• Information Services (07)
• Technology (40)

• Recorder (11)
• Recorder’s Records Management (87)

• Senior Dining (53)
• Nutrition Trust (83)

• Secondary Roads (49)
• Road Construction Escrow (48)
• Weed Eradication (55)

• Health (04)
• SIH Consortium Trust (89)

• Emergency Management (09)

Chairperson Stutsman called the Johnson County Board of Supervisors to order in the Johnson County Administration Building at 9:00 a.m. Members present were: Charles Duffy, Jonathan Jordahl, Mike Lehman, Sally Stutsman, and Carol Thompson.

Information Services Director Jean Schultz said the Fiscal Year 2001 Department 07 budget didn’t change very much. She said she adjusted some accounts to make them match what they actually spent. Schultz decreased the Community Service Bureau line by $2,000 because the Johnson County Community Network will no longer be hosting the County’s web pages because the County has purchased its own web server. Schultz increased staff registration fees by $1,400. Schultz said the non-personnel budget decreased by $170.

Schultz said on the technology worksheet, the Hardware Maintenance Contract for the HP-3000 mini-computer increased from $5,000 to $8,500 because it is now paid off and they have to start paying a maintenance agreement on some of the hardware. She said the 939 lease purchase will soon be paid off so that line item will decrease $26,000. Schultz said the Software Maintenance Contract line item decreased by $11,000 because they will no longer have their accounts payable and general ledger under maintenance because they can no longer get a maintenance contract on that. She said the $6,000 software purchase that she put on a decision package will be used to buy department specific software. Schultz said last year her request was $191,000, but this year it’s $158,000.

Schultz requested another $100,000 this year for Payroll/HR/Financial Software. Stutsman asked if $200,000 is enough if the Board approves it. Schultz and Budget Coordinator Jeff Horne said they didn’t know. Schultz said it depends if they do just HR/ Payroll software first or if they do a whole system. Stutsman asked if they could add components on to the system. Schultz said it makes sense to do Payroll/HR together first because they don’t have HR software and their payroll system is the oldest system they have and reporting requirements are changing next year. Jordahl asked about incorporating case management software into this. Horne said a modular system might be more practical because you can find synergy between different kind of systems with functions. Schultz said often the companies that write accounts payable, general ledger and budgeting software do not write payroll software, but they have interfaces already written between systems. Jordahl said to the extent that they can find synergies or efficiencies they should be alert to that. Schultz and Horne agreed.

Schultz listed the following goals for the Information Services Department: upgrade 2 network servers, 32 PC’s and 15 printers to continue the 5 Year Replacement Program keeping people’s equipment and the servers up to date; selection and implementation of new Payroll/HR software and possibly full financial software; increase the availability of County information via the Internet; expand the use of document management in the County; and expand the technical expertise of employees. Jordahl said their first goal is really a benchmark and the goal should be follow the 5 Year Replacement Program.

Thompson asked why the HR software is listed in the Information Services budget rather than the technology budget. Schultz the HR software was on the technology worksheet and everything on the technology worksheet ends up going into the Department 40 budget. She said the Department 40 budget includes what they refer to as central technology accounts which are keeping up the networks and the 5-year replacement and also includes money that’s designated for specific departments. Horne said they have some departments who have circumvented this and have bought things off their office equipment line item. Stutsman said that was exactly what they wanted to avoid. The Board and Schultz discussed the Department 40 budget requests from other departments and the proper way to keep track of them. Stutsman said this is something they need to discuss when the budget process is over.

Schultz said she did want to go through the Central Technology budget for the line items that Information Services or the Computer Committees budget for. She said the Department 40 budget is confusing to look at because some of the things are designated department money, which they don’t budget for, and some things are central technology money. Stutsman suggested that Schultz try to pull all other departments central technology requests together and then come back to the Board to give the Department 40 presentation.

Lehman left at 9:30 a.m. Recessed at 9:33 a.m.; reconvened at 9:40 a.m. with Lehman present.

County Recorder Kim Painter gave the Board copies of last years and this years Strategic Planning documents and said the way she budgets revolves around Strategic Planning. Painter said the Recorder’s Office tends to be a revenue producer and as currently run, basically gives each citizen back $2.00 that the County would otherwise have to tax to cover programs and offices. She said Department 11 is the main budget for the office, which includes their salaries and benefits as well as the office operating expenses. For this year’s revenues, Painter predicted only a minor increase. Painter said the Recorder’s office has almost no control over their sources of revenue because it pertains to real estate and other items that are affected by interest rates and that type of thing. Painter said last year they had a decrease in their revenues in Department 11 primarily due to the fact that interest rates were going up and people were not financing mortgages or adding different kinds of loans on to their mortgages. She said the Recorder’s office is also always subject to dips in revenue and spikes in revenue based on whether or not it’s a licensing year for boats, snowmobiles and ATV’s, and Fiscal Year 2000 was not a licensing year, but Fiscal Year 2001 will be.

For Fiscal Year 2002, Painter cut the Department 11 non-personnel budget by 9.5% because their costs have decreased due to document management technologies. Painter said, in looking at the Fiscal Year 2000 and also the Fiscal Year 2001 totals and reestimates, the budget has steadily decreased from the Fiscal Year 1999 actual. She said they now have a much clearer operating budget. Painter said the first thing she did was reallocate monies for staff and officer participation in conferences because this is a goal that she has. She said those will be funded by budget savings and the other line items areas, and it’s her hope that the Board would view that as supporting both fiscal responsibility and staff development. Thompson asked if the microfilming is tapering off and if eventually there won’t be any expense for that. Painter said they’re microfilming plats only, which is a small expense and they’re looking to scan those. Painter said the other area of increase is in the equipment area and it’s primarily a matter of clarification. She said the Recorder’s Budget 87 has really never appropriately shown the rental and leasing history that they’ve had with Icon Office Supply on photocopiers. Painter said she’s added dollars to the lines for office equipment maintenance and also office equipment rental to more accurately reflect the cost that they incur in photocopying and will review the costs the next time she gets a chance.

Painter said they do have decision package items that pertain to personnel. She said this focuses on an effort she wants to make to keep the office open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday because their 5:00 to 5:30 hours are the least efficient use of staff time. Painter said she bundled the new hours in with 2 part-time permanent positions. There is currently a permanent full-time Clerk II position vacant in the Recorder’s Office. Painter said she had been discussing the possibility of using 2 part-time people to help with the staffing, but what she is proposing now is to request that the Board change the vacation to an Account Clerk II. Painter said the bottom line is that their personnel total will go from $347,086 to $346,743. Thompson said a full-time person would get benefits and she likes that a lot more than hiring 2 part-time people. Jordahl said Painter is welcome to run her office as she pleases as an elected official; however he does recall instances of people coming to the Recorder’s Office after 5:00 and it would be nice if Painter could systematically inform those people of changes to avoid frustration. Painter said she’s going to be looking at offering more types of .PDF forms that people can access on the website, and print off and mail in, and not have to drive to the office. She said they do have a drop box as well and an array of materials outside the door after hours so that people can leave them requests for items and fees and that type of thing. Stutsman asked if people used that. Painter said that they occasionally do. Duffy said they do, like deer hunting permits and things like that. Painter said people really like having access to the booklets.

Painter said Department 87, or the Recorder’s Records Management Fund, is the dollar fee that they get for placing into an interest bearing account in accordance with the Code. She said their office uses this money the way other departments use the Central Technology fund. She said they have 5 public search PC’s, 7 PC’s for the different staff areas, and several scanners that are all on a replacement schedule that they’ll be bearing themselves. Painter said when there is a possibility to do so, when they’re not in a year where they’re replacing equipment, she uses it for the things she has designated such as converting paper documents to images in order to open up additional space in the office. She said that’s where the largest items are in the budget, there’s $15,000 for records conversion. She said they purchase security paper for Vital Records, and they’re paying for that out of this budget. She said there’s some money for hardware maintenance and purchase. Painter said she’s decreasing her estimated total for this fund because they get their money from documents that they record and its hard to predict what the economy will do. Painter said she does like to keep the Board informed of what she’s doing with that money.

Jordahl asked as a continuing generosity on the part of Painter’s department to utilize recording fees to continue the electronification for the rest of the County, is she still subsidizing them. Painter said yes, she helps out in whatever ways she can, like with GIS. Jordahl said he want to make sure that Painter’s help doesn’t go unnoticed and also that the Board remain cognizant that if Painter asks for something and is also contributing something that the contribution not go unnoticed. Thompson asked how this money can be used. Painter said the verbiage is for the technological upgrading of Recorder’s records. She said she uses that a little bit more broadly when she can and just tries to be helpful and not put extra burden on the technology fund. She said she thinks it’s fair to replace equipment out of this, because they’re upgrading technology.

Painter said she wanted to talk briefly about the COTT real estate indexing system. Painter said the COTT system was not talked about favorably during the County’s computer studies. She said she wanted to let the Board know that COTT has made a lot of changes and that they now have COTT available on their network PC’s. She said that all of the County offices that need to look at the real estate index now use their Reflection software package and they access COTT from their own desk and their own departments, instead of having to come into the Recorder’s office. She said that’s new since they began to work with Document Management and have gone to network PC’s instead of terminals. She said it’s her plan to purchase a remote user tracking software package from COTT sometime during the next 12 months which is a license that allows for an unlimited amount of offsite users to dial in and access the real estate index from their home or office. She said this could be a big personnel time saver for them if banks and lending institutions wish to subscribe locally to this service that they will hopefully be able to offer. Thompson asked if subscribe implies revenue. Painter said it does and she needs to think about that and visit with the Board about that. She said she has 2 minds about that, as they get technology and can make new services available, she thinks they need to come up with fees, especially for people who stand to make money from the data or use the data in the course of their normal business. She said for individual subscriber fees, that’s an interesting discussion they haven’t had yet. She said she knows some people feel strongly they shouldn’t have to pay. Painter said there’s also a system upgrade with a new point-of-sale or front counter fee software module from COTT. She said this would allow them to assign book and page numbers at the front counter instead of at the back. She said customer receipts could be printed that would show their recorded documents book and page numbers right at the front counter, which would be a huge change in how they do everything.

Recessed at 10:10 a.m.; reconvened at 10:22 a.m. with Lehman absent.

Senior Dining Director Mike Foster said when he speaks of revenues and potential Heritage Agency on Aging appropriations it’s merely speculation at this point in time. He said they have to have their budget into Heritage by January 2nd, 2001. Foster said their first goal/decision package is to reduce turnover and enhance recruiting abilities by enhancing salaries and parking availability, and to make their salaries competitive and reflective of job description responsibilities. He said he has gone through all of their positions with the exception of himself and the home delivered meals manager. Foster took all of these positions and bumped them up one salary range, with the exception of the computer person who he bumped up 2 ranges, which comes to a pretty dramatic increase. He also would like to add a food service supervisor who will be a working supervisor and cross-trained in all the activities within the kitchen. This will allow Foster more time for administrative duties, and since they’ve become so decentralized, also allow him an opportunity to get to other meal sites to do more public relations work. Stutsman asked if any other positions are being eliminated for this new position. Foster said in terms of hands on people, there will be no more people in the kitchen because he is requesting an elimination of the cook’s helper janitor position, which results in a reduction of $16,050. The food service supervisor will result in an increase of $21,000. Foster said if you add all the range increases, delete the one position and add the one position, you come up with $18,900 increase in personnel. Foster said they’re requesting 5 parking places in the Chauncey Swan ramp at $40 a month to enhance their ability to recruit people.

Thompson asked about the new pay grades. Foster said pay grade 10 would be eliminated and they would still have 2 people on pay grade 11. Stutsman said she was confused about who’s going to pay for this and if it would be submitted to Heritage too. Foster said that’s what he needs to know from the Board, in terms of direction, because he assumes Heritage will not buy into this. Jordahl recommended that Foster work with Human Resources Administrator Lora Shramek on this point. Foster said he discussed it with her, but in terms of working on the numbers, he has not worked with her. Jordahl said that although Foster is having trouble with staff turnover, he should not have manipulated the pay scale that was established through the salary survey. He said before they approve anything like that they better have a conversation with Shramek. Foster said he did meet with her in terms of the job description. He said the direction they’re looking towards going is revising the structure of jobs and rewriting the job descriptions, which would indicate the pay is warranted. He said they are going to cross train everyone which will be reflected in the job descriptions. Jordahl said that places quite a burden on Shramek because she has to assist with that, proof it and make sure that that’s consistent with everything else that’s going on. Jordahl said one of the goals with the salary survey was that all departments would be looked at the same time. He said it was precisely foreseen that it would not occur that departments would seek to gain increases for their employees within the salary matrices by reclassifying people. He said the classifications should accurately reflect the duties and that’s why worksheets were sent out to do that. He said in order to justify a reclassification of Foster’s employees, there should be a real difference in what Foster’s asking them to do. He said the cross-training should be something that is different from what was occurring at the time that the salary survey was done. Thompson said Shramek says when she reviews a position, one of the factors that she looks at is comparable salary. She said if that has changed in the community since the original review was done, that would give them more points. Stutsman said she agrees with what Jordahl said, if the Board is expected to pay the bill, then you have to play by the rules. She said in the scheme of things, maybe it’s not that much money, but if they have every department coming in and saying they want to upgrade all of their employees one salary range, it would be a lot of money. Thompson asked how many descriptions this encompasses. Foster said part of what they’re going to do is condense them, for instance, making the food production positions applicable to all people. Foster said it would be 15 separate job descriptions. Thompson said that’s a lot of work for Shramek. Foster said they’re working together on it, basically what their plan is, is that Shramek will work with him in terms of creating the first one, checking it, editing it, making it ADA acceptable, then he’ll do them on his own from there on. He said they’ll do them one by one. Stutsman said it almost sounds like Foster’s talking about a reorganization. Foster said no, not necessarily, but they do need to look at their structure in terms of future growth.

Foster said their second goal is to increase units of service goals to be measured monthly. He said they’re anticipating serving more people. He said they are currently serving more people than their projected goal this year. Foster anticipated, with the ramp opening in March and they could really go over their anticipated goals this year. Thompson said she thought when she was talking with Heritage, they told them that if they served more meals that they could reestimate their budget with them in order to draw down more of the USDA money. Foster said he didn’t believe they would actually receive USDA money. Foster said they’ve never approached them for more money for food, generally speaking they’ve had maneuverability within the budget to cover those types of items. He said if they could show the growth on a prolonged basis, but a lot of it depends on when the ramp is done and cost of parking.

Foster said another part of this goal is increasing their food costs. He said last year they asked for $1.40, but only received a $1.27. He said they are again asking for increases in food costs. He said this is certainly in keeping with the Board of Supervisor’s goal in terms of continuing diversity, trying to be a model program. He said food costs are continually rising, and they need to continue their availability of offering heart healthy alternatives. Foster said he knows there’s been some discussion recently in terms of the recent evaluation of their program, that they’re serving too much food and that they need to reduce the amount of food they’re serving. Foster said he would anticipate that Heritage may or may not cover this in terms of revenues. He said he has to believe that they would certainly be willing to compromise on this, but he doesn’t firmly believe that they can continually not request food costs and not request increases in those food costs. Foster said he thinks their costs are certainly indicative of the fact that they do present a full meal in terms of courses, and he believes their quality is of a higher quality then some of their typical sites. He said they reviewed Heritage’s menus yesterday and theirs are significantly different then theirs. He said in order to attract people, particularly when this parking ramp opens, he doesn’t want to be serving hamburgers and hotdogs. Foster said they need to respond to people’s changing dietary habits. Duffy said they produce good meals up there and he hasn’t heard any complaints, but they can’t tell people what to eat.

Foster said their third goal is anticipated higher fuel costs, so their request for cost from $1.25 to $1.50 per gallon. He said he would not expect any resistance from Heritage in terms of revenues for this request. Foster said all the other budget items in their budget are status quo. Foster said the end result is this year their budget is $416,578. He said Heritage’s commitment to that is $369,918. He said their request for FY02 is $453,577 and that includes all the decision packages. Stutsman said this is difficult trying to figure out how much without knowing what Heritage is going to fund and Foster agreed. Foster said if he had to guess he would assume that Heritage is going to be willing to give them 3% of their personnel costs over and above what they’re covering this year. He said they covered $227,000 of their personnel costs so he projected they would increase their personnel cost by $6,600. Foster assumed that they’ll also cover the request for gas cost, $1,040. He said the $14,656 increase in food cost and increase in units of service is tough to guess what Heritage will do. Foster said if the Board assumes that Heritage does cover all of their requests, anticipated revenues would be $426,450, which would leave a gap of about $28,000. Foster guessed that Heritage would come up with approximately $392,000. Foster said this year Heritage gave them $369,000, but that’s given the fact that Heritage would reimburse them for the entire amount of raw food cost and gas cost. Jordahl said the raw food costs seem to be a real hard line for them. Thompson said, last year the raw food was based on a formula that had to do with your history from a couple of other years. Then they made some adjustment to that and gave you a number, which was uniform to the other counties but didn’t really have much to do with their actual performance. Jordahl said it didn’t have much to do with Johnson County costs.

Thompson said wondered what their would be for this year if they took out the old and plug in the new year in the formula, because they probably have more meals in the newer year. Foster said yes, and currently they’re about $1.40 right now in food costs, so it’s certainly in keeping with where they’re at right now. Foster said he thinks that they’re suggesting that they look at prime vendor bidding, look at their portion sizes, and look at the amount of potential menu items they’re serving. He said their suggestions through this evaluation that they only serve 4 menu items, rather than 5 menu items and still cover the RDA qualifications. Thompson asked if a lot of food gets thrown away because people don’t eat it. Foster said to some degree, some of those items you have to offer that amount however, otherwise they can’t qualify, and you have to serve a certain amount. Thompson asked if people are taking an extra dish of something and just leaving it on their tray. Lehman said he’s seen some people take it home.

Stutsman said the consideration for her is that, she completely supports having a good meal, having the variety, but she thinks that the Board has to recognize that if they’re going to continue having that as their policy then they’re going to have to pay for it, which means additional County dollars. She said each year they put more and more County dollars into this program, but there might be a time where they say how much additional County dollars are they going to put into this to supplement a federal program or do they need to start looking at ways to maybe cut back. She said that’s the dilemma for her, as a Board member. Foster said he recognizes that. He said one consideration is utilizing some of the trust money. He said they have quite a few resources in their trust dollars right now that they’re not even coming close to touching on the interest. Foster said they started a new campaign in terms of donations from the participants which is going quite well. Thompson asked if that shows up on Foster’s revenue page. Foster said no. Thompson said she didn’t see a replacement for the steamer. Foster said that’s in this years budget. Jordahl asked if the format of the offsetting donations been reviewed by Heritage. Foster said they haven’t received any comment. Thompson and Jordahl said they may want to ask them before they want the money.

Foster said he did not make any changes in Fund 83, but he made some subtle changes in the reestimated dollars. He said they just started this program in terms of the food fund, even at the time that he wrote this, he couldn’t speculate the revenues that would be generated from this. He said he did not change anything and did not make any decision packages. He said some of this was with the guidance of Chris Edwards in terms of they really don’t know what kind of revenues, they really don’t know whether someone is going to give them $5,000. Stutsman asked how they get a sense of drawing down the interest on this. Horne said it’d be a transfer from the donations revenue into the fund, into Department 53, the operating budget. He said they have to amend the operating budget for Department 53. Stutsman said she needs to have a plan how they’re going to spend these dollars. She said Foster says that there’s dollars in there that they’re not spending. She asked what the plan was, spending all the interest dollars to supplement, or is the Board supposed to make that determination.

Foster said he’s coming to the Board in terms of what the Board’s decision is, in terms of utilizing either more interest dollars or potentially even touching some of the principle. Thompson said they should do something like they did with Ambulance under the guidance of the Ambulance Committee, where they review each donation. She said that maybe the Nutrition committee could review the donations monthly. Stutsman said that sounds like that’s for one-time expenses. Thompson said they need to have a budget. Horne said yes, it has to be set up in the budget. He said they draw interest from other accounts, it would just have to be reallocated into 53, into the operating budget.

Foster said one thing the Board may want to consider is throughout the years they have had a significant amount of unspent interest that potentially could be used as carryover. Jordahl asked where that is represented. Horne said he’d have to look at the balance. Thompson asked if that went to the general fund. Foster said that’s something that Edwards can calculate for them. Horne said County Treasurer Tom Kriz gives him a monthly report on the interest from the various accounts and he can get that when they have a break. Stutsman said that to her has to be part of the budget deliberations with this department. Stutsman said she could see not touching the principle, but she can’t see letting the interest sit there just to accumulate. He said it is a budgetary decision as to whether they want to minimize the County’s current budget tax dollar contribution to this program by taking those interest dollars out, or whether they want to consider growing the trust fund so that they have some power to sustain this program through lean times. Stutsman said it sounds like they’re at the lean time, Heritage isn’t giving them anymore money. She said this may be the time where this starts to kick in. Foster said he recognizes this is a new frontier for all of them, but it’s something worth considering in terms of offsetting some of the shortages. Foster asked if the Board had any idea what the COLAs might be for next year. Stutsman said no. Foster said he has to start on Heritage’s budget and he just needs some guidance in terms of what that might be. Horne said he’ll see what he can get and he’ll drop Foster a note.

Stutsman asked Shramek if she was aware of the Nutrition program’s proposal to increase all the salaries one step. Human Resource Administrator Lora Shramek said she hadn’t actually seen the proposal. She said she had a very good meeting with Foster about the Nutrition department and the job structure. She said they went through each person, what their duties are and they talked about where he wants to go in the future. Shramek said they can devise a plan and try to get there incrementally. Shramek said some of the people might not be interested in having their jobs altered, but they could that through attrition. Shramek said it’s important to look at the big picture so that Foster can put in place and revision where he wants the department to go. She said it’s very hard for them to just go in and individually start updating the job descriptions without a plan. Stutsman asked if Shramek had the time to do this plan. Shramek said yes, she will work with Foster. She said it’s a very scary thing having to redo everything, but it’s not like they’re starting completely from scratch. Thompson said with cross training, in which Foster has been doing, maybe he could end up with less job descriptions, which would save a lot of time.

(Continued in Part 2)