1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT 9 Regular Session 10 Monday, July 12, 2004 11 9:00 a.m. 12 Commissioners' Courtroom 13 Kerr County Courthouse 14 Kerrville, Texas 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 PRESENT: PAT TINLEY, Kerr County Judge H. A. "BUSTER" BALDWIN, Commissioner Pct. 1 24 WILLIAM "BILL" WILLIAMS, Commissioner Pct. 2 JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Pct. 3 25 DAVE NICHOLSON, Commissioner Pct. 4 2 1 I N D E X July 12, 2004 2 PAGE --- Commissioners' Comments 4 3 1.1 Consider supporting inclusion of Guadalupe River 4 Basin in Texas Brush Control Program 12 1.2 Approve proposed tax collection contract with 5 Emergency Services District No. 2 18 1.3 Transfer of funds for Road & Bridge 15-611 Budget 20 6 1.4 Approve road names for privately maintained Roads 21 1.10 Consider awarding contract to DW Contractors for 7 septic tank mitigation in Oak Grove MHP 22 1.11 Interlocal Agreement for joint management of Kerr 8 County/Kerrville Airport - Joint Action Agreement 28 1.5 Public Hearing - amendment to TCDP Community 9 Development Fund Project 46 1.6 Amendment to TCDP Community Development Fund 10 Project; approve and sign resolution for same 46 1.12 Consider Airport Management Contract 57 11 1.7 Public Hearing - proposed amendment to TCDP Contract No. 722141 (Phase 2) for mitigation 12 of 13 septic tanks 77 1.8 Resolution requesting permission from ORCA to 13 amend TCDP Contract No. 722141 (Phase 2) to include mitigation of 13 septic tanks 77 14 1.9 Discussion with Kerr Central Appraisal District regarding the appraisal process 81 15 1.13 Resolution supporting merger of Kerrville Police Department into Kerr County Sheriff's Office 98 16 1.14 Consider acquiring truck for Jail Inmate Work Program 120 17 1.15 Consider, discuss, and take appropriate action on 2004 Stop Loss Insurance Policy Contract as part 18 of employees health benefits program 131 19 4.1 Pay Bills 141 4.2 Budget Amendments 143 20 4.3 Late Bills --- 4.4 Read and Approve Minutes 153 21 4.5 Approve and Accept Monthly Reports 154 22 5.1 Reports from Commissioners/Liaison Committee Assignments 155 23 5.2 Reports from Elected Officials/Department Heads 156 24 --- Adjourned 168 25 3 1 On Monday, July 12, 2004, at 9:00 a.m., a regular meeting 2 of the Kerr County Commissioners Court was held in the 3 Commissioners' Courtroom, Kerr County Courthouse, Kerrville, 4 Texas, and the following proceedings were had in open court: 5 P R O C E E D I N G S 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Good morning, ladies and 7 gentlemen. Let me call to order the meeting of the regular 8 Commissioners Court posted for this time and date, Monday, 9 July 12th, at 9 a.m. Commissioner Nicholson, you have the 10 honors this morning. 11 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Join me in prayer 12 and pledge, please. 13 (Prayer and pledge of allegiance.) 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you very much. At this 15 time, if there is any member of the public that wishes to be 16 heard on any matter that is not a posted agenda item, you're 17 -- you're free to come forward and tell us what's on your 18 mind at this point in time. If you wish to speak on an item 19 that is listed on the agenda, we would ask that you fill out 20 a public participation form. You'll find those forms at the 21 back of the room. It's not essential. It helps us in 22 planning purposes, and it also helps me in hopefully not 23 missing you when we come to that item. But if we come to an 24 item that -- that you wish to be heard on, and you have not 25 filled out a participation form, get my attention some way, 7-12-04 4 1 shape, form, or manner, and we'll see that you're heard. 2 But at this point in time, if there's any member of the 3 public that wishes to be heard on any matter that is not a 4 listed agenda item, feel forward to -- feel free to come 5 forward at this time. Seeing no one moving this direction, 6 why, we'll get on with the next order of business. 7 Commissioner 4, have you got anything for us this morning? 8 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yes, Judge. I've 9 got good news; there's no longer a traffic light in 10 beautiful downtown Hunt, Texas. And the -- TexDOT got that 11 project -- this is the rebuilding of the Shoemaker bridge -- 12 Shoemaker Crossing bridge. They got that done in, I think, 13 less than three weeks, and we had a flood during the 14 construction of it, so they did a really good job of getting 15 that back in place. And it's very much needed. As y'all 16 know, this is camp season, and there's -- the traffic out 17 Highway 39 is very heavy. That's all I've got. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner 1? 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir, thank you. 20 Just wanted to talk briefly about the Aqua Tex issue. I 21 failed to get the numbers of letters and et cetera. So, 22 Bill, have you -- you talk about it. I just wanted to bring 23 up -- maybe there's a couple of issues that I was really 24 concerned about that I've been working on, and one is 25 getting our state representative and state senator involved 7-12-04 5 1 in the -- in the issue. I've visited with our state rep 2 numerous times, and he is involved. He's written a couple 3 of letters, one very strong protest letter to T.C.E.Q., 4 and -- and to some other folks as well, but he is our state 5 rep; Harvey Hilderbran is standing up and standing firm on 6 our behalf. In my conversations with him, I asked him to 7 remind them that T.C.E.Q. is -- should be there representing 8 the public, the taxpaying public of the state of Texas and 9 should be automatically on our side, not some corporation 10 from wherever these people are from this week. That was one 11 issue. And I think Bill has been to Austin to speak with 12 the senator's office about getting involved, so I'll let him 13 talk about that. I have not. I'm kind of wondering where 14 our senator is in all this. But the second issue that I've 15 been concerned about and have been working on is the 16 location of the actual hearings, and I'm finding out that 17 the preliminary hearing, by law, shall be held in Austin. 18 But at that hearing, we can -- if we ever get to the point 19 to where we hire an attorney, we can request in that hearing 20 that all other hearings be held right here in Kerrville. 21 So, that is kind of in the -- in the process of -- but we 22 just need to remember, at that preliminary hearing in 23 Austin, we can request that the rest of them can come down 24 here, and I think that that would be just really fantastic 25 if we could have all the hearings right here in our own 7-12-04 6 1 hometown. I know the folks have been talking about 2 chartering buses and all that kind of thing to get up to 3 Austin to the hearings. Do it right here at home. That's 4 all I have, Judge. Thank you. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner 2? 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Couple things, Judge. 7 I'll just follow up quickly on what Commissioner Baldwin's 8 talking about on the Aqua Texas issue. The court 9 administrator, Kathy Mitchell, gave me -- gave, I think, all 10 of us a copy of the latest compilation of total of names and 11 protest letters. As of Friday, 993 names on petitions, and 12 634 letters regarding the protest, I believe, have been 13 forwarded -- Kathy, is that correct? 14 MS. MITCHELL: Yes. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- to T.C.E.Q. I'm 16 aware of more coming, and probably all of us are. Got a 17 call this morning from a gentleman in one of the Aqua Texas 18 water company districts who wanted to know where to bring 19 these names and letters and so forth, and so I reconfirmed 20 for him what that's all about. I was in Austin all day 21 Wednesday on a series of meetings, and had an opportunity to 22 visit on a couple matters that I'll talk about later, but I 23 did talk to Senator Fraser's office with respect to this 24 issue, and the senator will weigh in on it in support of 25 this effort to secure hearings and so forth, and to see that 7-12-04 7 1 the right thing is done. I understand also that a docket 2 number has been assigned by T.C.E.Q., which indicates that 3 that process is moving forward, and -- and we'll see where 4 all that takes us. 5 Center Point, this past week, lost a very 6 unique individual in a tragic accident on the Guadalupe 7 River. Betty Wardlaw, the wife of Ken Wardlaw, the owners 8 and operators of the Rocking River Inn, was drowned at 9 Government Crossing when she and her husband and two other 10 couple -- another couple were tubing from the Rocking River 11 Inn downstream to Government Crossing. It was a tragic 12 accident. She was sucked into, as were the other -- two of 13 the others, sucked into the whirlpools that are created by 14 the heavy flow of water going through the three big conduits 15 under the Government Crossing. Tragically, the one that 16 Betty was sucked into was jammed with debris, stumps, 17 leaves, trees, limbs, and so forth, tires and every other 18 thing you can think of, and she got caught in that tube and 19 drowned. Needless to say, twelve hours later the rescue 20 folks managed to free her body from that tube. The other 21 two companions were sucked through a companion tube and were 22 blown out on the other side of the crossing, and, after 23 collecting themselves, were okay and weren't injured. Her 24 husband, trailing along behind, got out of the river. 25 Fortunately, he didn't see his wife go under, but he was 7-12-04 8 1 there to see everything else that took place. 2 A couple things come to mind about all this, 3 and first of all, a rousing credit to all who participated 4 in the rescue effort, not the least of which were our EMS 5 folks from here, the Center Point Volunteer Fire Department. 6 I believe Comfort Volunteer Fire Department came over, Texas 7 Wildlife -- Parks and Wildlife folks, and -- and community, 8 community at-large, citizens from the community. Notably 9 among those were Ernie Kaiser, who brought his backhoe down 10 and assisted in -- in the heavy lifting with his equipment 11 to try to free up that tube so Betty's body could be 12 recovered. So, a lot of credit goes to those folks. The 13 tragedy is that they knew the outcome of their efforts long 14 before their efforts were completed. But it also calls into 15 mind, I think, the need for a little more vigilance on the 16 part of -- of our Highway Department; not necessarily Road 17 and Bridge, because our folks are pretty diligent about 18 this. This was a state highway, and I don't know that that 19 state highway -- those tubes under that crossing had been 20 cleaned in a long, long time. It would indicate that they 21 were not. And I think it calls into question the type of -- 22 of diligence we -- we use in maintaining these low-water 23 crossings. 24 This particular one that Betty was caught in 25 had a stump -- a huge stump that took hours to get out, 7-12-04 9 1 along with all the other debris, before they could reach her 2 body. And I think that I'm going to take the opportunity to 3 -- of this tragedy to talk with the TexDOT folks here and 4 implore them to be a little more diligent about cleaning out 5 these conduits underneath these low-water crossings. 6 Needless to say, they're dangerous, and people need to be 7 aware of the danger associated with large tubes conducting 8 water in the velocity that took place in this particular 9 accident. But I think we need to also think about how we 10 keep that flow going. I was told by the ones who were there 11 that immediately after that tube was finally cleared and 12 Betty's body removed, the volume of water increased to such 13 an extent that the three or four inches that were over the 14 Government Crossing all during that time went down almost 15 immediately, which tells you that, among other things, this 16 is appropriate for us to be more diligent about. We lost a 17 fine citizen, a young person who was vibrant, dedicated, 18 far -- far-reaching in her vision and her drive to get 19 things accomplished, was a credit to the Center Point 20 community, and she will be missed by the community and her 21 family as well. Thank you, Judge. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, Commissioner. 23 Commissioner Letz? 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just like to say one 25 thing to reiterate again, you know, just in a general area; 7-12-04 10 1 our river is an extremely dangerous river. Many, many lives 2 get lost on it, and all kinds of events, whether it's being 3 washed off the road in a vehicle, which recently happened 4 also at Government Crossing -- or a year ago, I believe, the 5 drownings and various accidents. So I just -- everyone just 6 really needs to be vigilant and be careful when they're on 7 that river. It looks peaceful and calm, but it is 8 dangerous, and lots of conditions with the flooding we've 9 had make it more dangerous. 10 The other comment I'd like to make is I'm 11 kind of surprised at the modesty of one of our colleagues up 12 here. I received word from another colleague out in the 13 western part of the state that one of us has been appointed 14 as the second vice president of the West Texas County Judges 15 and Commissioners Association, Commissioner Baldwin, and 16 congratulations to you. I think that is a -- it says a 17 great deal about what the state association thinks about him 18 that they appointed him due to a vacancy created on their 19 board. They came to him, as I understand it, and asked him 20 to take on the second vice president position, and then he 21 will move up to become first vice president and president in 22 the next couple of years. But I think even more important 23 than the personal accolades that go to Buster is that that 24 takes Kerr County to Austin. When you serve on these 25 boards, you automatically get a seat on some legislative 7-12-04 11 1 committees and TAC Board, and I think that it really helps 2 Kerr County to have a representative and seat at the table 3 in the legislative process. So, congratulations to Buster, 4 and also to all the residents of Kerr County, 'cause now 5 we're represented once again in Austin. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you. Thank you 7 very much. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Congratulations. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's all I have. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. With respect to 11 the loss of Betty Wardlaw, there was a -- quite an 12 outpouring of love and respect yesterday at a memorial 13 service for her. Some of you may not recall, back in 14 February we held a strategic planning workshop -- the 15 members of this Court did -- to try and project out into the 16 future some of the major issues that will affect Kerr County 17 and to attempt to lay some sort of groundwork for the 18 planning that will be needed on the resolution of those 19 issues. And, immediately upon -- upon our decision to hold 20 that strategic planning workshop, Ken and Betty Wardlaw 21 immediately stepped forward and said we'd love to host you 22 people down here. And they were absolutely fabulous hosts. 23 They've got a wonderful facility down there, fed us a 24 wonderful lunch, and just made it a tremendous venue for 25 that purpose, and we were very grateful to them for that. 7-12-04 12 1 And so the Court has a personal connection -- all of us 2 do -- to those people, and we -- we send our respect and our 3 love, and -- in the mourning of their loss. Anything 4 further, gentlemen, before we move on? Let's get on to the 5 first item on the agenda, if we might. Consideration and 6 discussion of supporting the inclusion of the Guadalupe 7 River Basin in the Texas Brush Control Program. Mr. Fred 8 Bartel is here, and he approached me about this subject and 9 asked that the Court consider it. And, Mr. Bartel? 10 MR. BARTEL: Judge Tinley, Commissioners, 11 thank you for asking me to speak here today. I live in 12 Kendall County north of Boerne in Welfare. I have no 13 special interest in this thing other than water 14 conservation. I think it's one of the biggest problems we 15 have before us, and so I'm here to ask you to support me on 16 a letter that I'm writing to Jeff Wentworth -- Senator Jeff 17 Wentworth and Harvey Hilderbran, and Congressman Carter 18 Casteel. I've already coordinated this with Judge Eddie 19 John Vogt in Boerne, Kendall County, and Danny Scheel in 20 Comal County. A few months ago, our County Agent, Jay 21 Kingston, put on a field day at Waring, Texas, on the Hoyt 22 Seidensticker property, where Texas A & M was conducting 23 tests on water absorption and so forth by cedar. So they 24 have a laboratory set up out there in the middle of a cedar 25 break on the Seidensticker property, and this laboratory 7-12-04 13 1 measures how much water actually stays in a cedar tree and 2 so forth, and that data's transmitted back to A & M by 3 satellite. 4 This study shows that, because of the 5 construction of cedar leaves, the first half inch of rain 6 that falls on cedar trees is retained in the leaves and 7 eventually evaporates. If another half inch of rain falls 8 before that evaporates, it falls to the ground, but it lands 9 in the oily residue usually under a cedar tree, and so that 10 next half inch of rain doesn't get into the ground, either. 11 Senate Bill 1, in 2001, set up the Texas Brush Control 12 Program, and they asked A & M to study seven river basins to 13 determine whether it was economically feasible to clear 14 cedar. Congressman Rob Junell of San Angelo headed this 15 project, and it started in the Concho River Basin up there, 16 and they got $15 million to start this program. The 17 Pedernales was one of seven river basins that was studied. 18 They got $1.6 million in 2002. Now, this program pays 19 75 percent of the costs of clearing cedar, and, of course, 20 the cost is based on the density of the cedar, just like it 21 is in the EQIP program. And this is an ongoing project. By 22 the 1st of August of this year, they will have cleared 23 25,000 acres of cedar in Gillespie County. 24 It is estimated that the Pedernales River 25 Basin, by clearing brush, is going to generate 89,000 acre 7-12-04 14 1 feet of water for the Austin metropolitan area. The 2 justification that was put together for the -- for the 3 Pedernales River Basin was that this is the fast -- one of 4 the fastest growing areas in the state, the Austin 5 metropolitan area; that their population is going to double 6 by 2050, and there's not enough water to support that many 7 people. You could say the same thing about the Guadalupe 8 River Basin. We have a fast-growing area. We -- population 9 projections, as you know, Commissioner Letz, in Region J and 10 K and L are predicting tremendous water shortages as we get 11 on down the road, and we're in a Priority Groundwater 12 Management Area. The Guadalupe River Basin was left out of 13 this program, and I think it's a great program. I think it 14 will increase the spring flow into the Guadalupe River 15 without a doubt. It'll help locally here, it'll help the 16 Canyon Reservoir, it'll help the ranchers that can develop 17 grassland where the cedar was growing. There's a provision 18 in this program that there will be follow-up as years go by 19 so that they control second-growth cedar and so forth. 20 So, this letter that I'm proposing asks that 21 the Guadalupe River Basin, especially Kerr, Kendall, and 22 Comal Counties, be funded for brush control in the next 23 legislative session, and I'd really appreciate your support 24 on that letter. And, again, I want to thank you for 25 allowing me to speak here today. 7-12-04 15 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, Mr. Bartel. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I've -- thank you also 3 for bringing this to our attention again. It was noted -- 4 or has been noted by Region J for some time that the 5 Guadalupe River was left off, and really not sure why that 6 happened originally. We have asked that -- Region J -- that 7 it be included. We've had asked for this to be done, but I 8 think that one thing we have not done is gone to the 9 Commissioners Courts of the areas and then, through us, go 10 to our state representatives and state senators to get -- 11 you know, get the -- the money appropriated for an 12 additional river basin. Clearly, this benefits everyone in 13 Kerr County and everyone downstream along the Guadalupe 14 River. And at the last meeting or meeting before, Greg 15 Etter came in, with U.G.R.A., and went over part of the 16 study that was done in Kerr County that Mr. Bartel referred 17 to. So, yes, I think I'm very much in favor of it, and I 18 will make a motion that we support this effort, and I guess 19 ask the County Judge to basically use the form letter that 20 is attached, sign same, and send it to our legislative 21 folks. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'll certainly be 23 happy to second that, but I want to make sure we clear -- 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: There's some typos, I 25 know. 7-12-04 16 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- clean up some 2 things here. Number one, it has Senator Wentworth in there, 3 and I know that Jeff is always willing to help us, but we 4 want to add our senator in there as well. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And Mr. Hilderbran and 7 Mrs. Casteel are not congress people, and Hilderbran doesn't 8 have a "d" on it. And that's about all I can find right 9 now. But I think it's exciting. I can't believe we were 10 left out in the first round. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: You're speaking of, 12 essentially, a letter of support to our representatives in 13 Austin asking that the Guadalupe River Basin be included in 14 the Brush Control Program, and that, specifically, Kerr 15 County be included and authorized for funding, essentially, 16 is what I'm hearing. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is -- my question is, 18 are we asking them to -- in the new legislation, to add us 19 in there? Or is there still $30 million sitting out there 20 that we want to tap into that's already there? What -- 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: As I understand the way 22 it has been done, they designated -- or they created a Texas 23 Brush Control Fund, and then they funded it by river basins. 24 So, you have to be in the river basins that were chosen to 25 be funded. But the mechanism is set up in the original 7-12-04 17 1 legislation that additional river basins could be added 2 through the appropriation process. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And so that's what 4 we're asking them to do? 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. Then we 7 automatically tap into the money. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I would be supportive 10 of it. To follow up on Commissioner Baldwin earlier, there 11 are a couple other things need to be corrected in all this. 12 On the distribution side, Greg Etter is U.G.R.A. and Gordon 13 Morgan is Headwaters Groundwater Conservation. Those are 14 mixed up. I'm not sure what Carter Casteel -- is she a 15 senator or state rep? 16 JUDGE TINLEY: State rep. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: She's a state rep and 18 former county judge. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I knew that, yeah. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Comal County. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: My motion essentially is 22 to take the -- the letter -- it can be modified briefly, and 23 send it to our legislative people, and I think also 24 Headwaters and U.G.R.A. And I think we also -- I think that 25 Susan Combs and, you know, some of the other people in the 7-12-04 18 1 legislative process should also be included, since, 2 certainly, Department of Agriculture is how this funding 3 comes about, so I think she needs to be included as well. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Good point, Commissioner. 5 Motion made and seconded to request of representatives and 6 others involved in the state government, as well as local 7 water agencies, to have Guadalupe River Basin included in 8 the Texas Brush Control Program and be authorized funding 9 under the appropriations for that program, and for the 10 County Judge to write a letter of support to that effect. 11 Any further question or discussion? All in favor of the 12 motion, signify by raising your right hand. 13 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 14 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 15 (No response.) 16 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. The 17 next item on the agenda is consider, discuss, and approve a 18 proposed tax collection contract between Kerr County Tax 19 Assessor/Collector and the County Emergency Services 20 District Number 2. Good morning, Ms. Rector. 21 MS. RECTOR: Good morning. Well, I have been 22 working with the Emergency Services District Number 2 and 23 negotiating a tax collection contract. Each of you have a 24 copy of that contract, and I am here before the Court for 25 the approval of that contract to collect taxes for the 7-12-04 19 1 emergency services district. 2 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I move to approve. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 5 approval of the agenda item. Ms. Rector, this is the same 6 format of contract that you've utilized where you've 7 contracted to collect taxes for other jurisdictions? 8 MS. RECTOR: Yes. 9 MR. TUCKER: And the County Attorney has 10 previously approved that format? 11 MS. RECTOR: Yes. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And the rate's constant? 13 I mean, it's uniform, 1 percent? 14 MS. RECTOR: 1 percent across-the-board, yes, 15 for all the jurisdictions. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 17 MS. RECTOR: And I would like to commend the 18 emergency services district for their effort and hard work. 19 They have been a pleasure to work with, and I'm looking 20 forward to -- to working with them in the future. It's a 21 fine group. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Any further question or 23 discussion about the motion? All in favor of the motion, 24 signify by raising your right hand. 25 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 7-12-04 20 1 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 2 (No response.) 3 MR. TUCKER: That motion does carry. Thank 4 you very much, Ms. Rector. 5 MS. RECTOR: Thank you. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: The next item on the agenda is 7 the transfer of funds for Road and Bridge 15-611 budget. 8 Mr. Odom. 9 MR. ODOM: Yes, sir. Thank you, Judge. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Good morning, sir. 11 MR. ODOM: Good morning, sir. With the 12 agenda item, you have the supporting documents there showing 13 what we -- I propose to transfer from and to. We've had 14 rain since February of this year to the 1st of July, and 15 several floods, so what I've looked at, it's been putting a 16 very hard strain on the -- on the working budget. And I've 17 taken a look at the -- these line items that I'm 18 transferring from, but I feel that we can support to do that 19 without jeopardizing our main operations, and this -- this 20 money is to go to those line items that I think will help 21 support us and keep us going through at least into August, I 22 hope. By that time, we should be fairly close to finishing 23 our -- our sealcoat programs. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Move approval of the 25 budget transfer. 7-12-04 21 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 3 approval of the agenda item and budget transfer. Any 4 further question or discussion? 5 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Mr. Odom, your -- I 6 see that you're able to take some $8,000 or so from Payroll. 7 How does that occur? 8 MR. ODOM: That occurs from the fact that 9 I've had some people either leave -- I had a retirement 10 from -- from an individual, Ray Lynch, and I've taken that 11 money and looked at that. There's still a little bit there 12 that we didn't take out in overhead, but I took that out of 13 those salary savings. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Any further questions or 15 discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising 16 your right hand. 17 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 18 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 19 (No response.) 20 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. Thank 21 you very much, Mr. Odom. 22 MR. ODOM: Thank you, sir. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Next item is consider 24 approving road names for privately maintained roads in 25 accordance with 9-1-1 guidelines. Ms. Hardin? 7-12-04 22 1 MS. HARDIN: You only have four private roads 2 this time, in Commissioner Nicholson's area. Three of those 3 four are inside a mobile home park. 4 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Move approval. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 7 approval of the agenda item. Any question or discussion? 8 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Ms. Hardin is there 9 any -- expected controversy over these names? 10 MS. HARDIN: Not to my knowledge. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Any further questions or 12 discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising 13 your right hand. 14 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 15 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 16 (No response.) 17 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. Let's 18 move on to Item Number 10. Consider, discuss, and take 19 appropriate action to award contract to D.W. Contractors for 20 septic tank mitigation in Oak Grove Mobile Home Park in the 21 amount of $49,402 as part of the Texas Community Development 22 Program, Contract Number 721075. Commissioner Williams? 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you, Judge. 24 The Court will remember that we did advertise for bids for 25 the mitigation of septic tanks in the Phase 1 part of the 7-12-04 23 1 Kerrville South Wastewater project. The bids came in a 2 little high, but nonetheless, we have to do the work, and 3 this will be to award the contract to the low bidder, D.W. 4 Contractors, for mitigation as part of the Contract 721075. 5 What will not happen, however, is a complete mitigation. We 6 will mitigate as far as the dollars take us in this phase, 7 and still remaining will be 13 others, and we'll talk about 8 those other 13 and how they are mitigated under the items 9 that we skipped over, which has to do with the amendments to 10 the -- to the next contract. But this will -- this will get 11 the majority of them done under this particular phase, and 12 that will leave then only some cleanup items, punch list 13 items in Phase 1, which, as the Judge knows, we're working 14 to try to find a way to get the punch list items done so we 15 can move to Phase 2 and get that one moving. So, I would 16 move approval of the contract to D.W. Contractors for septic 17 tank mitigation, and in the amount of $49,402, as part of 18 T.C.D.P. Contract 721075. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 21 approval of the agenda item. Any question or discussion? 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. Question I have is, 23 is the -- the amount here is $49,402. Does that reflect the 24 13 that are not included? Are they -- I mean -- 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No, they have been 7-12-04 24 1 moved out, and we'll talk about that under these others. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: They're moved out, so did 3 they bid on those 13? 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, they bid on the 5 entire job. He bid -- his bid to do the job was 49,000 -- 6 it's a good question. But it will not take us all the way 7 through. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I guess -- well -- 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We only have $35,000 10 left, is what I'm saying. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's the answer. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, really, the 14 contract's for $35,000, unless we approve -- unless the 15 amendment goes through under -- 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, no, we're going 17 to issue the contract for 49,4, with the Court's approval, 18 and the remaining 13 and change will come from Phase 2 19 funding. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But that -- 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Same contract. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But that has to be 23 approved. I'm a little leery of approving the -- more than 24 $35,000 at this time, since we don't have approval to spend 25 $49,000 at this time. 'Cause the amendment has to get 7-12-04 25 1 approved by Austin, correct? 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, we're 3 requesting a budget amendment. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Which Grantworks will 6 be here to talk about in a little bit. I believe that's 7 perfunctory; that will happen. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't have any question 9 about that, but still, until that gets approved by Texas 10 Community Development Program, we don't have the $49,000, 11 because the -- until the amendment gets approved. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, we do have it; 13 it's just in the second phase. We do have it, and the 14 funding is there. We just have to move mitigation of 13 15 tanks from Phase 1 to Phase 2. We do have the funds. We 16 have been awarded the money. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. Was the -- but 18 the money -- was the money awarded to do these -- these 19 specific mitigations? 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It was awarded for 21 Phase 2 of the Kerrville South Wastewater project, and 22 our -- our grant administrator believes, as does the 23 engineer, that there is excess funds there that can be used 24 for this purpose. So we do, in fact, have the money. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We have the money, but 7-12-04 26 1 it's not for this area. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's not for this 3 phase. Same area, different phase. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I guess I would be more 5 comfortable with us approving $35,000 of -- under this 6 contract right now, and then doing the second part after the 7 amendment gets approved. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, why don't we 9 get the amendment out of the way and come back to this one? 10 JUDGE TINLEY: We can certainly do that. 11 Either that, or -- 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But the amendment has to 13 be approved, still, by -- 14 JUDGE TINLEY: -- we can approve $35,000 of 15 the existing funds, and subject to the approval of the 16 amendment, the contract for the entire 49 -- 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: -- and change. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's exactly what I was 20 trying to say, thank you. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you, Judge, for 22 untying that knot. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is that acceptable? 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's acceptable. 25 The goal is to get it all done. 7-12-04 27 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. Okay. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: All right. Judge, 3 you can restate the motion. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Let me take another run 5 at it here. The motion is to approve the sum of -- 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Go back to number -- 7 what, 6? Number 7. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: $35,395 out of the current 9 phase, and subject to the approval of Office of Rural 10 Community Affairs of the amendment to Texas Community 11 Development Program Contract Number 722141, allowing the 12 transfer of an additional sum of approximately $14,000 -- 13 slightly more than that, for a total amount of $49,402. Is 14 that fairly stated? 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah, except we can 16 stick in the first contract phase number, which is 721075. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's the first one. 19 That's -- the $35,000 would come from 721075, $35,395. And 20 then, when we do the rest, the balance will come from 21 Contract 722141. Those two. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. That's the motion. And 23 you seconded? 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I seconded. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: All right. Any question or 7-12-04 28 1 discussion? You want in on this, Commissioner Baldwin? 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Absolutely not. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: I didn't think so. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Keep the sewer 5 flowing, right? 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, just keep the 7 sewer flowing. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: All in favor of the motion, 9 signify by raising your right hand. 10 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 11 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 12 (No response.) 13 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. We'll 14 move to Item 11, which is consider, discuss, and take 15 appropriate action on an interlocal agreement for joint 16 management of the Kerr County/Kerrville Airport, Joint 17 Action Agreement. I believe Commissioners 2 and 3 were the 18 ones that were primarily working on this issue. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We'll both join in, 20 I'm sure, along the way, trying to explain how this all 21 comes about. But what -- what is in front of you is -- this 22 is the first of two documents the Court's being asked to 23 look at and approve, and this one is a Joint Action 24 Agreement which puts Kerr County and the City of Kerrville 25 in compliance with Texas Revised Civil Statutes regarding 7-12-04 29 1 Municipal Airport Act, which is the predecessor to Chapter 2 22 of the Transportation Code. It provides for us to 3 jointly administer the affairs of this through a -- a joint 4 board whose composition will be expanded from the current 5 five to seven members; two County Commissioners, two City 6 Council people, and three at-large members. They will have 7 complete say over the day-to-day operations and the policy, 8 et cetera, of the airport, with the exception of tax 9 levying. They will have no authority for that. They will 10 have -- they will have to come back to the owners for 11 property acquisition, property sales. But, by and large, 12 they can operate the airport, I believe, on a day-to-day 13 basis without Commissioners Court or City Council oversight, 14 and that oversight will come from the two members of each 15 governing body sitting there. 16 We will deal with -- this allows us to deal 17 with how the members of the board are selected, and 18 equalizes the funding for the operation of the airport 19 itself into a fifty-fifty -- identical fifty-fifty split 20 with actual -- actual expenditures required to operate and 21 maintain the airport. It provides for allocation of costs 22 and ownership upon early termination or failure to adopt a 23 budget. It locks us in, is what it does, and into our 24 ownership position, and it locks us into the requirement of 25 always budgeting for our 50 percent share of the actual 7-12-04 30 1 costs. And failure to do so, adopt a budget that will 2 support our 50 percent, then would set a mechanism in motion 3 that -- where the ownership would entirely go to the 4 surviving party, whoever that happened to be, whether it was 5 the City or the County. It deals with allocation of real 6 property in the event that happens. It deals with the 7 existing leases in non-owned buildings and fixtures, as to 8 what takes place there, and also deals with the sale of 9 the -- of the property in the event one party or the other 10 succeeds the other in ownership. 11 It took Commissioner Letz and I -- what, the 12 better part of six or eight months to -- to work out these 13 details with the City. I want to thank both the City -- the 14 mayor and Councilman Smith, who's in the auditorium here 15 today -- in court today, and City staff for their -- for its 16 work with City Manager, Ron Patterson, and Assistant City 17 Attorney, Ilse Bailey, who did a lot of legal research and 18 helped guide us through this process. I may think of 19 others, but, Commissioner Letz, what else would you like to 20 add on this, please? 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just a few comments on -- 22 before I forget this, first of all, I'd also like to thank 23 Judge Tinley on this. You might recall, if we go back in 24 history, a little over a year ago, it was Judge Tinley that 25 first brought this to everyone's attention that the airport 7-12-04 31 1 had not been properly operated for the last almost 20 years. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Thirty. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And after a -- numerous 4 discussions with the City and our legal staff and their 5 legal staff, I think everyone is now in full agreement 6 and -- that the Judge was right, and thank him for his -- 7 you know, looking into it and getting this whole thing 8 started. I think the result is that we are, hopefully, 9 about to enter into a new phase for the airport, where it 10 will -- that will enhance the operations out there. I think 11 both the City and the County will be better represented, and 12 I think we'll have input from the public as well. 13 I met with the Airport Board last week; I 14 went over this agreement with them, and one of the things 15 that I told the Airport Board was that the makeup being two 16 Commissioners, two City Councilmen, and three members at 17 large -- and I think it was my personal feeling that the 18 three members at large would come out of those five that are 19 currently serving on the advisory board. I -- and I, you 20 know, pretty much encouraged them to try to sort out amongst 21 themselves as to which three out of the five that would be. 22 I think I would certainly -- I am comfortable with all five 23 of those members; they are outstanding, knowledgeable 24 people. They've done a great service to the community, and 25 hopefully they can come to an agreement as to, you know, who 7-12-04 32 1 is best to serve on this new board. 2 The key is that everyone needs to remember 3 that this board will run the airport. It's going to remove 4 a lot of the decision making -- almost all of the decision 5 making from the City Council and from this Commissioners 6 Court, and so I would make a special note that everyone read 7 and reread three or four times on Page 3, Paragraph 4, Item 8 (e), Powers and Authority. That is the nuts and bolts as to 9 what we're doing, and that, you know, basically says that 10 we're turning over everything except, you know -- I'll just 11 read the sentence. "However, in no case shall the Board be 12 authorized to impose a property tax (fees exempted), sell 13 bonds or otherwise enter into other debt instruments, 14 dispose of airport property, or exercise power of eminent 15 domain without the prior written consent of the governing 16 bodies." Aside from that, this board will operate that 17 airport. 18 And there are some things that have come to 19 my mind recently; I think we need to really decide a little 20 bit about tax abatements, or not specifically -- I don't 21 know if that goes -- is it included with that board or not? 22 I would say, the way it reads right now, it is. I don't 23 know if that's our intent. I think that if there were a -- 24 probably -- I think, both probably on the City Council side, 25 I'm guessing, and I know on this Commissioners Court side, 7-12-04 33 1 that a few things will probably come before the bodies to 2 make sure everyone is in agreement as to exactly what the 3 authority is and kind of come up with some sort of rules and 4 regulations out there that -- what the parameters of that 5 board will be. But I really think the board needs to be in 6 place, and that can be worked on after the fact. 7 I think everyone received a Draft 8 since the 8 Draft 7 that was in the background material. I -- I think 9 everyone received the memo that I wrote to Ron Patterson 10 when I received that. And I think my desire would be that 11 we, if we are in agreement, adopt this in substance. There 12 may be some wordsmithing required by individuals of this 13 Court; I know there is from City Council. And I think that 14 if we start trying to draft an actual document at this 15 point, we'd be going back and forth for the next six months 16 trying to get it in final form, with our two schedules. I 17 do believe that once we get the final form, the County 18 Attorney certainly needs to look at it, so the approval will 19 be subject to his approval, but that would be my 20 recommendation. I am comfortable with the document; I think 21 it's a good agreement. I think it will serve the airport 22 well, and I think -- that's just -- well, that's my comments 23 for right now. I'll see if there's any other comments 24 before either I or Commissioner Williams make a motion. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I have one question 7-12-04 34 1 that, in my opinion, is -- is as important as anything in 2 the document, and that is the issue of auditing, the 3 end-of-year audit. Who is responsible and who does that? 4 Does the County Auditor do it, or do -- would we include 5 them in our annual audit? Or do y'all's -- 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think the Airport 7 Board would -- would authorize the audit and select the 8 audit -- whoever would perform the audit. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do you think that that 10 verbiage needs to be in here? 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, that's a point 12 that we can certainly take under consideration, 13 Commissioner. I don't know that we talked about an audit, 14 as such, knowing that both -- both governments do go through 15 annual audits, or are required to do so. And, certainly, 16 this board would have to require that. It's a point to be 17 considered. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I think it needs to be 19 added somewhere or clarified in there, because it -- boy, 20 that would be a good place to have a good fight at the end 21 of the year, wouldn't it? 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Let me -- let me respond to 23 that, if I might, Commissioner. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And it may be in 25 there. 7-12-04 35 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Under the management contract, 2 which is the other agreement between the board and its 3 contractor for the day-to-day services, that particular 4 provision is under Paragraph (e) under Terms. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Talked about it so 6 much, I'd forgotten. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: You can find it on Page 3. 8 That does include auditing, "unless specifically agreed upon 9 otherwise by written contract or other agreement between the 10 parties." Now, of course, those parties are going to be -- 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Both the City, the County, and 13 the Joint Airport Board. Actually, as I see that agreement, 14 it's between the Board and whoever they're contracting with, 15 actually, for the most part. But you're exactly right; it 16 needs to be something that -- that both parties and both 17 owners can be comfortable with and have confidence in, and I 18 think it is a very important issue, because in dealing with 19 allocation of responsibility between two different owners, I 20 think it's very important that we both be comfortable with 21 the particulars that we're looking at. With respect to 22 Commissioner Letz' comments about tax abatements, it would 23 occur to me that the Airport Board having no authority to 24 impose taxes, it has no authority to -- 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Reduce. 7-12-04 36 1 JUDGE TINLEY: -- to abate or otherwise 2 modify. That would be limited at this point in time to only 3 those jurisdictions where -- which have the ability to 4 assess and collect taxes. There's one item that I can 5 certainly understand Commissioner Letz' desire to -- wanting 6 to adopt the principle, and I'm certainly in favor of that. 7 There's some clean-up and wordsmithing. I noticed a lot of 8 items in Draft 7, as initially proposed, and a lot of those 9 were cleaned up in 8, and there was some refining of 10 terminology. I would like to mention, however, one specific 11 item which I deemed to be a matter of substance. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge, you're in the 13 Joint Action Agreement? Or are you -- 14 JUDGE TINLEY: No, sir, I'm -- yes, I'm in 15 the Joint Action Agreement. I surely am. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: The -- the management contract 18 is another agenda item. On Page 6, where we're talking 19 about the allocation of the real property, where one party 20 fails to provide a budget or otherwise respond, under 21 Paragraph (ii), in talking about a failure and right to 22 cure, it originally provided in Draft 7 for written notice 23 of the failure, and the word "written" was stricken. I 24 think we need to leave that word "written" in there. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You're in Allocation 7-12-04 37 1 of Property, Subsection c (ii)? 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, uh-huh. I'm looking at 3 the red-lined agreement, Draft 8, which indicates that, in 4 about the sixth line, I guess it is, or seventh line -- 5 sixth line, where it formally reads, "...and further fails 6 to remedy such failure within 30 days after receiving 7 written notice," in the proposed Draft 8, it would strike 8 the word "written." I think that word "written" is very, 9 very important. I don't want to rely upon someone's memory. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think we talked 11 about that, and we wanted "written" in there. Written 12 notification. So, we'll insist that it goes back in. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: But, other than that, I 15 certainly agree with Commissioner Letz' idea about how to 16 proceed forward; that we approve it in principle, and 17 subject to the final tweaking of the document, and further 18 subject to the County Attorney's approval, let's move 19 forward on it. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think what we can do is 21 approve it in substance. I think we still can bring it back 22 to the Court for final approval. I think we just need to 23 get both bodies to agree. We can work out a final form, get 24 the attorneys involved on both sides, and then bring it 25 back, make sure everyone's in agreement. It's more just a 7-12-04 38 1 concept -- or more than a concept; it's pretty much an 2 agreement, but just -- 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah, I think so. I 4 mean, you take care of the -- as you say, the wordsmithing 5 and any last-minute thoughts, T's that need to be crossed 6 and I's dotted. I think also, we can probably, at that 7 meeting, evolve, perhaps, a strategy in principle as to how 8 to populate the new board, and come back and be more 9 specific about that as well. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And as to the audit 11 provision, I think that needs to be included in this 12 agreement. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I agree. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's a different -- 15 that is something that -- you brought it up, Judge. This 16 agreement is between us and the City. The other agreement 17 is between the Board and the contractor, so that needs to be 18 in this agreement. I appreciate you noticing that. I'll 19 make a motion that we -- 20 MR. SMITH: Pardon me, Jonathan. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Good morning, Councilman 22 Smith. 23 MR. SMITH: How are you doing? I'm 24 Councilman Smith. I live at One Antelope Trail here in 25 Kerrville. I'm the ex-officio -- or whatever it is. I'm a 7-12-04 39 1 nonvoting member of the -- of the Airport Advisory Board, 2 and I've gone over all these details, and I know your -- 3 your representatives have worked real hard on this. This 4 will be taken up by the City Council tomorrow night, and one 5 of the things that I've added to the agenda is the 6 appointment of -- of the two City representatives on the 7 Council, because when this is passed, the existing board 8 will be dissolved, and if this is to go in effect, you need 9 to name the two County officials on this. The City was 10 hoping that it would be approved in form and go into effect 11 with all these language changes, and an attorney got hold of 12 it; he changed a lot of things to agree with the code, but 13 he -- he also garbled the thing a lot. So -- so, there's an 14 awful lot of changes to the attorney's changes that will -- 15 will complete -- but none of these things are -- are really 16 substantial. 17 And, so, I would like to see this approved 18 and -- and placed in effect with these language changes to 19 be done by what I would call an editorial committee. But, 20 if y'all so choose to -- to approve it in form, but not 21 in -- in effect, that's okay too. But I -- I would surely 22 hope that, since we've been operating incorrectly for a 23 number of years, that we would expedite this thing getting 24 cleaned up and -- and go on. And I have spent a lot of time 25 working on this, and I think it's -- and your people have 7-12-04 40 1 spent a lot of time working on it. I think it's -- it's a 2 very worthwhile agreement. Thank you. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Councilman? 4 MR. SMITH: Yes, sir? 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You mentioned that 6 you're going to add to the agenda -- or add to your 7 discussion the appointment of the people? 8 MR. SMITH: No, it's already been placed on 9 the agenda. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's already on the 11 agenda? 12 MR. SMITH: I mentioned it, and I said that 13 if we're going to place this in effect, we're more or less 14 dissolving the committee, so we need to -- we need to have 15 our appointments instead of waiting for another -- another 16 council meeting to appoint them. We will -- there's a 17 possibility that we will approve it, and also approve the 18 two City representatives on the new formed board. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, therein lies a 20 problem. Two City representatives. You have two council 21 people and we have two commissioners. That was the two City 22 representatives. 23 MR. SMITH: There's only one City 24 representative on it now. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Be one County and one 7-12-04 41 1 City other appointment, and then there's a chairperson, and 2 that's kind of what I was hoping that maybe the task force 3 could talk about, would be a procedure by which we come 4 together and -- and winnow this board down from its existing 5 five to three. And part of that strategy would be, perhaps, 6 for the City and the County to agree on the chair, leaving 7 then only one other person from either side to be selected, 8 if we could agree on the chair. And, of course, we'll take 9 care of our own representation here, as will City Council 10 take care of its representation. So, I'm not sure how 11 you're going to proceed with that, since there are -- there 12 are five people there whose future is dangling, so to speak, 13 in terms of service. 14 MR. SMITH: Yes. It would be my 15 recommendation -- and I'm only one vote -- that Dr. Davis 16 continue, since he has been the chairman for a while, of the 17 advisory group. I would like to see him continue. Of 18 course, that will have to be voted on when we do appoint the 19 two city and county people. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'm glad you mention 21 it that way. And I haven't spoken to Commissioner Letz 22 about this, but I would be in hopes that Dr. Davis could 23 continue to chair it, and that would leave, then, one other 24 for the City to appoint and one other for the County to 25 appoint, if we both agree on the chair. 7-12-04 42 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We agree on all of them 2 anyway. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I know we do. But 4 it's question of -- 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But, I mean -- 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- how you get from 7 five to three. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, I think that -- I 9 agree with Councilman Smith, that we need to get this thing 10 done. It needs to be expedited. We've been working on it a 11 long time, but there's no way the County -- one, we don't 12 have it posted to appoint anyone today, so we're not going 13 to appoint anyone for two weeks. Or -- 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Unless we call a 15 special meeting. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And, secondly, you know, 17 we can't approve it until we get a form approval by the 18 County Attorney, 'cause it's all been done by the City 19 Attorney. So, I think the goal should be to approve it in 20 substantive form today, and with the goal of having it 21 effective August 1, and have everything in place. And 22 that'll give each body one more meeting this month to get 23 the final agreement before us approved, form-approved by 24 everyone, and work out the details of who the three 25 appointments are going to be, because we're going to have to 7-12-04 43 1 appoint the three at-large at that next meeting also, if we 2 can move it that way. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I kind of like that 4 strategy, in setting August 1 as a target date for the new 5 board to take effect, because we just added one paragraph. 6 We need to talk about that, being the audit, plus the 7 tweaking of various things that the City Attorney has put on 8 -- in the red-lined draft, and some things that the Judge 9 has noticed and so forth. It would be my suggestion that, 10 immediately after City Council tomorrow, that the task force 11 get back together one more time to hack out all these little 12 changes, and perhaps -- and perhaps then strategize as to 13 how the appointments take place and so forth. Just an idea 14 of mine. 15 MR. SMITH: Yeah, that procedure sounds good. 16 Of course, I'm only one guy on the City Council, but I'll 17 bring that up at the City Council, that -- that we follow 18 the procedures that you've just outlined. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: We appreciate your concern, 20 Councilman Smith. The -- the bottom line problem that we 21 have now is, we can't appoint anybody today. 22 MR. SMITH: Right, I understand that. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: If we were in position and 24 ready, willing, and able to do that, it's not on the agenda. 25 We'd either have to post a special meeting, or we -- we're 7-12-04 44 1 going to have to reserve it till next time. So, we just -- 2 we're under that limitation. But we want to get this thing 3 knocked down just as you do, and -- and maybe if we can 4 operate on the August 1 timetable, we can all get there at 5 the same time. 6 MR. SMITH: Well, considering that this has 7 been handled inappropriately for 20 years, I guess a couple 8 of weeks wouldn't hurt it. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Actually -- actually, it's 10 over 30, if the truth were known -- 11 MR. SMITH: Okay. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: -- Councilman. 13 MR. SMITH: Well, fine. Thank you very much. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make a motion that 16 we approve the Joint Action Agreement in substance, and 17 direct the -- the City/County committee to revise language 18 appropriately, obtain form approvals, and re-present this 19 for final approval at our second Commissioners Court meeting 20 in July. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Subject to the -- 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Subject to the County 23 Attorney -- 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Subject to the County 25 Attorney. 7-12-04 45 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded. Any 3 further question or discussion? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: My only other comment 5 would be just to the rest of the members of the Court. Any 6 other grammatical or, you know, minor changes that were 7 missed -- I mean, I've read it so many times, I don't see 8 the mistakes any more. If you'll just point them out to us, 9 we'll try to get them incorporated. 10 MR. SMITH: Pardon me. Did your motion 11 include the August 1st -- 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It didn't include the 13 August 1st, but it did include our second meeting to do 14 final approval. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second meeting in 16 July. 17 MR. SMITH: But it is the intention of doing 18 it on August 1st? 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Which is prior to 20 August 1st. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, as expressed. Thank you, 22 Councilman. Any further question or discussion on the 23 motion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising your 24 right hand. 25 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 7-12-04 46 1 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 2 (No response.) 3 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. We 4 have a timed item now. Let me recess the Commissioners 5 Court meeting at this time and convene a public hearing for 6 an amendment to the Texas Community Development Program, 7 Community Development Fund Project. 8 (The regular Commissioners Court meeting was closed at 10:03 a.m., and a public hearing 9 was held in open court, as follows:) 10 P U B L I C H E A R I N G 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Mr. Odom? Ms. Hardin? 12 MR. ODOM: Yes, sir. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: We'll be taking up the next 14 item shortly. Is there any member of the public that wishes 15 to be heard on this posted public hearing item, that being 16 the amendment to the Texas Community Development Program, 17 Community Development Fund Project? Seeing no one getting 18 my attention or moving to come forward, I will close the 19 public hearing for the amendment to the Texas Community 20 Development Program, Community Development Fund Project. 21 (The public hearing was concluded at 10:04 a.m., and the regular Commissioners Court 22 meeting was reopened.) 23 - - - - - - - - - - 24 JUDGE TINLEY: And we will now take up Item 25 6, consider the amendment to the Texas Community Development 7-12-04 47 1 Program, Community Development Fund Project, approve and 2 sign resolution for the same. Mr. Odom? 3 MR. ODOM: Yes, sir. I -- this is a learning 4 curve for us, and -- this project, and we have been before 5 you before, but we have to make an amendment to this in 6 reference to the original contract that we sent in for 7 health -- health, safety, and welfare of the citizens. We 8 had to do some projects ahead of schedule, before we got 9 their approval, because of safety issues. And because of 10 that, we had to submit an amended resolution and amended 11 form. So that's what we're asking the Court to do, is to 12 sign this form. Truby has a little bit more detail. She -- 13 she went to their seminar to go over this, and so hopefully, 14 we hope at this time that this is the last of the amendments 15 that we have to submit. So, any questions? I'll turn it 16 over to Truby. She's a little bit more knowledgeable than I 17 am in this grant. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I have at least one 19 question. Go ahead, Truby. 20 MS. HARDIN: Go ahead. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What's going to 22 happen to the dollars that were allocated for the 23 replacement of the walk bridge in Flat Rock Lake Park? 24 MR. ODOM: I'll take that one. At this time, 25 I don't have the exact question -- answer for you, other 7-12-04 48 1 than a supposition. Supposition is that that amendment that 2 we sent to FEMA is up in six months, and I think that was 3 1 July. So, I do not know exactly how that works with FEMA, 4 but in reference to this, our paperwork, we have to submit 5 this to be through with it. And, at this point, we have -- 6 we have talked previously, when we had the workshop, that 7 that program -- I mean, we're not through with the bridge 8 one way or another. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We've only just 10 begun. 11 MR. ODOM: Well, that's true. And you only 12 have $9,232, I think, if memory serves me right. $9,232; 13 that is what FEMA gave you. And that extension -- we asked 14 for an extension on December the 22nd of '03, and to my 15 understanding, that was a six-month extension, if that went 16 through at the first of the year, so we assume that that's 17 already up. But for us to clear everything with ORCA, this 18 is a separate thing, what is -- with ORCA. We have to just 19 say that we're -- you know, we're not going to be able to do 20 it at this time. We're through. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That still doesn't 22 answer my question. Turning back -- are we deobligating 23 these funds and turning them back? 24 MR. ODOM: My understanding right now, 25 they're deobligated; that's right. That it -- that it 7-12-04 49 1 expired on July the 1st. Now, that's with FEMA. Now, what 2 happens with FEMA, I don't know. I don't know if they'll 3 ask you back or not. I can tell you where the funds are at. 4 They haven't been sent back to FEMA. They're in Line Item 5 10-350-700, $9,232. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can we -- well, I think 7 we should -- I mean, one, we should request an extension 8 from FEMA. 9 MR. ODOM: We did. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay, another extension 11 from FEMA. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah. 13 MR. ODOM: Well, I think that would be 14 appropriate. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. I mean, I think 16 they -- what is the -- can we not request an extension on 17 these other ones, on the ones that are being excluded here? 18 Or do we just need to close that? 19 MR. ODOM: We need to close it. We need to 20 close the ORCA, because it jeopardizes your funding for 21 something in the future, and that's what we want to get out 22 from underneath. Even $9,232 is not enough money to build 23 that crossing as we propose to do that. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I -- we know that. 25 But those are dollars that could be coupled with other 7-12-04 50 1 dollars in hopes of finding enough to get this issue moving. 2 And I'd hate to cough up nearly $10,000 if I don't have to 3 cough that up. 4 MR. ODOM: You'd be coughing -- to use that 5 word, if you coughed up -- that's only $2,000; that's 6 25 percent of that $9,232. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'm sorry, now you've 8 lost me. 9 MR. ODOM: Well, you've asked for $9,232, 10 right? 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What were we awarded 12 for the bridge? 13 MS. HARDIN: From FEMA, we were awarded 14 $9,232. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 16 MS. HARDIN: From ORCA, 25 percent of that. 17 MR. ODOM: 25 percent. So, in other words, 18 you have to -- they -- they gave us $9,232 for the project. 19 However, we have to put in 75 -- they gave 75 percent of 20 that. ORCA gives you 25 percent of that. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. Well, it's 22 still $9,232, whatever, total? 23 MR. ODOM: Total. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 25 MR. ODOM: Between those two entities. 7-12-04 51 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Were we using the FEMA 2 money to match -- to make the ORCA match? Or can we do 3 that? 4 MS. HARDIN: I don't understand the question. 5 MR. ODOM: I don't understand. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We've got an expert 7 on that matter sitting in the back that can maybe help us 8 here, even though this is not his project. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, we received 10 9,000 -- 11 MR. ODOM: 232. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: From FEMA. 13 MR. ODOM: Right. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What money -- what -- 15 where were the funds for this, for the walk bridge at Flat 16 Rock Park under ORCA? Did we ever receive any funds, or -- 17 MS. HARDIN: No, we just -- they committed 18 the funds, but we haven't received them yet. 19 MR. ODOM: We haven't received -- 20 MS. HARDIN: We have to show proof that we've 21 completed it in order to get the money. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. But was it our 23 intent to use the FEMA money to do part of the project, and 24 then get some of that money back from FEMA? We were 25 leveraging the FEMA money with ORCA -- 7-12-04 52 1 MR. ODOM: Mm-hmm. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And the total of the 4 two was maybe other funds as well. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. Okay. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Dave Tucker of 7 Grantworks, Leonard and Truby, is here on another matter, 8 but he is so familiar with ORCA and these matters that I 9 think we ought to pick his brain. 10 MR. ODOM: Sure. 11 MR. TUCKER: If the project is a typical 12 FEMA/ORCA disaster relief grant, then the 25 percent on ORCA 13 funds are matching for the FEMA funds, and the 75 percent 14 FEMA funds are matching for the ORCA funds. They are each 15 other's match. FEMA requires a 25 percent match. ORCA's 16 providing that. ORCA requires at least a 5 percent, but in 17 this case, I think a 75 percent match. FEMA is providing 18 those funds. So, they -- they pair up nicely in that 19 manner, if this project is typical of the other disaster 20 relief projects that I have assisted localities in 21 administering. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Question. Mr. Odom mentioned 23 that by having this thing hanging and continuing to hang, 24 that it may jeopardize our ability to be a recipient under 25 current and future projects. Tell us what we need to know 7-12-04 53 1 about that, Mr. Tucker. 2 MR. TUCKER: That could be true. I don't 3 know the specific rules regarding eligibility of disaster 4 relief grants, but if they -- if the County has outstanding 5 projects, it would hinder making applications for Community 6 Development grants on the next application cycle. But I 7 should tell you, the reason I'm here is for the Kerrville 8 South projects; the 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004 project. 9 2001, as the Court is aware, has taken a long time. The 10 2002 and 2003 projects are going to be bid out together. 11 And, to be honest, since we haven't bid out that project 12 yet, the County will not be eligible to apply for Community 13 Development grants this October at this -- at this point, 14 because the plate is full, as it were, with existing grants. 15 And, so, if this lady and gentleman are nervous about the 16 disaster relief creating a situation of ineligibility on the 17 County's part for the 2005-2006 cycle, I have to admit that 18 our 2002 and 2003 project take credit for that already. 19 (Laughter.) 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So, are we foreclosed 21 until we obligate the funds in Phase 2 and Phase 3? 22 MR. TUCKER: Yes. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Which we've known. 24 MR. TUCKER: We have -- you have known, yes. 25 So, just to make you aware of that. I believe I can assist 7-12-04 54 1 the County in -- even though the deadline has passed, in 2 requesting and cajoling ORCA to grant another extension, if 3 you think that's necessary. I think that that would be 4 possible. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: And, at this point, because of 6 the -- of the ongoing nature of the Kerrville South projects 7 that are already in the pipeline and in the multiple-year 8 contracts -- 9 MR. TUCKER: Yes, sir. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: -- and our eligibility being 11 in question for future funding because of those, -- 12 MR. TUCKER: Uh-huh. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: -- is it your opinion that the 14 best thing we can do overall is to try and get an extension 15 of this project that's under discussion now? 16 MR. TUCKER: Based on the facts that I have, 17 I would believe so. But I have less of a handle on the 18 facts than Truby. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Ms. Hardin is shaking 20 her head no. 21 MS. HARDIN: Our deadline is May of next 22 year. If it could be done before May of next year, we don't 23 need an extension. 24 MR. TUCKER: I thought that the extension had 25 been -- had gone from December to this July. 7-12-04 55 1 MS. HARDIN: The FEMA one has. 2 MR. ODOM: The FEMA. 3 MS. HARDIN: But not the ORCA. 4 MR. TUCKER: Okay. Okay. As far as 5 eligibility with FEMA is concerned, I don't know. I don't 6 know. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think we should try to 8 keep this -- I mean, I think we should try to get an 9 extension on the FEMA. If it gets turned down, then we do 10 this. 11 MR. TUCKER: Sure. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But will it happen by 13 next May? Certainly no better than a fifty-fifty chance. 14 MR. TUCKER: Can -- are the funds obligated 15 by contract to reconstruct the bridge? 16 MS. HARDIN: No. 17 MR. TUCKER: Okay. Is there a civil engineer 18 or architect working on that? 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Leonard. 20 MR. TUCKER: Okay. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: He's our civil engineer 22 and architect. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: On Road and Bridge 24 matters. But on the park matter, we -- on the park bridge 25 matter, we haven't gotten that far yet. 7-12-04 56 1 MR. TUCKER: I'm just kind of playing 2 catch-up here. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I know. Thank you 4 for -- 5 MR. TUCKER: Sure. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- talking to us. 7 MS. HARDIN: If you want to drop the walk 8 bridge and the park, then we can do an amendment for the 9 projects that have already been completed which there's no 10 way we can do, and for those that we did under budget, and 11 we can leave the walk bridge and the park in there, and if 12 it is not completed before May -- I think it was May -- 13 MR. ODOM: I think it was May. 14 MS. HARDIN: -- of '05. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I would prefer that 16 route. 17 MS. HARDIN: Okay. But, at this point, if we 18 don't do something, we're in jeopardy of losing all of it. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 20 MS. HARDIN: The Judge has already gotten 21 letters to that effect, and we need to get the paperwork in 22 to do this. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. Okay. 24 MS. HARDIN: So, just -- if I retype the 25 resolution and remove the walk bridge? 7-12-04 57 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. 2 MS. HARDIN: And that's acceptable? 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make a motion that 4 we approve the resolution with the deletion of the walk 5 bridge and at Flat Rock Park. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'll second. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 8 the resolution as modified. Any further question or 9 discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising 10 your right hand. 11 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 12 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 13 (No response.) 14 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. The 15 -- let's go to Item 12, consider, discuss, and take 16 appropriate action on the Airport Management Contract. I 17 think -- 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Let Commissioner Letz 19 lead this one. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: All right. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'll jump in on it. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This is the -- what we 23 referred to before is the agreement that the new Airport 24 Board will enter into with -- with a contractor to operate 25 day-to-day operations. It is envisioned at this time that 7-12-04 58 1 that contractor will be the City of Kerrville. They -- you 2 know, mainly from a continuity standpoint, but it is set up 3 that either the County or the City can be the contractor. 4 Either one could do it in the future. It is set out a lot 5 in the -- I guess in the -- if you go to Page 2, Airport 6 Facility Maintenance, there's -- actually, let me go back 7 further. The terms of the agreement start on Page 1, 8 Paragraph 2. Then you go through a series of -- all the 9 way -- of items from Airport Manager, Administrative 10 Support, Airport Facilities Maintenance, you know, on down 11 through insurance. That's kind of the nuts and bolts of 12 this agreement, in my opinion. That says how everything 13 will be run. 14 These items are split out in different 15 paragraphs largely because those are the -- they kind of 16 coincide with budgeting issues. I think the -- kind of a 17 lot of talk behind the scenes that we were trying to -- or 18 Commissioner Williams and I were trying to do is to set up a 19 system where the Airport Board can encourage the 20 contractor -- the main contractor to sub out certain 21 portions of this airport maintenance, as is done with the 22 mowing contract right now. There are things -- everything 23 from financial support through a lot of Road and Bridge-type 24 work, to legal that we're trying to get -- we've now kind of 25 set those out as individual items. And if the County 7-12-04 59 1 chooses, or someone else chooses to bid on some of these 2 individual components, they could. And the idea is that if 3 we put these items out for bid, hopefully we get a better 4 bang for our buck, whether we do it ourselves or the 5 third-party private sector does it, like the mowing 6 contract. So, that's kind of where -- you know, where it 7 goes. That's the intent to start with, to have the City of 8 Kerrville handle these functions. 9 There is a -- I guess the -- the second part 10 of this we will handle during the budget process, which is 11 the budget for all these items. And this agreement, along 12 with the provisions that we approved in form, will cause the 13 County to pay its proportionate 50 percent cost of all -- of 14 a lot of items that the City has borne 100 percent up till 15 now, and that is one of the reasons that we were trying to 16 get a -- a form contract where the County could take up some 17 of these functions, because I think it is -- it is a real 18 expenditure from the -- as an example, human resources. 19 There's a real dollar amount that can be attributed to the 20 human resource side in the City, as a general -- as a main 21 contractor, and I think that the City should be reimbursed 22 50 percent cost for that. 23 But it's also -- it's easy to absorb it, if 24 you're the contractor, to absorb some of these. You're 25 really not hiring another person, per se; you're just 7-12-04 60 1 dedicating hours of existing personnel. And I think, for 2 that reason, there is some benefit to -- for the County to 3 try to look at some of these functions. If the County did 4 bid on this, we would be a subcontractor of the City on 5 those specific functions. But it's -- kind of a little bit 6 of background as to what was in our minds when we were 7 negotiating this. That's why it's set out in a lot of 8 different items, both from a budget standpoint and a bidding 9 standpoint. But that would be something that will be up to 10 the Airport Board as to how they choose to handle that. 11 This is the agreement between -- I believe the City and 12 County both sign this, but it is -- it is kind of more of a 13 final -- the actual agreement is between the contractor and 14 the Board. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah, that's correct. 16 You know, as the Commissioner pointed out, it breaks all of 17 these areas down in terms of day-to-day operation and 18 management, and I think precludes the County from 19 determining whether or not it wants to bid to be an 20 individual -- a contractor or a subcontractor. I believe 21 also the Airport Board, in its infinite wisdom, can 22 bifurcate these services. It could award -- it could award 23 contracts for the outside work to one entity; it could award 24 contracts for engineering and financial and so forth to 25 another contractor. And in this case, of course, that would 7-12-04 61 1 continue to be the City. The City could render all of these 2 services under contract, or some of the services. The 3 County could render some of them or -- or whatever. It's 4 open. And both -- both governmental agencies have an equal 5 opportunity, as does private enterprise, to bid on these 6 services, and that would be the Airport Board's role in the 7 future, to determine how they get the best bang for their 8 buck. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think the other thing 10 I'd like to add is that the -- the Airport Board creates the 11 budget, and then that budget is presented both to the City 12 and the County. It's -- so it's a different -- you know, 13 it's a different system totally than has been used in the 14 past. And the Court will have two members on that Airport 15 Board. I think that's, you know, a real -- and probably 16 almost the most important difference between the future 17 operations and the past operations in this budget, just like 18 it is with this body's budget, where we have a lot of 19 influence on what gets done in the county. The Airport 20 Board will create this budget. And I think that, through 21 that process, we'll -- we'll see how it works. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I don't have any 23 other comments, Judge. You got some? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: If I might, certainly, you 25 gentlemen are much more familiar with the terms of this 7-12-04 62 1 agreement than am I, having worked on it for months and 2 months. I am -- I'm trying to find the provision that 3 requires or even suggests that -- that the maintenance and 4 other functions that could properly be performed by entities 5 other than the City, be they private or public, be -- be 6 handled on some sort of a -- a bid or proposal basis, or 7 someone other than the City. As I read Paragraph C, it 8 merely says, "Airport Facilities Maintenance. The following 9 categories and types of maintenance shall be provided by 10 Contractor," who is defined as the City, and then it 11 enumerates those. I'm obviously missing something here. 12 That includes what you've mentioned, Commissioner. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think how you get to 14 what I'm saying is, the Airport Board can request that the 15 City put these out for bid. And we got into, I think -- or 16 you get into -- we got into negotiation -- into a problem as 17 you -- if you contract with somebody, that person is 18 responsible for doing it. The City, in this case, is 19 responsible for operating that airport. And there is -- one 20 of the, I guess, tougher points we had was, you know, how 21 the Airport Board communicates back to the chief executive 22 officer of the City, being the City Manager, to make sure 23 that the contract is lived up to. And -- and including the 24 Airport Manager. And, you know, I'm not totally happy, from 25 the -- being a representative of the County standpoint, but 7-12-04 63 1 I understand the City's standpoint, that they need to -- if 2 you're the contractor, you've got to be able to have some -- 3 you know, you're responsible, and you can't have other 4 parties, you know, picking parts of it for the 5 responsibility. So, I think that the -- the way that it -- 6 you know, that it has to work is that the Airport Board has 7 got to be very strong in dealing with the City on the -- you 8 know, the contract, and recommend certain things go out for 9 bid. If the City chooses not to listen to the Airport Board 10 in some of these ways, the option is to remove the City's 11 contract. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's the point I 13 want to follow up on, too. I think the answer to your 14 question, Judge, may more specifically be embodied in -- 15 one, two, three, four -- the fifth "Whereas" on the opening, 16 where it talks about what is in the best interests of the 17 City and County and the citizens for the various management 18 services to be provided to the Board by contractor pursuant 19 to written agreement, and that such agreement will result in 20 a more efficient -- and so forth, so on, so forth. Our 21 understanding is that the Board has the authority to change 22 contractors, and they can do it -- they can do it in whole 23 and in entirety, or they can determine to do it in segments, 24 because there are better efficiencies to be gained. They 25 could do it in segments and I think it's covered in that 7-12-04 64 1 "Whereas." 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think it's the -- I'm 3 not sure I totally agree that it's done -- that the Board 4 can require it to be done separately. I think you still 5 have a contractor, and you can put a condition, through the 6 City or the contractor, that you go out for bid on certain 7 areas. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well -- 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't know if you can 10 require the contractor to do that, but I think the option 11 then is for the Board -- if the City won't -- or the 12 contractor won't follow the wishes of the Board, the Board 13 can remove the contractor. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay, we're getting 15 to the same place -- 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Why can't you just add 17 some verbiage in there somewhere that they -- that you -- 18 the contractor can go out -- can privatize it out? 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We can do that, too. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Seems like, to me, if 21 you just add that in there, you wouldn't have to worry about 22 whether it's hidden here or hidden over there. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Or better yet, possibly, 24 Commissioner, a statement in there that, in performing the 25 various services, to the extent the various services are 7-12-04 65 1 available from other persons or entities, public or private, 2 that the contractor shall make every available effort to -- 3 to obtain proposals. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Can you put that down 5 in one page? 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think you can 8 accomplish it in that "Whereas." And, following your 9 thought, "Whereas, the owners and the Board find it in the 10 best interests of the citizens of the city and county for 11 various management services to be provided to the Board by 12 contractor," parentheses, "City, County, or private," and 13 that covers that base. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think that -- I think 15 you can do it there, but I would -- I think the better place 16 to put it, in my opinion, is on Page 2, under the Airport 17 Facilities Maintenance. Make a new number (i) -- first (i). 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I agree. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Whereabouts? 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Page 2, C, Airport 21 Facilities Maintenance. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Add a new number -- a new 24 (i), and put a provision there for the ability of the 25 contractor to subcontract out. 7-12-04 66 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I agree. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Either that, or possibly at 3 the end of Item 2, put in a general proviso that applies to 4 all of those items, which would allow for -- for any of 5 these services to be provided by -- 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Add an (o)? 7 JUDGE TINLEY: But with the -- with the 8 intention being that, to the extent that any of these 9 functions can be provided by any third-party entity, be it 10 public or private, that every effort will be made to 11 submit -- submit that function for competitive proposal so 12 that the most efficient and least cost be obtained in the 13 operation of the airport. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, as long as it's 15 a -- and I'm speaking for the City as well. I see -- 16 JUDGE TINLEY: I'm not speaking for the City. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: As long as it's the 18 contractor's option, I would not think they would object. 19 I'm not speaking for them; I'm just saying that's -- but I 20 think it makes it real clear, the intent, if we have a 21 provision that says they may go out to subcontract portions 22 of the services. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: There are, obviously, some 24 functions that -- that it wouldn't be appropriate at this 25 time. At some future point down the road, within the 7-12-04 67 1 40-year term of this agreement -- we're dealing with a 2 40-year term, so we've got to look way on out there. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Only dealing with 4 five-year increments. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This is -- yeah, this 6 contract is five-year increments. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We're not going out 8 40 with this one. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But, either way, five 11 years is a long time. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let me ask my 13 boy-dummy question of the year. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let's say -- let's 16 just use mowing as an example, and the contractor goes out 17 for bids for the mowing out there. And let's just pretend 18 that Kerr County wants to mow, and so we talk Leonard into 19 going out there with his batwings and knocking the mowing 20 out. How is that handled, budgetary-wise? Do you just 21 reduce our portion of the 50 percent, or how -- how does 22 that work? How does all this work? 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think the budget 24 will be established with the cost in it. We supply the 50, 25 but we -- we would regain that. If we got a subcontract, we 7-12-04 68 1 would regain those funds. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Regain, meaning -- 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Through Road and Bridge, we'd 4 actually be -- 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Paid. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: -- be paid. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Road and Bridge. 8 Would Road and Bridge receive the payment? 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Kerr County would, 10 yeah. We'd get the money back for that particular service. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is that -- mowing and 12 plumbing and those kind of things, is that -- is that 13 something that you have in mind? 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mowing's a good 15 example, Commissioner, because mowing is currently 16 subcontracted by the City to somebody else right now, so 17 it's a good example. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The biggest-ticket item 19 is work done by the Streets and Maintenance Department; it's 20 about 40 -- last year's budget, or this current-year budget, 21 about $46,000 or something like that. And it includes 22 runway maintenance, lighting maintenance, you know, a number 23 of things right now. I would note that the -- you have to 24 be certified in a number of areas to do a lot of that work, 25 and we don't have anyone certified, so we couldn't do it. 7-12-04 69 1 But it may make sense for Leonard to get some people -- or 2 Leonard to get certified so that he can work on -- 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Lighting, 4 particularly. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- PAPI's and -- 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Whatever. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: There are more acronyms 8 at that airport than anything you can imagine. But, anyway, 9 because of that item -- and it's something that Street 10 Maintenance in the City's doing. It's a very good, close 11 match. And we're -- in developing the budget and looking at 12 numbers -- and I asked Ron Patterson for them; his staff 13 have come up with them. We've broken things out that -- 14 like that department has done, that the -- their law -- 15 legal department has done or their human resources have 16 done, kind of by department, because that's, you know, the 17 easiest way, probably, for them to break it out, but also 18 for us to see where the money goes. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Mm-hmm. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And they -- and I think 21 if someone were to bid on it, County or somebody else, you 22 would have a very good record from the City right now as to 23 what that work -- 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- covers. 7-12-04 70 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, do -- and you 2 two guys -- and I appreciate all the work you've done on 3 this thing. In your preparation of these documents, did you 4 have in your mind somewhere that the County would 5 participate in some of these? 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Oh, that we would 7 have the opportunity to participate. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I understand that. Do 9 you see us out there with tractors and shovels and picks? 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I see -- I'm on the 11 same page with Commissioner Letz on this. I do see us, one, 12 having the opportunity, particularly in areas of -- where 13 heavy equipment is used and apron -- apron or road 14 maintenance is involved. If we were to get involved in more 15 runway-type maintenance and lighting and all that kind of 16 stuff, some folks would have to have certificates, which we 17 do not now possess. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I know. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: But the opportunity 20 is there, and I think that's the important part. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The answer to your 23 question is, yes, I do see -- I envision us bidding on some 24 of these functions out there. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you. 7-12-04 71 1 MR. SMITH: The Court's representatives have 2 made it perfectly clear that the County can provide certain 3 services if they -- if they so choose. But the point is, 4 Kerrville -- the City of Kerrville will continue to manage 5 the airport, because it's managing it right now. But the 6 Board has the right to hire any person or any firm that's 7 capable of running the airport in a -- in a proper manner, 8 and it doesn't -- it doesn't say the City or the County. It 9 just says that they have the right -- that it's -- 10 theoretically, when you reconstitute the Board, they have 11 the right to hire the contractor. But -- but, as a matter 12 of continuing the operations, these -- these constituent 13 agencies, I believe is what they decided to call the County 14 and -- and the City, they're going to -- they're going to 15 continue it, and -- but this has been discussed in a great 16 deal of detail by Commissioner Letz, I'll assure you that. 17 So, this has been discussed and discussed and discussed, and 18 I think it will be handled in -- if we get over all this 19 description of the agreement, I think it'll be handled in a 20 manner that will be satisfactory to both owning parties. 21 Thank you. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Gene, let me ask you, 23 is this your first encounter with one of our local Germans? 24 MR. SMITH: No. No, I've -- 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It's a different 7-12-04 72 1 world, isn't it? 2 MR. SMITH: Yeah. Well, I'm part German too. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. 4 MR. SMITH: Thank you. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, Councilman. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I would move approval 7 of the Airport Management Contract in substantial form, 8 subject to bringing it back with some of the items included 9 that we talked about. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded. 12 Talking about bringing it back at the next meeting along 13 with the other one? 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yes, sir. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Any further question or 16 discussion about this item? Commissioner Nicholson? 17 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I've got one 18 observation and one question. Observation is, I'm very 19 pleased with these two agreements, and I think they 20 represent a great improvement for the future and the way 21 our -- our airport's been managed. I have an expectation 22 that it will probably enhance our ability to achieve 23 economic self-sufficiency for the airport sometime in the 24 near future, and that's an important goal I think we should 25 vigorously pursue. I am disappointed that the Airport 7-12-04 73 1 Manager does not report directly to the Board. I think that 2 creates an unnecessary level of management, and a filter 3 between the managing board and the Airport Manager, and I'm 4 a little bit uncomfortable with the language in the 5 management contract where -- where it says, on Page 2, the 6 "Contractor shall employ one full-time individual as an 7 Airport Manager." That, in my opinion, is the discretion 8 and authority of the managing board to decide who is going 9 to hold that position. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Comment. I mean, we went 11 around this a long time, and at the last meeting, if you 12 look on Page 2, (a) under Airport Manager, there's a second 13 little (i), which doesn't really change anything, but it 14 does give an intent that the Airport Board should have 15 impact into the performance review of the Airport Manager. 16 A couple of reasons; one, I think the City Manager -- and I 17 understand his position, even though I didn't agree with it 18 totally from the Court's standpoint, but the City Manager 19 felt that it was imperative that the contractor be 20 responsible for the Airport Manager 100 percent, because 21 he's an employee of the Airport Manager -- of the City, and 22 they're the contractor, and they felt that they need to have 23 -- if they needed to fire him for something that the Airport 24 Board didn't want to, but because of violation of city 25 policy, potentially, they wanted that right. And I don't 7-12-04 74 1 disagree with that, as long as they listen to the Airport 2 Board when it comes to performance reviews, and I think that 3 they will. The other reason it was set up this way went to 4 a liability and an insurance issue, as I recall. If the 5 Airport Board -- if the Airport Manager worked for the 6 Airport Board and created a whole separate entity out there, 7 because of public immunity and other things, it raised the 8 insurance rates for the facility and everyone involved so 9 much that it was -- it didn't make sense. It cost us too 10 much money to set up a scenario like that. And I don't know 11 if it was Ilse or Ron or somebody went and talked to some 12 insurance companies about that. And it was very important 13 that the -- you know, we don't want, at this time anyway, 14 the Airport Manager reporting straight to the Airport Board. 15 We want him reporting to the contractor. It serves the -- 16 it's more cost-effective that way. But -- 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Commissioner, there 18 are some human resources issues too, which we would 19 recognize. And it is a topic we talked long and hard about, 20 about that. But I see it gets us back to the basic -- which 21 if, for example, the Airport Manager, as an employee of the 22 contractor, was not performing to the satisfaction of the 23 Airport Board, and the Airport Board was making its feelings 24 known and nothing was done about it, the Airport Board can 25 change contractors subsequently. 7-12-04 75 1 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: But -- and I don't 2 want to belabor that point. This is a good management 3 contract, and I think we'll be in a lot better shape, but an 4 alternative would have been to have the City payroll the 5 manager, simply provide the payroll services for him. And, 6 again, I see that the provisions would provide that the 7 contractor shall remain solely responsible for supervision 8 and direction of the manager, and, again, I see no value 9 added by having the City Manager supervising and directing 10 the Airport Manager. That was my comment. Now my question. 11 How much more is this going to cost us? 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Probably $100,000. 13 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: A year? 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Initially. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Initially. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And, at the same time, 17 we're -- and that is a real number. But the other number 18 that we're going to start tracking separately is the -- we 19 all hear about the economic impact of the airport being 20 $30 million, which is -- I'm sure that's true, but we're 21 going to start tracking the property out there that gets -- 22 the real property that gets taxed by the County separately, 23 and including aircraft, facilities, and things of that -- so 24 we can see exactly how much money's coming back to the 25 County from the airport. As an example -- and, you know, 7-12-04 76 1 the main things that we're really looking at are some of the 2 aircraft out there. If they are business jets or business 3 aircraft, they are taxed as business property, just like the 4 inventory at Home Depot. And if this airport is successful 5 in the direction it's going, in attracting some of these -- 6 well, we've attracted some; if we can get some more of those 7 jets, we'll go a long way toward making this airport pay for 8 itself really fast. 9 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I believe that's 10 true. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Any further question or 12 discussion on the motion? All in favor of the motion, 13 signify by raising your right hand. 14 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 15 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 16 (No response.) 17 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. I 18 will now recess the Commissioners Court meeting, and I will 19 open a public hearing on a proposed amendment to the Texas 20 Community Development Contract Number 722141, that being 21 Phase 2, for the mitigation of 13 septic tanks originally 22 included for mitigation in the Texas Community Development 23 Program Contract Number 721075. 24 (The regular Commissioners Court meeting was closed at 10:43 a.m., and a public hearing 25 was held in open court, as follows:) 7-12-04 77 1 P U B L I C H E A R I N G 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Is there any member of the 3 public here today that wishes to be heard on this matter in 4 the public hearing? The public hearing is open, and you may 5 speak whatever you have to say. Seeing no one coming 6 forward or otherwise indicating a desire to speak, I will 7 close the public hearing on a proposed amendment to the 8 Texas Community Development Program Contract Number 722141, 9 in Phase 2, for mitigation of 13 septic tanks originally 10 included for mitigation in Texas Community Development 11 Program Contract Number 721075. 12 (The public hearing was concluded at 10:44 a.m., and the regular Commissioners Court 13 meeting was reopened.) 14 - - - - - - - - - - 15 JUDGE TINLEY: I will now reconvene the 16 Commissioners Court meeting, and will move to Item -- 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: 8. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Item 8, and that is consider, 19 discuss, and take appropriate action on resolution 20 requesting permission from the Office of Rural Community 21 Affairs to amend Texas Community Development Program 22 Contract Number 722141, that being Phase 2, to include 23 mitigation of 13 septic tanks originally scheduled for 24 mitigation under Texas Community Development Program 25 Contract Number 721075. 7-12-04 78 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you, Judge. 2 You got through the public hearing there, and we got all 3 those numbers thrown out, and we're back to 13 tanks, where 4 we were a while ago. 5 MR. TUCKER: That's right. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Dave, would you 7 enlighten the Court a little bit on -- 8 MR. TUCKER: Certainly. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- what we know about 10 this and what we believe is acceptable under ORCA's rules 11 and so forth and so on? 12 MR. TUCKER: Yes. Judge Tinley, 13 Commissioners, good morning. As you're aware, the County 14 has four grants to provide sewer service to the entire 15 Kerrville South area. This is regarding Phase 1 and 2 16 together. We had originally set aside approximately $600 17 per septic tank for Phase 1. It's a requirement of the 18 Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, and the Upper 19 Guadalupe River Authority is providing the match. Any 20 first-time sewer service that is provided must include the 21 mitigation of the corresponding septic tank. When we 22 received bids to remove all 54 septic tanks in the entire 23 project area in Phase 1, the bids were reasonable, but high. 24 The Court will act later today on awarding the contract to, 25 hopefully, D.W. Contractors, who was the low bidder. 7-12-04 79 1 In order for us to remove all 54 septic 2 tanks, it is -- we need to basically lift up 13 of those 3 septic tanks and place them in Phase 2, and pay for them 4 with Phase 2 money. The first-time sewer service has 5 already been provided. Since we are required to remove the 6 septic tanks, this is how we're going to pay for it. There 7 is no reduction of beneficiaries; we're just paying for 8 those 13 septic tanks from Column B instead of from Column 9 A. That's the point of that. The reason this is required 10 from ORCA's point of view is the individuals who live in 11 these 13 houses will be considered beneficiaries, not only 12 of Phase 1, but also of Phase 2. Phase 1 paid for the sewer 13 line to their house. Phase 2 will be paying for their 14 removal of the septic tanks; therefore, these beneficiaries 15 will be reflected on both projects. And that's it. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: This is a practice 17 which is acceptable under the ORCA rules? 18 MR. TUCKER: Yes. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: To the best of your 20 knowledge, other people -- 21 MR. TUCKER: Certainly. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- do the same thing? 23 MR. TUCKER: Yes. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: For the same reasons, 25 that a contract exceeded the limits of -- of what we had 7-12-04 80 1 anticipated the expense to be? 2 MR. TUCKER: That's correct. I have -- I've 3 witnessed a similar situation several times before. The 4 County's fortunate to have several grants. It's not unusual 5 to reshuffle the activities among existing grants, as long 6 as all the beneficiaries are still there. Since Phase 2 and 7 3 are planned to be bid out concurrently as one large 8 project, we expect there to be cost savings in that, and we 9 don't expect to have to remove beneficiaries in any future 10 phase. It should all come out in the wash. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Assuming the Court approves it 12 today, what do you see as the turnaround time for ORCA's 13 approval? 14 MR. TUCKER: I'd say within two weeks. If I 15 can get executed forms this afternoon, I'll hand-deliver it 16 to the state office today when I go back to Austin this 17 afternoon. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Make a motion. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'll make a motion 20 that we -- we approve -- adopt the resolution requesting 21 permission from the Office of Rural Community Affairs to 22 amend T.C.D.P. Contract 722141, part of Phase 2, to include 23 mitigation of 13 septic tanks originally scheduled for 24 mitigation under T.C.D.P. Contract 721075. That's the 25 motion. 7-12-04 81 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 3 approval of the agenda item. Any question or discussion? 4 All in favor of the motion, signify by raising your right 5 hand. 6 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 7 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 8 (No response.) 9 JUDGE TINLEY: At this time, we'll take our 10 break and we'll reconvene at 11 a.m. 11 MR. TUCKER: Thank you. 12 (Recess taken from 10:46 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.) 13 - - - - - - - - - - 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, let's come back to 15 order. We were in recess until 11 a.m. The next item on 16 the agenda is a timed item for 11:00, being Item 9, a 17 discussion with the Kerr Central Appraisal District 18 regarding the appraisal process. Commissioner Letz? 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. I put this on the 20 agenda based on the conversation we had at the last court 21 meeting, and I visited with Fourth and told him I was 22 putting him on the agenda, and I was going to give him -- 23 send a letter out to him with a few questions to kind of 24 guide him a little bit. Fourth, I'll turn it over to you. 25 MR. COATES: Okay. 7-12-04 82 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And, as I told Fourth, I 2 said these are things that came to my mind. The -- the 3 thing that got this whole thing going was the first item on 4 the questions that are attached that everyone has in the 5 agenda backup. And the other things are things that came to 6 mind that I thought, if he's going to come over here, he 7 might as well explain a little bit more of the process, keep 8 us better educated over here. So, with that, have at it. 9 And don't speak more than 30 minutes. 10 MR. COATES: Well -- 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Or 15, actually. 12 MR. COATES: Okay, I'll try to keep it down. 13 Of course, I could spend days on explaining the appraisal 14 process. I prepared a little information packet. I only 15 brought about 10 copies, so -- guess I'd better give it to 16 the powers that be up here. 17 (Discussion off the record.) 18 MR. COATES: I think the first question is 19 explain how property owners in overlapping appraisal 20 districts are appraised. We've got three overlaps in Kerr 21 County. There's school districts, so in some cases, they 22 can be cities or any other taxing entity. In Kerr County, 23 we have three school districts that overlap into us. 24 Biggest one's Comfort. Next largest is Harper, and the 25 smallest is Medina. This has been a problem for a long 7-12-04 83 1 time. The Legislature tried to go in and correct it. They 2 changed it about, I guess, probably two sessions ago, to 3 where they said that if the values don't match between the 4 two different appraisal districts, then they have to 5 average. There was a lot of controversy over that, so they 6 came back in the next session and they said okay, that's out 7 the window. You don't have to average any more. Back to 8 the way it was. 9 Each appraisal district has its own value, 10 one for the school, one for the county. So, evidently they 11 had some, you know, pressure from their constituents, so 12 they came back and said, okay, this time we're going to take 13 the lowest value. So, in other words, if you don't match 14 your values, you got a taxpayer in one appraisal district 15 saying -- say he goes to the school district; he goes before 16 their board and gets his values lowered. Then the other 17 appraisal district has to take that lower value. Now, 18 there's a loophole in it, which I consider a loophole. They 19 may not; they may think it's great. They also have the 20 opportunity to go to the other appraisal district and 21 protest that one, and if they get a lower value than they 22 got at the first appraisal district, then they get to use 23 that lower value. The other district has to do it, so they 24 get two bites of the apple. 25 Right now, since all the school districts are 7-12-04 84 1 -- that overlap are appraised by other appraisal districts, 2 their values are set by the other districts. And the reason 3 why is, the State Comptroller does the property value study 4 on each school district, and that determines state funding 5 for those school districts; you know, the Robin Hood plan, 6 Tier 1, Tier 2. I don't have time to go into that, and I'm 7 sure that, you know, if I tried to explain that, I'd 8 probably get bogged down. But, anyway, basically, if you 9 don't get local value in your school district, you get 10 penalized. So, take Comfort, for instance. They did not 11 get local value in Comfort ISD last year. According to the 12 Comfort -- Kendall County Chief Appraiser, she tells me they 13 stand to lose $700,000 in state funding. And the 14 superintendent's telling me, with a brand-new teacher 15 starting salary, that's about -- I had it written down here 16 somewhere -- about 30-something new teachers -- 17 AUDIENCE: 32. 18 MR. COATES: 32, okay. We've got a school 19 board member here. It's about 32 new teachers. So, 20 superintendents tend to look at state funding and, well, how 21 much teachers do I lose if I lose $700,000? So, basically, 22 if they don't get their funding, they have to do one of two 23 things; cut the budget, or raise the tax rates. All these 24 districts -- special school districts are up there at that 25 $1.50 cap, so they've got nowhere to go but start cutting. 7-12-04 85 1 There's districts around the state that are starting to 2 charge fees for extracurricular activities. Bus service is 3 being cut, you know, all kinds of things. So -- 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I have a question. Maybe 5 you can answer this, Fourth. 6 MR. COATES: Go ahead. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm not sure I'm 8 following you on this, okay? So, you -- you made the 9 decision, and I would agree with it, that you went with the 10 appraisal district where the school is, because they have 11 the most to lose if we're under value. 12 MR. COATES: Basically, yeah. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. But you also said 14 that you're -- we go with the lower value, so if any 15 resident in the Comfort School District or the other 16 district schools looked at our appraisal things and said the 17 Kerr County value was lower than the other one, then they go 18 to Kendall County and say, "You've got to lower my value." 19 MR. COATES: Basically, yeah. That shouldn't 20 be, because we try to match values. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 22 MR. COATES: Do our best. I'm not saying we 23 don't make a mistake or two, but yeah. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, the public can drive 25 them down if the public does that? 7-12-04 86 1 MR. COATES: Correct. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Then the Comptroller 3 comes back, and they don't make value again, possibly. 4 MR. COATES: Possible, yeah. Yeah. And we 5 had a big increase in Comfort ISD that was a $20 million 6 increase from our values last year to their values this 7 year. This was the biggest one. Medina is so small, it was 8 insignificant, the overlap is. The -- the one up in Harper, 9 there wasn't much of a change in Harper, either, as far as 10 overall values. There wasn't a big change in Harper, 11 either. But the big one came in Comfort. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. That's -- I 13 wanted to make sure I understood what you were saying. 14 MR. COATES: Yeah. Is there any other 15 questions? Did I explain that fully enough? I mean -- 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I actually even 17 understood it. You did a great job on that one. 18 MR. COATES: All right. Well, that's good, 19 because sometimes they -- the Legislature passes these new 20 laws and nobody understands them, you know. You've got 21 appraisal districts out there doing different things. I 22 mean, it happens. I guess I explained why do values vary. 23 Why does Kendall have primary -- you've got that. To me, 24 the simplest thing would be for the lines to be drawn at the 25 county. That would take care of a lot of problems, 'cause 7-12-04 87 1 it's a nightmare trying to get these -- these accounts to 2 match. It's a logistics nightmare. But I don't think 3 that's going to happen, because schools have too much to 4 lose, and they're going to lobby against it. You know, 5 there's a ton of money that they would lose. 6 Explain how the Kerr CAD appraises property. 7 We do it mostly based on sales, market value sales. And 8 there's another question down here, how does the Appraisal 9 District justify the rapid increase in property values? I 10 asked my senior appraiser this question. He says we don't 11 have to justify anything. No, I'm kidding. But, basically, 12 what happens is we will have some -- some, you know, 15, 13 20 percent increases in market in areas that we have enough 14 sales. In some areas, we may rock along for two or three 15 years and not have any sales, not have enough sales to do an 16 adequate reappraisal, so we don't really know what's going 17 on in that area until we get the sales information. State 18 requires that we reappraise once every three years. We do 19 it once every year. We look at every neighborhood, every 20 subdivision. We go through them all and we reappraise 21 according to sales information that we have. Now, there 22 have been instances where you may have an area that's very 23 similar to one area; you don't have any sales in the other, 24 so you basically extrapolate and say, well, you know, these 25 areas are very similar. There's no sales occurring for some 7-12-04 88 1 reason. This is a real stable neighborhood. There's not a 2 lot of changes, so you'll use sales from outside the 3 neighborhood to appraise that one, as long as there -- as 4 long as they're comparable. There's a 10 percent cap on 5 homesteads. There was an effort by the Legislature to get a 6 3 percent, a 5 percent in the last session; it did not pass. 7 Let's see. Oh, yeah. Why does it seem that 8 most property owners that protest their value get a 9 reduction in value, and is this fair to neighboring property 10 owners that do not protest their property values? Well, I 11 looked at some figures. In -- in about 50 percent of the 12 cases, there is some change in value when a person comes in. 13 Now, we mass-appraise, so there's no way -- we're not like a 14 fee appraiser where we have the opportunity to go out there 15 and look at one piece of property and spend a whole day at 16 it, you know, and then go out and get a comparable sale for 17 each property. We have to basically blanket-appraise or 18 mass-appraise. What that means is -- is that we set up 19 schedules for the land, we set up schedules for 20 improvements, try to put it on fair and equal. 21 As y'all know, all properties are not created 22 alike, and they don't stay alike, so we have to reappraise, 23 come back, see what's changed, make differences for a creek 24 or for trees or for, you know, whatever happens to be 25 driving the market. That's what we'll look at. The ones 7-12-04 89 1 that come in and protest, typically they've got a problem. 2 People that actually come in and say, well, yeah there's a 3 reason. I mean, you know, it's not just that, well, my 4 value went up; I want it lowered. Well, that does happen. 5 I'm not going to -- but, typically, most people are -- you 6 know, they look at it, you know, methodically and say, well, 7 you know, mine shouldn't have gone up this much. You know, 8 I've either had a recent appraisal done by a fee appraiser, 9 or I've just bought the property or, you know, I know what 10 my neighbor's is across the street, what his is appraised 11 at, and mine's a lot higher than his. We've got 12 identical-type properties, or very similar, so that's why I 13 see the ones that come in oftentimes will get a reduction. 14 And you've got to have a good reason. You just can't, you 15 know, come in and say I want it lowered because my taxes are 16 too high. Then we send them over to the County 17 Commissioners and say, tell them to lower the rates. But -- 18 Explain how the Kerr CAD interacts with the 19 State Comptroller in regards to appraisals. Like I said 20 before, they check us. They send a state appraiser out. He 21 looks at all of our values in our school districts. They do 22 a property value study based on the sales information that 23 we have available. They determine that we're not at the 24 correct level of appraisal, and then they will not assign 25 local value. Then we get into a -- basically an appeals 7-12-04 90 1 process, similar to what the ARB goes through. We -- we go 2 to the State; we meet informally, we show them you can't use 3 this sale because, you know, it's from a father to a son. 4 You can't use this one because it includes personal 5 property. You know, we try to get things thrown out that -- 6 that don't make sense, and it will change the -- the 7 statistical form that they use. Sometimes one sale, if it's 8 a high-dollar sale, you know, two or three, $4 million sale, 9 can change your whole study, where it flips it out of local 10 value, you know. You really want to watch those. If 11 there's a discrepancy, that's what we do; we go in and we 12 fight as hard as we can. In fact, I just talked to the 13 chief appraiser down at Kendall, and she says she's thinking 14 about going to court with the State over their values in 15 Comfort, so we'll see what happens. 16 Explain ag values and how these are 17 calculated. In your folder, there's a little scenario 18 that's right out of the ag manual, and it's kind of a 19 complicated formula that they use. Basically, it's a cash 20 lease method, is what's normally used. We'll do 21 questionnaires to all the producers in the county every 22 other year. We'll get -- we get a lot of lease information 23 from them; probably get about 2,000 responses to these 24 questionnaires, and we use these in figuring the typical 25 cash lease. It's averaged over a five-year period, so you 7-12-04 91 1 don't see a huge change in your ag values like you can in a 2 market value situation on -- on property that's appraised at 3 market value. They basically factor in typical grazing 4 leases, any other income, like a hunting lease, which is 5 real typical for this area. They take the typical rate, 6 which is the -- it's the cap rate, and it's the -- used to 7 be the old Federal Land Bank interest rate, which is now the 8 formal credit bank -- credit bank rate; they use that. They 9 back out fencing, taxes, and now they're doing water wells, 10 throwing that in. And that gives you a typical value -- or 11 a typical land -- a net to land, and then that is used in 12 your -- in your five-year average. You do it for every 13 year, so each year you've got to add a year, and that's 14 added into the average. And that's why some years, you may 15 see a $2 increase. 16 We're seeing more and more -- it's getting 17 harder and harder to differentiate between what is typical 18 and what is non-typical in a lease, because we've got so 19 many of the hunting ranches now, and they're throwing in 20 this, you know, exorbitant hunting income on some of them, 21 so we have to look. You know, we got a big array of values 22 there of leases. I mean, we've got some there as much as 23 $25 an acre, you know, on a hunting lease. We've got some 24 that are down there at zero, because, you know, it's a -- 25 they don't charge anything for hunting. Either that, or 7-12-04 92 1 it's all crop land, or for some reason, there's no hunting 2 income. But, typically, you know, we look at that -- that 3 typical lease. It's not -- you know, it's usually the 4 highest number that are at that per-acre amount. I've got a 5 list of -- of the present ag values on that back page in 6 there, and it breaks it down into the different classes. 7 Our biggest class is native pasture, and we're at about 8 $56.49 an acre on native pasture. Crop land's higher. We 9 don't have a lot of orchards, but that's higher. Any 10 questions on that? 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I have a couple for 12 you, Fourth. 13 MR. COATES: Sure. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You may have answered 15 one of them on the ag values. How frequently they're 16 reevaluated for accuracy, and continuation of whatever 17 required agricultural activity. Did I hear you say five 18 years? Or is that five-year averaging? 19 MR. COATES: It's five-year average. As far 20 as -- are you talking about inspections by an appraiser? 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, I think that's 22 what I'm talking about. I have a couple questions here, 23 'cause I get the question asked me all the time. I think 24 there's some popular misconceptions about your process or 25 what's required or what's actually happening. I get a lot 7-12-04 93 1 of people asking me questions about that guy with a 2 million-dollar house sitting on top of a hill with 50 acres 3 around his house, and three goats. How is that taxed? How 4 is that appraised? Question. 5 MR. COATES: Yes. If -- if he's got ag 6 value, he's supposed to have a minimum herd size, which is 7 two animal units in Kerr County, and the land has to be able 8 to sustain -- be able to sustain a minimum number herd size. 9 So, you know, if he's -- if he's got the minimum herd size 10 in there, then he can qualify his place. If he's had it for 11 five out of the past seven years, the use on there, then 12 that is another qualification. So -- 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So, I think I'm 14 hearing you say that the guy with a million-dollar house on 15 top of the hill with 50 acres and two goats -- only needs 16 two, right? 17 MR. COATES: No, two animal units. An animal 18 unit is a cow and a calf. It would be six goats. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Six? 20 MR. COATES: Unless they're pygmies. It gets 21 complicated, I'm going to tell you. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: He would qualify for 23 an agricultural land value exemption or exception, or 24 whatever you call it? 25 MR. COATES: Simplification, yeah. If he had 7-12-04 94 1 the minimum herd size, if he had the number of acres to -- 2 to sustain that -- that minimum herd, and if he had been 3 doing it for the correct number of years, five out of seven, 4 then, yeah, his land would get productivity value. We also 5 have market value; he'd be taxed against productivity value. 6 So, we talk about productivity loss when we're -- when we're 7 looking at -- at values. For instance, in Comfort ISD, we 8 had a productivity loss in the overlap alone of 9 $156,694,722, a loss in taxable value. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Now, the house in 11 this particular hypothetical that I painted, the house would 12 be taxed differently? 13 MR. COATES: House would be taxed at market 14 value minus any exemptions; homestead, over 65, disability. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 16 MR. COATES: Yeah, the house would probably 17 be sitting on a, you know, half acre of land or an acre, and 18 the land and the house would be at market value. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. How many acres 20 are required to qualify for an agricultural exemption? 21 MR. COATES: Depends on the type of land. 22 There's no real minimum. There's no real per-acre minimum 23 number. It goes back to the herd size and what it takes to 24 sustain that herd size. You may have a classification of 25 land that's, say, low-lying, very fertile valley land, 7-12-04 95 1 doesn't have any brush on it. You can run maybe an animal 2 unit to every 2 acres on that, so you'd only need 4 acres. 3 You might have an old, rough mountainside that's covered in 4 cedar, you know, stock, and rate on that may be 100 acres or 5 150 acres to the animal unit. So, it varies with the -- 6 with the class of land. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I appreciate your 8 answers, and when I get those questions, I'm going to give 9 them your phone number. 10 MR. COATES: As long as I can get yours in 11 return. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Fourth, since we're a 13 little bit ahead of schedule -- you've done a great job -- 14 one question on -- how do you handle subdivisions like 15 Falling Water, where you have -- and, you know, I chose that 16 because it's been involved in a lawsuit out of Kendall 17 County for a number of years. 18 MR. COATES: Yeah, I kind of inherited the 19 Falling Water situation that's going on out there. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Let me explain what it 21 is -- what we have. We have a large-acreage subdivision, 22 maybe 1,000 acres, divided up into -- into -- he said 60; 23 I'm not sure -- a number of lots varying in size from 24 probably 3 acres to 20 acres. No fences are allowed. And 25 they originally ran -- literally ran sheep over the whole 7-12-04 96 1 subdivision, and they qualified for a wildlife exemption. 2 And, you know, the -- the houses -- the, you know, I guess 3 half acre where the houses are, or acre is taxed at market 4 value. The rest of it's taxed as ag. 5 MR. COATES: In Kendall County, they don't 6 have ag, I don't believe. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 8 MR. COATES: If I understand correctly. Now, 9 they're doing wildlife -- they're doing the wildlife 10 management on it now. You asked how to handle it? 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I guess not just how you 12 are. How is the State handling it? Because I know it's 13 been litigated. 14 MR. COATES: They don't really care about the 15 individual properties. Typically, they say -- well, I guess 16 I shouldn't say that they don't care. They tend to look at 17 the overall values that we have, you know. They leave that 18 part of it up to us. They set up criteria for educating our 19 appraisers, and they have to go in and -- and be licensed, 20 get their designations, so they're supposed to be taught how 21 to -- how to appraise property. When you've got a situation 22 where, you know, it's an overlap like that, it basically 23 boils down to whoever determines whether or not they qualify 24 for -- for ag or wildlife management. We're human. 25 Evidently, when that happened down there, one appraiser -- 7-12-04 97 1 chief appraiser thought that they didn't. Other one thought 2 that they did. They appeared to me -- I've looked at it. 3 It appears to me that, yeah, they are doing all the things 4 that you need to do to qualify for wildlife management, 5 which is the three out of seven list, and keeping census 6 counts and that type of thing. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: In order to get the 8 wildlife management, don't you have to have an ag exemption 9 first? 10 MR. COATES: Correct. Correct. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And then -- 12 MR. COATES: That's right. 13 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Fourth, who's got 14 the authority or the responsibility for determining the 15 validity of exemptions for religious or charitable 16 organizations? 17 MR. COATES: That would be me. 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I like when a guy 19 stands up and says I've got that responsibility. I like 20 that. 21 MR. COATES: There is a higher authority. We 22 won't go into that. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Why not? 24 MR. COATES: Well, this is a pulpit, isn't 25 it? 7-12-04 98 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything further for Mr. 2 Coates? 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Thank you, Fourth. 4 Appreciate you coming over. 5 MR. COATES: Thank you, gentlemen. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Appreciate you being here. 7 MR. COATES: I invite you to come down; we're 8 having ARB hearings. Invite you to come down and watch. 9 Very interesting process. Thank you. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Thank you. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: The next item that we have on 13 the agenda is Item 13, consider and discuss resolution 14 supporting the merger of the Kerrville Police Department and 15 the Kerr County Sheriff's Office to reduce taxes and achieve 16 improved law enforcement at a lower cost. Commissioner 17 Nicholson? 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah. This is a 19 proposal to ask the City of Kerrville to join with us in 20 studying the opportunity to merge our law enforcement 21 organizations, and I think it's a -- presents a great 22 opportunity to significantly improve local government in 23 Kerr County. The merging of the city police department into 24 the county sheriff's department is not a novel idea. We 25 know at least five other counties in Texas that have -- have 7-12-04 99 1 taken this course, and we know that at least one other is -- 2 is presently studying and considering it. And I see that 3 there's three major benefits that can be derived from a 4 merger. One is improved law enforcement. Two, it will 5 reduce costs, and three, it will lower taxes. 6 The first benefit, the function and 7 capability of law enforcement will significantly improve, 8 and the policing will occur seamlessly throughout the county 9 by eliminating the artificial boundaries of city limits and 10 separate organizations. Also, law enforcement resources 11 will be concentrated where they're needed, and the 12 elimination of the redundant activities will reduce costs 13 and improve performance. The jail's a good example. If 14 both the City and the County operated different jails, the 15 taxpayers would pay more, except that we do have a combined 16 facility. And on the same line of logic, there is no need 17 for -- to have two separate dispatch units in Kerr County. 18 The second benefit, the cost of law 19 enforcement would be reduced. One county that's currently 20 considering a consolidation estimates a 10 percent savings. 21 Other organizations find possibilities for savings on the 22 order of 15 to 20 percent when they reduce government or 23 combine government services. In Kerr County, we spend about 24 $3.7 million on the Kerrville Police Department and about 25 $4.6 million on the Sheriff's Department, for a total of 7-12-04 100 1 $8.3 million. Applying those savings estimates to that 2 budget number could produce a savings in the range of 3 $800,000 a year to $1.6 million a year. 4 The third benefit is a reduction in taxes. 5 Citizens in Kerr County and Kerrville pay too much in taxes 6 for local government, and we must find ways to provide 7 services more efficiently. My constituents who live in 8 Kerrville remind me that they are taxed twice to pay for 9 local law enforcement and local government, and they're 10 right. In fact, the tax rate for those who live in the city 11 is about 2.35 times higher than those that live in the 12 county. Some of my constituents who live in Kerrville have 13 told me that they will have to sell their home because they 14 can't afford the taxes, and that's tragic and it shouldn't 15 happen. Citizens who live in Kerrville should not have to 16 pay for redundant law enforcement agencies. 17 There is no valid reason not to pursue the 18 approach to improving local government like this. I expect 19 there would be some opposition, but I don't think that'll be 20 based on a commitment to good government, but more on 21 politics. I view this approach as a good opportunity for 22 both governments to significantly advance their efforts to 23 provide efficient and effective government through 24 cooperation, and I move that we approve the resolution. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I have some questions 7-12-04 101 1 I'd like to ask before we -- 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll second the 3 resolution, but I've got some comments to make before I vote 4 for it. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I have questions, 6 too. We have an Assistant City Attorney and a County 7 Attorney here, and my question has to do with -- before I 8 ask the question, let me -- let me make a comment. The 9 purpose that you're setting out, Commissioner, is valid; 10 there's no question about that, and if we can find 11 opportunities for saving taxpayers money and providing 12 health and -- health and safety and law enforcement the way 13 we should, then I think we should be about that. My 14 question, however, has to do, I guess, more with the 15 process. I'm given to understand that Texas law sets out 16 through the Constitution the Sheriff is the legally 17 constituted chief law enforcement officer for a county. Am 18 I correct, Mr. County Attorney? 19 MR. MOTLEY: I believe that's right. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. I've also been 21 given to understand that if -- if a process like this were 22 to take place, that it would really be more in line with a 23 city contracting with a county for legal services, as 24 opposed to merging. Am I correct, or am I incorrect? 25 MR. MOTLEY: You're saying you -- the 7-12-04 102 1 agreement would have to be in the context of some sort of an 2 interlocal agreement? 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yes, sir, as opposed 4 to a pure merging of two departments. Yes, that's the 5 thrust of my question. 6 MR. MOTLEY: Well, I've not looked at it. 7 You know, I don't know. I would -- I have not looked at it. 8 I've not looked at consolidation of governments. I've been 9 curious; I think Dave was saying that it's been done in 10 different areas in Texas, and I'm not aware -- Arlington, 11 Fort Worth, somewhere up in there, they're doing it? I know 12 they do it in other states. I'm just not familiar with the 13 process. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Do you have the 15 answer, Commissioner? Is it -- is it an interlocal 16 agreement? Does it happen in these other counties by 17 interlocal agreement, or by pure merger of two departments? 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: It's my belief that 19 it happens by interlocal agreement. And I used the term 20 "merger" to -- simply to put forward a concept that says 21 that the assets -- human assets and physical assets of the 22 Kerrville Police Department would be transferred to the 23 Sheriff's Department, and that there would be an interlocal 24 agreement for the Sheriff's Department to provide a law 25 enforcement program throughout the county, in the city 7-12-04 103 1 limits and outside the city limits. I think it's just a -- 2 the same concept we did with the jail, only more complex. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Probably a great deal 4 more complex. The other question I have has to do with -- 5 you identified the City of Kerrville in terms of merging or 6 consolidating. I like the consolidating, probably, common 7 services better than the terminology "merging." I'm curious 8 as to why you didn't include the City of Ingram. 9 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I think the City of 10 Ingram would be also a candidate for this. I haven't 11 specifically talked to anyone on the City Council. I've 12 talked to the City Marshal, and he says it's interesting, 13 and he agrees that -- 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think that's what 15 the Sheriff says. 16 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: -- law enforcement 17 would probably be improved. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you. 19 AUDIENCE: That's not what he told me. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The -- I have three 21 comments. And I think the, I mean, exercise of studying it 22 and possibly trying to do it, I think it makes sense. Under 23 the second "Whereas," I have a question on the -- it reads 24 right now, "Property owners in Kerr County are taxed by Kerr 25 County and the City of Kerrville." Shouldn't that read, 7-12-04 104 1 "Property owners in Kerrville are taxed by Kerr County and 2 the City of Kerrville"? 3 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yes. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. So that "Kerr 5 County" should read "Kerrville." 6 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yes. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. The other concern 8 I have is -- it's under the third "Whereas." First line 9 reads, "Significant savings in the cost of such law 10 enforcement can be achieved." To me, that's a little 11 presumptuous. I think it should say, "may be achieved." I 12 think the -- I mean, to me, the goal of this is to get a 13 study to see if it is, and to me, we shouldn't, you know, 14 predispose it to say that it will be. Say that it may be 15 achieved. And, similarly, on the next "Whereas," a 16 combination of two agencies, it says, will result in 17 improvement. I'd say, "may result in improvement." Other 18 than that, to me, it looks good. I think "merger" -- I'm 19 not sure that's the best word, after what I heard, but I 20 don't know -- I don't have a real problem with it. I think 21 we're talking more about a concept right now and trying to 22 get a study to move forward. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I think this 24 resolution is way ahead of time here. I think your first 25 step would be to ask the Chief of Police and the Sheriff if 7-12-04 105 1 they're interested in -- in it, and if they're not, you're 2 not going to get anywhere with the thing. And words are 3 pretty and flowery, and they actually -- they actually mean 4 something. And this thing of significant savings -- where? 5 How? Consolidation does not always save money, and I can 6 give you some examples. These words, "improvements in the 7 capability of law enforcement," in what way? See, I can't 8 -- I don't think that I can support this resolution. I 9 mean, it looks good and it sounds good, but I think I would 10 need some -- a little more foundational language, like how 11 does it save money? What kind of money is it saving? Where 12 does the savings really come from? And -- and enhancing -- 13 enhancing law enforcement services, how? How does that -- 14 how do you -- how's that done? So, I can't support this. I 15 need to know -- I need to know what the Sheriff of Kerr 16 County -- how he feels about consolidation. Plus -- one 17 more thing. Plus, the state law allows you to do that, just 18 like you do with the library and the landfill and the 19 airport and law enforcement and Road and Bridge and all 20 those things. It already provides for it. You can do those 21 kinds of things today, so it's not like it's any kind of 22 major deal; you just do it. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'd like to make a few 24 comments. One, what the Sheriff thinks about it doesn't 25 really matter, 'cause I won't be the Sheriff forever and 7-12-04 106 1 ever and ever, and this is a step that would change the two 2 departments forever. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Rusty, you're the 4 Sheriff today, and we were asked to vote on this resolution 5 today. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Today, to be perfectly 7 honest, the resolution of combining or -- or letting the 8 City contract -- and only way I've ever seen this done in 9 Texas is small departments, such as, like, Ingram, that 10 couldn't afford regular a police department; then they would 11 contract with the County for the Sheriff's Department to 12 provide law enforcement in those areas. Now, Las Vegas has 13 a metro deal which they adopted and changed everything. I 14 don't know how theirs actually works. The former chief -- 15 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Las Vegas, Nevada, 16 or Las Vegas, Texas? 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Las Vegas, Nevada. The 18 former chief and I did look, and one thing we've always 19 thought about, and this Court has mentioned several times, 20 is, like, a combined dispatch, and we thought of ways that 21 we could save, you know, there and be more efficient. And I 22 don't know that you would save that much money on personnel, 23 'cause both departments, in my honest opinion, as far as 24 personnel, whether it's dispatch or officers or what, are 25 always undermanned. That's just the way it -- the way it 7-12-04 107 1 is. My investigators have anywhere from 50 to 75 cases per 2 investigator caseload. I know the City's has the same. 3 Your -- you know, I have four people on patrol for 4 1,100 square miles all the time. You're not going to save 5 on personnel. Nether department has adequate personnel, in 6 my opinion, as it is. 7 Some of the other costs from when Chuck and 8 I, the former chief, looked at it was to go to the same 9 computer system. That would work efficiently for both 10 departments if we did a combined dispatch, and even getting 11 that computer company up here to talk to us was an initial 12 cost of over $200,000 for the City of Kerrville to switch 13 over to Software Group, okay, to have that same type system. 14 City of Kerrville has laptop computers in all their 15 vehicles. The County does not, so that would cost another 16 $100,000 to the County to do that. Salaries, when you're 17 doing the entire department's, is going to be a large 18 question in it. There's some patrol sergeants in the city 19 of Kerrville that make more than I do, the Sheriff, and so 20 there is a large difference in salaries that you're going to 21 have. 22 If you really wanted something that I think 23 would be more feasible and would be a lot better, my opinion 24 is that -- I think the City of Kerrville's police department 25 is kind of getting old and out of space and different 7-12-04 108 1 things. What was talked about before the Sheriff's Office 2 and jail was built, when it was built a number of years ago, 3 is an addition onto the building on the 17 acres that we 4 have out at the Sheriff's Office, which allows another wing 5 to go out to house the separate police department, but yet 6 at that point you could combine some functions, like a 7 central dispatch office, okay? A central training room. 8 You know, a central courtroom. They've got municipal court; 9 we've got J.P. out there. Those type of areas is where you 10 could save a large amount of money on those type things, not 11 trying to merge the two departments totally into one. City 12 has their city ordinances they need to look at. We don't 13 enforce city ordinances, okay? There's a lot of different 14 things on -- on that type that I think would be a lot more 15 efficient than trying to combine the two departments. 16 And, plus, there is one drawback, is if -- 17 and I'm not saying this in any bad terms or anything. The 18 Sheriff is an elected position every four years. The 19 qualifications to be Sheriff are a high school education and 20 no criminal record, and that's it. You don't have to have 21 prior law enforcement experience. You don't have to have 22 prior anything. And when you're talking about somebody that 23 could come in and run for Sheriff and get a position like 24 that, that has zero law enforcement experience, to step in 25 as Sheriff I think could be a -- a scary road to go down. I 7-12-04 109 1 think you need some qualifications. Now, I know the 2 Sheriff's Association and Legislature have worked on some 3 things trying to change that and to up the qualifications 4 that it would take for somebody to be Sheriff or run for 5 Sheriff, but that's still in the works every legislative 6 session. 7 But I think you'd be a lot better off 8 organizing the two departments out of one area, because it 9 would make it a lot more convenient with the jail, with 10 dealing with inmates for both departments. It would make 11 the communication between the departments so much better, 12 and that's where you can enhance law enforcement somewhat. 13 If we have a burglar out in the county that's hitting three 14 or four places, and the city's got burglaries, unless both 15 are talking, both sets of investigators and patrolmen, you 16 really don't get the working that you need, and I think that 17 can be enhanced by just putting everything in one building, 18 but yet separate except for certain areas. My opinion. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: My -- my reason for 20 seconding the motion is primarily to get the study going to 21 see what should be consolidated, and after rereading the 22 resolution, I would have another change which I'd recommend 23 to the final "Resolved." That would be, "Resolved that the 24 Kerr County Commissioners Court invite the City of" -- 25 excuse me, "invites the Kerrville City Council to join in a 7-12-04 110 1 joint effort to complete the study for possible 2 consolidation, with a target date for the study of 3-1-05." 3 Basically, moving up the date six months, but saying that, 4 you know, it needs to be looked at. And that's really what 5 I am saying here; I think it needs to be looked at. I think 6 that the -- if the City agrees that it needs to be looked 7 at, then a small committee similar to what we've done with 8 the airport and some of the other things should be 9 appointed. I think, clearly, the Sheriff and the Chief of 10 Police should be -- I can't control what the City does, but 11 I think the Sheriff and a Commissioner, you know, would be 12 the ones to look at it. I don't -- I think it is always 13 good to look at ways that may be -- may be beneficial to the 14 taxpayers in saving money, and that's what I see this 15 resolution as doing. I don't think it should be predisposed 16 to doing it. It's just to look at it. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, Commissioner, like you, 18 I see this as calling for a review, a study to see what 19 benefits, if any -- there may not be any -- might be derived 20 from some sort of consolidation of all of or part of the law 21 enforcement services. A couple of things disturb me. The 22 Sheriff has indicated that he and the Chief have already 23 done a study at some point in time here of central dispatch. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes, sir, we were 25 looking at that. 7-12-04 111 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Well, I -- I got the 2 impression that -- that you and the former Chief had -- had 3 already done a study about law enforcement generally, and 4 maybe I was -- I was mistaken about that. If so, I -- I 5 think we need to start there by looking at that study that 6 you've done. And the second item that -- that created a 7 concern was you were talking about your investigators and 8 the city investigators, and if they were in the same 9 building together, they'd be able to communicate about 10 common-type cases which were occurring, some in the county, 11 some in the city. I would hope that kind of communication 12 is going on right now. 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Oh, it does. Now, don't 14 -- don't get me wrong; it does. But if you're in the same 15 building, but separate wings, that communication is so much 16 more constant, okay, than just when they're out trying to 17 work. A lot of their work is phone, office, desk, you know, 18 type work. I think you get a lot more communication, and 19 the common centralized dispatch would help out that 20 function. But there's so much other differences in the two 21 departments, consolidating it into one department, I don't 22 think, is -- is an appropriate route to take, and I really 23 don't think you'll find any savings. Consolidating parts, 24 you know, dispatch, training areas -- 'cause our training is 25 all joint now; we do a whole lot of that kind of stuff. You 7-12-04 112 1 know, court -- municipal court, J.P. court out there, as far 2 as facilities, that is -- is now centralized. Impound yard 3 for when we have vehicles towed, because we got a larger 4 area out there. You know, the City could have them towed 5 there too; we can take care of that. There's a lot of those 6 kind of things that I think would be very wise to look at, 7 and would be cost savings. 8 But I think the Police Chief -- or the police 9 department needs to run their own department, as far as 10 their city ordinances, their way of doing things. You know, 11 your patrol officers all work together now, and they work 12 together great, 'cause they don't have the manpower in the 13 city of Kerrville to cover everything 24 hours a day. I 14 don't have it in the county to cover everything like we 15 should 24 hours a day, so they all run back and forth and -- 16 and help each other out now, okay? Just like the shooting 17 that occurred a few, you know, weeks ago. One of my 18 officers was at it, the city officer was at it; everybody 19 was helping each other and working together. But your money 20 savings for the county -- for the citizens, the city and 21 county, and more efficiency would be to -- to combine the 22 building, but yet -- combined but separate, except in areas 23 like dispatch or training or courts or different things like 24 that. Doesn't make it a lot more efficient dealing with 25 inmates. 7-12-04 113 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, it may very well -- a 2 study may very well validate just what you've said, but the 3 point is, we don't know that at this point. It may show 4 that joint dispatch is -- is a good area to do 5 consolidation. It may show that combined office 6 arrangements, that -- that impounding, vehicle impounding 7 and a lot of other functions are appropriate for 8 consolidation or -- or otherwise combining. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I would agree with you. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: But I think we need -- I 11 certainly see no harm in attempting to get all of the proper 12 players involved, the -- the persons who are involved in the 13 law enforcement functions, as well as those who are involved 14 in the administration and the funding and all of those 15 things, all together working on a common project, rather 16 than having them done separately and apart. And it may well 17 be that when we get to the end of the road, there are zero 18 functions that are appropriate based upon this combined 19 effort, but I certainly think it behooves us to look at ways 20 to improve the delivery of government services to the 21 citizens in such a manner that, one, it's more efficient, 22 and two, that it's less costly. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: And I see this -- 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I have no -- 7-12-04 114 1 JUDGE TINLEY: I see this as merely trying to 2 get together, to put a formal study together to really look 3 at what areas, if any, of the law enforcement function -- 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I have no problem with 5 that at all, Judge. I would encourage exactly what you're 6 saying. We all know providing law enforcement for the 7 county or the city is probably one of the biggest-ticket 8 items in anybody's budget; it's a very expensive process. 9 But Commissioner Baldwin asked what my opinion was, okay, or 10 did mention he'd like to hear from me. And what I gave 11 y'all is what I have seen in this county and how I 12 personally feel it could work in this county, after 25 years 13 of experience in this county and seeing a number of 14 sheriffs, a number of chiefs come and go, and the department 15 policy. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Judge, I have a 17 couple comments here -- or questions, and maybe suggested 18 amendments. I agree with Commissioner Baldwin; I think 19 there's some things about this that are troubling. The 20 aspect of saving taxpayer money or improving services is not 21 troubling. The question is, how do you get there? And a 22 long time ago, I learned that you learn to crawl before you 23 learn to walk before you learn to run, and this is kind of 24 one of those cases. And Commissioner Nicholson and I have 25 talked about, you know, where do you start with this 7-12-04 115 1 project? And I think -- following up on one of the things 2 the Sheriff said, I think dispatch -- common dispatch is a 3 good place to start. 4 I would like to suggest some changes which 5 would make it somewhat more palatable to me. First of all, 6 I'd like to include the city of Ingram. I think if we're 7 going to have the discussion, we might as well discuss it 8 with everybody, the value. So, in any case, where we talk 9 about only the city of Kerrville, I think we should talk 10 about the cities of Kerrville and Ingram. And, secondly, 11 I'm troubled about the first "Resolved," and I'd like to -- 12 I'd like to -- well, the first and the third "Whereas," 13 before we get to the first "Resolved." The first "Whereas," 14 where we talk about redundancies and economies of scale, I'd 15 like to make that read -- instead of combining the two law 16 enforcement agencies, I'd like to make it read, "by the City 17 of Kerrville and City of Ingram contracting with Kerr County 18 for law enforcement services." That's what it's all about. 19 It's not merging. 20 But the first "Resolved" is the one that I'd 21 really like to change, where we talk about, "Kerr County 22 Commissioners Court does hereby endorse the exploration and 23 study of the benefits to be derived from the merger..." I 24 would like for it to read that the Kerr County Commissioners 25 Court endorses the initiation of discussions with the City 7-12-04 116 1 of Kerrville and the City of Ingram to study -- to do a 2 study of benefits to be derived from a single law 3 enforcement agency providing services to all of Kerr County. 4 To me, that's what we're talking about, and I think that's 5 what we should say in the resolution. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, I don't disagree 7 with that, and actually, I'm -- I think the time is right, 8 based on what the Sheriff said, to do this, at least to 9 proceed with the discussion and study. Because I -- if the 10 City -- I mean, if the City is, at some point in the next 11 five to ten years, planning on building a new facility, I 12 think the offer for discussion of using property that's 13 already owned by the County makes a whole lot of sense, and 14 that needs to be put on the table formally before the City 15 Council so they don't go out and buy property somewhere 16 else. So, I think it's -- I mean, the time is right to do 17 it. However, I -- there have been so many modifications, I 18 would also think that we should bring it back -- and I'd be 19 glad to work with Commissioner Nicholson -- at the next -- 20 to work on language and present it at the next meeting, 21 because I just -- I don't -- I'm not comfortable with making 22 a whole lot of changes up here and then trying to approve 23 it. We'll try to, you know, take it back, more for -- you 24 know, as a study, get it going. And, like I say, I'll be 25 glad to work with Commissioner Nicholson on that, as long as 7-12-04 117 1 I'm not on the committee. (Laughter.) 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I don't want to be on 3 the committee, but I do want to get some of these thoughts 4 in somebody's hands. 5 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I think that's a 6 good approach, Commissioner. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I think the idea of -- 8 of looking at law enforcement in the community is a 9 wonderful idea, but as long as you have verbiage in here 10 that I will be voting on that says combining two law 11 enforcement agencies, I will not vote for that -- or merger 12 of the city police into the Kerr County Sheriff's Office, I 13 will not vote for that. But let's go study all day long, 14 all year -- do a year-round study. Let's do it. Do it. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Are you volunteering to 16 be on the committee? 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No. 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Two observations. 19 One, I hope -- we do need to do a study so we can evaluate 20 the advantages of some combination of -- of police, and we 21 don't need to prejudice the outcome of the study by saying 22 that it can't be done, and I think I've heard some of that. 23 I think we need to go into it with an open mind and a clean 24 piece of paper and say, what are the possibilities? Look at 25 other counties and see what their experience was with 7-12-04 118 1 such -- such a merger. The second thing, I think the -- 2 probably dismissing the economic benefits without -- or 3 benefit of the study, also. When -- when Exxon and Mobil 4 merged, they didn't keep two treasurers. They didn't keep 5 two law departments, research departments and everything 6 else. They -- they achieved significant reductions by 7 elimination of redundancies, and the same thing would occur 8 if we merged -- if we combined or contracted for or whatever 9 the word that we choose to use, if we got some synergy 10 between these three law enforcement agencies in Kerr County. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let me give you an 12 example that will contradict that a little bit, right here 13 close to home. The Unit Road System in Kerr County. Before 14 that system, we had four different precincts, and if we get 15 rid of three bulldozers and keep one, get rid of three 16 maintainers and keep one, downsize the people, the crews, 17 and consolidate everything under one unit and just rotate 18 around the county, we're going to save money. Not a true 19 statement. Not a true statement at all. Number -- number 20 one, we didn't come anywhere near to downsizing. We've 21 probably tripled the manpower in Kerr County. And the Road 22 and Bridge budget that I -- I love -- I love Road and 23 Bridge, but the budget is considerably higher than it was 24 before. So, it's not -- consolidation is not always a 25 money-saving operation. I mean, I can go on. T.C.E.Q came 7-12-04 119 1 out of -- what were they last week? 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Train wreck. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: T.N.R.C.C., and 4 they -- they were created out of a whole bunch of state 5 agencies to help this same -- with the same mission in mind. 6 Once T.N.R.C.C. came into play, they just exploded and, 7 hell, you couldn't even get them on the phone, much less do 8 anything with them. So, you know, consolidation is not 9 always -- not always the best thing. But I'd like to see 10 the first study be this salary issue. I have the city 11 salaries and the county's salaries, and see if we can go 12 around the state and borrow enough money to get Rusty and 13 them up there to the city, or the other option is get the 14 City to drop theirs down to us. Now, that's going to be a 15 fun thing to do. So -- you know. Y'all go study all you 16 want. I -- I'm not going to say it won't work, but you got 17 a long hill to climb here. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, seems to me that 19 the study -- I mean, from what Rusty says, the hopeful -- or 20 likely outcome of the study is just what Rusty's 21 recommending. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I've looked at what 23 Rusty's recommending; I like that. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And we can't -- but if we 25 don't go to the City and say, hey, we have land we can -- 7-12-04 120 1 can build on, it will never happen. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: The sense I have, Commissioner 3 Nicholson, is that you, working with Commissioner Letz -- 4 and the rest of us, as far as that goes -- will work on a 5 new draft of a resolution and bring that back next time, and 6 we'll go from there. Is that what I'm hearing? Is that 7 acceptable? 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. It's -- 9 it's a very ambitious undertaking. It's not easy. If it 10 was easy, we'd just get somebody off the street instead of 11 this talented group we have up here. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Who would that be? 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Ed. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything further on Item 13? 15 Let's move forward to Item 14, consider and discuss 16 acquiring truck for Jail Inmate Work Program. I put this on 17 the agenda. I realize it's out of sync with the budget, but 18 I'm sure most of you know that Officer Johnson -- Deputy 19 Johnson, who is in charge of this program, apparently he 20 gets the tail end of the hand-me-down equipment, and the one 21 that he got, with nearly 300,000 miles, finally laid down 22 and I think is -- is gone. And, for a short period of time 23 now, Deputy Johnson has been utilizing, I think, the oldest 24 unit that the Kerr County Maintenance Department has, the 25 reliability of which may be somewhat open to question. And 7-12-04 121 1 based upon that, why, I think Commissioner Baldwin got 2 together some figures, didn't you, Commissioner? 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I did. There's -- 4 there's some bid numbers here behind your document here, 5 your meeting information. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Basically, this would be a 7 lease similar to what we're using on our patrol units and 8 our constable units, except this would be for a -- a truck 9 for the utilization in that program. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Question I had to start 11 with, is maybe -- why do they need an F-250? 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Little heavier duty, and it's 13 my understanding it's also a long-bed truck; it's not a 14 short-bed. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. I mean, I 16 understand that. I know there's an F-250 and a 150. I'm 17 just wondering why we need a heavy duty truck to -- I mean 18 what I see them doing is pretty much maintenance on 19 courthouse properties, which are pretty much on paved 20 streets. 21 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, that's not 22 everything. They do all the county parks. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: They do parks, so 24 they move all that equipment around? 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They move all that 7-12-04 122 1 equipment around. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 3 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: We're up to our 4 necks in trash out at the Ingram Dam because we don't have a 5 truck, so I'm going to support this one. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Move your port-a-potty 7 around a little bit. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: I guess the next question, 9 Sheriff, have you found a home for the first lease payment? 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I found part of one. 11 Okay, under our budget, the jail budget, under 512-495 is 12 what's called a SCAAP Grant expenditure. I think, if y'all 13 will remember, a year ago I came before the Court, and that 14 SCAAP program was where we can get reimbursed for housing 15 non-American citizens, whether illegal or legal, it doesn't 16 matter. If you remember, we gave that proposal. Well, last 17 year our -- our funds out of that that we made -- that we 18 got reimbursed for, and what's in that budget line item, is 19 $6,940.44, and that could be used. We haven't used it for 20 anything else. That's a reimbursement; it got added into -- 21 it's an award back to the County for the expenditures we 22 spent on inmates that were from other countries. And there 23 is some money left in -- we will have a little bit of extra 24 also in Line Item 512-106, which is the nurse's salary. 25 Currently, we should be at about 25 percent left in our 7-12-04 123 1 salary line items, and in that one we're at 50 percent, 2 which would give us about an extra three, four thousand 3 dollars in there, which would cover the first lease payment 4 on those. 5 Now, that truck, if you'll recall in looking 6 at the budget that I submitted for next year, was included 7 in that budget to replace that truck. That truck was -- has 8 been with the County for about 15 years. It was the 9 original Zowie drug dog truck. Been repainted a couple 10 times; it's had everything in the world. Now it's either 11 got a cracked head or something, and it's just not worth 12 spending that kind of money on it. So, what it would do -- 13 we could come up with it, at least out of these two line 14 items out of the jail budget, if that were approved. And 15 then I would drop -- well, the first year and the next 16 year's budget, I don't know if it would actually drop the 17 budget, but it would drop it by one payment, 'cause we're 18 going to be making one payment this year instead of three 19 years. So, it -- we would see it come back on the end. And 20 it is a vehicle that has to be replaced, so there's no doubt 21 the benefits of that program to this county, I think, are -- 22 are remarkable. I think everybody's seen it, and I do think 23 it really helps. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Rusty, my only 25 question is, is the truck available? 7-12-04 124 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes, there is a truck 2 available -- there's two. One would take 60 to 90 days to 3 get here, so I wouldn't take that one. It's through 4 Philpott Motors, same company we do the contract with. 5 They've already gone through the bid process with the state 6 bid and everything, so we can get it. The other one would 7 be same exact truck; only difference is one has power 8 windows and one does not, and so I'm fine with the one that 9 does not. You know, I'm not worried about power windows on 10 that type of work program truck. And the total cost of the 11 truck for the whole thing would be 20 -- about $21,000, and 12 I don't think that's bad for an F-250 crew cab, heavy duty, 13 with the towing package on it, and everything else just 14 plain. 15 The initial cost in here was $7,422.28, but 16 you're going to have to add -- since we're not leasing with 17 it the other equipment that we normally get with our patrol 18 cars, there is some addition that will have to be done to 19 that $7,000, and that would be installing the radio -- let's 20 see, graphics are $260. That's just putting the work 21 program and the Sheriff's Department decals on it. Deer 22 guards, $425, and Advantage Communication's installing the 23 radio and overhead lights on it. I think you need $270, so 24 you would have to add that to that 7,400-something for the 25 initial payment. 7-12-04 125 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Talking about approximately 2 another thousand dollars, first year? 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Front-end load on it. 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes, that's only 6 front-end load. That's just initially equipping it. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: That's still within those two 8 items that you gave us. The first item almost covers it. 9 It's 6,900 and change. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: So, you're lacking about $400 12 there. The 400 plus the 1,000 extra could come out of the 13 second account that you mentioned. 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's correct. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is -- you know, I'm 16 working off this thing that Lee Behrens got, payment amount. 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The one other change I 18 need to make is, this is also a 2005 pickup instead of a 19 2004, which I had in the budget. That's the only one they 20 could find, so you're getting a year newer truck, okay? 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Payment amount is 22 7,337, and am I the only one on earth dealing with that 23 particular number? Or -- 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Hold on. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: That's the one I'm dealing 7-12-04 126 1 with. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's the one you're 3 dealing with? I haven't heard the Sheriff say that number 4 yet. 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The payment that I have 6 on here would be -- this is the one without -- no, because 7 the 7,337 was the one with the power windows. That was the 8 2004. They don't have one. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: How much is the 10 payment? 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The payment would be 12 Seven thousand, four -- 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Seven, four? 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Went past it. 15 $7,422.48. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: 74 -- 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 22. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: 22. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 48. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: So, it's up almost another 22 hundred dollars. But then, in addition to that, 23 approximately $1,000 load for the grill guard, the decals, 24 the radio -- 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And the overhead lights 7-12-04 127 1 on top of it, yes. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Law enforcement equipment. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Add $1,000 on top of 4 that seven for our initial this-year's budget. $7,422.48 5 would go to G.M.A.C. for their first payment on the truck. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: G.M.A.C.? 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Ford Motor Credit. 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Ford Motor Credit. The 9 additional $1,000 would just have to go back into the 10 Operating Equipment to have the other equipment installed 11 into that vehicle. Okay. And that amount of money could 12 come from those two line items that we have extra in there. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do you want me to try 14 it? 10-512-495, move $6,940.44 from there, as well as 15 512-106, you take $1,000 out of there. And I don't know 16 where you move it to. 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I think it would all 18 have to go to Capital Outlay, wouldn't it, Tommy? 19 MR. TOMLINSON: Actually, it's a lease 20 payment, so we -- it's really for that purpose, so we can 21 set up a line item for -- for lease payment in the jail. 22 There's a lease payment in the Sheriff's Office; there's a 23 line item in there, but not in the jail. We -- we take -- 24 we can take it out of the jail budget, or -- 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes, it's coming out of 7-12-04 128 1 the jail now. We have an Operating Equipment in the jail, 2 which is the 106, the $1,000 out of it to go into that to 3 pay for the equipment to be installed. 4 MR. TOMLINSON: There's not a lease payment 5 line item in the jail budget, but we could put -- we could 6 formulate one. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All right. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's about as far as 10 I can go with that motion, not knowing anything else. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, you've got the 6,900 12 coming from those grant moneys. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Right 6,944. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: And then there's the 15 additional 500, mas or menos, coming out of this other line 16 item that he was talking about, for a combined total of 17 7,422.48. That's what goes into the jail line item -- new 18 line item for lease payments, correct? 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I don't think it goes 20 into the jail line. I think it comes out of jail and over 21 to the Sheriff's Office. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It could do that, or it 23 could stay in that program. The vehicle -- that vehicle's 24 maintained by the jail budget on Vehicle Gas and Maintenance 25 anyhow. 7-12-04 129 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: 'Cause it's an inmate -- 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I didn't realize that. 4 You're right; I'm wrong. Think I can eat today sometime? 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: An additional -- 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Then, out of that second 8 budget account that you took the approximately $500, you'll 9 take another $1,000 from there and transfer it to Operating 10 Equipment in the jail to handle the front-end items such as 11 radio, light bars, grill guard. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's 106, I think. 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 18 approval of the motion as stated. Any further question or 19 discussion? 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I will make a comment. I 21 thought you were going to repeat the motion, and you didn't. 22 That's approving the lease of the vehicle. I don't think it 23 was ever -- whoever made the motion, the motion was to 24 approve the lease of the vehicle. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: $7,442 and whatever. 7-12-04 130 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And approving the 3 first payment. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: That's included in your 6 motion, correct? 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Authorize County 9 Judge to sign same? 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I guess, if he needs 11 to. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Any further question or 13 discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising 14 your right hand. 15 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 16 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 17 (No response.) 18 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 19 What's your pleasure, gentlemen? Do you want to blow 20 forward? We got one more regular item, and then -- 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, do we have an 22 executive session? 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Then let's go to lunch. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'll buy that. I 7-12-04 131 1 didn't say I'll buy lunch, but I'm buying the idea. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That was close. Words 3 mean something. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. We'll stand adjourned 5 until -- or recessed, rather. We'll stand in recess until 6 1:30. 7 (Recess taken from 12:12 p.m. to 1:30 p.m.) 8 - - - - - - - - - - 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's come back to order. We 10 will reconvene the Commissioners Court meeting scheduled for 11 this date, Monday, July 12th, 2004. We went into recess 12 shortly after noon to reconvene at 1:30. It's that time 13 now. The next item on the agenda is Number 15, consider, 14 discuss, and take appropriate action on 2004 stop loss 15 insurance policy contract as part of the employee health 16 benefits program. I put this on the agenda as, pursuant to 17 the Court's direction, I propounded to Don Gray, our 18 insurance consultant who the Court had employed to work with 19 us on our 2004 employee health insurance program, the 20 questions that I had. The questions are contained in Mr. 21 Gray's response as he addresses those questions. I received 22 late Friday afternoon -- or sometime Friday afternoon his 23 final, which is essentially the same as the draft that I 24 put -- the so-called, quote, final draft, unquote, that I 25 put with the backup for the agenda item today. 7-12-04 132 1 By way of observation, it appears that as to 2 the particular questions regarding some discrepancies, I was 3 a little disappointed in that most of those answers tended 4 to hinge upon some telephone conversations which Mr. Gray 5 had with Mr. Ray Rothwell with E.B.A. in June of 2004, 6 which, at least in my way of thinking, creates some concern. 7 And I don't think it's any secret that I don't have a lot of 8 faith in the credibility of Mr. Rothwell, and have publicly 9 so stated. It seems that one of the issues relating to how 10 did we end up with Monumental Life, as opposed to Fidelity 11 Security, which was contained in the quote, and it's merely 12 because, according to Mr. Gray, in his discussion with 13 Mr. Rothwell, he just forgot to mention it during the 14 December 22 meeting. Mr. Gray's comment, if that comment 15 had been made, referring to indicating it was from 16 Monumental, much confusion would have been avoided. And, of 17 course, that was a lot of the reason for my concerns. As 18 I'm sure all of you have read the material, I won't -- 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, Judge, you 20 mention responses. Let's go to that one and start there. 21 Tell me which one that is. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: That's under Question Number 23 2, and is in the second paragraph of his reply. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, I read it. 25 My -- I guess my question is, what kind of response did you 7-12-04 133 1 expect? 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I'm not sure I expected 3 a response, other than -- I got the responses to my 4 questions. Is it proper for a bidder who bid one company to 5 then obtain coverage with another? And, of course, the 6 answer is no, it isn't. And was it standard practice in the 7 industry? And he said no, it's not. And, absent prior 8 notice and -- and consent by the party to whom the coverage 9 is being offered, is it ethical? He said, absent that, it 10 was not ethical and so forth. But -- 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And then what do we do 12 -- see, I agree. Just common sense tells me that that is -- 13 that is true. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: The -- the real two remaining 15 issues, as I see it, Commissioner, are the issue of -- of 16 acceptance of a -- of a secondary contract, which probably 17 is not that much of a problem. The contract did contain an 18 adjustment paragraph, premium adjustment, and for adjustment 19 of the annual deductible aggregate. The basis for the 20 adjustment to the aggregate deductible -- that was an 21 increase of a considerable amount -- was that, by the time 22 the Monumental contract was, in fact, submitted, they had 23 the December loss figure. So, for that reason, they 24 increased the aggregate deductible. That, of course, would 25 have been the basis for the provision being in the policy. 7-12-04 134 1 I was concerned about that provision being in 2 there, because we've been quoted a rate, and I didn't want 3 to end up later on in this year being told, well, we told 4 you one thing, but now it's going to be higher. Based on 5 the information which Mr. Gray included, which he said was 6 provided by Mr. Rothwell, the increase in the aggregate was 7 because of the company having the December loss figures, 8 which I think presumes that he also had the November loss 9 figures, which would be the last two months of the prior 10 policy year, and upon which the review would be made to 11 determine whether or not there was a spike in premium more 12 than 10 percent for the prior 10 months. But I think that 13 leads us to one of two conclusions. Number one, our -- our 14 premiums are still within what we agreed to pay, if they 15 don't get adjusted. Secondly -- actually, they're -- 16 they're a little bit under what we agreed to pay, if they 17 don't get adjusted. Secondly, now that the December and 18 presumably November loss figures for last year are known, 19 there will be no basis upon which those either premiums or 20 the aggregate annual deductible can be increased, because 21 they had those figures available to them. 22 I guess, on the one hand, I'm saying since 23 they had the information, there's no reason for that clause 24 to be in the current-year contract. But, on the other hand, 25 since they had the figures available to them and they made 7-12-04 135 1 some adjustments based upon that, they've already done what 2 they were going to do under that clause anyway. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Mm-hmm. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: So it's probably six of one, 5 half a dozen of the other. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: The Kerr County 7 premium is less than we budgeted, correct? 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, I think it came in at -- 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: $6,000 less. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: -- 22,720. Now, it did allow 11 for an increase in the aggregate deductible of 27,817. But 12 Mr. Gray states we know we're going to get the 22,720 13 decrease in the premium. Whether or not we end up having to 14 bear the burden of the additional 27,8 is problematical. In 15 all probability, we won't. So, offsetting one against the 16 other, it's probably to our benefit. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. That's why I 18 read the paragraph at the top of the page -- Page 3, I'm 19 looking at. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: At his response. And 22 part of the difference between the $26,000 benefit -- 23 reduced premium benefit and 22 has to do with an increase in 24 the census; more people covered. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. There were two 7-12-04 136 1 increases, one from the -- from the initial bid; then a 2 second one which was presumably because, according to 3 Mr. Rothwell, having the December loss figures available. 4 And the second increase in the aggregate deductible was 5 because of the additional insured, the additional 6 population. That one -- the second one was solely due to 7 that. Bottom line, if there will be no -- if there will be 8 no adjustment of either the premium or the aggregate 9 deductible under the clause in question, the benefit is 10 probably net to us. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's the way I read 12 it. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think -- are y'all done 15 on that point? I mean, I think -- I mean, as I read through 16 Mr. Gray's report, I mean, the thing that stood out to me is 17 that some things were done that are not proper, ethical, 18 whatever, whenever he changed the carrier. However, the 19 change was, as Mr. Rothwell later told us, to our benefit, 20 and it was -- from the standpoint of a lower premium, and 21 the company had a higher Best rating than the original 22 company. So, I mean, you know, I think, that being said, I 23 could -- I was looking for the exact comment, but the thing 24 that struck me the most in this whole arrangement is we 25 would not have had any of this issue if we would have hired 7-12-04 137 1 Mr. Gray to represent us totally, which we did not. And the 2 fact is that we prepared the RFP in-house through -- I guess 3 we asked Tommy to do it or Barbara to do it, or the Judge, 4 whoever. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: I had a hand in -- significant 6 hand in it. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. And I think that 8 the -- you know, what I've learned is that I'm clearly no 9 insurance expert, but we need to hire an insurance expert to 10 prepare the RFP and to handle the bids, not just evaluate 11 the bids, in the future. I'd strongly recommend this Court 12 hire someone like Mr. Gray to handle the entire process so 13 there's one person that we can turn to, and we're not having 14 these -- you know, what he said, she said, fingers pointing 15 and names changing and, you know, all that. So, I think 16 that that's really what I've learned. I mean, I think, from 17 the employees of Kerr County and the taxpayers of Kerr 18 County, we're in good shape. I think we should go ahead and 19 move forward, and with the lesson learned that these are 20 very complex issues that we probably need to have an expert 21 handle for us. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I get the same lesson 23 out of it; that we should move forward, for the benefit by 24 20,000-plus dollars, and we have a stronger underwriter. 25 But it points out the need to have somebody who knows the 7-12-04 138 1 insurance business with us from the get-go. I agree with 2 that wholeheartedly. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: No question, there were a lot 4 of lessons learned. Probably a lot more that haven't yet 5 been learned that need to be learned, but it does point out, 6 in fact, how complex this is. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: And my knowledge of it was 9 minimal going in, and it's somewhat better than that, but 10 certainly not adequate, I don't think. But if -- if we can 11 rely upon that -- the underwriter had the loss figures for 12 November and December available upon which any adjustment 13 would have to operate, and the only adjustments made were 14 those that are already plugged in; i.e., the aggregate 15 deductible. And -- and the premium being -- I can't imagine 16 the aggregate deductible going up and the premium going 17 down, but I suppose they have ways of calculating that. 18 But, if no other changes are made, I think we derive the net 19 benefit. That's the bottom line. But we went through a 20 pretty excruciating process to get there. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And even with the 22 benefit, some things were done -- we were not told some 23 things that we should have been told. I mean, even if it -- 24 financial benefit is not everything. I think that we 25 learned some other things in that area. So, you know, to 7-12-04 139 1 me, it comes under what I said earlier; we need to hire 2 someone that can handle these things for us, because I think 3 our budget and our insurance is too important to us, and too 4 complex for us to handle without expert advice. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'll go a step further 6 than that. I agree 100 percent, and I'll go a step further 7 and say that it should be Mr. Gray, in my opinion. I don't 8 know how many of those kind of people are out there, but I 9 know that he is on a retainer-type situation with a lot of 10 counties that includes Gillespie County. They retain 11 Mr. Gray themselves, and he's been a friend of this county 12 for a long, long time. He's done these things for 20 years, 13 darned near. You can probably ask Tommy, and he'd say yeah, 14 I'm very comfortable with him. 15 MR. TOMLINSON: Well, I know -- I know his 16 experience is in -- is in municipalities almost totally, so 17 he has -- in fact, he's an ex-employee of Texas Association 18 of Counties. So, he's -- he's been in the field of -- of 19 underwriting for Texas municipalities for many years. 20 That's how he got his start, actually, is with -- with Texas 21 Association of Counties. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So, what remains to 23 be done, Judge? Signing the stop loss agreement? Is that 24 it? 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, if -- if the Court -- if 7-12-04 140 1 it's the Court's desire to put forth a motion, second, and 2 favorable vote. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I would move that the 4 Judge be authorized to sign the stop loss agreement from 5 Monumental Life. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded that 8 the Court approve the tendered stop loss insurance contract 9 with Monumental Life, and authorize the County Judge to sign 10 the same. Any further question or discussion? All in favor 11 of the motion, signify by raising your right hand. 12 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 13 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 14 (No response.) 15 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Would you -- 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Is it the Court's pleasure to 18 get the housekeeping done, then come back to executive? Do 19 you think that may be the easier way to do it? 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Sure. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's fine. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I just wanted to make 24 one comment, Judge. Would you please make a note, mentally 25 or physically, to talk about this in our budget process, of 7-12-04 141 1 retaining an insurance person? Just have that discussion? 2 JUDGE TINLEY: I may talk about it sooner 3 than that, Commissioner. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Okay. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: We'll move on to the approval 6 agenda. First item up is the bills. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: We have them. We have 8 bills. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Couple of questions, if I 10 might. On Page 5, the last item under the jail, 11 high-resolution color cameras. Are these the security 12 cameras that we're talking about? I know we've had some 13 discussion about some of the field officers having cameras 14 and whatnot, but I think these are security-type cameras 15 that we're having -- 16 MR. TOMLINSON: I think those go to the jail. 17 These are for the jail. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Next item on the next page, 19 the phone expense. Has that always been that high? Am I 20 just now spotting this? Or -- 21 MR. TOMLINSON: For what? For what? 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, we've got the last one 23 to Kerrville Telephone Company for $1,367, and up above 24 we've got 580 bucks for Five Star Wireless. I suspect, with 25 as many cellular phones as they've got out there, that 7-12-04 142 1 probably the 580 is not out of bounds, is it? 2 MR. TOMLINSON: No. No, huh-uh. I'm -- I'm 3 sure of that. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: What about -- what about the 5 $1,367? 6 MR. TOMLINSON: I don't know. I'd have to -- 7 I'd have to look at the -- 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Does that seem inordinately 9 high? 10 MR. TOMLINSON: I don't know; I'd have to get 11 the history on it to see -- I don't think we can tell by 12 looking at this. We'd have to look at the -- 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 359? 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, 164359. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's just a regular 16 telephone bill. 17 MR. TOMLINSON: We have equipment -- ETS 18 equipment charges. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: How much of that? 20 MR. TOMLINSON: That's $548. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. That knocks it down to 22 about -- 23 MR. TOMLINSON: And the remaining is the 24 basic service. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 7-12-04 143 1 MR. TOMLINSON: For 816. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Okay. Only questions I 3 got. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move we pay the bills. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 7 payment of the bills. All in favor, signify by raising your 8 right hand. 9 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 10 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 11 (No response.) 12 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 13 Budget Amendment Request Number 1. 14 MR. TOMLINSON: Number 1 is for Environmental 15 Health. The request from Miguel is to transfer $68 from 16 Vehicle Insurance and $300 from Uniforms and Boots to his 17 Telephone line item for -- for the remainder of the year. 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Move to approve. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 21 approval of Budget Amendment Request Number 1. Any 22 questions or discussion? All in favor of the motion, 23 signify by raising your right hand. 24 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 25 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 7-12-04 144 1 (No response.) 2 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 3 Budget Amendment Request Number 2. 4 MR. TOMLINSON: It's from J.P. 1, to transfer 5 $50 from his Copier line item to his Bonds line item. It's 6 for his new -- new employee to start, I think within the 7 next two weeks. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: We don't have to do 9 the same thing at J.P. 2? 10 MR. TOMLINSON: No, she's already bonded. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: She's already bonded. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: I guess my next question is 13 that, pulling out of Lease Copier, isn't that a specific 14 amount that's plugged in, to the penny? If that's the case, 15 he's going to have to come back and plug that hole. 16 MR. TOMLINSON: Currently, it's -- it's -- 17 we've got funds left. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So moved. 20 MR. TOMLINSON: We check those out before -- 21 before we approve those. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: So moved? Okay. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 25 approval of Budget Amendment Request Number 2. Any question 7-12-04 145 1 or discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by 2 raising your right hand. 3 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 4 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 5 (No response.) 6 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 7 Budget Amendment Request Number 3. 8 MR. TOMLINSON: This is for the Tax 9 Collector. Her request is to transfer $125 from the 10 Telephone line item to -- to Bonds. We have a crime policy 11 that renews for $450, and we have -- only have $325 in that 12 line item. 13 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Move to approve. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 16 approval of Budget Amendment Request Number 3. Any 17 questions or discussion? All in favor of the motion, 18 signify by raising your right hand. 19 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 20 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 21 (No response.) 22 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 23 Budget Amendment Request Number 4. 24 MR. TOMLINSON: Number 4 is for the District 25 Clerk. Her request is to transfer $1,466.25 from Group 7-12-04 146 1 Insurance to Software Maintenance, and this is to make the 2 last payment for -- for this year. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So moved. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 6 approval of Budget Amendment Request Number 4. Any question 7 or discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by 8 raising your right hand. 9 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 10 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 11 (No response.) 12 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 13 Budget Amendment Request 5. 14 MR. TOMLINSON: Number 5 is -- is from the 15 Sheriff. Part of this request is to transfer $377.64 from 16 Group Insurance in the jail, $69.65 to Vehicle Maintenance 17 and $307.99 to Operating Equipment. The other part is for 18 the Sheriff's Office. The request is to transfer $897.62 19 from Group Insurance, $523.45 to Operating Expenses $374.17 20 to Vehicle Repairs and Maintenance. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So moved. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second, with a 23 question. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made -- I'm sorry? 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: With a question. 7-12-04 147 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 2 approval of Budget Amendment Request 5. Any questions or 3 discussion? 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Vehicle Maintenance in 5 the jail? Is that the van? Or what is the vehicle 6 maintenance through the -- for the jail? We have a vehicle 7 in the jail? 8 MR. TOMLINSON: They have one that -- 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Transport? 10 MR. TOMLINSON: It's an old -- one of the old 11 deputy's cars -- patrol cars that they use to run around 12 town. I saw one the other day, one of those old yellow 13 ones. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 15 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: It's a throw-down 16 getaway car. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Just an observation; 19 this is a -- the last -- these two items and the previous 20 one, we're borrowing money from Group Insurance, and I 21 presume that has something to do with employee turnover or 22 fewer people. 23 MR. TOMLINSON: A lot of it is. 'Cause 24 there's -- the waiting period for new employees -- 25 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah. 7-12-04 148 1 MR. TOMLINSON: -- there's a time period 2 where you don't pay health insurance on those people. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This time of year, you'll 4 see that more and more, things coming out of Group 5 Insurance. 6 MR. TOMLINSON: Of course, we budgeted the 7 maximum for -- as though we had 100 percent in, you know, 8 staffing. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Another observation; he's out 10 in both accounts, Vehicle Maintenance and Operating 11 Equipment. And, of course, in the jail operating -- one of 12 the other operations expenses and Vehicle Repairs and 13 Maintenance, he's still got a few months to go. He's 14 probably going to be back. 15 MR. TOMLINSON: Yeah. That's -- it's hard -- 16 it's hard to anticipate what that'll be. But -- 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 18 MR. TOMLINSON: -- we could go ahead and make 19 a stab at making an estimation, and do a budget amendment to 20 -- for the remainder of the year if you want to do that. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I would think that's his 22 call to make, and he chose not to. So, rather than do as 23 Mr. Arreola did -- he tried to figure out what it was going 24 to take him for the rest of the year and do it one time, 25 transferring. I just hope he's right, rather than having to 7-12-04 149 1 come back month after month. 2 MR. TOMLINSON: I'll talk to the Sheriff 3 about that. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Any further questions 5 or discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by 6 raising your right hand. 7 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 8 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 9 (No response.) 10 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 11 Budget Amendment Request 6. 12 MR. TOMLINSON: Six is for Nondepartmental. 13 We need to transfer -- 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, it's not. 15 MR. TOMLINSON: -- $1,708 -- 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Tommy, that's 198th. 17 MR. TOMLINSON: Oh, did I skip one? 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You skipped 6. 19 MR. TOMLINSON: I picked up two, okay. This 20 one is for the 198th District Court, transferring $1,688.42 21 from Special Trials to Court-Appointed Services. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So moved. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 7-12-04 150 1 approval of Budget Amendment Request 6. Any question or 2 discussion? All in favor, signify by raising your right 3 hand. 4 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 5 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 6 (No response.) 7 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Budget 8 amendment request 6 -- or 7, excuse me. 9 MR. TOMLINSON: That's for -- this is for 10 Nondepartmental, transferring $1,708 from the Address 11 Coordinator line item, $1,058 to Autopsies and Inquests, and 12 $650 to Pauper Burial line item. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So moved. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 16 approval of Budget Amendment Request 7. Any question or 17 discussion? 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I just wanted to point 19 out that we're very frugal with that Address Coordinator 20 line. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Wonder who the 22 commissioner in charge of that area was. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Any further question or 24 discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising 25 your right hand. 7-12-04 151 1 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 2 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 3 (No response.) 4 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 5 Budget Amendment Request 8. 6 MR. TOMLINSON: Budget Amendment 8 is for 7 County Court at Law. Judge Brown's transferring $5,000 from 8 Master Court Appointments to Court-Appointed Attorney line 9 item. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So moved. 11 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Second. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 13 approval of Budget Amendment Request 8. Any question or 14 discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising 15 your right hand. 16 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 17 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 18 (No response.) 19 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 20 Budget Amendment Request 9. 21 MR. TOMLINSON: Nine is from Maintenance. 22 The request is to transfer $662.50 from Maintenance Salaries 23 in the Ag Barn to Contract Fees for jail maintenance. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: For what? 25 MR. TOMLINSON: Jail maintenance, to Contract 7-12-04 152 1 Fees. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. From Ag Barn 3 to jail? 4 MR. TOMLINSON: Yes. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And the contract would 6 be maintenance as well? 7 MR. TOMLINSON: Yes. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So moved. 9 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Second. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 11 approval of Budget Amendment Request 9. Any question or 12 discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising 13 your right hand. 14 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 15 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 16 (No response.) 17 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 18 Budget Amendment Request 10. 19 MR. TOMLINSON: Ten is from Court Collections 20 Department. Their request is to transfer $210 from Travel 21 to the Credit History Report line item. 22 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: So moved. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 25 approval of Budget Amendment Request Number 10. All in 7-12-04 153 1 favor -- any further question or discussion? 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge, I want to make 3 a comment, that my understanding is this increase is due to 4 the Collections Department picking up the new J.P. work. 5 It's just costing a little bit more to do that. By the way, 6 I understand that that program is beginning to take off and 7 work a little bit. It's a good thing. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, that's what Mr. Alford 9 informed me. We're trying to work up a protocol on how the 10 timetable is going to work between the Justices of the Peace 11 and their clerks and constables, and then moving through the 12 system. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Mm-hmm. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Any further question or 15 discussion? Don't -- we already had the vote on it, didn't 16 we? Do we have any late bills? 17 MR. TOMLINSON: No. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. I have before me the 19 transcripts for Kerr County Commissioners Court special 20 session for Wednesday, June 2, 2004; Kerr County 21 Commissioners Court emergency session, Wednesday, June 9, 22 2004; Kerr County Commissioners Court regular session 23 Monday, June 14, 2004; Kerr County Commissioners Court 24 special session, Monday, June 28th, 2004; and Kerr County 25 Commissioners Court budget workshop, Wednesday, June 30th, 7-12-04 154 1 2004. Do I hear a motion that those transcripts be approved 2 as presented? 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So moved. 4 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Second. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 6 approval of the transcripts as presented. Any question or 7 discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising 8 your right hand. 9 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 10 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 11 (No response.) 12 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. I 13 also have before me monthly reports from the County Clerk, 14 Justice of the Peace Precinct 2, Justice of the Peace 15 Precinct 4, Constable Precinct 4, and the District Clerk. 16 We've also got one from Environmental Health Department, 17 Constable Precinct 4, Constable Precinct 3. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I have 2. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: 2 also. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Constable 2, also. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Already mentioned 4, and 22 Constable Precinct 2. Do I hear a motion that all of these 23 reports be approved as presented? 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So moved. 25 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Second. 7-12-04 155 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 3 approval of the named reports as presented. Any question or 4 discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising 5 your right hand. 6 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 7 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 8 (No response.) 9 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. Do we 10 have any reports from any of the Commissioners on their 11 committee or liaison assignments? Commissioner 1? 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Guess not. I was just 13 giving Kathy a little rest there. No. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner 2? 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, it's not a 16 liaison or committee assignment, but I did spend a good bit 17 of last Wednesday in Austin padding the halls of the Capitol 18 in search of money. I had a -- what I'd call a productive 19 meeting with Representative Hilderbran's staff, Senator 20 Fraser's staff, and believe it or not, the Lieutenant 21 Governor, but most importantly of all, the Texas Water 22 Development Board with respect to one of my stated goals in 23 getting a sewer system underway for Center Point. And I'm 24 sufficiently encouraged that -- and probably will ask the 25 Court very soon for permission to file an application with 7-12-04 156 1 the Water Development Board for some planning/engineering 2 money. There are two funds available to us. There's the 3 Disadvantaged Community Fund, and then there's a Hardship 4 Fund, either of which we should be eligible for, for 5 planning/engineering for the project, which could lead us 6 into other dollars for construction purposes. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Anything else? 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No, sir. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: All right. Three? 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't believe so. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Four? 12 (Commissioner Nicholson shook his head.) 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Do we have any reports from 14 any elected officials or department heads? 15 MR. ARREOLA: Real quick. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Environmental Health? 17 MR. ARREOLA: I know it's late, but I would 18 like to inform the Court of the progress for the last three 19 quarters. As you can see in the monthly report, we had a -- 20 had a slower than normal quarter this last quarter. We 21 believe this is based on the rain. We had so much rain this 22 -- this quarter, we got about 13 inches more than normal for 23 the year. But, still, we're up about 12 percent in our 24 year-to-date in revenues. We're still up. Next quarter 25 looks to be, or has been historically the busiest of all the 7-12-04 157 1 quarters in the year, so we -- we expect pretty good 2 revenue, pretty good activity in next quarter. Our 3 expenses, until -- year-to-date, we have spent about 4 $102,000, little bit over that, from our original budget of 5 $155,999. That's about 63 percent of the budget, or 6 63 percent of our expenses in the budget, compared to what 7 we -- the revenue is. I might show you a little bit on the 8 graphic you have on top -- 9 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: What is this "Y" 10 axis? Is this dollars or number of -- 11 MR. ARREOLA: No, that's number. Number of 12 cases, number of inspections. That's actual number of -- of 13 items. 14 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Am I saying that -- 15 what's the definition of aerobic cases? 16 MR. ARREOLA: That's the -- the cases we had 17 to investigate. We are mandated by the state law to 18 investigate -- not complaints, but violations on aerobic 19 cases. 20 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: How do you uncover 21 violations? 22 MR. ARREOLA: We have a set activity -- or 23 the maintenance providers in the county send us reports. 24 We'll -- we'll check those reports. We flag any -- any 25 out-of-compliance unit. We have to go investigate. 7-12-04 158 1 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: We're getting more 2 than twice as many out-of-compliance cases this year. 3 MR. ARREOLA: Yeah, from last year. We have 4 had a lot. 5 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Is it better -- is 6 it better compliance activity that contributes to this? Or 7 are we -- are our systems going bad? 8 MR. ARREOLA: Part of it is all the activity 9 we had at the beginning of the year, that we were not able 10 to flag all those, and they kind of piled up. And when we 11 don't notify these people, they just assume it's okay and 12 then don't renew, so that's part of it. But, you know, what 13 we used to do is send out a reminder before they actually 14 expired. We haven't had a chance this year at the beginning 15 of the year, and that kind of piled up a little bit to those 16 people. We have done about the same construction 17 inspections, little bit higher this year. We have done a 18 little bit more authorizations to construct, more permits. 19 The permits to operate, which is the last license -- the 20 final document, it's a little lower this year. And the 21 complaints -- investigation of O.S.S.F. complaints, it's 22 higher also this year. We have more failures. That's on 23 the -- on the graphic. The next page you have is just -- 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Let me ask you a question, if 25 I might, before you go on, -- 7-12-04 159 1 MR. ARREOLA: Yes, sir. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: -- Mr. Arreola. On your 3 permits to operate, your '03 is for the entire '03 year, 4 correct? 5 MR. ARREOLA: No, that's year-to-date. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, that's just 7 year-to-date. So, percentage-wise, you are down comparable 8 to this same time last year? 9 MR. ARREOLA: Correct. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, thank you. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Kind of a follow-up; 12 if I'm looking at a -- a total of all of the green bars -- 13 MR. ARREOLA: Yes, sir? 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- am I given to 15 believe that your office handled more than 1,000 16 transactions in this month? 17 MR. ARREOLA: It could be. I haven't got -- 18 I don't have that number, but it -- 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's just totaling 20 up the green -- 21 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Year-to-date. 22 MR. ARREOLA: That's year-to-date. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's Y.T.D., not 24 just the month? 25 MR. ARREOLA: Year-to-date. 7-12-04 160 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay, Y.T.D. through 2 June. Got you, okay. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Six months. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay, fine. That's 5 still a lot. 6 MR. ARREOLA: Okay. The next page you have 7 is just the analysis of all the activity in the department 8 you have compared to 2003. We don't have that good 9 information in 2002; the data is not that great to compare, 10 but 2003/2004 we can compare real good. We're doing -- 11 we're doing better than last year overall. 12 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Looks like -- 13 looking, again, at aerobics, do I see that the -- that the 14 installation of aerobic systems is a lot lower than it was 15 the two previous years? 16 MR. ARREOLA: Yes, sir. 17 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: That's good. 18 MR. ARREOLA: Yes, sir, that's good news. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Miguel, how come this 20 stat is dragging here on this page? This says October of 21 2003 to January of '04. And you don't have the stats for 22 February, March, April, to get us a little closer to where 23 we are? 24 MR. ARREOLA: October of -- 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: '04. You show this 7-12-04 161 1 as being from October -- 2 MR. ARREOLA: That's correct. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- '03 through 4 January 31, '04. 5 MR. ARREOLA: No, that is incorrect. That 6 should be to -- 7 JUDGE TINLEY: June 30. 8 MR. ARREOLA: -- June 30th. Sorry about 9 that. That is year-to-date. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 11 MR. ARREOLA: Okay. On operations in the 12 O.S.S.F., the -- the O.S.S.F. Division is well-staffed and 13 has the necessary equipment to provide an efficient service 14 to the county taxpayers and professionals in the industry. 15 We're doing okay on O.S.S.F. We're still working on a 16 computerized system to make it more efficient, faster. We 17 will require a little bit of assistance from the Department 18 of Information Technology to get a couple of programs -- 19 software programs. And the computers, we're okay on 20 computers. We need one for Solid Waste; we've touched on 21 that a little bit. We have received very positive comments 22 from the people in the community that utilizes our services. 23 On -- on complaints, as you see in the chart, we have 24 received 66 complaints on O.S.S.F., and we have managed to 25 investigate them all. Of those 66, 21 were brought into 7-12-04 162 1 compliance without the need to go to court. The rest, 43 2 cases, are still under investigation. They're still 3 pending, and we request the assistance from the County 4 Attorney and J.P. court in one case to solve it, and that's 5 done. On the Solid Waste division, we still need some help. 6 We're still understaffed. We need some equipment -- some 7 electronic equipment. Basically, a computer is needed, and 8 probably a -- just a camera also would be good to have 9 there. We have one right now that is obsolete; it's not -- 10 it's not compatible with the computers we have, so we might 11 need to request that in the proposed budget for fiscal year 12 2005. It's already contemplated that a full-time 13 inspector -- somehow, we can get that. Also, the computer 14 is in the budget for next year. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Miguel? 16 MR. ARREOLA: Yes? 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: In there, in that 18 Solid Waste -- and I've already lost the page, but you had 19 documented one -- one investigation where there was the 20 photographs and all that, and I noticed that you were the 21 investigating officer. 22 MR. ARREOLA: Yes, sir. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do we not have an 24 employee down there other than you? 25 MR. ARREOLA: We do, yes, sir, but I am doing 7-12-04 163 1 also work for Solid Waste. We basically -- 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You're doing -- you're 3 doing the Solid Waste work, and he's doing Solid Waste work. 4 MR. ARREOLA: Yes. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And it's still an 6 overload. 7 MR. ARREOLA: Yes. Yes, sir. I have -- the 8 next pages you got, there's two cases. That shows the cases 9 we have received for Solid Waste only. This is not O.S.S.F. 10 complaints; this is only Solid Waste, and we had a total of 11 84 cases, year-to-date. Of those, we have resolved -- I've 12 got the number here -- 45. They're closed. We managed to 13 bring those into compliance. They have cleaned up the 14 properties. We requested the assistance of J.P. court in 15 one case; that's still pending. It's going to go to court. 16 And we still have the rest, which is 39 under investigation. 17 And I just -- we just closed one this morning, so there's 18 one more that we can close. But, yeah, it's a lot of -- a 19 lot of cases. And this is just complaints that we've 20 received. It's not what we might be able to go and -- and 21 pick up ourselves. It's a lot of -- a lot of trash needs to 22 be cleaned in the county. So -- 23 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Miguel, I get really 24 frustrated with our inability to act quickly to correct some 25 of these solid waste things, and -- 7-12-04 164 1 MR. ARREOLA: Uh-huh. 2 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: -- I'm looking at 3 these two addresses on Country Lane. What -- what 4 additional tools are available to us to -- to get compliance 5 more quickly? 6 MR. ARREOLA: Some of them, we're working 7 with the property owners. I don't know exactly which one 8 you're looking at, but some of them kind of drive a little 9 bit, because they do some progress, and instead of us 10 spending all that time and money with the court and 11 attorneys, we'll give them an extra two weeks and we'll go 12 back. So, it's our time that is -- we're spending, but it's 13 probably cheaper to go that way if we get a result. Some of 14 them get to be a long case because of that. Some of them, 15 they just don't comply. We have one that we had to 16 basically give a ticket and just put in J.P. court, and 17 we're waiting on the court to act on it, so I don't know how 18 long that's going to take. You know, we've seen that if we 19 work with those property owners, they will work with us and 20 we'll get better results. 21 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Unless they're in 22 jail. 23 MR. ARREOLA: Yeah. 24 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: One of these renters 25 that -- where we can't force them to comply, 'cause it 7-12-04 165 1 isn't -- he's in jail. I think his renters belong in jail. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I noticed a couple of 3 these bad ones are in Loyal Valley in my precinct. I have a 4 question -- a couple questions. 5 MR. ARREOLA: Uh-huh. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: First of all, on 7 number 36 in the July -- the pending -- 8 MR. ARREOLA: Pending. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- illegal burning on 10 Stoneleigh Road. 11 MR. ARREOLA: Mm-hmm. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Since the burn ban is 13 off, what were they burning that was illegal? 14 MR. ARREOLA: They were burning plastics and 15 tires and things like that. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay, thank you. 17 MS. RECTOR: Not supposed to burn. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What about the one 19 with the chicken -- something to do with the chickens? 20 MR. ARREOLA: That's done. That's -- 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Roasting chickens? 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Roasting chickens. 23 What was that? 24 MR. ARREOLA: Well, he had -- they were 25 complaining about too many chickens in the back yard. 7-12-04 166 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Oh. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Miguel, when you do 3 your report, could you do something that Road and Bridge 4 does which is really helpful -- 5 MR. ARREOLA: Uh-huh. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- in identifying 7 where these problems are? 8 MR. ARREOLA: Precincts? 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Identify them by 10 precinct number. 11 MR. ARREOLA: Sure. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Could you add that 13 precinct in? I think that would be helpful if you could do 14 add that to the same column, somewhere where the address is. 15 MR. ARREOLA: Okay, we can do that. One of 16 the reasons we had saw some more O.S.S.F. and -- I mean 17 Solid Waste and managed to investigate them all is because 18 of the slower activity on O.S.S.F., and I was able to do 19 more work on Solid Waste. I know about next -- next quarter 20 is looking to be more busier, so I don't know if we're going 21 to be able to do all that on Solid Waste. But we -- we're 22 working hard, as much as we can. The other aspect we need 23 to talk about is aerobics, and that's something that we have 24 -- we have to obey the law. We have to go by the state 25 rules on it. We have the tools. We have the database, and 7-12-04 167 1 we have -- everyone in the county knows what to do. They 2 send us all the reports. The problem starts when they don't 3 comply and we have to take the time and the resources to 4 make that in compliance. We have a total of 1,209 units in 5 the county in the ground. That means that we receive about 6 3,600 reports a year, and all those would have to be entered 7 in the computer, have to be filed, have to be followed. Not 8 all of them have problems, but they all have to be looked 9 at. And we -- what we need to do is notify the property 10 owner what the problem is, or when the maintenance -- 11 maintenance contract is expired, so that takes a lot of our 12 time. I know it's extra work that we have to do, but that's 13 mandated by the state. 14 So, that's -- that's more or less the report. 15 The thing -- we still look good. We're looking for a busier 16 quarter this coming quarter. I think we're going to be a 17 little bit lower than what we expected for the total year 18 revenue. We expected to grow about 28 percent, and we're 19 probably going to be lower than that, but still going to be 20 higher than last year. And about -- we -- we think it's 21 going to be about 60, 61 percent of the expenses in all -- 22 in the overall department, including Solid Waste, funded 23 with the revenues we get. So, that leaves 39 percent for 24 taxpayer funding. Any questions? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Thank you. 7-12-04 168 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you very much, 2 Mr. Arreola. We appreciate you bringing us that report. 3 MR. ARREOLA: No problem. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Do we have any other reports 5 to be given to the Court at this time? Okay. This will 6 bring us to the executive session or closed session. I 7 expect we're going to need -- in addition to the members of 8 the Court, we're going to need the reporter and Mr. Motley. 9 (Discussion off the record.) 10 (The open session was closed at 2:24 p.m., and an Executive Session was held, the 11 transcript of which is contained in a separate document.) 12 - - - - - - - - - - 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Well, is the clerk 14 going to join us? We'll come back into open session at 15 2:41. Do we have anything else to come before the meeting 16 today, gentlemen? 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, sir. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Hearing nothing, I will 19 declare that we are adjourned. 20 (Commissioners Court adjourned at 2:41 p.m.) 21 - - - - - - - - - - 22 23 24 25 7-12-04 169 1 STATE OF TEXAS | 2 COUNTY OF KERR | 3 The above and foregoing is a true and complete 4 transcription of my stenotype notes taken in my capacity as 5 County Clerk of the Commissioners Court of Kerr County, 6 Texas, at the time and place heretofore set forth. 7 DATED at Kerrville, Texas, this 16th day of July, 2004. 8 9 10 JANNETT PIEPER, Kerr County Clerk 11 BY: _________________________________ Kathy Banik, Deputy County Clerk 12 Certified Shorthand Reporter 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 7-12-04