MINUTES OF THE INFORMAL MEETING OF THE JOHNSON COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS:
JULY 8, 2008
Vice Chairperson Neuzil called the Johnson County Board of Supervisors to order in the Johnson County Administration Building at 9:06 a.m. Members present were: Pat Harney, Larry Meyers, Terrence Neuzil, and Sally Stutsman; absent was Rod Sullivan.
Executive Assistant Mike Sullivan said the last time the Board met they talked about the Strategic Goals that had been set out from an earlier Goal-Setting Session. He said he printed the material from the flip charts, put them on worksheets, and distributed them throughout the office. M. Sullivan said he thought the Board could go over them as a review; the meeting had been moved up because the National Association of Counties (NACo) and flooding issues. He said he hasn't had a lot of time to do anything other than take things off the flip charts but he believes they are at the point where people can break up into groups with their project leaders.
M. Sullivan said the project leaders for Rural Economic Development are Stutsman and R. Sullivan and five Goal-Setting Strategic Objectives have been laid out. He said they also laid out six Performance Activities, or things that need to be done in order to achieve the goals. M. Sullivan said resources needed were the Budget Coordinator and Planning and Zoning staff. He said the Board told him they wanted to continue to have meetings once a month to review objectives, though the target date to achieve the goals is two years. M. Sullivan said effectively the Board would start on July 1, 2008. He asked if the Board wanted him to go through each objective individually and Stutsman and Neuzil said yes, that might be a good idea.
M. Sullivan said the multi-year Strategic Plan project leaders are R. Sullivan, himself, and Budget Coordinator Rich Claiborne. He said Claiborne has a role in the resources because he is the finance guy. M. Sullivan said the last time the Board met they established five objectives regarding the multi-year Strategic Plan to enhance public information activities, which is something the Board has talked about for a quite a while. He said the resources used to achieve that would be all the elected officials and County department heads. Neuzil asked if the role of the project leaders is to build off of the issues and bring them back each month before the rest of the Board. M. Sullivan said yes. M. Sullivan said some people view short-term goals as goals taking 12-24 months to reach. He said in an operation this size a short-term goal can be reached in two years, and long-term goals can take five years or more.
Stutsman said she doesn't get the connection between 'Description of Goal-Setting' and 'Strategic Objectives.' She asked where it reads, 'Performance Activities' and 'Enhance Public Information Activities,' how it addresses the need for '2. Creating a triage policy when dealing with budget shortfalls.' M. Sullivan said the Board still has to formulate them; the Triage Policy was targeted more towards the Mental Health/ Disability Services (MH/DS). He said there is a shortfall in reserves like running into a close budget. M. Sullivan said all of the goals tie into working closer with the print media and editorial boards because that is imperative. Neuzil and Stutsman agreed. Neuzil said both radio stations KCJJ (1630 AM) and KXIC (800 AM) indicated they would love to have County government on the air on a weekly basis as part of their shows. Meyers asked if he meant talk shows and Neuzil said yes. M. Sullivan said that is a great idea. Neuzil said it is something to think about. M. Sullivan said he will certainly work on that.
M. Sullivan said the Green Initiatives leaders are Meyers and Neuzil. He said this was talked about quite a bit the last time the Board met; about creating a Green Team between the County and the community. M. Sullivan said with the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI) membership and the Green Building Council membership, Assistant Planner Josh Busard's recent certification, and Facilities Director David Kempf's background, the Board has the resources to achieve those goals. He said this is an overview because there hasn't been much time to talk because there has been so much going on with the flood. Neuzil said it is helpful to have everything on paper and Stutsman agreed.
M. Sullivan said the Metropolitan Transit Plan leaders are Stutsman and Meyers. He said there are great resources available including the Johnson County Council of Governments (JCCOG), and one of three specific objectives was work directly with JCCOG. M. Sullivan said another objective was sending a letter to the Johnson County Council of Governments indicating the Board's interest and intent in participating in the development of such a plan. He said that hasn't been done because it is for the project leaders to work on and Stutsman agreed. M. Sullivan said the other objective was the evaluation of a satellite parking site with a shuttle system for County employees. He said he still thinks that is a great idea and won't be too difficult for the Board to participate there. M. Sullivan said he could work with Information Services (IS) and do one of the two online employee surveys that are done from the Human Resources Department. He said the goal is to try and pique the interest of the employee in starting a similar service. M. Sullivan said that would be easy for the IS Department to set that up and he himself can be a resource.
Meyers said a survey would be a good place to start; to find out if anyone even wanted to participate in that. Neuzil asked if the Board had assigned someone. Stutsman said the Parking Committee and Neuzil apologized and said he was thinking of JCCOG. Stutsman said yes, she is on it and R. Sullivan is on the housing one. M. Sullivan said Stutsman's participation with JCCOG is the reason she is down as a project leader on the Metropolitan Transit Plan. He said at some point in time, maybe 10 or 15 years down the road, the quarter rail system could be a metropolitan transit plan if you're transporting people from Linn County through the corridor to Iowa City/Coralville. M. Sullivan said that is another thing that could become a corridor transit system. Neuzil said North Dubuque Street is a road that is brought up every so often. He said he has talked to some people who want the Board to consider creating an extra lane of traffic for buses. M. Sullivan said that densely populated area would be a hub for this kind of thing.
Neuzil said the Board needs to think about the peripheral roads that connect major cities. M. Sullivan said the population is growing quickly and the estimate is now up to 125,000, though he would not be surprised to see the number rise from the Houston Effect from Hurricane Katrina (i.e. people from Linn County moving to Johnson County because of the flooding). He said he could see it happening because they are not going to decide what to do with homes up there for probably at least another a year. Neuzil said that the Board should think about the North Liberty to Coralville and Tiffin to Coralville connections in particular.
M. Sullivan said the other really big objective is the new Justice Center. He said the project leaders for that are Neuzil and Harney and they have talked for a number of years about things appearing in the goal descriptions and the strategic objections. M. Sullivan said these need to be as fluid as possible because of environmental changes. He said the Criminal Justice Coordinating Committee (CJCC) Coordinator position is being discussed now and the Johnson County Bar Association is now involved in discussions of financing options. M. Sullivan said one issue still needing definition is a jail versus a justice center; that is a goal that has to be laid out. He said the location of the structure needs to be determined as does determining the actual operations expenses to run the facility.
M. Sullivan said he talked to the Durrant Group yesterday and their findings/report should be done and finalized in two weeks. Neuzil asked if Durrant Group Representative Mike Lewis was going to come during a Board meeting and M. Sullivan said yes, he asked Lewis to come in and present during a Board meeting. He said otherwise it could be presented during a joint CJCC Board meeting because from now on the two are combined. M. Sullivan said the Board didn't have a quorum of committee members for the CJCC meeting the other day. M. Sullivan said the Board has been having those meetings on the first Wednesday of every other month. Stutsman asked if the Board is having a joint meeting next month. M. Sullivan said yes, there will be a joint meeting on the first Wednesday in August. He said that will time out with Lewis getting his stuff done, and Lewis will come any time the Board wants him to. M. Sullivan said his thought was to bring Lewis in for the joint meeting and then for the Board meeting. Neuzil said he thinks the committee process will probably work best and M. Sullivan said OK.
M. Sullivan said the Board will have two different settings; one with the CJCC meeting where they will have questions and one live evening meeting with the media and the public where they can ask questions. He said a meeting every month may be too much. Stutsman said she thinks it is too much; no one really has anything to say. M. Sullivan said the Board has a lot in progress right now. M. Sullivan said things will change, it is such a fluid design. He said they are going to push for a two-year time frame; some of this stuff is already in progress but he thinks it is good for the Board to sit and review everything today.
M. Sullivan said the last goal is the Secondary Roads infrastructure. He said this is another big project that operates under a separate budget. M. Sullivan said the flooding has impacted the project and there is a lot of policy review and revision that is starting up. He said the following day there will be the first hearing on the amendment to the zoning ordinance that deals with gravel roads and chip seal roads. He asked if it was on road counts. Meyers confirmed. M. Sullivan said it is in progress but will take a lot of time. He said that soon the Board will get an overview impact of the flooding on County roads. M. Sullivan said it is fortunate that they know the bridges are OK because they have already been inspected. Stutsman asked if the Hills bridge is open. M. Sullivan said he doesn't know if there have been divers in the water yet to inspect it. Neuzil said the Highway 965 bridge is open and that is good. Meyers asked if divers have inspected the Park Road bridge yet. M. Sullivan said the Park Road bridge is a problem because of the amount of debris underneath it. He said the Hills bridge was a problem because it had a pretty large vortex of water on one side; you could actually hear the sucking sound when you stood down there. M. Sullivan said the inspectors want that down below the 22-foot flood stage which, barring any more rain, the water should reach pretty quickly. He said the inspectors are getting pretty close to dropping it to 10,000 cubic feet per second out of the spillway, and he thinks Dubuque Street, which goes over it, at 12,000-16,000 cubic feet per second will start to recede. M. Sullivan said he has a feeling that the Park Road bridge may be closed for a while just because there is so much debris and the divers have to go by feel because they cannot see anything down there. He said the Hills bridge will most likely be open before the Park Road bridge is because there was some scouring on the bridge. Stutsman said she has heard all sorts of rumors like that piers have been sitting on nothing.
M. Sullivan said there was something else in the report about the best practices regarding rural road design, engineering, and construction. He said County Engineer Greg Parker would be one of the better resources for information but it is something the Board needs to gather information on what other counties across the country are doing. M. Sullivan said that while the Board is attending the National Association of Counties (NACo) conference the following week, it would be a good opportunity to ask about what other counties are doing with regard to road design, engineering, and construction. He said the Board could certainly look at doing the same things other counties in the country are doing rather than reinventing the wheel. M. Sullivan said frankly, there might be issues at the conference about justice centers and jails. Neuzil said green initiatives and Meyers agreed. Neuzil said he has already spoken with a few people who have talked to Kempf about some stuff. M. Sullivan said the Board could take the material with them to the NACo conference and make changes to the goals. Neuzil asked if the plan is still to hold the meetings on the first Wednesday of every month and M. Sullivan said yes, this is just a particularly hard month for the Board because they have so many meetings, the fair, NACo, etc.
R. Sullivan arrived at 9:29 a.m.
M. Sullivan asked how many Board members are going to the NACo conference and Neuzil said three. Neuzil said County Recorder Kim Painter dropped out but County Sheriff Lonny Pulkrabek is going. M. Sullivan said Pulkrabek told him at the Emergency Operations Center that he was going to the conference, and Neuzil said Pulkrabek wanted to do the same thing (i.e. find out what other counties are doing) with the jail issues. M. Sullivan said all he wanted to do was go over this stuff and review it with the Board. Neuzil said it does help to stay on task because in the past sometimes the Board would miss meetings one month and then another month. M. Sullivan said in reading through the Iowa State Association of Counties (ISAC) legislative priorities, he found a few things that will integrate into some strategic performance activities. Neuzil said the Board's goal is for each of the two subcommittee members to get together before the next meeting to review the papers. M. Sullivan agreed.
Neuzil said it would be helpful in the future to get an understanding of what M. Sullivan wants; to go beyond making a list and identifying things. He said he knows everyone has gone to 10 different seminars that tell them to do it 10 different ways to structure and achieve things. Neuzil said it would be helpful to have a work session or a strategic planning session so the Board knows how to plan better. Stutsman asked Neuzil if he was asking about the how to. Neuzil said that is what he is asking. He said what they have is really good and well-structured. Stutsman agreed and said it is a great start. Neuzil repeated it would be helpful to know how to make the lists correctly and how to focus better. M. Sullivan said the sooner the Board does it the better off they will be at understanding it. Stutsman said she may start to play around with some action plans Neuzil said he’d like to see the Board develop an action plan, to go beyond the list.
Adjourned at 9:35 a.m.
Attest: Tom Slockett, Auditor
By John Deeth, Recording Secretary