MINUTES OF THE INFORMAL MEETING OF THE JOHNSON COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS:
JANUARY 9, 2008
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page
Trails Committee Members Terry Dahms, Del Holland, and Janelle Rettig: Trails discussion 1
Assistant Planner Josh Busard and Facilities Manager David Kempf: Johnson County’s Participation in the Climate Communities Federal Policy Action Team...................................................................... 7
Facilities Manager David Kempf: Project Updates................................................................ 8
Board of Supervisors: Meeting Agenda Items..................................................................... 11
Board of Supervisors: Agenda Structure for 2008.............................................................. 11
Board of Supervisors: Internal Processes............................................................................ 12
Chairperson Sullivan called the Johnson County Board of Supervisors to order in the Johnson County Administration Building at 8:32 a.m. Members present were: Pat Harney, Larry Meyers, Terrence Neuzil, Sally Stutsman, and Rod Sullivan.
Trails Committee Member Terry Dahms said that he wanted to discuss concerns not only about off road trails but also on road trails. He said that the County has a great road system that encourages on road trails but not a lot of information available on where the best places to ride on street are and there could be some improvement in that. Dahms said that the casino in Riverside has a grant foundation and through that program they gave a grant to Washington County last year to develop a trails plan. He said that he thought they could apply for the grants but there are a few issues to decide on. One issue was whether or not the County as an entity should be the applicant for the grant or if they should use a non-profit agency like the Iowa Bicycle Coalition. Another issue was who should do the actual work if the grant is received, the County staff or if they should contract out to someone else. He said that he wasn't sure if it should be done by the County or with the County's cooperation by an outside agency.
Trails Committee Member Janelle Rettig said that the current plan written by JCCOG would not be replaced and that this would but be an additional chapter called bike tourism. Rettig said that if you make things easy to comprehend and interesting for people it drives rural economic tourism development. She said that they could consider adding fun and interesting signs and route tips but the grant would initially go towards the planning, mapping, and creating the document. She said routes would start in Iowa City and finger out towards interesting historic or natural routes. She said there could be collaboration with other counties to have different names for routes and similar fun signs, but that would have to be negotiated between multiple counties. Harney said that he had conversations with people in Washington County who are interested in getting that grant for a trail, and that they are specifically interested in a trail from Hills to Washington County, but are looking at trails in their county first.
Stutsman said that the issue is how the Trails Committee (Trails) and the Board work together and that a collaboration plan needs to be established. Stutsman said they need to get clear on what the Trails Committee role is, where the Board fits in and how to move forward. She said that when the Trails Committee was set up she envisioned that they would do recommendations to the Board and the Board would decide what to further pursue. She said the Committee should not apply for grants without the Board's knowledge because it might rise the situation that the grant has a $100,000 match that the Board would need to come up with. Stutsman said the Trails Committee and the Board would need to work together and need to determine how to do that and would also have to clear who would be in charge of overseeing, cleaning and maintaining the trails. R. Sullivan agreed and said there were situations when the Trails Committee has presented issues to staff and the staff did not help because they do not work for the Trails Committee but for the Board. R. Sullivan said there should be more frequent conversations so that the Board could ask staff to help. Stutsman said that if the Board decides to move forward with a proposal they would need to invest staff time and money. R. Sullivan said staff would need to have input on the notice time needed before they could start a project.
Trails Committee Member Del Holland said that they need to recognize that the Trails Committee is a new committee and have only started working on a procedure last year. He noted that at the first meeting of the newly constituted group they created a list of accomplishments and that he feels good about what was done so far, but the Trails Committee needs to grow and determine how to get things best done. Dahms said there were two really important accomplishments and one of that was the grant proposal submitted. Dahms said that next year might come around with some earmarks because the Legislature wants to see the connection made to Cedar Rapids. He thanked the Board for putting money in the County budget, that was not done prior to this fiscal year, and said the Trails Committee appreciates the ongoing support.
Rettig said she talked with Stutsman last year before the casino foundation grant proposals were due and Stutsman said she received a call and they wanted the County to apply. Rettig said they do not have a grant writer. She said that Meyers asked if they considered private foundations and private corporate money. She said that the answer was yes on a generic level and no on a practical level because the County has no grant writer, and can not pursue opportunities even if the Trails Committee finds and recommends them. She said that the only reason they had a grant done at all last was because of ECICOG. Rettig said that she heard the numbers from Iowa City to the Washington County line as 2.5 million for the separated trails. She said that she would guess the possibility of that trail would be far down on the list because the population center is not there and is not their job to get the Iowa City residents to go to a casino. She said that they had thought about proposing the idea of the trail to the Casino Foundation and ask that they approve a grant with no or little match. She said that if they really want Iowa City people to ride down to Washington County then they would have to pay for it because the Trails Committee has other projects in mind. She said that a lot of good bicycling routes go south so she thought that Washington County would have an interest in that since Iowa City people could end up biking there and it would be an economic development tourism issue for them. She said that it sounded like they were talking about two different casino foundation avenues with the first being the route's planning and mapping and the second for a potential trail. She said that they could apply for both of them but she doesn't think that they would have 2.5 million in one grant cycle. Stutsman said that when the Trails Committee identifies an opportunity they should come to the Board and they would find a grant writer and would provide the resources for them to apply for that grant.
Stutsman said that they get the best results when they develop a plan and they stick to it. She said that without a plan, when they try and go after any money for grants they can become fragmented and don't accomplish much. Stutsman said that part of the responsibility of the Trails Committee is to review the plan periodically and bring recommendations to the Board. Harney said that in the discussion with Washington County residents they wanted to know how the trail would benefit them, and suggested to tie their benefits into the proposal so that they can justify taking money out of Washington County and allowing Johnson County to have some of it. Harney said it does not matter if it would be a on or off road accommodation and that he encourages applying either way, or both to see if they could get some funds and build the trail in construction with the road construction.
Rettig said that accommodation for wide paved shoulders is already in the Roads Plan and that next building will go from Iowa City to Hills and the building after that from Hills to Washington County line. She noted that after the construction is done in 2-3 years there would be wide paved shoulders like that on Sand Road to the county line. Harney said that Washington County wanted their end done first and that could be a bargaining chip for them to give Johnson County some money if they want their end done sooner. Rettig asked if the schedule is reversed. Harney said that has not been decided. Stutsman said that with the 5 Year Road Plan coming up she hadn't heard any talk of reversing it. R. Sullivan said that one of the things they had been asking for from Secondary Roads was that for every project they show the Board where the trail would be and what it would cost even if a trail were not recommended.
Stutsman said that the big issue is land acquisition, and noted they can not condemn if the farmer does not want to give the land. Dahms said they always suggested that separated trails be built in the right-of-way. R. Sullivan said that there has been a positive change in the sense that they are talking about possibility of a trail in the project design. Dahms said they should start the relationship with the foundation by looking at the planning document and see if they are willing to work with Johnson County. Rettig said that she would not be on the voting side of recommending that they use Johnson County funds to support a trail to Washington County because there are other priorities to work on. She said that if they were willing to do it with no match she would support that. She said that they should apply and the worse that would happen is they would say no. R. Sullivan said that the Board would need to know which grants they want to apply for with enough lead-time to get things accomplished.
Rettig said the Trails Committee recommendation is to pursue the routes planning which would be a rural economic development tourism issue with no public local match. Rettig said they would prefer a non-profit to take the lead on that and the Board would send a letter of endorsement. Dahms said they should take opportunities as they come up because things could change rapidly. He said that if they do end up changing directions his concern is that it doesn’t take funds away from other priorities. Stutsman said that the update would need to be a public process so that the community is aware of what is happening with the trails. Stutsman said there might be a lot of people from Iowa City that want to bike to the casino and that have to be recognized and the Board needs to respond to what the community wants. Dahms said there is some background work being done on the connections to Kent Park that is being paid for with donated money. He said they are looking at what it would cost to purchase the right-of-way through outright purchase or easement, determine where the alignment might be, and who the landowners are.
Dahms said one of the only things that they can prove is that tourism generates a considerable amount of money. He said that he attended a forum with the candidates for the Iowa City City Council and they discussed trails fulfilling a transportation role, which was one of the things that he used to list early on, but no one could relate to that because gas prices were so high. He said that people are coming around and starting to understand that commuting on a bicycle might be a viable option and Secondary Roads has also begun to consider it, but they need to make sure that they are not over-designing the roads. Stutsman said that the other selling point of trails is health.
Retting said that in regards to the trail priorities the order is Dubuque Street, Solon to Ely, Tiffin to Kent Park and a Highway 1 separated trail. She said that they put in three applications for Dubuque Street and they were all denied and added that on the Federal recreation trails there were over $13 million a project and 750,000 miles. She said that she pursued talking to the local delegation for a state year mark for that trail because it is a regional priority, and said they could connect south Iowa City with Cedar Falls with mostly separated trails. She said that Trails Committee recommends that the Board take the $200,000 from last year, carry it over, and add another $200,000 so that they can pursue multiple projects at once, therefore being able to put some money towards the projects in case they don’t get grant funds for awhile. Stutsman asked if they put the extra money in Capital Projects. Neuzil said that it was not Capital Projects, but it could be carried over.
Neuzil said that he spoke with some people in Washington County and they didn’t believe that Johnson County would be able to get funding within the next 5-10 years until their needs shrunk a bit. He said that they were interested in lowering property taxes to offset some of the cost, so the funding that would go to these community projects out of current tax dollars would be less on tax dollars. He said that another issue is timing because Washington County's list is likely to be extensive and Johnson County’s projects will be done within 3 or 4 years, and at a minimum they will put a nice shoulder on the road so that bicyclists can get down there. He said that he wasn’t sure if it was going to be a family event to go to the casino but that the trail might be used anyway. Stutsman said she thought there might be a theme park being built and Neuzil said the casino is adding an amphitheater and water park at some point in time.
Neuzil said that he would like to know if Secondary Roads had any possibility for a separated trail if there is a wider right-of-way. He said that he wasn’t sure how much right-of-way there was. He said that as far as asking for a grant he wasn’t sure how many resources should be put into it. Neuzil said the application process is not very extensive but a lot of counties would not have the resources to hire a good grant writer. Rettig asked if Neuzil meant not to apply for a grant for a trail or not applying for a grant for the planning and mapping of routes and said that she thinks they would have a big interest in the routes. Neuzil said that any money that goes towards Johnson County is a political issue for them. He said that Washington County is going to at minimum put shoulders in all the way until Highway 22, and that they are hoping that the City of Hills would do that as well so that Johnson County’s wide shoulders do not narrow out outside of city limits. Stutsman said that it doesn’t hurt to ask.
Rettig said that she and Dahms could write the routes planning grant application in a day, but the trail grant is different and she is not recommending it. R. Sullivan said that they should do it in terms of a process where the Trails Committee comes up with an idea and then presents it to the Board to decide on. Dahms asked if they should apply in County's name or as a non-profit agency. Stutsman said that it would need to be written as the County. R. Sullivan said that Trails Committee should make a recommendation on whom to do the trail. Rettig said that they would prefer to contract out the work. Stutsman said they would need to have a discussion with a department head and ask how to accomplish it. She said that it is up to the Board to give direction one way or another. R. Sullivan said that there is nothing on the 5 Year Road Plan for that part of the county so any map would contain the roads as they are.
R. Sullivan said that it seems different than other grant applications because other applications require that an engineer design the trail. Rettig said that staff would be involved no matter what. She said that they aren’t recommending that there’s any local match to it. She said that if the County applies for the grant for bicycle economic development tourism routing in the county and out none of the $400,000 would go toward it. She said that even if the Iowa Bicycle Coalition would do the main work, the County mapping staff would still need to be involved, but would not be responsible for the final document. She thinks that there is a better way to go because there might not be as strong interest on staff in the final document as there would be if the work was contracted. She said that the County would still be involved and contribute time. Stutsman said that at the least they would work on the background information.
Rettig said the Trails Committee would need to know if the Board would prefer staff to do it completely or if they wanted a mixture. R. Sullivan said that he wasn’t sure if their staff was prepared to do it. Harney said that this was discussed when they first brought up this trail that they needed to have a designated group to do the applications. He said that he would be supportive of having an engineering firm do the supplying for grants and doing the work needed because it's done together and presented as a package, instead of the Board receiving small portions of information from a lot of separate groups. He said that any trail request specific that goes through ECICOG has to have an engineer tag on it to be considered. Dahms asked if they knew of any local engineering firm with expertise. Rettig said that you need an engineering firm to do a separated trail but not necessarily to do bicycle routing because it is a process of going out and studying the roads and deciding on the best route. She said that some overlay is needed with the GIS mapping system, and the County's involvement would be needed even if an outside group would do the overall plan.
R. Sullivan said this is a unique request. Retting said this is not a trail, but is a good thing for the County and the economic development plan, and could produce a very interesting map. Harney said that a new firm is opening up in Coralville that is getting into grant writing and is talking about some Federal grants available for trails. Stutsman asked if they were pursuing a grant for bike tourism routing. Rettig said yes and noted that it appeared the Board wanted the Trails Committee to pursue applying for the grant in the County’s name and recommend a subcontractor do the major chunk of the planning and have the staff involved as needed. R. Sullivan said that it sounded good to him and asked how the rest of the Board felt. Stutsman said that they should discuss later on if they have adequate staff for issues like this or if they need to find people to do it. Dahms said they could make the decision after getting the money. Retting said that they were looking for a blend of both County and outside help. R. Sullivan asked if there was an agreement from the Board of Supervisors for Rettig’s proposal. Stutsman said yes. Rettig said that she believed the deadline was April 1st.
Rettig said that she thought the consensus was that they weren’t interested in pursuing the trail grant to go to Washington County. She said that it would be a lot of work and she didn't think it might be the highest priority. Stutsman said that she thought Rettig laid out the priorities well and she agreed with them. Harney also agreed. Rettig said that she wanted to praise the Board for not passing the ISAC resolution about immunity and the Board of Supervisors were good leaders in seeing the broader picture. Stutsman said several counties have passed it but the majority are small rural counties that are in panic about the potential of liabilities. Dahms said that they thought it was important that a staff member from the County attend the bicycle summit in Des Moines on an ongoing basis. Dahms said the summit has days set up for engineers and traffic planners and is pleased that Assistant County Engineer Rob Winstead would attend this year. Stutsman said that these are things that need to be brought to the Board’s attention so that they can give direction to staff. Rettig said the Friday session is geared towards engineers and planners who come from all over the Midwest.
Neuzil said to keep an eye on the 5 Year Road Plan that would be discussed at the February 14, 2008 meeting. Neuzil said the 5 Year Road Plan is not going to change too much this year, but the Board asked staff that future reconstruction projects include a separated trail as possible. Stutsman said that the County Engineer recommends that the 5 Year Road Plan should not change and said the Board would conduct public hearings to see if the public would like additional projects included in the plan, and the Board would consider adding those to the plan. Rettig said that as far as earmarking for the trip the Board should let them know if they need any documentation or anything. R. Sullivan said that they would probably need to get a few copies of ECICOG grant application to take with them. Rettig asked if they wanted the one with the largest match or the smallest match. Stutsman said both of them. Rettig said that they were the exact same application with the difference of how much you have to pay. R. Sullivan said the smallest match.
Neuzil said it would be desirable to get copies to all of them. R. Sullivan said that if they got one they could do the copies. Rettig said she would also provide an electronic copy of the application. Neuzil asked if the list of priorities were documented. Rettig said that they were.
Assistant Planner Josh Busard said that the Climate Communities (CC) is a lobbying firm in Washington DC. The County pays $8,000 for CC to go in on its behalf and lobby Senators, Congressmen and other policy makers. He said that there are other programs like this and the County could be free riders and let some of the other counties take care of this. Stutsman asked what they were going to lobby for. Busard said policies that would help promote reducing greenhouse gases and Facilities Manager David Kempf said they are mostly advocating. Neuzil said that they already had an advocate, the National Association of Counties that is aggressively addressing congressional issues and that they should not spend money on this. Kempf said there would be a lot of similar entities open up. Neuzil said that lobbying is a great thing, but the need lay more with the State than the Federal level.
Harney said the lobbying entities would eventually replace the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI) and noted that he had a problem sending a lot of money out of the country when this could be done at the local level. R. Sullivan said that ICLEI is international because the United States is far behind the rest of the world. Neuzil said that he disagreed and R. Sullivan said the US is amazingly far away from Europe and the international standards exist because of that. Stutsman said the Board does not know enough to determine what they wanted to lobby for and that until they were further along in the process this would be a waste of money. Harney said that they do not have to do it but they needed to consider all the options.
Kempf said that ICLEI looks at what the County could do to help curb greenhouse gas and become more green and the lobbying organizations are looking to change standards. He said that they would see a lot of similar organizations open up because of the global climate changes and the County could not afford to belong to all of them. Neuzil said that the Ferguson group was a good group and have very active people within it. He said that the County has limited resources and dollars and is not in a position to join one of these groups. R. Sullivan said that it sounded like 'no' was the overall answer. Stutsman said that when these issues become more relevant in time they should further discuss the options. Neuzil said that they were having a hard time using $6,000 to go to a Chamber event so money is an issue to stay concerned with. Stutsman said that they were on first name basis with their congressmen and that might be more effective for now. Busard asked if it was something they should evaluate in 6-9 months. Stutsman said yes and they should always keep their options open. Neuzil said that the organizations would change and they would start attending events like ISAC.
Planing and Zoning Administrator Rick Dvorak said there was discussion about Busard becoming LEED certified and there are not a lot of people in Iowa that are certified. Busard said that being LEED certified meant he could participate smartly in the LEED certification of the new building, provide help for future projects and he could use his knowledge to work on environmentally friendly policies for the County. Stutsman said that the building was a good first step and they could branch out from there. Busard said that the Green Building Council currently concentrates on individual buildings but in 2009 they should be coming out with standards for neighborhood development which is a lot of what the County is doing and could build those standards into the Land Use Plan.
Stutsman asked how the County became a member of the Green Building Council. Busard said that Executive Assistant Mike Sullivan told them they were members. Stutsman asked if it was through ICLEI and R. Sullivan said they were the same thing. Stutsman asked Kempf if he was comfortable working with Busard and Kempf said that he is and that going through the LEED process is going to be a good learning opportunity for both of them. He said that maybe down the road Busard could act as a consultant and Busard said that he could act in full capacity for buildings that are less than 50,000 square feet. Neuzil said that Busard could talk to Conservation Director Harry Graves because he would like to have the new Conservation facility LEED certified. Stutsman asked if they should have Busard come to the Department Head Meeting to explain what he has done so that other department heads will be aware and use his knowledge as needed. R. Sullivan said that it sounded like a good idea. Kempf said that they could talk to the Department heads about the new building and LEED process and how Busard could help in future projects. R. Sullivan said that he would add Busard to the agenda.
Kempf handed out the updated schedule for the Health and Human Services building. He said that the construction fence is up and they are moving equipment in and doing soil analysis that would determine how much dirt would need to be removed and how much fill would be needed. He said the plan is to have the grading work done before January 21, 2008 and would start doing the upper pass pilings on January 21 2008. He said that there would be a lot of activity on the site and noted that they have live feed that could be access by going to http://www.johnson-county.com/plant/index.shtml and clicking the laptop icon. Kempf said they capture a hourly snapshot to compile a foot book animation of the project happening. Stutsman asked if they had done a press release on the live feed and Kempf said no because they just got it on the website but plan to do so.
Neuzil said the Assessor’ Office would like some direction in regard to the temporary relocation. Kempf said they would not make the connection into the Administration Building until mid summer so they had time to reconfigure the space. Kempf said they would like to keep the Assessor's Office in the building so that limits the places where they could be temporarily relocated. Stutsman said that she would encourage putting the Assessor in the break room. Neuzil said they could temporarily relocate the break room on the hallway by the Building Inspectors Department. Kempf said his first choice for the relocation of the Assessor's Office would be the lower level conference room, but is concerned they would not have enough space. Harney asked if they could temporarily store the Assessor's files in the small break room in the Treasurer's Office.
Stutsman said they should keep in mind that this would be a temporary situation. R. Sullivan said the flow of work needs to continue and taking them outside the Administration Building would be a bad idea. R. Sullivan said that Iowa City Assessor Dennis Baldridge is putting this issue on the agenda for the Conference Board meeting on February 4, 2008. Kempf asked if he should come up with a plan prior to that meeting. R. Sullivan said that it would be a good idea for Kempf to attend the meeting and answer any questions that might come up. Neuzil said that the Space Needs Committee should come up with an option giving consideration to computer access, phone issues and storage. Neuzil said there would be four months of inconvenience. R. Sullivan said that Kempf should plan on making it to the meeting and that the issue should be added on the Department Head Meeting agenda
Neuzil asked if they are losing any employee parking due to construction. R. Sullivan said that employee parking was reduced because there were several students using the parking lot. Kempf said they have taken care of that situation and asked employees to use the parking tag. Stutsman asked if there are posted signs that say that it is private parking. Kempf said there are reserved parking signs. Harney asked if the signs mention car towing for unconformity and Kempf said that they do. Kempf said he would need to talk with the construction company to not allow their employees in that area because they have parking on site. Kempf said that they were still trying to iron out issues with the skywalk and the City but they would be able to work through it. He said that he received word that the City is giving them a new address on Dubuque Street rather then Lafayette Street. He said that the main entrance will be off of Dubuque Street and Clinton Street but the building would be addressed off of Dubuque Street and added that they had made a formal address change request and they should be receiving a formal letter soon. Meyers asked if the LEED consultants were getting involved immediately and asked who they are contracting with and Kempf said they work with Martha Norbeck's C-WISE group, which would be involved from the beginning. Kempf said that C-WISE attended the pre-construction meeting and had talked to all the subcontractors.
Meyers asked if the Board could sit in on a couple of construction group meetings. Kempf responded that he would like the Supervisors to attend a couple of meetings as they can. Kempf noted that he would send the meeting schedule. Neuzil asked for clarification of what each contractor is doing. Kempf explained that Novak was the architect over the whole project and Tricon was the construction company. Harney said that the workers have been told not to park in their employee lot and some of them will have to park on-site. Kempf said that they were having discussions on that issue. Stutsman asked if they could set up a shuttle service and Kempf said the workers would comply because they would start towing cars away. Neuzil asked if any of the PowerPoint presentations that Kempf has done on the project is on the web. Kempf said that there are some schematics posted but he could also add the presentations. Kempf said he did a 45 minute presentation to the Area Facility Managers Group on projects that the County is doing.
R. Sullivan said that they would discuss parking ramp issues the following day. Kempf said that he was asked to talk to the New Optimist Club about County projects and would do a PowerPoint presentation on the Health and Human Services building and have handouts for SEATS/Secondary Roads project.
Kempf said that they would have the pre-construction meeting for SEATS/Secondary Roads building on January 10, 2008. Kempf said that Neumann Monson is the architect and S & G Construction is the general contractor and they would get the formalized list of sub-contractors at the pre construction meeting. Kempf said that groundbreaking would be January 14, 2008 at 1:00 p.m. and said that they would set up a podium and microphone. Neuzil asked if there was a press release on it and Kempf said that he hadn't done anything. R. Sullivan said that he sent some information about the project to five places and Kempf said that the Chamber of Commerce would also post a notice.
Kempf said that SEATS Director Tom Brase has sent out notifications and asked a couple of individuals to say a few words at the ceremony. He said that MMS, the site engineer of the project for Neumann Monson, did not follow through on filing for a storm water permit for work they're doing there, which would delay them by a couple of weeks but that issue has been resolved. Stutsman asked if it would cost them money because they didn't file the permit and Kempf said that that it wouldn't cost the County but it would cost MMS. Kempf said that the delay shortens the length of time they have to finish the project and were hoping it wouldn't change the final completion date. Stutsman said that time is money because the County continues to pay rent for SEATS. Kempf said that they did some calculations and found that they needed to get rid of some heat load in the winter months because they have to supply air conditioning for the closed server bunker and decided to extend the geothermal lines over to the bus bunker.
Recessed at 10:00 a.m.; reconvened at 10:07 a.m.
There is no date set up for the Joint Leadership meeting. The Conservation meeting was rescheduled for February 6, 2008 at 11:00am. The Trust for Public Land would give a presentation at the February 6, 2008 meeting. There would not be a Conservation meeting on January 10, 2008. The DVIP Souper Bowl would be on January 31, 2008 at 5:30p.m.
Stutsman and R. Sullivan serve on the Rural Policy Board which meets once a year, and would like to have quarterly meetings. R. Sullivan said that most small cities do not have a city manager and that there are several issues that should be addressed. The Board agreed to brainstorm discussion ideas that specifically deal with the smaller towns.
The Supervisors would each create position statements to be used for Congress lobbying during the Washington DC trip on February 20, 2008. Neuzil would work on smoking and local control, Stutsman would do trails earmarks and County Attorney's pay, R. Sullivan and Neuzil would work on MH/DD, Meyers would work on Ambulance, Harney on Rift and Vehicle Registration, and R. Sullivan would work on records electronic storage.
Neuzil asked if the public got moved to the beginning of the agenda. R. Sullivan said that he would like to but wanted to see what the rest of the Supervisors wanted to do. Stutsman said the public discussion was placed at the end of the agenda because there were several controversial issues and had to determine if the Board should have public comments prior to staff recommendations or staff report followed by public comments. R. Sullivan said that if they want to speak about an item on the agenda they need to wait for it to come up and this extra category is reserved to talk about something that’s not on the agenda. Stutsman said that the Chair needs to be clear to limit it to 5 minutes.
R. Sullivan said that he spoke with Auditor Tom Slockett and he said that Recording secretary John Deeth could add a hyperlink to the agenda to include specifics of each item on the agenda by clicking on it. He said that the City has a system like that. Neuzil said that the public could subscribe on the Johnson County website to get the agendas emailed. Neuzil said that the minutes would be presented in a similar format after they are approved. Stutsman asked if they could post the minutes in draft form until they are approved. R. Sullivan said that Acting Deputy Auditor Casie Kadlec should participate in the discussion and present the pros and cons of posting draft copies. Harney said that he would not want the minutes posted publicly until they were approved by the Board to avoid posting incorrect information.
R. Sullivan said that Executive Assistant Mike Sullivan was planning on being gone for at least two weeks. Neuzil said that in the past Budget Coordinator Richard Claiborne has been the backup person. He said that, Claiborne, Secretary II Jo Hogarty and the Chairperson work on agendas with the Auditor's office. R. Sullivan said that Claiborne had a big adoption meeting Thursday night and would not attend the Board meeting.
Neuzil said that M. Sullivan was an intricate part of strategic planning and it didn't sound like he would be there for the first strategic planning meeting. Harney said that they should wait until the week before to decide if they need to move it back. Neuzil said that the issue is not what to accomplish but how to accomplish things.
R. Sullivan said that with M. Sullivan being gone it's going to be a challenge and one of the most difficult things will be communication and that they would have to work with Hogarty and Claiborne to have them send the information out to avoid any legal issues. Harney said that someone needs to be answering the phones. Neuzil said that the system is set up to go to automatic voicemail and added that they need to make sure Claiborne is aware that someone needs to cover the phones. Neuzil said that they had agreements meeting on January 18, 2008 at 11:00 a.m. and a Planning Council meeting on January 23, 2008. Harney said that he would attend the Frytown meeting.
Stutsman said that the Auditor's Office brought up doing the minutes for other committees. Neuzil said that there were no objections from the departments in regard to doing their own minutes. Neuzil said that the only time more extensive minutes would be on the jail issue coming up. R. Sullivan said that they should not spend more money to get extra committee meetings typed. Stutsman asked if they were going to move all public comments up to the top of the agendas. R. Sullivan said yes. Harney said that he was concerned the public discussion would take up a lot of time during the meeting if the item is placed first on the agenda and R. Sullivan said the Board would limit the time for each public member. R. Sullivan said that they should try this set up for awhile and possibly change it later.
Adjourned at 10:58 a.m.
______________________________________________________________________
Attest: Tom Slockett, Auditor
By:
On the _______ day of _____________________, 2008
By John Deeth, Recording Secretary
Sent to the Board of Supervisors on March 7, 2008 at 3:30 p.m.