Thompson: Business from the County Attorney?

White: There are a couple things to mention to you. I received the copy of a decision by the Iowa Court of Appeals yesterday in the case of Rudman versus City of Iowa City, City of Coralville, Johnson County and State of Iowa. The reason for mentioning to you this morning in report form and I’ll send you a copy is it really is the case that often times, maybe almost always when a public agency or anybody else in the public’s eye is sued, there’s a fair amount of publicity attendant to it. It gets fairly prominent coverage. We are always in the position of not being able to comment, sometimes because we haven’t seen the suit. Sometimes because it’s pending litigation and we’re prohibited from commenting and by the time it works it’s way through the courts it becomes a much less prominent story and that’s been the case with Rudman, which was decided yesterday. The claim was, this started in 1996 and that’s one of the reasons why it gets less attention when it finally gets decided. Fairly serious criminal situation, but the woman who had been the victim of an assault on a Sunday night sued Iowa City, Coralville, University Police and Johnson County claiming that on Friday and Saturday law enforcement should have arrested the person who assaulted her on Sunday night. Our role was as the custodian of the domestic abuse mandatory arrest registry. It was clear to me and our defense of the case was that the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office as they usually do did exactly what they were supposed to do. Did nothing wrong. Yet we spent thousands and thousands of dollars defending this litigation, which has now been decided in favor of all of the law enforcement entities including Johnson County. The question had to do with whether a no contact order was enforceable by mandatory arrest. Our Sheriff in cooperation with our Clerk, I think has actually been a leader in the State of Iowa in maintaining accurate mandatory arrest records. The prior offense that this individual was charged with was not a domestic abuse assault and so the no contact order that was in existence did not go on the registry and there was not a mandatory arrest. The Iowa Court of Appeals yesterday affirmed our view all along that not only our Sheriff, but Iowa City police, Coralville police and the University of Iowa police were guilty of no wrong doing whatsoever in this matter. Its just taken a long time for it to work its way through the process and for that to be confirmed by the courts. I also should mentioned to you last spring, the County Attorney’s Association asked me if they could submit my name to the Supreme Court for consideration to serve on a judicial redistricting committee. Literally that was 3 or 4 months ago and then a couple weeks ago I got a call from Justice Laborado asking if I would indeed serve on the committee. It’s one of those invitations that you really don’t turn down when a Chief Justice calls you to ask you to do this, but the time frame is fairly short. The committee’s work needs to be finished by December. But judicial redistricting is very important, so you’ll probably going to see me a little less between now and December while I’m working on that committee. I’ll mention to you part of what I was doing last week, which was really interesting. The Iowa Association of Counties has for a few years now sent it’s second vice-president to some other association’s annual conference. I’m currently the second vice-president. I spent Sunday through Wednesday of last week attending the Michigan Association of Counties Annual Conference. That was really a good use of time. I learned a lot. The theory is by the time you’re president, it’s helpful to you to have observed the way some other State runs it’s conference and some of the things that they do in operating their association. Within the first couple of hours of being there on Sunday afternoon it was obvious to me that the main issues that they were dealing with had a familiar ring to them, like increasing health insurance costs, judicial redistricting was interestingly enough was a topic of fairly hot debate up there and the state budget. Michigan has system of State revenue sharing for local government. The Michigan State budget for the current year includes $800,000,000 that the State Legislature appropriates to units of local government. $220 million of that go to counties in Michigan. As part of dealing with the budget situation that looks and sounds and walks and talks very similar to Iowa’s the Governor in Michigan vetoed that appropriation about 3 weeks ago. In a matter of two weeks, his veto was overridden by the Michigan legislature, which was still in session. It was just an extraordinary accomplishment for local government. The veto override passed both houses of the Michigan Legislature with only one dissenting vote in either house; a nearly unanimous override of a veto of funding for local government out of the State budget. They were probably not done entirely with that fight, but it’s a pretty remarkable illustration of what local government can do if it coalesces on a goal and works together in trying to get along with the state legislature. I’m sort of envious of their budget source, because we don’t have anything that approaches that.

Neuzil: Yes, we have unfunded mandates.

White: Well they do too.

Neuzil: They have some of those too.

White: But it was an interesting trip and interesting to visit with other county people who learn quickly that I’m a prosecutor because I asked a lot of questions in the 3 and the fraction days that I was there. But dealing with many of the same issues that we are.

Thompson: On the redistricting, will you be advocating for the boundaries for the court district to be the same as other boundaries like DHS.

White: Well that will certainly be an interest of mine. Unfortunately Iowa has so many different districts. The original Harold Hughes concept of uniform districts has long since been trashed. Those districts are still out there, but they’re seldom used. In fact not only Harold Hughes, but Bob Ray when he was governor tried to adhere to that same policy, but over the last 20, 25 years we’ve really gone away completely from that. The Chief Justice clearly wants to reduce the number of districts. In fact the real surprise that was in the Supreme Courts order, which came out I think Monday or Tuesday was… The charge to the committee is to reduce the current 8 districts to 6 or fewer. When we first started talking about who was going to serve on the committee, the charge seemed to sound like make recommendations for how many districts. But obviously the Supreme Court has applied it’s own hand in directing the committee to reduce the districts at least by 2, from the current 8 down to 6. But similarity of districts I think is important and it’s something the Judicial Branch, I don’t think, has given much thought to in the past. So short answer to your question is yes.

Harney: For what it’s worth I was going to mention I certainly support what I read in the paper about you wanting to keep in particular Cedar Rapids area, Linn County and Johnson County together because the 6th District here has worked very closely together and have been a model for much of the State and those districts the way they have proceeded and handled the probation, the parole system, things like that, the whole judicial system.

White: I agree. I’m pleased that Judge Remley, who is our Chief Judge and who I think does a real good job, not only substantively as a judge, but administering this district. He is one of the co-chairs of the Supreme Courts committee. David Oman interesting is the other co-chair.

Stutsman: Will you be meeting in the new judicial building in Des Moines?

White: I don’t know yet.

Thompson: Does DHS have 5 districts now?

White: You would know better then I how many they have now.

Thompson: I thought it was 5, but I know that this district is way overweighed in terms of population. If they had 5 and you made this district in to 2, that would give you 6.

White: It’s getting harder when you reduce the number of districts for anything in Iowa. If you look at the Congressional Districts and look at the size of 2 of them. If you were trying to administer programs in Iowa in 99 counties, it’s very difficult with districts that large.

Thompson: You have to have a factor for judges driving time.

White: Already do.

Stutsman: Have them fly.

Thompson: Thank you Pat.

Thompson: Business from the Board of Supervisors. We note that we received minutes from the East Central Iowa Council of Governments for June 27th, 2002. That brings us up to reports and inquiries from the Board. Sally do you want to start?

Stutsman: Sure. I had a MECCA Board meeting last Thursday evening. I just wanted to report that their new building is open. This is an apartment building for women and families with substance abuse problems. It will have 12 units and 10 of those units will be 2 bedroom apartments. All of those apartments have Section 8 vouchers, so they will be eligible for there. It’s a transition housing, so they will stay there just a short period of time then move out into the community into other Section 8 housing. But I think that’s a real need that’s being addressed in the community. So we’re glad to see that that’s completed. Pat and I made a road trip with Secondary Roads yesterday morning as part of our work as the liaison from the Board with the Secondary Roads staff. We went out to Solon and saw the road project there. That’s pretty impressive what they’re doing. A lot of grading work and a lot being done, but that’s certainly going to be a welcome addition to what’s already been done as far as the Mehaffey Bridge Road and the continuation of that on into Solon. We also went out to Newberry and looked at the road surface out there. Remember that’s the pilot project of this recycled asphalt to see if that might be something that the County wants to enter into for dust alleviation on these gravel roads. They had put the material down. They hadn’t put the oil coat on it, so we want to go out and look again when that’s put on to see how that goes, but it looked real good and certainly didn’t have any dust on it. This is a pilot project that the Board entered into where the homeowners along the route paid for the project and we’re just assessing to see how it’s working. We also looked at the driveway on Dubuque Street. It was consensus and a letter’s being drafted that we are going to tell the homeowners that if they have a problem with the driveway that they’re going to have to fix it themselves. That we as a policy do not fix driveways into private subdivisions and that to be consistent with out policy that we’re going to maintain that. But a letter’s being drafted. It will be circulated to the Board to make sure that everybody’s OK with that letter. Met with Mike Sullivan. Pat and I met with Mike as our regular liaison meeting. I also wanted to mention that I am not going to be here for the next 3 Board meetings. This is a new situation for me. I think in my 7 plus years on the Board that I’ve never missed 3 consecutive Board meetings ever. I don’t think I’ve ever missed 2, let alone 3. Anyway, next week I am going to be in Des Moines to work on the legislative priorities for ISAC. I’m chair of the Human Services Committee. We meet on Thursday morning, but the Wednesday afternoon before there are a number of issues that have come up with the County Case Management Board, which I also serve on, that really have an impact on the County. I weighed whether I should take the time to go in there, but I think it’s going to have some serious consequences for counties. So I think my time is well spent going in for those meetings and giving input about changes that are being proposed through the Department of Human Services for case management and the impact that will have on funding for people who are chronically mentally ill. Then the following 2 weeks I’ll be on vacation, so I will not be available. So I just wanted to give the Board a heads up on that. That's it.

Thompson: Thanks. Terrence?

Neuzil: Another busy week as a member of the Board of Supervisors. Let me run down just a few. Had an opportunity, Sally Stutsman and I, had a chance to go visit with Governor Vilsack at River Junction. He made a visit on his, what he called the listening and learning tour for the Iowa Governor. He particularly talked about health care security, talked about Medicare, talked about prescription drugs. If you’d like to know more about more Medicare for Iowa and that fact that at this point the State of Iowa’s losing what could be close to a billion dollars in money from the Federal Government because of the unfairness if you will. The web site is www.moremedicareforiowa.com that’s all one word. I also had a chance to visit with Governor Vilsack, he was in Iowa City, downtown. He was discussing in particular University of Iowa tuition loan breaks for the students. Helped with the evaluations for David Kempf and also Steve Spenler. Attended some fund events including the Kent Park playground dedication with the Board of Supervisors. Worked with the Conservation Department there. They had a very, very nice turnout for the Kent Park playground dedication there. Had at least 100 some kids alone playing on the new equipment. So that was a great event. Had site reviews with emphasis on Sharon Center and Lone Tree. We’ll be working on those in the next few weeks. Then I attended a hazard communication meeting with the Human Resources Department. Learned about material safety data and a number of other things, including where our information is provided for the Board of Supervisors, which is in Mike’s room. We had a test on that, so got that all taken care of. That is pretty much the week. I will be tomorrow at the Old Threshers. So if I see you down there, hopefully we’ll connect. I’ll be looking for the Danes and a bunch of others who always camp down there every year, so it will be a good time.

Thompson: Thanks, Mike.

Lehman: Had some communication and things with some of the other Board members did it with some of the representatives from the City of Tiffin. There was some confusion over the 911 address signs that the County has and now quite a bit of that property has been annexed into the City of Tiffin. Our history has been to remove those signs after annexation and there were some that had been annexed in for almost 2 years. Decided to take the signs in addition to the other recently… Rick Dvorak, visited with him. He had issued a memo to the City officials and postmaster, so I think it maybe need to be reminded some of the requirements that the Cities inherit when they do annex property and stuff. So I think that’s been somewhat resolved. We worry about people not being able to be found by emergency vehicles because of confusion of signage.

Stutsman: Not only emergency vehicles, the phone company can’t find the places either.

Lehman: Pat Harney and I met with the Secondary Roads and some property owners. We’re discussing a problem that we have with some water drainage. I’m sure we’re going to be meeting several other times. Met with Andy Chappell from Pat’s office. It’s a very fine line between roads for transportation and not for drainage. A lot of property owners are expected to have Secondary Roads provide drainage for their property with our ditches along the roads. There are some situations where a property, because of topography needs to drain across a road to the following property where the elevations are. In other cases we’re being asked to solve drainage problems in agricultural fields by the use of our ditches. I know our Secondary Roads, we need some clarification on how far to go. Along the same lines I met with an individual that needs to access a grade B level road, which is a dirt road. Brush has grown back up there and has become a problem for him getting back to some property that he farms and also property that he owns. I think Sally and Pat have visited with the Secondary Roads and we need to have some type of work session to determine how much of our limited funding are we going to put into maintenance of some of these roads.

Stutsman: I think it’s on for next week’s agenda, informal meeting to discuss the Board’s policy or review it.

Lehman: OK, great. FinCore group, Carol and I are the Board representatives for that and after I believe it was 5 demos, the group has pretty well decided on 2 site visits. These will be to clients of these vendors to see those operations. They’re still trying to work out some timetables, but I’ve got to compliment the group. They really hung in there. Members of the Auditors, Information Services, County Attorney, Board of Health, Jeff Horne our Budget Coordinator. They’ve hung in there. What they’re trying to do is hopefully find something that’s going to work well for everyone. Our system is almost 20 years old. It’s really out of date. It’s very limited in what capabilities they can address such as payroll, different withholdings and things like that is one example. We do have some money set aside for this. We’ve been setting money aside. It looks like we're close to being on target for budget, but they’ve got a lot of work to do and I give them a lot of credit for what they’ve done so far. Let’s see. Your site visits with Terrence. I think we all enjoy those to see what we’re going to be voting on, but also the staff that we go with gives a good insight on the history of the sites we’re looking at. As we drive along they’ll give you background on other previous approvals or denials. It’s a good history lesson, good education for what we’re required to do. I think we’ve maybe all been out on those so far. The ones that we’ll be seeing here next month.

Neuzil: Too bad the store was closed over at the Amish…

Lehman: Down to String Town. A little plug. It’s only certain days a week that they’re open.

Neuzil: They’ll be up next.

Lehman: Also attended a seed corn and soybean field day at Ray William’s farm. The prospects for the crop in this area are very good. The prices are up a little bit. Not to say that farmers are going to like to have their taxes increased, but the prospects are very good here. We’re in a much better situation then some of the other areas around Iowa or the Midwest. So just knock on wood that will continue and we’ll have excellent weather. It’s been cool weather. The grain fields been real good right now. The test weights and the crops are going up. We’re a very good situation here. Personally, my wife and I took our daughter to Minneapolis. She’s going to be studying in London this fall at the University of London in finance and business. I don’t know if she’ll be able to send any notes back to us or not, but through the University of St. Thomas where she attends and many other schools have that program. She’ll be able to study abroad this semester. Right now she’s got a week of traveling. She’s in Amsterdam and Brussels, then be back to London here next week.

Neuzil: That’s great.

Lehman: Miss her, but it a good step in the direction for her. Good education. That’s all I have.

Thompson: Thanks. Pat?

Harney: I think most of it’s been covered here. As Sally mentioned she and I met with Mike Gardner and Al Miller. We also met with Mike Sullivan and reviewed the policies and procedures that’s going on in the office and issues. Terrence and I met with the Facilities Director, David Kempf, for a biweekly meeting. We went over the progress he’s making, the buildings. He’s becoming acclimated to his job now. Things seem to be going very well. We’ll continue to work with him on that. If he has any questions we try to take care of it. Attended a Chamber of Commerce meeting Tuesday, with again it was with the Governor and with Chamber members. He gave a very good overview of the education and the elder services, the medical and drug issues. He’s been very active in that area. It was real interesting to listen and visit with him. Sally and I met with Secondary Roads staff, Mike Gardner and Al Miller. We took as she said, that site visit. The 180th Street development out there, Mehaffey Road, the reconstruction of that road is really interesting. It’d be worth the time for the Board to go out there and just see that first hand, the accomplishments they’ve made and where they’re at on it. It’s moving right along. They’re getting to the point where they’ll be putting down the base for finish on much of that road. So it’s coming along real well. Also attended the Children’s Miracle Network function yesterday at the University of Iowa Athletic Club. They had a very good turnout. Kirk Ferentz spoke and the young children that the money goes for very good purpose over there in the treatment of these youth at the hospital was a worthwhile event. That’s pretty much my week. Sally and I did meet with the Emergency Management Director, Tom Hansen. We reviewed the local multi-hazard mitigation plan. There’s work we need to do to meet the requirements for the State. We’ll be working on that, trying to get that accomplished along with Mike Sullivan.

Stutsman: So we’ll give a report where we’re at with that. There’s just a lot of miscommunications about just what exactly we need, so we’re going to be setting up a meeting with ECICOG, with the department of management people in Des Moines as well as Tom Hansen and Supervisor representatives so that we all have a clear understanding of what’s expected. Because the deadlines coming up the end of December and we want to make sure that we’re in compliance with that deadline.

Thompson: Thank you. Sally and I and Jeff met with the County Clerk and Art Scott, the MECCA Director this week. The closing of the beds at Mount Pleasant for substance abuse creates a problem for the Clerk’s office, because the people who come in with all the paperwork ready to commit their family members for substance abuse problems are being told there are no beds. We’re sensitive to how upsetting this would be for a family. Art mentioned that in the past the County has had an agreement with MECCA to do pre-screening. The Clerk’s office mentioned that if they did that that would help them because then they’d be able to partner on how to find an available bed. So one of the things we’re going to do is try to look at that resolution that set up the pre-screening system and see if we can resurrect it. Then Jeff is going to be working with Art about finding available beds and finding a way to fund them.

Stutsman: I was just going to say, Terrence you mentioned the unfunded mandates. This is a classic example of what the County is faced with. The State closed all these beds that we used for people that are just, really need help. It’s a terrible position to put a family into, into involuntary committing somebody and then to make that decision and to be told there’s no beds because what the State has closed. We are required to pay for these beds, so we have no choice. It’s certainly something that we haven’t budgeted for. We’re just trying to look at a way to address this problem that’s been passed down to the counties.

Thompson: Well it’s clear that we have to pay for the screening evaluation, but the problem for me is that it appears that if a person doesn’t have private health insurance there is no funding for treatment. That’s a serious problem. I would guess that a good number of people who need substance abuse treatment have already lost their health insurance, if they ever had it. So it's probably going to be a long-term problem, but we think we can do some things immediately that will solve some of the difficulty in the immediate situation. Then we’ll move onto looking at where these beds are going to be and how they’ll be funded. Mike mentioned the site reviews and how useful they are. I just wanted to say, I had mine this week too. I just was struck driving around the County of how beautiful it is this time of year. Everywhere you look it’s like a Grant Wood painting. It’s really nice.

Stutsman: That’s true.

Thompson: This afternoon the Courthouse Security Group for the 6th District is meeting. I’ll be attending that meeting as well as David Kempf since any structural repairs that we would make to the Courthouse would have to come out of David’s budget. I thought he should be there. We’re going to be looking at the report that we prepared awhile back. Then I suppose in the future trying to make a plan for Courthouse security. I also wanted to mention that Rosalee Rose is retiring. There’s an event for her this week. She’s been the Director at the Visiting Nurses Association for a number of years. I think it’s safe to say that things won’t be the same without her. Next Wednesday on the 4th the Board has a work session, the monthly meeting for doing evaluations and progress reports from the department heads. Is there any other business from the Board of Supervisors?

Lehman: This might be a good time to point out that just from out reports you probably should get a good indication that all our work isn’t done here in our office or our desks. Some people are frustrated that they come in and are expect to find us. There’s many times that none of us our here. As you can see from our reports, we’re out doing a lot of research, a lot of work making contacts, but our home numbers are readily available. If we’re not in the book, Jo Hogarty our secretary and Mike makes those available. None of us have any objections to phone calls at home, which we do get quite a few. I just want to emphasize that we are available. Maybe not necessarily at the most convenient time for a lot of the public, but I’ve met offsite with several people that feel more comfortable in what they might call a more friendly situation. I just to emphasize that we try to be as available as possible, but you’ll have to bear with us. We’re not always here in the office.

Thompson: Good point.

Stutsman: Along with that, encourage people to call ahead. One of us will try to be available if at all possible. But to make sure that there is somebody here it’s a good idea to call.

Thompson: It certainly is fine to call us at home. I actually don’t mind that.

Stutsman: But I prefer not after midnight.

Thompson: Inquiries and reports from the public.

Welsh: Two things, I was only going to do one, but in light of what Mike and Sally just said. The public really needs to be reminded that the Board of Supervisors is not a full-time position. The salaries, the huge salaries that you all get are not based on a full-time job. I think sometimes we forget that. But what I did want to notify you all of is that Eve Casserly, on behalf of the Johnson County Taskforce on aging has put together in the last 2 days really a remarkable panel that’s going to be on September the 9th, Monday at 2:00 p.m. at the Johnson County Senior Center with the working title of Community Partnerships Involving Seniors and Planning Services. This is going out as a conversation in how does the community determine what services seniors need. How do they determine how those can be funded? Who can best provide services? How do they all fit together? The panel that she’s lined up includes Carol Thompson as the Chair of the Board of Supervisors Steve Atkins as the City Manager, Ralph Wilmoth from the Department of Public Health, Connie Benton-Wolfe from Elder Services and Beverly Jones who is the president of the Council of Religious Communities. That is going to be on September 9 at 2:00 p.m. at the Johnson County Senior Center. Who knows what will come out of that kind of discussion but I should express appreciation to Eve for planning that and I’d like for you all to know that many of you can attend.

Thompson: Thanks Bob. Any other comments from the public? We’re adjourned.

Adjourned at 11:05 a.m.

Attest: Tom Slockett, Auditor

By Casie Parkins, Recording Secretary