Stutsman: Business from Rod Dunlap, Director of Johnson County Conservation Board and update on the conservation education building.
Conservation Director Rod Dunlap: Well actually it should be the Conservation Board, it was a request by the Board of Supervisors, an update by the Conservation Board so we have the board members with us today. I hope we're not in violation with the Iowa meeting law on...
Bolkcom: Ask that guy on your left.
Dunlap: We might have to ask some of them to leave. I don't know what the mix up was, but actually we have Tom Hoff the Board president and members here. I certainly will assist them, but I just wanted to clarify that on the agenda, that it should be the Conservation Board.
Stutsman: And it does say Conservation Board.
Duffy: Yes, but I... Ask Pat White's here, just to protect everybody.
White: It depends what you're going to do, if the Conservation Board is going to start talking it would be a violation. There's not reason they can't sit and listen to Rod and Tom or whoever is planning a presentation.
Stutsman: Can you do that?
Bolkcom: The power of the Chair.
Stutsman: We appreciate all of you coming, it's a good sign of support for what's going on here.
Bolkcom: Good morning.
Conservation Board President Tom Hoff: I think what I'll do, thank you for asking us to come in. I think maybe what I'll let Rod do would be give you some of the details as to dates, what we've got planned for the bid letting, the details and so forth. Then if you have maybe just general philosophical questions or so forth, then maybe I can entertain some of those. So with that, I guess I'll just turn it over to Rod, because he works with it every day.
Dunlap: All of the documentation in regards to a public hearing, notice to bidders, bid letting has been followed, and copies of those have been sent to your office to keep you informed of what's going on there. The Board, on October 8th, did approve of sending a notice to bidders out after conducting a public hearing on the plans, specifications, form of contract, and estimated cost on the building. There was no objection from the public as of today in the news media, and that will be the official publication on notice to bidders. The plan specifications naturally have been approved by the Board. The project is well into the mainstream of finding out how many contractors will be interested in the construction of the building and to find out what those costs for the construction will be. The bid letting is set up for October 29th. The opening of the bids will be held at 2:00 at the Board's operations center and at that time will be reviewed by the architect Martin Design out of Marion, who is the building architect on this, and myself, and other staff members. The Board will actually have the letting at 6:00 p.m. on that same date right here at your administration building in this meeting room at 6:00. This gives a building architect and the Board staff an opportunity to go through those bids, make sure everything is in order in regards to bid bond or any problems with the bids. The architect will have an opportunity if necessary to visit with the contractors that are the bidders and be able to make a recommendation to the Conservation Board at 6:00 p.m.
Bolkcom: So you have 4 hours basically to do that? Is that what you're saying?
Dunlap: Yes.
Lacina: Congratulations on the site you selected and the landscaping. As an observer, it looks really, neat location.
Dunlap: Thank you.
Hoff: I would just comment that I think it's important when you look at that site to remember that what was taken out of there was not native to Iowa, it is what many people would refer to as junk, trash, trees, shrubs, and so forth, honey locust, black locust, multi-flora rose. Those types of things. What has gone back in there to date is native to Iowa or was native to Iowa until we changed the landscape out there. So what we're trying to do with that area is reconstruct it to what it was maybe 100 years ago or so forth. Another comment I would make is that at our public meeting last week, there was no public comment, there were only a couple of individuals there I think other than Board members. So it was a public meeting, it was opened and closed fairly rapidly. But since August of 1996, a year ago through last week, the Conservation Education Center has been on our agenda 11 times. So there were times when the public was present when that was discussed and those of you are aware of how we conduct our meeting, before we close an agenda item, we always ask if the public has any comment, so forth or so on. I can recall a couple of individuals making positive comments; I can not recall out of those 11 meetings anybody ever questioning the need for it or any negative comments. So there has been quite a bit of exposure other than just the public meeting last week. I assume if nobody comes for eleven meeting and speaks against it and they don't come to the formal meeting and speak against it then nobody's against it. I don't know what other conclusion you could draw. Hope to break ground yet this year. If weather is good the last part of this fall as it's been the first part, if we can get some good bid in and get rolling so they can get it enclosed and work on it during the winter. With a completion date of maybe next May. We'll just see.
Lacina: Well the fact that it's so close to different ecosystems like the pond and the highlands and the extremes I think will be good for the students, but I'm trying to remember on the blue prints. It's been a while since Charlie and I have stopped out and looked at them out there. The classrooms and that can be shared or isolated, but I'm trying to remember, did you leave room for the eventual expansion if you need to for additional conference center? Is it designed in such a way that could be, if the demand is there, expand it?
Dunlap: No it isn't.
Lacina: That's what I thought.
Dunlap: That was a discussion that took place in the early stages, in the preliminary design of the building before the Board retained the services of an architect to do a preliminary design. At one time there was some thought in regards to putting a building up that as additional classroom space would be needed, it could be added. Due to the limitation of the site and the general topography of that area, and keep in mind that during the process of all of the site planning we had native plant material in the area to the south of the parking lot and to the building which limited us on the amount of space that we had to put the building in and the parking lot. Now that native plan material was strictly an enhancement program that started back in 1976 with the acquisition of that land through bonding and the land and water fund money. So we were limited in the amount of space that we had without destroying the native plant material, both grasses, forbs, in prairie species and timber species, and also woody plants that the site for the building was limited in terms of general space.
Lacina: So the problem wasn't so much the building, but all the (inaudible).
Dunlap: Yes, and the other thing the Board discussed was is that the time now is to put the building up complete. The business of coming back and trying to have an add on would interrupt activities and programmings in the future going on at the building, let's say that you put on a new addition, you have such things as the contractor working and you have that disrupting, you always have a certain amount of the area, the landscaping that's destroyed. We see that go on all the time with expansion projects. It was a general consensus and total agreement I believe amongst the Board members and certainly myself that let's put up the size of building that we feel is adequate to handle the number of people that will participate in the programs putting on there. So thought went into it.
Lacina: Good answer. I was just wondering if it's been considered and obviously it has.
Hoff: And as you recall several months ago Steve, we told you that cost had gone up significantly from what we originally thought to and that was one of the reasons, what Rod said, we decided to do it, do it once, it ended up being larger than what we originally thought.
Stutsman: Funding for the building. Are you all pretty well on track with that? (Inaudible) Tom.
Hoff: Well we've discussed, there are a number of options. We have a pretty fair balance in our trust account that holds our REAP funds. We don't want to totally extinguish that account, but there are dollars from there that can be used, there are dollars from the annual appropriation back to us of the fees that we generate during a given year, that's a source of funds. I know a couple of you who attended a meeting a couple of months ago thought that there might be in addition to that maybe some sources of funds for a couple of years from the Supervisors in addition to that I would certainly at any time take you up on that offer. So the funds are there. A final decision has not been made yet to hear more specifically this that or the other, but if you look at the picture as a whole, the funds are there.
Stutsman: So I guess basically we just wait until the 29th to see what comes back with the bids and things.
Hoff: Our understanding from the architect last week when he was there that their office had already received 2 or 3 inquiries for specs prior to them even releasing. So that would indicate that there is a pretty good demand from the construction trade. I can't believe they need to be building more houses around here. Some of them are looking for some projects to take them through...
Dunlap: The plans and specifications are on file down at the Auditor's Office for those of you who have not had an opportunity to see them. I do have a copy with me, however it's the only copy that we have and it's to be available at our office for anybody to view. But the Auditor does have them down there on file, so if you get an opportunity and want to take a look, there is no difference basically other than they're complete from what we had at the time the Board of Supervisors met with the Conservation Board out at the Conservation Board Operation Center.
Jordahl: A week or so ago I went up to the University of Northern Iowa and visited a similar facility. I think it was a center for Environmental Education at the University of Northern Iowa Campus. It's nice to see, you know that sort of a big public commitment made. It says something about where our values are that we're putting money into this. So I'm glad to see what you're doing.
Dunlap: Well to be very honest with you I could spend all day telling you the benefits of this project. I have to be very honest with you and say that this was a vision of a Conservation Board that none of you appointed. It was a long time ago, about 1972 when a very energetic Board with a lot of vision, and we've been able to carry that on. Some people say it's a dream and believe me, after working out there the last 2 years on the site project, I have to say it kind of was a dream and it is becoming reality. But even at that time in 1972, that particular land was earmarked as an area that we refer to as a wilderness area or a rough, and was specifically set aside on the original Site Plan as a study area. To be very honest with you there will probably be many Conservationists and Resource Managers that would take a look at that area and say you don't have it, because you do have a tremendous amount of non-native species in that area. But if we're going to be in the business of conservation education, then I think that we have to have that situation out in the field where we can conduct those training sessions to actually show that the things that man destroyed through different processes of living can be restored to native plant material. This will be a good example. I really feel very strongly that if there is going to be any ideal situation where we've taken an area that had a tremendous amount of impact on it, even to the point of some destruction in terms of soil loss, definitely in terms of native plant material loss, this restoration project could be considered by some as a miracle because it has not been easy. There has been 2 years of site prep on the area. By the way, just to bring you up-to-date, the prairie has been seeded. That was seeded about I believe September 9th or 10th. It was done through hydro-seeding. Right now the area that was seeded to native prairie grasses and well over 60 some wild forbs. The cover crop, the oats, and the annual rye grass has germinated and actually some of the prairie grass has germinated such as the side oats gramma. Now we have actually got a site just south of the parking lot that in July we did a small seeding of native plants, both forbs and grasses on the south side of the parking lot, a narrow strip. Actually the blue grass that was planted there in July has headed out. So we know these types of soils will grow native plants. Keep in mind that they are type of soils that, a lot of wind blown sand, they are not real high in nutrients, but I do believe that we can reestablish that area to the native plant materials that existed there during settlement.
Stutsman: Rod I want to thank you for coming in and for the Board, for coming in and updating us on what's happening in the Conservation Board.
Duffy: Can I say just one thing? Sally, of course, the cost of this is really not the Johnson County taxpayer's dollars. There might be a few dollars. Let's see the funding from REAP, that'll be about $240,000 on this project.
Hoff: I don't have the exact figures here Charlie, but you know it would appear that the REAP funds are going to be a bulk of it. I'm not sure if it's correct to say that isn't Johnson County taxpayer money because...
Duffy: No, I don't mean all of it, but the bulk of it.
Hoff: Because the REAP money, you know, it flows to Des Moines from Johnson County and numerous, all of the other 98 counties and they turn around and they funnel some of it right back to us. So I think yes, that has definite Johnson County money there. The reappropriation back of the fees and so forth is definitely money from I'd say 90% Johnson County residents.
Duffy: Yes, that's right.
Hoff: I guess I would take this opportunity to say that's why I think it might be totally appropriate if the Board in your infinite wisdom could see fit to give us a little appropriation that you would say this is directly from the County funds. Because everybody in this County is going to have an opportunity to use them. We have thought and explored about going out and asking people for money. I know they often do that when you need band uniforms or high school athletic... Or if there is a specific trip somewhere to pay for the bus fees. But the people that give then are normally very directly connected to that program, normally receiving a very direct benefit of that program. Here we have a facility that is open to everybody of Johnson County and I think it's a little less appropriate to go asking specific individuals to fund what I think should be a countywide process. So that's just for you deliberation and consideration. That's my personal philosophy. That's not the Board's philosophy.
Stutsman: OK. Any other?
Bolkcom: Yes. Just good work. This has been a long time coming.
Stutsman: Yes.
Bolkcom: We'll look forward to seeing the bids.
Dunlap: Thank you.
Stutsman: I appreciate everybody coming in and your Board responding so well to your directive. Business from the County Attorney, discussion regarding Department of Human Services appointment of 3 management members to the Labor Management Committee. Good morning Pat.
County Attorney Pat White: Good morning.
Bolkcom: Good morning.
White: As part of the 3 year collective bargaining contract that we've agreed to with the union representing Human Services employees, there is a new provision in the contract calling for a formal Labor-Management Committee. You need to appoint 3 members to that committee and essentially the questions for you are: When do want to do that? Who do you want to appoint and how do you want to go about deciding who to appoint? Do you want me to consult with Cheryl and make a recommendation? Do you want to consult with Cheryl and make a recommendation? Do you want them to come and talk about it? This will be probably 3 to 4 meetings a year of a couple of hours length. It's analogous to the Ambulance Labor-Management Committee that Sally has been serving on and that I've been serving on. I think in this particular one there is not the same need for my involvement as there was with Ambulance and I'm actually hoping not to be a member of this committee. I think I would probably suggest that Janet be designated as an alternate to this group. We had a meeting last week to try to put the finishing touches on the contract and the union is anxious to get this committee together and have a meeting. I told them I would get at least the initial discussion on your agenda this week.
Lacina: I'm going to suggest that you talk to Cheryl and make a recommendation to us because the individuals that are appointed are probably going to need to be familiar with the employee handbook, know the time commitment, and you can explain that right up front so that they know what they're getting into. Just as a suggestion.
Stutsman: I guess I would agree with that. Would it be appropriate to have Board of Supervisor on that?
White: Well, I think that's one of the questions. I think you can share with your colleagues your feeling. My own is that your involvement in the Ambulance Committee has been of value, but there is a different history with that unit. That has been a more problematic unit, I think it's fair to say. I don't know that I have a strong opinion about whether one of you wants to be or needs to be involved. I think at a minimum, if you're not going to be on the team at least one of you ought to be an alternate. I haven't spoken with Cheryl about this, so I don't know whether she would recommend up to 3 people out of that department or not.
Stutsman: Speaking from my experience on the Labor-Management, I think it's really been valuable for me and the communication and just having more of a feel for Ambulance Department and seeing things from their point of view. I guess for that reason I would say at least an alternate, if not a regular member on that committee.
Duffy: Sally would you have time to do it?
Stutsman: I would have time to do it, you know, I certainly don't have to be the one to do it, but I...
Duffy: I think you'd be the one.
Lacina: That's fine.
Jordahl: Yes, you'd be the most familiar with the concerns of labor in that area.
Bolkcom: Uh-huh.
Stutsman: Unless somebody else wants to do it, I'd be happy to do it, but you can maybe (inaudible).
White: It's one of those situations where it's best not to change when the Chair changes. You and I haven't visited about this, but I'm hoping the Board will have you stick with the Ambulance Committee even when you're term as Chair ends. So the question for the 5 of you would include, is it a good idea to have the same person or would you prefer to have somebody different since it's a different department? There are pros and cons to doing it either way.
Stutsman: Uh-huh.
Bolkcom: I think the continuity of having one person, it makes some sense here. Develop some expertise in this person to do labor, you know, there is probably some similarities between the 2 departments in some ways about how problems are solved.
Jordahl: Probably the counter-argument contained in your argument though, that you could put all of your expertise in one person and then what happens? So it might be a good idea to spread it around too.
Bolkcom: So at reelection stay on.
White: I should add in addition to the committee meetings we're hoping to do some training fairly quickly. The Federal Mediation Service has offered again to provide training for the people who are going to be members of this Labor-Management Committee. We're actually hoping to get that training started yet this month.
Bolkcom: Great.
Stutsman: That does sound good. Well, do you want to...
White: I'll visit with Cheryl. I think this Thursday is probably too early for us to get a report back to you and I'll try to get a report, at least a note to you for your next Tuesday meeting. Then maybe target putting it on your agenda for appointment a week from Thursday.
Stutsman: Sounds good.
White: Under the category of other, as long as I'm here, tonight is our first collective bargaining negotiating session with the Secondary Roads Department if one of you have an interest in joining and observing the process. Again, my recommendation would be that if one of you is going to do it, that the same person stick with it, not necessarily every session, although you are welcome. But whoever, if anyone, is going to come and observe I think it's best that the same person observe as we go along.
Lacina: I've got a conflict this evening, so I probably won't be the one.
Duffy: What time is it?
White: 6 o'clock.
Stutsman: At Secondary Roads
White: Our office.
Stutsman: Oh, OK. Is there someone from the Board that can go to observe?
Bolkcom: How long does it last?
Stutsman: Pardon me.
Bolkcom: How long?
White: They're open-ended. This is the 1st one and so I would think 2 to 3 hours, but that's... I mean we might get there and decide we only want to be there an hour, or we might get there and say we've got enough areas of agreement that we can work until midnight. That's hard to predict.
Jordahl: When you said you wanted the same person to attend throughout the time, would there be a problem with say Charlie went and were going to continue to participate in this thing, if I went just to observe do you see a problem with that? I wonder what the role of participation of a Supervisor attending this is.
White: Well, initially I think the role is to see what the process is and how it works and ultimately my reason for recommending the same person is that there might well come a point at which a Board member would be a more active participant. When Dick Myers was on the Board he participated pretty actively as a member of the negotiating team and I think constructively. He was able to interpret negotiations to his colleagues on the Board. I think on balance it worked fairly well. He and I ran into some disagreements and we ended up airing those out in front of the Board in an executive session or 2. I just think communication is improved if a Board member is in touch. I also think it's helpful to your employees to see that you folks are that interested to give up an evening or 2 or 3 during the course of the negotiations.
Stutsman: Charlie are you?
Duffy: I think I... I'll be back in just a second.
Lacina: Yes, it's too bad it had to be tonight.
White: It's not critical tonight.
Stutsman: OK, I guess I would just like to make sure that there aren't 3 of us there. That there is at least 1 or 2.
White: I strongly recommend only 1 be present. We've got another session scheduled in November. We picked 2 dates to start with.
Stutsman: Joe or Jonathan?
White: I don't really need to know either, you can...
Jordahl: He just said he strongly recommends... Did I hear you correctly, that you strongly recommend that only 1 Supervisor be present?
White: Yes.
Stutsman: So...
Jordahl: I'm kind of waiting to hear from Charlie.
Stutsman: OK, well we'll find out who can do it. But I would certainly encourage somebody else to go. Anything else Pat?
White: No.
Stutsman: OK, thank you. Why don't we take a short break?
Recessed at 10:15 a.m.: reconvened at 10:24 a.m.
DISCUSSION: APPOINTING A MEMBER TO THE DIVERSE-CITIES PLANNING GROUP
Stutsman: I'm going to kind of skip around a little bit, under this business from the Board of Supervisors, maybe to kind of organize some of these items. They're kind of out of sync. First thing that I'd like to talk about is discussion regarding appointing a member to the Diverse-Cities Planning Group. There was a letter attached to your agenda requesting an appointment from the Board of Supervisors to this group. I contacted Heather Shank yesterday to kind of get some more background information on this group and Joe you might have some information too to share about his committee. Basically what Heather said is that Don Grove, who is the head of the Civil Rights Commission in Des Moines is organizing these kinds of committees across the State and there are 16 committees organized so far in Iowa. They are in Muscatine, Marshalltown, Hampton, Fort Dodge, Mason City, and Polk County, and Des Moines. What the idea is, is that they meet to determine what kind of diversity needs there are in a particular community. She couldn't tell me exactly what this committee will work on, because that's part of what the planning group will do, is to identify some specific issues that are relevant to the community. Then to begin to address those issues. She said that in one community they looked at issues concerning the police force in dealing with minorities. They dealt with situations concerning hate crimes in communities and those kinds of things. That's not to say they'll do that in Johnson County, but that's the kinds of problems and things that they look at. Joe do you anything to add to that?
Bolkcom: I'm just familiar with the work of the Iowa Civil Rights Commission around study teams, I guess they are calling them diverse cities now. Principally focused in some, as you say, communities get together and they talk about what the diversity issues are. There has been a number of study teams dealing with race relations and just bringing together people so they can talk and get to know people better and with some success. It's good to see this going on, but essentially that's all my real knowledge of it in terms of just general knowledge about this going on in other communities around the State as opposed to here.
Stutsman: So the Board needs to appoint somebody to be on this planning group.
Lacina: Do we, do we really? I mean do we know that there are problems if the cities are dealing with it or do we want to... I guess that's my question. You say we have to. Is this mandated.
Stutsman: Well I guess I would ask you why wouldn't we want to be a part of this.
Lacina: Well why establish another committee if the major population centers and with the University, the towns are involved. How would we identify the need or determine who would be involved. I mean are we going to put somebody from the Sheriff's office on it or the discussion here looked like they're crime related.
Stutsman: I guess we could put somebody from the Sheriff's office on there. I think that they have somebody from the City Council and from the Coralville City Council as part of it. I guess along those lines they'd probably were thinking somebody from the Board of Supervisors.
Lacina: I can see where it would be relevant for population centers, but in looking at the rural area, I'm just curious as to why we're included.
Jordahl: Well we don't relate to the rural area.
Lacina: No, I know but I'm saying that the overlap, there are already groups representing the population centers.
Bolkcom: We've got substantial suburban population in this County. Are you saying that we don't represent enough rural people to be involved in discussion of diversity issues.
Lacina: No, I'm not saying that.
Bolkcom: OK. I think it's a good thing.
Lacina: I'm saying if it was made we need to appoint somebody to this and the question I asked was given the limited information we have and given the...
Stutsman: Well would you like somebody from the planning group to come in and fill us in a little bit more about what they're about?
Lacina: I think that would be a good idea of what they're about.
Stutsman: OK.
Duffy: I believe Scott County, I mean the Quad Cities, I think it was in the Quad Cities Times last night about the (inaudible) but I don't know anybody from that County there either because it's diverse cities. There's more cities in this... Who is the representative from Iowa City City Council and Coralville?
Stutsman: I don't know if they said a representative and I'm just going by the letter. Maybe that's one of the things that we could ask them, is who is on the planning group.
Lacina: I think we need more information. I'm not taking one position for or against, I'm just saying that based on one letter at this point...
Stutsman: Joe, do you know who, is Heather the contact person?
Bolkcom: I would think so.
Stutsman: OK, why don't I contact Heather and ask if she could... Or Carol do you want to contact Heather and ask if she or if she has somebody else that's involved with the planning group to come in and talk to the Board a little bit more about this? You know maybe get an idea of who is serving on the planning group from other municipalities or government entities.
Duffy: Can we get some information from other counties?
Jordahl: Yes, I'd like to make a couple of observations about this that we're talking about Iowa City and Coralville being involved here, but I don't recognize a name from the Iowa City City Council on the signatures of this letter here. Not to say that we shouldn't be but I think what they're asking for is not necessarily a member of the Board of Supervisors, but rather that we appoint someone and that someone might be any member of the community that we're aware of who is particularly interested in these issues or would be well qualified to address them. Secondly, that in making that appointment that we might want to seek out a member of some ethnic minority group that would have more firsthand and direct understanding of the difficulties that such people might confront. That's 2.
Bolkcom: Yes, in general I think it's a really good thing that this is going on. I think that the Board ought to have somebody represented on it so that we have a better understanding of diversity issues and how to promote that understanding and this is really a simple way to do that I think. As we will find out. The other thing is I misstated earlier what the Iowa Civil Rights Commission has organized are called study circles, not study teams. They come together basically volunteers in the community come together and visit about whatever topic those people want to visit about. Whether it's race relations, whether it's sexual orientation, whether it's all of the immigrants coming to town that they're worried about, etc. I mean I think when this is a diverse county and the Board has a role to play in it promoting understanding of diverse people.
Duffy: But it says Iowa City and Coralville, diverse cities. That would say the city is part of the county but I just... I'll agree with Steve, I'd like to have some more information.
Stutsman: OK.
Bolkcom: Sounds good.
Stutsman: OK. Carol if you could contact Heather and see if you can't have her come in and...
Bolkcom: So they have a meeting Thursday night. I think it would be good if somebody, maybe that would be an opportunity to learn more about it.
Stutsman: That would be a good idea.
Bolkcom: maybe you could attend that meeting Steve.
Duffy: Is this an incorporated group or...
Bolkcom: I have no idea. I think that's pretty loosely...
Lacina: Give a presentation to the whole Board and that way...
Stutsman: You can't go Thursday night?
Lacina: I can't attend Thursday night.
Bolkcom: I can't attend either Thursday.
Lacina: So I'm suggesting we just have them come make a presentation to our Board and then we all have the same information.
Stutsman: Jonathan Thursday night?
Jordahl: What's the question Thursday night? Wondering if someone could attend or...?
Lacina: 7 p.m. is their meeting on the 16th?
Stutsman: Yes.
Lacina: At the Coralville Council Chambers.
Stutsman: I've got a conflict that I don't want to work around real...
Jordahl: Yes, I have something that I don't have to attend, but I could.
Stutsman: Well, lets you and I talk about that and we'll see if one of us could...
Jordahl: Yes maybe we could arrange to cover this.
Stutsman: OK. Carol could I have you call Jean Schultz about computers for employees. She was going to help me bring that to the Board.
DISCUSSION: SETTING AN AGENDA FOR JOINT MEETING OF LINN AND JOHNSON COUNTY SUPERVISORS
Stutsman: Discussion setting an agenda for Joint Meeting with Linn and Johnson County. We set up that date for October 29th and I think we need to put together an agenda about topics to discuss. We kind of started a list on the blackboard in the back room, just if people had some items if they thought might be relevant for us to discuss.
Lacina: Landfill was one.
Stutsman: Landfill and the Detention Center.
Lacina: Detention Center. I don't know if, Charlie, we used to have a disagreement with Linn County on the county-line Road from that quarry up there. Do you that... I think that's been resolved hasn't it? As far as dust alleviation and a lot of the rock that comes out of that goes north into Linn County and the dusts are... We might check with Gardner but I think that's been resolved.
Stutsman: OK.
Lacina: Update on the airport expansion and commercial planning for the southern part of Linn County. I think we really need to talk with them about what they plan in the long-term with that airport, what's coming.
Jordahl: And the City of Cedar Rapids in the same breath. I think we need to discuss with the Linn County Board of Supervisors about their relationship with the City of Cedar Rapids in terms of the same kind of planning and then we need to in my opinion schedule a similar meeting with the City Council of the City of Cedar Rapids and talk about what their plans are for development in the South.
Lacina: Let me take a quick look at that board.
Stutsman: I guess I had put on legislative issues that we might find some joint interest.
Lacina: The tax with the utility companies is something that we might...
Duffy: That's a good idea Sally. Where are we going to have this? Shueyville right Carol?
Peters: Right. 11:30.
Duffy: Where at?
Peters: Shueyville.
Bolkcom: Shueyville, where in Shueyville? P N P?
Peters: Actually it was previously Night Light. It's under new ownership.
Duffy: That's a nice place.
Peters: I've been told the food is really good and they're open during the day.
Duffy: What time is it? 11:30?
Peters: 11:30.
Lacina: Financial and budgeting process?
Stutsman: Do we want to spend any time talking with Linn County Supervisors about the financial and budgeting process.
Bolkcom: Well, how many hours are we going to meet with them?
Stutsman: Well...
Lacina: Well I think we could ask them how they use the information they get from their process. I mean are they looking at some specific ratios or just give us a sense of how they feel about it.
Stutsman: How the Supervisors feel about it. OK.
Jordahl: How it works there. For me there is an overriding question in that it's regional planning and cooperation and some sort of regular schedule of meetings with them. I mean we've been meeting regularly with Supervisors from other counties, but I think in terms of the likely impact on us and our infrastructure and communities and so forth Linn County is a far more significant player and if we're going to meet regularly with anyone it should be them.
Stutsman: Should we kind of explore some regional, and I don't think it's just with land use. I think Human Services and...
Jordahl: Law enforcement.
Lacina: We've been a long time loser in the area of Human Services when Jean Oxley was on, she would go up there and battle for dollars and we always came in on the short end of the stick so that's a good idea.
Stutsman: I don't think boundaries are necessarily in peoples minds between Linn and Johnson County.
Peters: Just regional planning issues. OK.
Bolkcom: They are in the midst of their comprehensive plan update too and it would be good to hear about that, give an update from them on what they're' doing. Another bullet under that is transportation planning. We've got Jeff Davidson sitting here and asking the question of OK where are we planning on developing Roads as Steve suggested when new arterial roads are put through what impact does that have on traffic flow and again Linn County's plans are going to have an impact on us.
Lacina: One example of poor planning is when we did the naming of the roads years ago we have I think a mile and half of road called Vega Avenue. North of the boundary it's Ivanhoe Road which runs many miles up into Linn. I don't know why we just didn't call it Ivanhoe Road for the whole thing, because right there you've got an address change and the whole 911 system when you get an emergency call, well it's this tiny piece of road. So some of this cooperation is really important.
Stutsman: Anything else? Carol if you could put together a tentative agenda and then send it up to Linn County and then maybe we could put it back on for next week to see, finalize it. If anybody else has any other idea or any other thoughts that they want to bring up with them aside from meeting all afternoon we may have to have this be a regular scheduled time.
Jordahl: Well yes, that idea of a regular scheduled meetings... I don't want to scare them about additional meetings but it could be every couple of months or quarterly or something, but I think it should occur regularly so we don't fail to do it.
Bolkcom: We could do ICN.
DISCUSSION: REQUEST FOR COMPUTER PURCHASE PROGRAM FOR EMPLOYEES
Stutsman: Next thing that I would like to talk about is the computers for employees. I asked Jean to come in and kind of help me explain this program. I was approached by an employee in the Treasurer's Office who understood that the City of Iowa City was offering a computer buy program for their employees and he wondered if Johnson County could be involved in a similar program. So Jean and I have been doing some preliminary leg work to get more information about this and see if it is something that the Board would like to proceed on and offer to employees. Basically what the City has done is that they have set up an arrangement with Gateway Computers and are offering their employees the option of buying computers. What they are doing is that they are buying the computers, the City is buying the computers and then the employees are buying the computers over a 3 year period. It's deducted from their paycheck on a regular basis. The program is offered just to permanent employees that are not on a probation. There is a very detailed contract drawn out concerning the buyout and stuff. But basically the City is financing the purchase of these computers over a 3 year period for these employees to buy them. In talking with a representative from Gateway there is interest in other communities from the area in doing the same thing. North Liberty is currently looking into it, as well as Coralville, so it seems like it's getting a pretty positive response. Jean and I talked about it to the Who What-When Committee and got their OK to proceed with this. They thought it fit in will with the computer needs of the County So I wanted to bring it to the Board to see if the Board is interested in pursuing this, offering it to employees. If we want to do the same kind of arrangement that Iowa City is doing, basically financing the purchase and allowing employees to buy it over a 3 year period.
Lacina: What do you mean by financing the purchase? Are the employees paying the interest rate? Is there a net cost to the...
Stutsman: No, the employees pay the cost of the computer and the City is basically carrying that for 3 years.
Lacina: So the City is carrying it in terms of...
Bolkcom: Financing it.
Stutsman: Financing it.
Lacina: They're eating the interest.
Stutsman: Right.
Jordahl: The City is paying the interest for those 3 years or is the employee paying the interest?
Stutsman: No. Let's see, and the way they're viewing it is basically a yearly bonus, about $85 for each employee who wanted to take advantage of the offer. The City estimated the financing cost of around $255 over a 3 year period on a $3,000 computer loan, is what it amounts to.
Lacina: What would happen if we just went through a local lending institution and set up a amortization schedule and we wouldn't have to be subsidizing with taxpayers' dollars.
Jordahl: Yes, or there is sort of, it's an incentive to someone to get a computer to subsidize them getting a computer. But I wonder with Steve about the propriety of using tax dollars to provide benefit to the employees in an uneven way like this. Like, you know, you can get this if you want a computer, if you don't want a computer, you can't get the benefits. We're not going to give them $235 cash if they don't buy a computer. I'm not sure how I think about that.
Lacina: I've got a question, governments don't pay the sales tax, how do they get around that? Do they charge the employees the sales tax?
Stutsman: The way I understand the City owns the computers and then are just selling them to the employees. So I don't know if sales tax is an issue, because the City owns the computer until the employee makes the last payment.
Lacina: So this is a way for the employee to not pay sales tax? I think we should look into that one carefully.
Peters: Yes, I don't thing that was it. I think it was just a way for the employee to be able to get the equipment. I don't think it was any evasion of sales tax.
Lacina: I like the idea of doing the benefit. I guess I just think we need to take a careful look at it and ask the City, number one on sales tax how do you deal with that? Then number 2 I think we could go out to one of the lending institutions and get a favorable interest rate and just have the employee cover it, especially if we can get a better bulk purchase rate. I get a little nervous about somebody coming in and wanting a computer and somebody coming in and saying I want the equivalent benefit, but I don't want the computer, finance this on a bike.
Stutsman: Uh-huh. The only way I could say that you could justify it as one of the goals that we have in our strategic plan is this whole thing in computerization of the County and that this fits into a goal that we have specified and that in order to get our employees more computer literate we're offering them an opportunity to buy a personal computer for their home. Whereas we don't have a goal for them to learn to ride bikes or whatever. You know...
Bolkcom: It's not a bad idea.
Lacina: I like the idea very much, the only thing is whatever we do I want it to be safe so that we aren't challenged and all of sudden becoming a finance company, financing things.
Stutsman: I agree.
Lacina: That we're financing things.
Stutsman: Uh-huh and maybe the first step to do, as Coralville is currently doing is just to put out a memo to employees and see how much interest there is in this. It was brought to me by one employee, but I don't know if every department if they would take advantage even if this was offered. If we only had one or 2 employees I don't know if it would be worth it to spend a whole lot of energy pursuing it.
Lacina: I like the idea though. Also, could we do something jointly with Iowa City and get an even better deal with a larger bulk purchase?
Schultz: I didn't get the impression that they got any off of the computers. I didn't get the impression that they got a better price.
Stutsman: A discount or whatever.
Schultz: The one thing that the person from Gateway did do, is he did propose X number of configurations, like maybe 5 or 6 kinds of configurations and then he brought those PC's one day and then was available to meet with employees to talk to them and kind of guide them as far as configuration they would want. But I don't think they got any kind of price break from Gateway.
Lacina: That makes me a little nervous, because all of a sudden we're bypassing our local retailers.
Jordahl: Retailers, and manufacturers.
Lacina: Which Gateway does, Gateway is going direct to Sioux City.
Jordahl: Well it says here South Dakota and I think that's one of the problems. This is out of state fundamentally isn't it?
Bolkcom: Yes, but nobody is making computers in Johnson County though.
Jordahl: In Iowa City I believe when I was looking into one 2 years ago there was a company making them to order here in Iowa City. I forget the name of it, but they would build how much memory do you want and so forth.
Lacina: But at least if we have a local supplier if there is no advantage on price.
Bolkcom: Well the advantage is in the financing, that the County would absorb...
Lacina: We're subsidizing it basically is what it amounts too.
Bolkcom: Yes, basically. We're saying that we want our employees to gain more computer skills. They can do that on our time here at the office or they can do some of it on their time if they have the equipment at home. I mean if it's $85 a year in financing, if somebody spends 10 hours over the course of the year messing around with their computer at home versus us paying them $10 an hour here to learn it that would be a... That investment of that interest money pays us off in some substantial returns I think if people gain skills about how to use computers.
Lacina: I don't think that's the issue as much as going out of state by bypassing local support facilities. If we want to offer that program I think it's something we need to look into, but I think there are some questions we need to look into first.
Schultz: I would think we would want check with local vendors to see if they would offer that same kind of thing. Some of them even if the County didn't finance them, I know for example one company we buy a lot of our PC's from that have a good price, they will give the same 15% discount off of list price to any County employees. We can check vendors like even if the County didn't finance it if people could get a discount off of list if they bought it from those vendors or something like that. So that would still be a benefit as an employee but it wouldn't cost the County anything.
Lacina: See I think we should take a serious look at this, but I think we should look at those options as well.
Jordahl: There are 2 questions here. One is who are we getting the computers from and as part of that can we get a discount, price break from them? The second one is do we want to use some sort of incentive beyond that to encourage employees to do this, because there is some benefit to us as an employer to have computer literate employees.
Peters: The one thing that I've heard from several employees, and I've had several of them ask me if in addition to the one that Sally had visited with, if the County was interested in addressing this, was that if you go through the or have some sort of mechanism through the County here so that when the employee gets a computer, however they get it, if that computer could be configured closely to what they're using at work it's going to be a big benefit to the County...
Duffy: That would be a good idea.
Peters: When they're at home and just working on something of their own at least the application and the methodology of how to use that application would be the same as at work so that when you get to work you're ready to go.
Bolkcom: Good point.
Jordahl: Heck of a good point.
Stutsman: I talked to Jean Goldsmith up at North Liberty and asked her why they were going with Gateway and that was the very reason. She said they have Gateway, well just to reinforce what you're saying in their administration building so it's just logical that employees use them at home and then they come to work and it's a good transition.
Jordahl: Now there are other peripheral things as I glance over your shoulder at the Gateway information. There is a question of 24 hour technical support. Would an employee have the same technical support of they bought from a local vendor. That's one of the questions...
Stutsman: Maybe that's the kind of questions we need.
Schultz: Usually you would because if you bought say an AST PC from computer solutions for example, computer solutions isn't the one going to give them the technical support. The AST would. Quite often you would have that same kind of support.
Jordahl: Is that the name of the company I'm talking about Jean, Computer Solutions where they will custom build a computer here in Iowa City for you?
Schultz: I don't know if they will, I think Davin will for example, and there is some other ones, they custom build them but they still get the parts from...
Jordahl: Sure all of the parts are coming from elsewhere, but I mean Gateway is probably getting their parts from somewhere too but we're talking about a local vendors paying local taxes and so forth supporting the local economy. Now there is merit in looking at it, see if we can get an equivalent kind of a deal.
Lacina: Does Iowa City have a policy on data coming from a home-based machine into their system and what I'm concerned about is the firewalls to protect against virus and corruption of data.
Schultz: I asked them and they're looking into that but they don't have any formal city policy as of yet. When I was talking to them about this Gateway thing I asked Gary Cohn in their IS department and he said they don't have any formal policies yet.
Jordahl: Is it possible to configure a computer with something like Norton Utilities that would automatically when you go to load any disk or receive something from the Internet it would automatically check it for bugs.
Lacina: Not for all of them because the University just crashed again this fall and they've got about everything imaginable installed on their net system from you name it and still the kids were in there hacking on it and were able to crash the system. So yes you can take measures to protect but with 6th District we had a system that got bad enough that we basically shut everything down and started over up there because things got so bad, because everyone was bringing in their own personal calendar, their own Microsoft Word, they had Microsoft applications or this or that and it got to be such a mess that we had to go to the other extreme and say here is the word-processing you will use, here is this... But again that's another subject for another day. I like the idea of offering some kind of incentive program to the employees. I just think we need to look around a little more, do a little more research.
Stutsman: That's what basically Jean and I wanted to know if the Board was interested in pursuing this or else we wouldn't spend any more time on it. So if we have OK we'll just go ahead and check out the sales tax thing and the possibility of lending institutions, look at some other local vendors and...
Jordahl: Let me talk out of the other side of my mouth here with Jean's notion that we might be able to get a discount. It is also possible by going to directly to the national organization whether it's IBM or whoever we might be more likely to get a governmental discount than if we go to a local vendor. That's the other edge of the sword cutting the other way.
Duffy: Jonathan, I do have a problem with going out of the County. I remember when the Auditor's Department took on the mapping of the county, which was a tremendous effort. One of the reasons it would be, the people that worked on the maps would be paid from County dollars and because they did it we didn't have to go over to Illinois for a firm and I think if we can we should stay in the County. I can't see a reason why they couldn't give us a discount through a dealer some way, but I think that you know there are people who pay taxes in this County and that wouldn't be too good to do.
Jordahl: I'm just wondering what the price spread might be.
Duffy: Sometimes you have to go out of the County. If we do it in Johnson County I'd be for that. If you have a computer at home for the first 3 years you couldn't use that for other than County issues?
Lacina: No, they could use it for their own purpose, but they couldn't sell it to someone else and come back in for the program. I'm assuming that's what the contract with Iowa City is. Over a 3 year period you have to maintain this contract...
Duffy: If you could use it, it would be kind of tough sometimes (inaudible).
Stutsman: No, you could use it for anything that you wanted but you could not sell it or trade it in in the 3 year period.
Duffy: Lets see how we come out on it.
Stutsman: Maybe I'll pass around this information from the City of Iowa City and what they put together and Gateway just for peoples information. It's interesting what they (inaudible).
Jordahl: To answer your concerns there Charlie about in county out of county, I myself said it would be nice if we could go with a local supplier and made that point. I just think that it's possible we should look at what the national picture is as well because we might get a substantial discount where we would be spending far fewer taxpayer dollars, it wouldn't be taxpayer dollars would it? Where it would be much cheaper for the employee to do that. So we should at least know what those numbers are and we may decide to go with a local provider just on that basis that you suggest.
Bolkcom: Will this include a survey of employees as well, do we want to try and do an assessment of the demand?
Stutsman: Yes I think.
Lacina: Because we're going to want some kind of standardized configuration, do they want laptops, a lot of our stuff runs 16 megs of memory which is probably far beyond what they need at home. But we're going to need to do some type of survey and see, maybe they want to buy power machines, I don't know, but they probably need to know.
Peters: Well, they probably want to buy for the future.
Bolkcom: Yes. Buy the best you can buy.
Peters: (Inaudible) would be obsolete. Technologies really change.
Lacina: Probably if we're looking at that, those are expensive machines.
Duffy: What do you mean by expensive?
Lacina: Oh you can go 7 to $10,000 if you want.
Duffy: How much?
Lacina: If that's what you want.
Stutsman: According to the City they included the monitor, the printer and the computer...
Schultz: I think the maximum they financed wasn't it $3,500?
Stutsman: 3,000 I'm thinking.
Schultz: It was either 3,000 or 3,500 is the maximum they would allow finance.
Stutsman: There were basically 3 options that they offered too. According to the literature, all of them were good options, they said there is no low end, but it's just depending on an individual specific needs. If you just want the basic data processing, option one fits your needs. If you wanted to do high tech graphics on the computer you would look at option 3.
Jordahl: There is one other point I would like to speak to that Steve you raised the concern about firewalls and information that might corrupt the County system and so forth and it may help to some extent to know that the networking subcommittee of the What-When in recommending the policies to the what when committee has talked about limiting or requiring that any software that's going to be loaded onto the County system would be put on by Information Services and would sort of be vetted through them, employees would not be employing their own software as you described the 6th Judicial District Problem.
Lacina: Well actually now you can pick up viruses through files or even through e-mail in some situations. So it isn't necessarily the loading of, in that situation they were. They were loading their own programs. This will become, well the kids and the people that are doing this stuff are becoming very very sophisticated. They are the designers of the machines and know the loops. I'm glad to hear you're working on that.
Jordahl: I think we have that on, has that meeting been rescheduled?
Schultz: For the What-When Committee meeting, that's going to be one the 31st.
Jordahl: 31st of October, 2:00 or 2:30.
Bolkcom: 1:30.
Jordahl: What-When, 1:30. I'm suggesting Steve that you may want to attend that, because you sound like you have some insights into things that we need to guard against.
Lacina: Oh, I'm sure staff, and I've talked to Bill about this too, and the University had the problem, and Jean you need to recommend to us what's available and what we need to do.
Schultz: I think we did put in there that if you bring in files like word-processing files or anything on a diskette or of you download anything through e-mail that it be run through the virus checker first. Like you said the software, before you load the software, number one you have to have a valid license and it would only be installed by people either in our department or designees. For example Chris Edward's in the Auditors Office is very knowledgeable. He could install, download because that's what Tom wanted. But still things can get through but we're trying to check as much as we can.
Lacina: Because doesn't Microsoft have imbedded in it now that Microsoft Word the Concept virus? I don't think anybody has figured out how to get rid of that.
Schultz: It's hard.
Stutsman: Well Jean and I will continue working on this, thanks for your help Jean.
Duffy: I have one other question. Suppose a County Employee wanted to pay cash for one of them to us and get a discount if it's the same type. That'd probably work too?
Lacina: Well then they'd save the interest if there was any to date.
Stutsman: Yes. So OK we'll continue checking into that.