Department's heads that were in this meeting that as a County Board we do know that we will be doing a market recalibration it will not be happening in the next 6 months it is likely to happen in the more of the 6 to 12mon period of time uh just right now we feel it's too early to do it not enough of the market has done it and if we do it too early we will find ourselves on the uh bottom side of that of that equation and putting us right where we are right now losing multitudes of employees to our sister counties and cities so for that point we have decided to just hold tight we do know that that puts us at risk in the short term of losing employees but we feel that we have a great work environment we encourage our employees here at Ray County to stick with us we value you we want to work with you we understand that there may be better offers out there but we offer a one of a Kind work environment and I stand behind you and for that reason uh this recommendation isks Mr chair are we was there a motion or anything on that comment I would like to just make a comment under policy 3A um the change to the employee of the month program um just to comment that I was a little disappointed that we moved away from the option of um if a parking spot um wasn't available that we would offer um PTO uh as as an alternative and we switch that now to a gift card and so that's just my comment I was disappointed we just implemented that and felt it was a good goal at the time and um that's all just I just a little bit disappointed that we've changed that Mr chair I we had a motion several minutes ago oh we voted on the first one to no but on the B we didn't vote for this TSS you made a motion on that I'm sorry Miss yeah you had you had morphed it into a non-motion in your own way I apologize I wish you would have called me on that I I didn't realize that was a motion the chair being the chair but um but yeah I made the motion to let let this go through the natural order and not have any more research done by anyone okay so we have a motion by commissioner catchmark to I guess I'm trying to break try understand it uh have no further research done and have this go through the natural order and I guess I'm okay with that cuz that's really what the really what you had that's really that's really what that recommendation is I mean it may be more wordy to it but it's essentially the sheriff still can come and have conversations with HR about that position it you you can't preclude him from doing that no matter what recommendation you do there why are we here I guess then why is this here before us why is it here well that's where I I think the the recommendation language is probably not the best R the best the L recommendation language should have stated that no change uh continue to have conversations with HR for possible changes in the future that's if you want to change the that because that's really what it is okay it's no change and continue to have conversations with HR uh to maybe bring something forward at a later date all right okay all right you guys you good we can change the recommendation that language okay we had a mo second all right second by commissioner Shane any further discussion all in favor say I I I Poe same sign I all right the uh motion passes for 2B on 41 all right well Mr chair I can well we had the building inspector insector refer to the workshop so that that was the request by commissioner d d is to move that to the workshop for some more discussion we have to have a motion on that um we do have to yeah we have all the rest of the items we have to make a uh a recomend uh motion on I had discussion for a couple others so I'm just trying to if you want to go is that okay yep what are we doing a motion on uh 2C the Planning and Zoning overcome building inspector to refer to the October or sorry October the June Workshop next week did I not make that motion already no you said you that you asked for that change but it wasn't through a recommendation so okay I would like to make that recommendation all right we have a motion by uh commissioner Dietrich second second by commissioner Shane any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I post same sign all right the item 2C is approved unanimously to the workshop uh next week the it Telecom reclassification system engineer Mr chair I didn't have any anything to add I'm I'm good with that I'll make a motion to approve that recommendation for letter D and I'll second that all right motion by commissioner catchmark second by commissioner Holland any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I post same sign all right letter passes unanimously all right letter e Mr chair so in talking Administration I let them know I'd be asking this today but it sounds like if we add this one appraiser it uh it covers the current additional townships and then there's room for growth let's say if in the next couple years a city or a couple more Township says hey we want your services also and I was wanting someone to explain what that I'll just for lack of a better word the downtime will be used for because this does the the new townships were taken on doesn't amount to basically 280 hours of work so I'm looking for an explanation of how we justify that a a full-time person for that with anticipated growth but no guarantee so I guess I'll leave staff to you Tony you want to address it other we had uh [Music] good morning morning um the growth itself within Reich County this county is very dynamic in the last four years uh we've had an additional 4700 Parcels created we've been basically juggling and trying to accomplish some kind of a balancing act with the existing staff that we have we've got two districts alone that right now our appraisers are averaging about 4,000 Parcels a piece um we've got one District that's 6,900 another that's 5400 so we're shifting people around doing this we've hit a Tipping Point basically with the 1800 um the growth the other growth that's probably being mentioned is um uh districts that might come away because of local assess local assessors retiring uh we feel right now where we're at if we had a district come our way a small one we could absorb that uh the the position itself is not going to be sitting there doing nothing we've got plenty of work for them to do well and to the point where you articulated at the uh Personnel committee I don't know if it was memorialized in the minutes is that you currently are operating with uh zero extra capacity uh so backfilling if any position would happen to come open or if there's people on extended leave right now you are operating with zero extra capacity so this actually gives you a little bit of buffer if when and if any of those situations are people take extended leave on vacations where before you might be depending on the time of years not able to honor yeah and very little of that I mean if we're looking at ourselves uh growing by a th000 Parcels a year that comes to us we have to accomplish that work so um I don't know how long that buffer will [Music] last okay and and it's the question where the the folks have still have the independent assessors they still could find one and we they still have that option I mean there's no pressure for them to give it up and you're planning maybe you'll get them maybe you won't we don't know correct but main point is to you know hear you explain that you have adequate workload for the persons because we question I wouldn't be there otherwise yeah well thanks you don't we don't see you that often so thanks for coming well want to hear the other side of it too and and Tony we've had a lot of discussion this over the years the the private Market uh we're still have to do the due diligence of reviewing their work and depending on how good or bad they do that workload for us could be high could be low uh so that is a we still hold a certain level of liability on the private Market that when townships hire them in having to review their work and this gives us just a little bit more capacity yeah and I've tried to be transparent with this at budget time uh actually had it in budget to hire this person take it out if it didn't didn't happen um but it was taken out at that time I no you followed the process correctly So based on the last year's budget I do remember Mr chair I'll make a motion to approve the addition of the appraiser position all right motion by commissioner catchmark I'll second that second by commissioner Holland to approve the uh appraiser position all right any other discussion hearing none all in favor say I iose same sign thank you motion passes unanimous all right now we are on to the uh item three from the Personnel uh committee meeting the Personnel policy 307 the employee recognition uh Pro or employee of the month program I'm sorry Mr chair commissioner dedri had a point did you have something else it was a little out of order but that's what I wanted to add it was a little distraction okay so another point I had was where does the money what pot of money does the give certificate come from I forget what line item in the budget I'm going to let either Lindsay or Mark come up there I was just say Mr chair that would be out of the employee recognition budget in 100 100 that's what I thought yeah is there any option like like the vending proceeds can go to that too or is that uh restricted access that you can't you could use that the the the we have a multitude of latitude from the uh vending proceeds those ones can be used much more less restricted than the department 100 employee recognition we're under uh public accounting rules correct Mr chair Mr catchmark um the vending proceeds is much more open in how it can be utilized because it is a program for the employees by the employees more or less um we do have some certain limitations but uh it's not as restricted as public funds where the employee recognition program has to follow the specific statutes related to those programs and that is what we do Mr chair what's the expected amount if we do this $50 gift card 600 bucks a year yep okay once a month times 50 bucks 600 bucks okay if they even take it they might take the option of the parking spot parking spot okay well no that's helpful I just wanted to kind of quantify and see if we were interested in the vending proceeds uh that we got plenty in that fund too I think that would be something that must be directed by the employees on the use of the vending money correct okay well they weren't asked to weigh in on this yet because we're potentially we're voting on this today but and to and your point was you wanted to see this PTO is that was that what right I would like to maintain the program as is so the reason we went to removing the PTO is because we have a a large number of County employees that have uh an in excess uh PTO Banks that are uh quite large and for that reason and that combined with the labor market we felt that we are not in a position uh to add into add more PTO when we already struggle with having people in the building to work just because of vacancies and then as well as the fact that a lot of employees aren't even actually using their PTO they're just banking it up so we felt that doing it as a uh a compensation was better allocation Mr chair that would have been probably a good discussion when we implement it in the first place then Mr chair how how many hours of PTO were they getting it was a half day it was four hourss it was four hours at whatever their pay rate is yeah a lot more than 600 a year for the 50 or The Parking Spot yes for employee of the month for appreciating our employees yes uh are we discussing that that part or you you certainly can well I think if you if you got your own private business and your own money that you got a lot more latitude than the public driving around and looking what we're doing besides the work from home that our employees have that there's a lot of folks that don't like that and this I think uh seems more reasonable for the situation that we're in um I like it the way they have it spelled out here here M I don't know about the rest I guess we had two that like this that was a recommendation three sorry then I'll entertain a motion I'll make that motion to approve the recommendation as written all right motion by uh commissioner cat Mark second by commissioner Holland to approve Personnel policy 307 Employee of the Month uh as presented any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oppose same sign I motion passes 4 one all right next would be the uh Administration adopt uh revisions to policy 309 um which we've Mr chair I feel you've already taken action that's what I was just going to say I was reading down there it was kind of a duplication of it so we don't need to do that uh next would be uh designate Commissioners to serve on the selection committee for the Personnel Board of Appeals yes Mr chair we've uh solicited uh application for members of the public to serve on this committee uh we have received five uh so would like to have the board appoint two Commissioners to serve on a selection committee or if you wanted to do as a committee of the whole you could do that as well uh we just need to select a person as expediently as possible so let's hope that the this commitment by these four individuals would be this interview would be probably their biggest commitment because like if it's historically holds true they haven't met in a decade this group or this panel so the interviewing itself may be their most time commitment they have um all right two people raise their hand I'll do it all right commissioner Holland crickets here crickets I guess if if nobody will do it I will so it's all right there we go somebody make a motion I'll make a motion that Holland and vet are appointed the Commissioners to serve on the selection committee is it yep we have a motion by commissioner Holland I'll second second by commissioner catchmark any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I hi post same sign all right motion passes unanimously all right refer topics to the June 11th Workshop we're adding on there the procurement analyst position as well as a discussion on the uh building inspector position as well those are added um Mr chair y I would like to discuss I talked to staff about this already but the viability of the wellness program in R County that would include a look back of the budgeted versus the actuals and they understand what my request is if others up here want more information now I can give it to them all right the viability of the wellness program okay hey uh an update on the ditch project as far as prioritization and staff and a look at staff billing time to a particular ditch are we getting close to that administrator mati Mr chair Mr catchmark uh our our staff group is meeting today uh this afternoon I can't remember what time but I have Finance I have uh egg and drainage I have everybody involved that they're planning that meeting once that information's together we'll come forward and set a meeting date St time to what ditch all the ditches so all the ditches that are on the on the record right now where we're at what we've done time frames and then some policy discussion on how we assess them do we assess based on actual cost vers versus estimated cost on repairs um do we keep a positive balance in each dish disc account do we not keep a positive balance in each disrict account so we have quite a laundry list of items that uh we have on our list for today to talk and gain information from yeah I don't know that we're you're not looking to bring that's way too big of a discussion for us to be doing the workshop based on the number of items are on here unless you guys are planning on having dinner here tomorrow night uh M Mr chair I believe that will be a drainage authority of a whole worksh uh meeting that we're going to have to schedule that that's what I would I okay I was making sure because there's a lot of items to discuss there and by the time we go through each of the different ditches I mean that that'll be a two-hour meeting in its own you're looking at it probably at least a two-hour meeting yeah yep a lot of information that has been getting put together and we're plan continuing to plan that meeting today yeah all right I had to start somewhere because I had heard an update I want everybody involved but the piece on the billing so you got something to think about is right now everybody is paying in the county for staff time on a ditch that they may never know about benefit from or otherwise there's an option I guess this is a past board philosophy to uh to do it that way but we could look at if you work if staff's working on a certain ditch they bill the time they're spending on that ditch and the benefit of land owners pay instead of the rest of the county and we don't have to debate it here but that's that's what we got we can debate it later time I i' I've had this debate with many different Commissioners over the years so I'm willing to have that debate though yeah okay that's one piece of it but thank you y all right that's all I had to add no problem so uh with that uh we looking for a motion to actually we don't even need to make a motion those are just the consensus that those are the items on the worksh uh the viability of the wellness program one addition the other one would be the addition to building inspector as well as the procurement analyst position all right uh review the July board meeting schedule uh there has been this come to the attention that there is uh the July 19th leaves us with a uh in a situation where we would be three weeks at the end of the month uh without any board meeting as well as on the 19th uh there is the situation where there will be uh a couple Commissioners absent from that meeting so we are looking to move the 19th board meeting to the 23rd to alleviate the issue of having a three-week break from board action as well as then it just solves the issue of having multiple Commissioners and potentially not having a quorum here if another one would miss so when you're proposing have the proposing was to move the July 19th board meeting to the 23rd 16th or 16th I'm sorry 19th 16 16th to the 23rd okay and then uh what about the July 2nd what is the recommendation for so there still be a meeting on July 2nd there'd be a workshop on the 9th and then we would have nothing on the 16th and then we'd have one on the 23rd otherwise there would have been no no meeting for three weeks okay sounds good Mr Sher all right I'll make a motion for that change all right motion by commissioner catchmark second by commissioner Holland any further discussion hearing done all in favor say I I post same sign motion passes unanimous all right uh discussion on the warrants uh for the sheriff's department commissioner Holland um yes chairman vetch uh we last Wednesday uh met with staff and uh asked for three separate items that weren't um uh Quantified as to when the rest the county has to go through and a and add certain line items to why they want the purchases and if they fall under policy we did submit that on on Wednesday um the staff did and we have gotten uh a push back as to um wanting to provide that information that is per state statute and um by our auditor so at this time I would like to take these items off uh for non-payment and that would be item 11476 so just so you know that these are acknowledgements they've already been paid right but they will they they assured me that they can go back and take payment back um Mr chair members of the board you can't take money away from employees without a judgment or a court order or an agreement can't just unilaterally do that but I think they can uh if they get overpaid they can write a check to the county the employee could write a check back to the county but you have to have an agreement we have wage theft laws in the state where we can't just go in and just suck money out of someone's account I would at this point the question would be too is from from uh like a gby Accounting Standards like this what they submitted for payment meet the accounting standard and threshold it doesn't meet good morning morning Madam chairman and Commissioners it doesn't meet the public purpose there's just some additional questions on the public purpose part of it which we've asked so then to me then it's more of a legal issue um I guess at that point I would have I would say that we would want to refer this uh to a venue outside of this room to have a discussion on the legality of whether we we should have or shouldn't have paid for it and what what methods we have to uh recapture the funding if there is an ability to do so Mr chair I think that it'd be appropriate for a professional service to take a look at the Ray County financial policies and any statutes that apply and that should be an outside professional service I looks at that outside County that looks at the I'm sorry let me trying to wrap my head around it you're looking for an outside audit firm no a law firm so you want to refer this out to our outside legal council which I'm sure the County Attorney is in uh his office probably would prefer that versus dealing with this matter on their own but I will defer well not I mean maybe commissioner hen had another idea but just me listening to the back and forth here Mr chair Commissioners um when it comes to financial policies those are primarily internal controls however the public purpose piece that you are referring to is State Statute we are obligated to prove that all money going out our doors is for public purpose and that our financial statement Auditors do do they do look for all of those legal compliance type issues um but they do a sample they're not 100% looking at absolutely everything if we were to do a professional service to look at our um Financial policies they're simply going to pull other governmental entities and see what maybe best practice would be um and I think Heather and I have looked at between the two of us I can guarantee we've looked at about 50 other entities over our careers to know that we're not far from in line so you're looking to hold hire an outside professional service whether legal or auditing to review our fiscal policies not for the clawback well you look at me Mr chair and I hope that all five spoke last but I hope that we're all interested in this but if we got to refuse to comply this is a Tipping Point the fact that we were told that they don't by our auditing uh processes is the only way that we can get them to go by the auditing process that we have in place is to not pay those bills Mr chair is this something I mean i' this is the first I've heard of this Mr chair and um I think this discussion um might be not the right place for this right now I don't I don't understand what um if there's been a problem and it's been a longtime problem and we haven't addressed it if it's not a problem or if it's perceived problem I I do think that this is something that is on me and my team that we should have followed Financial policies and not allowed payment okay so I need to take this one so it's a onetime thing is that what we're talking about yes I mean we well I think we just needed to know more on the public purpose of what these three items what these three items were the question is at this point don't mistake that this this is not approve payment because the payment's already been made that's we've already delegated that authority to finance so at this point it's more of a discussion as to whether we can or should go from a clawback perspective and in other organizations I've been in we have clawback money and commissioner vetch when I was on the school board we this is our major job as being a board member is to make sure that everybody is doing their due diligence and we didn't pay those out until the board looked at them so we have a different philosophy here I and maybe we need to go back to the old philosophy then if people aren't going to abide by the rules of the auditor in the state of Minnesota I mean I don't know I don't know where to go from here but when when I go through the warrants and I see three big flashes that can't be accounted for questions that I ask that won't be addressed then I feel like we're going down a slippery slope and I guess I just don't want to say it's not all the Departments this is a specific example of a elected Department Mr chair yes in all the claims review and there's been hundreds of them people don't like them I know but I there's been a lot of cooperation since I've been here so I wasn't involved with this correspondence I don't know if it's we were going to refuse to comply or someone drew a line in the sand or whatever it was but the affected folks knew that this was going to be be discussed and willfully left this meeting so I think that's a point of record also that this is the place to discuss it because I assume there was behind the scenes conversations that this could have been settled outside of the big room but somebody affected decided that they didn't want to be a part of it but we are left as the decision makers along with Finance here who's taken an interest in following rules so if uh if that's it I don't know what the correspondence was if they said nothing or we refused to comply what ever it is but we really have to resolve it and it seems like it's left to us Mr chair yes commissioner that's a lot of assumptions you just made in the was an you have no idea why they had to leave I know I I pointed out that they willfully left commissioner dedri and you can't you're implying that they left so they couldn't answer a question Noe I I said they willfully left can someone deny that that happened nobody forced them to leave right Mr chair could I just and Commissioners just I would recommend just we take a little bit of caution and and I think it's it's not I recommend not going to a outside Law Firm to review this um without exploring it a little further and I think outside of a public board meeting would be a better place to uh review this I I I know a little bit about the expenditures we're we're talking about and I do think there was a a public purpose based upon my understanding of the trip but I I don't have detailed information about the expenditures being scrutinized but I think uh we should take a little bit of caution before we we go down the the route of an AUD if I could say something um without a doubt I don't think we're looking at whether it was or wasn't it's just that when we needed the proof of the public purpose I know myself when I went to DC I went through a lot of back and forth back and forth and back and forth me being an elected official I had to do that it was per state statute that that's what I needed to show forth so that being said that's why I did it didn't want to break the laws the rules not just our policy but the state and so I want to caution like to I this the dollar months on this is less than $800 collectively so I want to make sure that if we would outside any contract legal councel we we'll defeat the $800 on the first phone call um not to say that there still doesn't warrant a discussion and a a a correction act corrective action I just want to make sure that we we're doing corrective action if we can do it internally at at a expense that is more warranted versus trying to spend more money commissioner Ben uh that department was giving given three uh warnings as to knowing what was going to happen today um and they refus to comply so I do think that I think we need to have the discussion and maybe if that puts us all in a in a a bad position we need to get out outside Council just so that it doesn't keep happening I I'm just trying to do our due diligence in making sure that however we go about this that we're not damaging the uh taxpayers on a an elected official battle uh because at the end of the day if you do any kind of battle on this and them justifying they may have their point of view whether they're here to articulate it or not that they may feel justified in it and finance has their perspective I don't know they may produce documents that say that those were approved at a later time and then which Cas puts us in a quandry as so we spent money on an attorney they spent money on an attorney and all those attorneys theirs n our side is being paid for by tax dollars on a discussion of less than $800 that may or may not be of public purpose and right now we're more in a quander as to because we don't know because they haven't produced information to meet the threshold per the finance department to feel that they feel comfortable that it was a public purpose it may still be but we don't we we and rightfully so you've asked for it they haven't produced it so it leads you to have to be where you need to be in in believing that it's not warranted Mr chair maybe for clarification can someone share if there was correspondence that said we will refuse to give you the data or we don't have time or what was who got the correspondence uh Kate D the accounting manager got sent the correspondence I don't believe she received anything back after her correspondence that's the one as did I good morning Commissioners um as you saw two of you received the correspondence back on the first request on May 30th um the items were approved and it's out of their budget for the public safety no further explanation will be provided okay that speaks for itself Mr chair and then I guess the response back should be uh you know per public accounting standards that you need to document this otherwise we will be forced to ask the uh board at a later date to come forward with a recommendation per uh what commissioner Holland is asking that we uh remove payment or at a later date so they have to ask them to justify it Mr Mr chair uh I I do know that after that correspondence uh Kate did uh send over the state statute uh regarding and the uh Auditors uh the auditor per per state statute what the auditor of right county has said and they had no response after that and we've not heard anything Mr chair if I may first I just want to say that I don't there's no indication that any of this was not a public purpose expenditure so I want to be clear that there wasn't evidence that this was expense that was outside of the law or our policies so just to be clear about that second Lindsay and I have been having some conversations about this and I think we would like the opportunity to sit down with the Sheriff's Office talk to them about these rules talk to them about why we need these rules and then hopefully get them to be in compliance with just a conversation that we have with them before we get too ahead of ourselves and um have anybody come in and review this because I think once we get the information based on the conversations I've had I'm pretty confident that they're going to come back that they were public purpose expenditures we just need the documentation to support that but I would like to have some ground rules with the Sheriff's Office of things that we need in order for our finance team to make sure that they're doing the things they're legally obligated to do and that they're making sure that the sheriff's office is protected from anything that could potentially go wrong by them not following those rules so we're all on the same team here and that's what Lindsay and I have been talking about that our role is to help the Sheriff's Office make sure that they are following those Finance rules and I think we could probably settle that with a conversation I'm hoping just between staff um and if the board's good at that I'd like to just have that conversation with them set those expectations and come to an agreement with them of what they're able and willing to provide I agree I think agree with that as well and and the question here is you need documentation correct that's it and again can we just say that can we say that we just need some documentation we did we did they clearly it was clear purpose no the question initially was def no defining the purpose of what the need was the public purpose was defining it well we we've defined that it was a it was a public purpose for Public Safety what we need is a documentation to follow up with that correct and Mr chair I think some of that conversation has been had but it hasn't elevated to the level that maybe it needed to in order for us to make the impression that this is this is what we need and this is why we need it this isn't an optional thing this isn't you know one side against another side it's it's purely compliance with the law that's the only reason we're asking for it and I think if we have that conversation I'm hoping we can resolve it resolve it relative and that's where it needs to be articulated this this isn't a politically motivated move by uh some Commissioners I believe this is this is a purely and it really needs to become from more of an internal Administration and finance saying that that they're they're putting some hard policies and the policies already there it's more of saying that we're going to hold you to the to the teeth of these policies and and stop payments deny those payments it really I don't like it to escalate to this level because then it has a feeling of of a political nature to it which it it doesn't and I I hope it doesn't so chairman VCH to that point uh we I would I did not want to bring it to the big room I did not want to have this conversation in front um we warn them uh many times and we don't want this to continue you so yes I I agree that you should have that conversation because that's what everybody else in this they have to you know get the same questions from us when we go through warrants and they they Unfortunately they decided not to cooperate so all right uh so I guess at this time I appreciate we consider this informational as uh Administration and finance department will continue to uh quantify and you can come back at later date if you want to have more discussion on it but you're going to work on quantifying the public purpose on those expenses uh as you would need to anyways because of a potential audit and you'd want to be able to substantiate those claims all right at this time uh we have a closed session actually Mr chair if we could agenda if we could table this item to June 18th 2024 I have an update at this time I thought I would but I do not okay so the uh at this time we'll be tabling the Clos session uh to June 18th with that being said it is 10:33 if there's no other items to come before the County Board we will adjourn at this time thank you