COUNTY ATTORNEY J. PATRICK WHITE: AGREEMENT REGARDING MEDICOLEGAL INVESTIGATION SERVICE (COUNTY MEDICAL EXAMINER)

Lehman: OK. Next is Business from the County Attorney. A report and discussion agreement regarding the medical, legal…

Lyness: Sure. Why don’t you go ahead and come up. This is Jeff Gaulthier, from the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, who I apologize, has been sitting here all morning waiting for this agenda item.

Gaulthier: I learned a lot.

Lyness: Pat had to leave. He couldn’t stay. He has been the one who actually has been working on this agreement. If you want to put it on for next week you can go ahead and do that. Jeff is here. I think you should go ahead and take the opportunity to visit with Jeff. To get to Pat’s bottom line, he is going to recommend approval of this. I can kind of fill you in. There have been ongoing negotiations between the County and medical examiner, University Hospitals, etc. in terms kind of what the change is going to be. Dr. Bozek was part-time, single, solo practitioner kind of thing who had a little bit of flexibility in terms of his time. Now, working with Dr. White, obviously he is in a structural setting at the University Hospitals. It’s going to be kind of a different arrangement than we have with the medical examiner. So, this was an attempt to try to kind of formalize exactly what is going to go on, what the billing process is going to be, kind of what the agreement about what is going to happen is. There has been a lot of negotiation back and forth, just from my having looked at the file a little bit yesterday in terms of what should be included in here. So, just to tell you, our position is that we recommend approval. Go ahead Jeff, if you want to kind of talk to some of the specifics about what the negotiation was.

Gaulthier: Well indeed it does reflect what is now in place and has been operating since the 2nd of January. What we have been negotiating is basically just grammatical issues regarding the language in the agreement. Since Dr. White is an employee of the University of Iowa and has contractual arrangements with the faculty practice plan. We had to incorporate that language into the document in order to make it work in our system. So, you’ll see on the signature page, it’s got everybody there, which is unfortunate that we have to go to that direction, but that’s the system I work in and that’s what we need to have. So, working with Pat, we were able to answer, I think, and deal with his concerns and correct emphasis and our turning over at the Hospital. Bill Hesson has looked at it. He is comfortable with it, we’re ready to go and meanwhile the service is being provided basically on handshake, that this is what we have decided. There is no budget impact on this. Everything that’s reflected in this document has already been accommodated in the budget proposals that we have worked together with previously. So, we agreed also, we’d like to have your support, sign your agreement, put it in the file, let us get on with the job that we have been asked to do.

Lyness: I would emphasize, too, Pat also even said that this is really just kind of putting it in writing what we’ve been doing. It’s not really a change. It doesn’t have a budget impact.

Stutsman: I remember when we first talked about the change over, this is one of the things that the University asked that we have in place. Just working with that system.

Gaulthier: Pat, (inaudible) point said that he didn’t feel that the County actually needed the agreement. I said I understand but I am kind of here asking for your indulgence that we do this. It makes it work for our people and we can all get on down the road.

Stutsman: If Pat recommends it I don’t have any problem putting it on next week for final approval.

Thompson: I don’t either. It doesn’t mention the records that we already have and what we are going to do about those. Does Pat have a recommendation about that?

Gaulthier: What he is going to do. He kind of left that up to him to figure that one out. We’re maintaining all of the new records and he was going to try to capture the old ones. I have no idea.

Stutsman: Jeff, did you have a comment?

Horne: We’ve been working on it for awhile. I need to meet with Mark and see if we can find between 8-12 file cabinets of old records and try to find room in the storage building.

Thompson: So, you don’t intend to take custody of those old records.

Gaulthier: Yes, Dr. White has made it clear that he has no need for those.

Horne: They’re not something we would need to access (inaudible) just need to have secure storage.

Thompson: Even if they were in storage, should there be access in a reasonable amount of time.

Horne: I would think so.

Lehman: OK. Does everyone feel comfortable with that as it’s presented and take action next week. OK. I apologize.

Gaulthier: No apologies necessary.

Lehman: No charge for the education though.

Gaulthier: I apologize for having to exit several times with pagers and phones and I was able to do what I had to do, but thank you.

Lehman: We’ll put this on for next week and I don’t believe will have to attend.

Stutsman: No.

Gaulthier: OK. That will be fine. Thank you.

Harney: Thanks Jeff.

Lehman: Thank you.

Stutsman: I was going to say one advantage of being at the end of the agenda, the Board is much more accommodating. We’ll move along.

Lehman: OK. County Attorney, any other reports or inquiries?

Lyness: No, thanks.

Lehman: Any others? OK.

Lehman: Business from the Board of Supervisors. We have Discussion Action Needed Here for Proposal from the Iowa State Extension Service. Sally, I believe you and Carol had worked on…

Stutsman: Right. Carol do you want to talk or do you want me to? Well, this came out of a suggestion that we have some kind of training session for people that we appoint to Boards and Commissions. To update the Board and refresh your memory, there was a problem with one of the Boards and Commissions, some complaints from the public about interaction with the public. So, at that time we started to talk about, well, we appoint these people to Boards and Commissions, but we don’t do much as far as giving them direction or orientation about how you interact with the public or what the Board expects or things. From there, Carol went ahead and contacted Jean Moline from the Extension Service. Carol and I met with Jean last week and Jeff Zacharias-Yutz, to talk about putting together some kind of meeting that would be open to any of the people that are appointed to Boards and Commissions. So, you have a letter in your packet with kind of an overview about what they were putting together. We just wanted to get an OK from the Board to go ahead and proceed with that. I love the titles that they suggested. The Trials and Tribulations of Being a Public Servant or So, You Want to Be a Public Servant. From there it would be just talking about how to run a meeting, talking about how to be respectful, just kind of those protocols and things. They had done this before across the State, so they are a good resource to tap into. There would be some cost involved. Carol, did you have a rundown on how many people this would…

Peters: It’d be about $1,500.

Stutsman: $1,500.

Peters: After (inaudible) they do provide, they could provide 2 separate meetings. One that addresses strictly meeting laws, criteria, what have you, and then Sutherland would be professionalism of a Board or Committee Member.

Harney: Do they have a limitation on the class size?

Peters: No. This would be an hour and a half to 2 hours. It would be like an assembly type class. There would be an opportunity for questions and answers, but it would be mostly just to facilitate what is expected of a person serving on such a board. It wouldn’t be addressing just one type, like just Zoning or Nutrition. This would be broad based so it would address anybody that would serve on the Board of Commission.

Thompson: Attendance would be voluntary on the part of the Commission?

Stutsman: Right.

Thompson: Do we have any indication that Commission Members would attend this?

Peters: No.

Lehman: We had 3 dates here. Carol suggested, due to some other conflicts, June 5th might be a date. Is there a chance we might want to offer more than one date because of conflict?

Stutsman: Well, the person who would be doing this is from Iowa State Extension in Ames. So, I think we would have to coordinate and I think these are the dates that he was available. We could, but it probably would depend on his schedule, when he’d be available.

Lehman: I was going to say, if we set it far enough ahead of time, the majority of people would be able to attend, make changes in their schedule, try to get as many people as we can.

Peters: Now, of the 145 people that (inaudible) you actually do appoint a lot more people to boards and commissions other than that. But, the ones that I focused on were Ambulance Advisory Committee, Board of Health, Building Code Study Committee, people that are studying the Sensitive Area ordinances, Veterans Affairs, Compensation Board, Conservation Board, Historic Preservation Committee, Integrated Roadside Vegetation Management, MHDD Planning Council, Nutrition Board, SEATS Advisory, Social Welfare/Cluster Board and the Zoning Commission and Zoning Board of Adjustments.

Lehman: What is the thinking, that this is something you might offer every 2-3 years? I know our Township Trustees, is that done annually?

Peters: I think it’s every 2 years, after an election.

Lyness: I think we’re looking at that for fall, too.

Lehman: It’s unlikely we’re going to get 100% participation, but to have some type of target and by offering it again in a year or 2, we catch new appointees as well.

Stutsman: Ideally, too, we’d have it in January, right after they are appointed. I think the majority of them are appointed so that they start in January. But, I think it would be good to have it every 2 or 3 years, just to get it on a regular cycle.

Peters: The other thing you could do, you could try taping it and then when people are appointed (inaudible) the tape is available for them to use.

Lehman: Good idea.

Stutsman: Part of it would be going to the Open Meetings Law. But, I think the main emphasis would be, how to be respectful to the public, how to handle criticism, how to keep a meeting moving along, how to deal with difficult people, if that should that arise.

Lehman: I could attend the part just on keeping the meeting moving along.

Stutsman: Sometimes no amount of input helps.

Lehman: OK.

Peters: I do wish to draw your attention to the fact that this money has not been budgeted. So, I’ll have to visit with Jeff.

Lehman: OK. What is the consensus of the Board? To tentatively set it up for the 3rd day here, June 5th?

Stutsman: It seems like things are getting so busy between April and May and time to get notification out.

Peters: Jeff if he could get Mr. (inaudible) report sometime in July. It’s kind of a slower month.

Lehman: We want to tentatively reserve that June 5th date and see if he might have a later date.

Thompson: Any much later than that and you start with vacations and that eats into your attendance too.

Welsh: For what its’ worth I think Carol raises a good question. What does the film need? Who are the people on the Boards and Commissions. Mr. White sent out a letter after the last episode to all of the people in relation as far as suggested procedure. They’ve received the open meetings law. If there is something that you feel there is value in having the meeting you can have somebody remind them of that. That is surely something the County Attorney’s Office could do and have done (inaudible). The other thing is that it makes more sense to me if your going to do it do it in the year you have the appointments. If people are fresh and have them appointed. (Inaudible).

Lehman: Some pro’s and cons there. We haven’t done this before. It would behoove us to get the thing started.

Thompson: It would be sort of sad to spend 1,500 and not have anyone come.

Lehman: Yes.

Stutsman: We did the background work. There’s nothing to say we don’t put it off until January if that’s what the Board wants to do. I think we’ve got the framework. I don’t think there will be any problem with just saying well.

Peters: I don’t really know how much interest there would be however I know reverend Welsh had mentioned to me one other time with some of the people that had been appointed to the Social Welfare Board, what was expected of them and of course they had his wonderful guidance to get them to where they were going. You’ve had that some question with some of the other people who aren’t used to being involved in public actively. They want to get involved, they don’t know exactly how to except to apply for a Board or Commission then they’d like to know afterwards which staff support there is for them.

Thompson: What’s the cancellation policy? If we ask people to respond by May 20th and then we didn’t’ get enough responses to have the class could we still cancel?

Peters: That’s no problem.

Lehman: If there might be some route to do that. Just to get a bearing the first time. I know the township trustees, I don’t know what percentage of turnout we have, but that’s very well attended. There isn’t a great deal of turnover there but those individuals keep coming back and they have questions and things.

Peters: You’ll probably have a larger turnout this next time because of the changes in the law.

Lehman: I kind of like that approach if we couldn’t do some kind of RSVP. Are you still looking at June 5 or do you want to look at a later date.

Peters: Maybe a suggestion would be to wait until after January first and start working on this as soon as people are appointed. Have everything ready to go, send the letters out, ascertain the interest and…

Thompson: I think when people are first appointed they feel a little unsure of themselves so they’d be more likely to…

Stutsman: I think that is a good point.

Lehman: I’d rather start with… Create an anniversary time there.

Neuzil: Is this just for those boards and commissions or is this something that could involve more groups.

Stutsman: The more you involve…

Neuzil: But I mean if we’re worried about attendance.

Peters: I think it’s a case of learning as we go. Walk before we run.

Lehman: What’s the consensus, maybe put it on hold and research it for a January start date.

Stutsman: I think get back to Jeff and say we definitely want to proceed but maybe want to wait until January and have everything in place and RSVP.

Thompson: We could send out the notice with the notice that people have been appointed.

Stutsman: Look at the end of January.

Thompson: They get their fat packet about the open meetings law which makes you think gee maybe I need more help here.

Lehman: Lets pursue that in January.

Peters: Thank you very much.

Lehman: Reports and inquiries do we want to hold off on that in light of the time.

Neuzil: I do have one thing and I brought these Iowa City Coralville Convention of Visitor Bureau with its new release. Inside it’s kind of neat because it has throughout it a nice little picture of the County Courthouse of the dome. It goes throughout the entire book which I thought was kind of a neat thing and it has a nice feature about the Courthouse as well, about the big celebration. They just came out 2 days ago.

Lehman: OK. Anybody else have any announcements they feel they need to…

Harney: I think there is one I would like to mention. I was going to do that in my report but we’re holding off on those. I would like to mention that we still have this ongoing saga with the County Jail. It was brought to my attention that there was 117 prisoners in the County Jail. These are not just overnight prisoners, these aren’t short terms. 18 of which are females and they’re expecting 2 more females today which is causing them to move people around. Their one cell block is already 16 people which is designed for 8. Which the double bunking allowed 16. So this means with the extra females coming in. They have to move some of the men out and they’re not sure what they’re going to have to do with those people, if they’re going to have to move or what we’re going to do with the population in the County Jail. Like I said they’re not short term. They are there for several days. The problem is still there.

Lehman: Carol had an item she wanted to check our calendars here to schedule our valuation process which is usually the first Wednesday of every month.

Peters: As you remember you’ve always set the first Wednesday of the month aside which the exception of the month of July for evaluation and work sessions, visits with other offices, what have you. On May 2nd you will have 2 pre-evaluations, one evaluation and your visit with the County Attorney’s Office. I did check with the County Attorney to see what his time availability was. He said he could meet on Wednesday afternoon or Tuesday the 8th in the morning. I thought given for as many items as you have you might want to…

Thompson: So you usually let our meeting spill into the next Wednesday but you’re saying we’d let this one spill over into the next Tuesday.

Lehman: I just wanted to check on some of those…

Neuzil: I do have a morning one but I could certainly miss that if that’s…

Peters: Now on the 8th it would be in the morning.

Neuzil: On the 8th I have an MH/DD.

Stutsman: What did we say? 9:00 on the 8th. I’ve got a doctors appointment at 8:30.

Neuzil: 10:00? That way I would be able to show up at the advocacy meeting for an hour.

Stutsman: So are we…

Peters: I’ll get back to Pat right away.

Thompson: We’re going to his place.

Peters: Yes.

Stutsman: Are we scheduled for a work session on the 9th too then?

Thompson: I wouldn’t think we’d need it.

Peters: On the 9th you have your meetings with the other cities.

Stutsman: But what we’ve kind of said if we can’t get everything done Wednesday of the 2nd then we spill over into the 9th.

Lehman: Reserve your morning of the 9th.

Thompson: The rest we have to do one pre-eval and one eval.

Lehman: We should be able to handle those. Stay focused.

Neuzil: I won’t be here.

Peters: To be honest I think they should be finished in that one morning.

Lehman: OK. That takes care of our calendar work.

Peters: Yes. Thank you very much.

Lehman: It took care of any announcements that you felt needed to get out today. Inquiries from the public?

Peters: Remind people of the spring cleanup.

Lehman: I don’t have that in front of me but it’s the first full week in June. Do you have the dates.

Peters: June 2nd through the 9th.

Lehman: It’s for county residents. They will allow up to 1,000 pounds free to the landfill. It will not include…

Peters: White items, tires, or yard waste.

Lehman: OK.

Peters: That doesn’t mean you can’t take white items out there. You can. It’s just that the expense is at your expense as opposed to the County’s expense.

Lehman: We’ll keep reminding people of that because I know we’ve had some inquiries already. OK. We’ll adjourn thank you.

Adjourned at 12:43 p.m.

Attest: Tom Slockett, Auditor

By Casie Parkins, Recording Secretary