MINUTES OF THE INFORMAL MEETING OF THE JOHNSON COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS:
NOVEMBER 18, 1997
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Vice Chairperson Bolkcom called the Johnson County Board of Supervisors to order in the Johnson County Administration Building at 9:00 a.m. Members present were: Joseph Bolkcom, Charles Duffy, Jonathan Jordahl, Stephen Lacina; absent: Sally Stutsman.
Bolkcom: Review of the formal minutes from last Thursday, November 13th. Does anybody have any questions, or additions, comments?
Lacina: There was one word change, but that's minor.
Bolkcom: OK.
Jordahl: Unless it was yes to no.
Lacina: "The the" was taken out.
Bolkcom: OK, good point. OK, we'll take that up in a moment under formal.
Bolkcom: Item number 3, business from Kay Hull, General Assistance Director for Department of Human Services regarding the proposed rent increase in General Assistance Guidelines by $50.00 per assist. Good morning Kay.
Department of Human Services General Assistance Director Kay Hull: Good morning.
Lacina: Good morning.
Hull: I'm here today on behalf of the of course General Assistance proposed amount of assistance for rent for the General Assistance recipients of Johnson County. The last time we changed these guidelines was in 1993 and we upped them from 150 to 200 and from 250 to 300. Our proposal today is to once again up them $50, which would mean for a single person they could receive, if eligible under all guidelines, $250 each assist, maximum of 3 times a year and $350 each assist maximum 3 times for multi-member households. This was discussed at the Cluster Board Meeting on November the 10th. I'm going to let Bob kind of tell everyone what the discussion was, but the proposal was indeed for the $50.
Board of Social Welfare Member Bob Welsh: I gave you a memo that shows that discussion when we first reviewed the attachment which is on the back sheet of that memo that Kay prepared for us. There was very strong sentiment to increase the grant allocation $75 per assistance. Because of our commitment to child care when we looked at the total budget, we backed down and I'm recommending that you change the guidelines to increase the rent allotment by $50. We discussed the fact that the County has 3 rent assistance programs, that the General Assistance allotment is the lowest of the 3 and would remain the lowest even with this increase. We believe the $50 increase is a minimum and quite frankly would be pleased if the Board of Supervisors approved an increase of $75. The recommendation before you, as Kay said, would increase the assistance for singles to 250 and for multiple person households to 350. We acknowledge that in light of the high cost of rent in Johnson County that even this increase in rent assistance in most cases will not cover the actual cost, but it's again a step we think in the right direction. We trust you will approve this change in the guidelines.
Bolkcom: So maybe you could give a little bit more background, either Bob or Kay, on the impetus for this. Are we finding a lot of folks having difficulty finding affordable rentals, property, apartments, etc., at the rate we pay now? Is that the issue?
Hull: The rate we pay now never pays the full rent for anyone.
Bolkcom: OK.
Hull: As far as people finding places, if you look at your transitional houses, which were just set up this year those rents are $250 and more. So to ask if they're having a hard time finding a place, the response to that is yes.
Bolkcom: OK.
Hull: If they're having a hard time keeping a place, the response to that is yes.
Lacina: In General Assistance, they can only receive this request, is it twice?
Hull: 3 times in a fiscal year if eligible under all of the guidelines.
Lacina: Yes. Thank you.
Welsh: That if eligible is an important factor because there is a lot of persons who are in need who do not qualify under the basic guidelines.
Bolkcom: Any other questions from the Board?
Jordahl: I remember asking the same question at the Board of Social Welfare meeting, but perhaps for purpose of the public information it would be useful to ask it again. I mean, if we've got 26,000, nearly 27,000 plus 4,500 equals nearly double, well not nearly double, but more than 14,559 that the increase. So there must have been some fair portion of the funds from the current year's budget that are not being spent or last year's budget that weren't spent.
Hull: That's correct. The budgeted line item was 125,000 last year and if you look on that sheet that Bob just gave you, Jonathan, you'll see that we spent 108.
Jordahl: Right. So it was 125. So I guess the question that needs to be asked is quite simply, not that you did anything wrong, but why weren't those funds spent?
Hull: Those funds were not spent because of the requests that we had last year. If you'll also note, we are getting more requests this year. We have spent, right now as of October 30th, I think $4,000 and some odd dollars more than we did last year at the same date.
Jordahl: Uh-huh. So we are projecting basically the continuation of present trends.
Hull: That's right.
Jordahl: If a person is eligible for this assistance, I mean you're talking about 18 new households here. Is this something we are mandated to do, so that even if we budget this much and then more people come in who are eligible do we have to help those people and find the money anyway?
Hull: Yes. Yes. If indeed the guidelines are set, the answer is yes. This program is mandated by the Code of Iowa. Each county in the state has to have a General Assistance Program and each county sets the guidelines.
Bolkcom: Charlie did you have a question?
Duffy: Well I don't see any problem with it. Indeed, the word qualify is kind of a gray area when you get something like this. But I don't have a problem with it.
Bolkcom: So in terms of the current year's budget, what percentage have we spent in this line item? Are we under?
Hull: We're a little bit over on this particular line item. On the total GA budget we're under.
Bolkcom: OK, so if we went over on this we could shift funds within the General Assistance budget.
Welsh: It probably will not require any adjustment in current year budget.
Bolkcom: OK, but we're basically anticipating roughly a $14,500 increase in this line.
Hull: For the year.
Bolkcom: For the year, and you're saying that the General Assistance budget, moving things around is going to be able to take care of that.
Welsh: For this year.
Bolkcom: But next year we can anticipate that this particular line will be adjusted to the increase.
Welsh: The increase of $14,550.
Bolkcom: OK.
Welsh: You'll note on Kay's document that she gave to us was an item considering the burial line item, because as you know Johnson County has one of the lowest burial line items. We chose not to recommend any shift in that item.
Bolkcom: OK. Are there any other questions?
Lacina: No, thanks for reviewing it.
Jordahl: Just one last thing, any excess in funds in this budget would then revert to the general fund. Is that correct?
Hull: That's right.
Jordahl: So what we're really doing here is budgeting, projecting the trend and saying we think we're going to need this much; if we don't need it, we're not going to spend it.
Hull: That's correct.
Jordahl: So that's a good way to do things.
Welsh: This is more appropriate in your budget discussion, but there are some items in the General Assistance budget, which from my stand point are what would be viewed in and out kind of accounts. Again, there is a need as Kay has explained, and I can understand this, a need for budget line item so you have something to charge that against until that money comes in. But there are several line items in the budget and that's why there is some flexibility in that if you examine it.
Bolkcom: Very good. Thanks for coming in. Item number 4, business from Bev Clearman. I don't see Bev here yet.
Welsh: I think they're coming around 9:15.
Bolkcom: Business from Deborah Conger. Maybe we could call Deborah and see if she could come over early. Business from the County Attorney. Any reports Janet?
Assistant County Attorney Janet Lyness: No.
Bolkcom: OK. Business from the Board of Supervisors. Reports. Charlie, do you have a report today?
REPORT (DUFFY): COUNTY ROAD CREW TREE TRIMMING
Duffy: Out in the rural area this last week or so there has been a lot of trimming done to the tree branches and from what I've seen, it's too bad we didn't have that bucket a few years ago because it saved a lot of trees from being cut down. Our County Road Crew is really doing a good job I think. The reason why they're trimmed, a lot of them when a school bus meets another car and especially after that snow storm and ice and snow on these limbs that it was hitting the wind shield of the school buses plus the emergency vehicles, ambulance and things like that. But, I think they're doing a good job. If you ever want to go out and take a look at some of these, Russ Bennett was out north of town and he has a hand in this, doing a good job.
Bolkcom: Great, is that it? Thanks. Steve, do you have a report?
Lacina: No, just echo what Charlie says. They did a nice job on Linder Road trying to save trees. Work hard. That's about it.
Bolkcom: Thanks. Jonathan?
Jordahl: Well, a few things. We've had, I think a productive session discussing staffing at the Board of Supervisors office, a lot of things shifting and changing with trying to decide about secretarial help and how to respond to the coming of a new human resources person. What to do about replacing our person to assist with the budget questions. I believe that job description has been finalized. I know Carol was working on it, I'm not sure if we're going to see that again before it goes on to Pat or before it goes to be advertised, but the changes were relatively minor to replace the person who basically would have been Kim Benge. Sunday, went down to Hills. This is a big thing. Hills Elementary School received a National Blue Ribbon School award for their program there that involves their counselor and some at-risk kids and all the parents, so they have an open school night on Tuesdays which gets people involved with coming in to experience the community kind of as a whole. They have games for the kids, they have food for people, and it's just a wonderful opportunity for the community to really work together. That was recognized on a national level. A lot of people were down there to say congratulations to them. I'm very heartened by the Board's continuing activity in strategic planning. We met yesterday with Tim Shields, and this is probably our 4th or 5th meeting with him. We're focusing in on how to accomplish some of the goals we have set for ourselves, setting some priorities, and asking I think importantly how we make sure that all the department heads and elected officials of the County are involved in this process. So I think it's going to be a very healthy thing in terms of opening up and strengthening lines of communication in all offices. In the same vein, I picked up on the spirit of the last strategic planning meeting and started going around visiting some of these offices that was strongly requested by various folks, and so I have done that with the Treasurer and on Friday night I talked with him. Went to the Courthouse, looked around at what the Physical Plant improvements we've been budgeting and doing up there. The new Courthouse room going in, we got a couple of spaces upstairs that could be improved and we've got the successful work in making the annex, or garage or whatever that is, file storage area, a much more comfortable place to work, I was glad to see all of that. Then I met with Jim McGinley of Emergency Management yesterday. So I think it's a really fun way, a fun part of the job being a Supervisor is to kind of keep tabs on what's going on in various departments. It's an enjoyable job, thanks.
Bolkcom: Great, thanks. Good report. Why don't we get back to the agenda. Bev Clearman's here and Mike Foster, item number 4, discussion regarding the fiscal year 1998 Nutrition Contract, which deals with our Senior Dining Program. Come on up.
Nutrition Committee Chairperson Bev Clearman: Good morning
Bolkcom: Good morning Bev.
Senior Dining Director Mike Foster: Good morning.
Bolkcom: Good morning, Mike.
Clearman: We're passing out a copy of our proposal so that you have it to look at. The first page entitled the memorandum is just some items that say that we arrived at this budget proposal over a process of the last couple of months. You've been working on it and yesterday at our monthly meeting, we passed the proposal that we're initiating today. On your second page, you have a page entitled fiscal year 1999 budget proposal, Nutrition Program. This is kind of an overview of the line item budget and what we have done. Overall salaries are increased by 3% over our ‘98 budget. We chose this 3% at Beth's recommendations from what you the Board of Supervisors may include in your budget and what we think that Heritage may approve. You will note that we have added a note here reflecting that the Board of Supervisors is currently having a consultant review their salaries for non-union personnel. As you're probably aware, this includes our personnel staff in it's entirety, since we do not have any union personnel in our staff. We've been told that this will be completed in January, and we're at a bit of an inconvenience here because Heritage requires that we submit our budget proposal by December 5th, which is in advance of any budget proposal, or budget workings that you may be involved in. We realized that in view of that, that we may need to re-look at this, pending those results. There has been some slight adjustment in the insurance for one of our Cook Assistant positions, in the longevity for the Director, and for Home Delivered Meals Manager. We have our Senior Center Manager/Secretary position, this is kind of a new combination position that we in reviewing our staffing, decided that this would be a good use of this time and if you're interested, we can talk about what that involves. But it is, we are projecting it to be a 30 hours position with a wage of $7.50 as a starting wage. It says reduced wage. In our past budget, we had looked at this position differently and we had thought we would need a higher wage, but in staffing review, we're hoping that this will attract someone to this position. Then another one of our cook assistants, we are advancing those hours from 25 hours to 30 hours, because we find that the 25 hours simply does not cover the amount of work that needs to be done with that position. Our premises remain the same. In travel, we have asked for an increase from $1.20 to $1.25 a gallon for gas. Equipment has remained the same. We find that our supplies have increased in cost, we're asking for a 3% increase in this area. There is also an increase of 5 cents for raw food costs, miscellaneous costs have remained the same. Meal count we are looking at 108,753 meals instead of previously the 108,703 meals. Note that this is based on our current sites which include 2 sites here in Iowa City, the Senior Center and Autumn Park; as well as a Hill's site, Swisher and Solon site, and Adult Day Care.
Jordahl: Can we back up to gas for a minute?
Clearman: Uh-huh.
Jordahl: I don't quite understand that. It seems pretty close to the price I pay for gas, but in terms of what it's going to pay for, this is to reimburse volunteers for the gas that they use delivering home delivered meals?
Foster: That's correct Jonathan.
Jordahl: Well it seems to me, there is, when we travel on County business and need to use our personal cars, there is a mileage rate that we're reimbursed that does not just reflect gasoline, but reflects the cost of wear and tear and depreciation and so forth on the vehicle. It strikes me that $1.25 or $1.20, whichever, doesn't come close to the cost of actually operating the vehicle over those miles.
Foster: I would agree with that. The reason we've gone this route for years, is because to forgo all of our volunteers having to utilize the process of a voucher process.
Jordahl: Uh-huh.
Foster: So we don't have 50 vouchers coming into the Auditor's Office for various people delivering meals. In lieu of that, we just provide them gas reimbursement, so they can utilize their own cars to go to a service station for that purpose.
Bolkcom: So how does that work? What's the typical case, somebody needs to put $5.00 worth of gas in their car to drive meals around, you give them money for 5 gallons of gas?
Foster: We allocate per route.
Bolkcom: Per route?
Foster: Per route.
Bolkcom: OK.
Foster: We utilize basically a gallon of gas for every 8 miles driven. That's been our standard.
Jordahl: So in other words, you're assuming somebody got 20 to 30 miles to the gallon of gas, then they would be getting something like a compensation for the wear and tear on their vehicle because you're paying them at a higher mileage rate.
Foster: Yes, I feel it's a fairly generous compensation for a gallon for every 8 miles is pretty appropriate compensation.
Jordahl: So actually you could call it something else. You could say it's a per mile, rather than a per gallon reimbursement.
Foster: In essence you could. In essence you could.
Jordahl: Which is very much like the per mile reimbursement that I'm talking about. So I don't understand why that's simpler than calling it a per mile reimbursement. Which is maybe an argument that doesn't need to take place, but it's a... You know you're budgeting how many miles per gallon they get in order to give them more money, why not just give them the money for the miles?
Foster: Well it's something we can look into certainly.
Jordahl: I mean, it seems to me, I think if it's appropriate for us, it's appropriate for your volunteers. I don't see the difference.
Clearman: Well that's certainly something we can review. That's a good suggestion. We will review that. I don't know that the mileage rate that is, I believe it's...
Jordahl: 32 I think, something like that.
Bolkcom: For the County?
Jordahl: Yes.
Clearman: Is it...
Bolkcom: 24 cents.
Clearman: It's 24 cents. I don't know that 24 cents per mile actually covers gas and wear and tear on a car. It very well may, but that's something that we can certainly review.
Jordahl: Well if you're getting 20 miles per gallon, you go 20 miles, you get paid $4.80 and that, is that right? You've only spent $1.20 on gas.
Clearman: Uh-huh.
Jordahl: So your wear and tear is $3.00 and something for those 20 miles. I assume that those figures are arrived at in some kind of a reasonable way. It might be a discussion to have with the Auditor's as to how that's calculated.
Clearman: Yes. We will look at that, that's a good suggestion. As mentioned, these proposals are based on sites that we are now serving. We are looking to expand to possibly North Liberty and to a Coralville site. These are sort of pending in the negotiation stage. So should we expand to those, we may need to make some additional changes here. So that is the line item budget. Then on the back of that sheet that's called the FY99 budget proposal, there is our RFP for fiscal year 1999. This form 1 through form 5 corresponds to a form that Mike needs to fill out for Heritage. These are the responses that we are going, that we propose to put in there. I don't know if Mike would like to review those, since he's more familiar with the actual form.
Lacina: The only question I would have is the statement that pertaining to the Sterba Trust, by policy, the Supervisors has the interest income not available for operational budgets. I thought that was a condition of the grant of trust, was that it would not be used for operational and Heritage when they look at this may think, well Supervisors can change the policy, but I may be wrong, but I think when Sterba's donated that money, it specifically was not to be operational, but to assist for other identified needs. Do you remember, Mike?
Foster: I believe that was a Board decision, that we utilize only the interest, not utilize the priority. I don't think that was specified in the endowment particularly.
Lacina: OK, I thought that was in the endowment, I may be mistaken on that.
Foster: But they are requiring full disclosure. Heritage is requiring full disclosure of all of our funds this year.
Duffy: Yes. But that's not the taxpayers money.
Foster: Agreed.
Duffy: I hope they understand that.
Bolkcom: Good point, Charlie. About how much interest does that get a year, Mike? Do you know? Do you have that figure?
Foster: 4 to 6 thousand, depending on when the CDs become available.
Bolkcom: OK.
Clearman: As mentioned here in that statement, we have only used that interest money for sort of extra things in the program. For example, to help pay for the volunteer recognition dinner is a prime example.
Bolkcom: I had a question about the breakout on the revenues. We're going to be asking Heritage for $367,000 approximately. The County in donations are $12,355. Could you guys have a break out on that figure of what's donations and what's Elderly Waiver? I assume that's what that $12,000 is.
Clearman: Right. That information is in the memorandum sheet. If you go down to the paragraph that begins in addition.
Bolkcom: Yes, I was reading that, I was just slightly confused by it.
Clearman: OK.
Bolkcom: So it looks like...
Clearman: There are 2 sources for this money. One is the Elderly Waiver Program and the 2nd source are donations and memorials that have been received by the program. The Elderly Waiver dollars will cover raw food costs for the Elderly Waiver meals. Then it says plus the $7,855 which is reflected in the budget at a 3% of line item now being funded by the County. This is an increase of $670 from the current total of $7,185. Is that...
Bolkcom: I'm still confused. I'm trying to identify. I see donations are going to be almost $3,000 on the 2nd to last paragraph.
Clearman: Uh-huh.
Bolkcom: In memorials, about $3,000. Is the rest Elderly Waiver?
Foster: All the rest.
Clearman: All the rest is Elderly Waiver.
Bolkcom: All the rest. That clears it up, OK, great.
Clearman: It is confusing.
Bolkcom: That's right.
Duffy: And the donations are already in, right?
Foster: That's correct, Charlie.
Bolkcom: Any more questions?
Duffy: Yes, I see where raw food costs went up 5 cents. That would make it what, about a dollar and 27...
Clearman: About $1.27. Uh-huh.
Duffy: That is amazing. We have to give credit to Mike and his staff for providing fine meals. I think our meals don't have to take a back seat to any place in Iowa, maybe across the nation. They're very good meals. The raw food cost, still $1.27, 28 cents, or whatever, compared to other placed that have Senior Dining through Heritage, I think we might be even lower than some of them and provide maybe better meals. Would you agree with that?
Foster: I think anybody you talk to is always going to agree with that, regardless of where they're from. I appreciate the comment, though. Our emphasis certainly is to maintain quality and service to keep up with what the economy dictates. We're always moving forward in terms of trying to find new items that they will be interested in. Of course, some of those items and basic staples continue to rise, so...
Duffy: Well you do a good job Mike, thanks a lot.
Foster: Thank you.
Duffy: You can't pat yourself on the back, but I can do it for you.
Foster: OK.
Clearman: As always, staffing, full staffing remains a problem and we are making that one of our priority goals to try to hire and maintain full staff for this next year.
Bolkcom: I was at a presentation on Friday at the agency, Mike presented to the Advisory Council Budget Planning Committee. The Advisory Council did an excellent job describing our program here in Johnson County which is a very large one. We've got 6 sites, almost 110,000 meals a year,. One of the priorities, by the way report to the Board, the area agency would like to see more congregate meal sites in their 7 county region. We could anticipate maybe some, Mike, and the committee has talked about North Liberty and Coralville, but if those were to come about, I would assume we would be seeing some additional resources from the area agency as well to make those happen so... It's an exciting time for this program I think as it grows.
Lacina: So to permit, to present this then to Heritage, do you need Sally's signature, Joe's signature on this to send it forward?
Clearman: Uh-huh, we...
Lacina: So we're not on for formal then are we?
Bolkcom: No we're not.
Lacina: We need to do that next Thursday? Put you on for...
Bolkcom: Next Tuesday.
Clearman: Next Tuesday.
Bolkcom: The Board will be meeting Tuesday for, because of the holiday next week.
Clearman: OK.
Bolkcom: So it would be good just to get this on as a formal action item. We appreciate you coming in. I know that the Heritage is ahead of our schedule for getting these things approved.
Clearman: Yes, and this has always been kind of a problem, because it is in so far in advance. It's kind of a best guessed.
Bolkcom: Sure.
Foster: Therefore you realize we will be visiting you again pending negotiations.
Bolkcom: Sure. Mike you might follow up with Sally. Sally couldn't be here today, she's in Des Moines for a meeting on the Iowa Plan today and is not at the meeting, but you might want to follow up with her between now and maybe next Tuesday so she can understand what's going on here.
Foster: OK.
Bolkcom: Great.
Jordahl: (inaudible)
Bolkcom: Thank you.
Clearman: Thank you.
Welsh: I have one question.
Bolkcom: Sure, Bob.
Welsh: If you translated Jonathan's question of volunteer dollars to be paid on a mileage basis, you take the 8 miles per gallon that's now being used at $1.25, to do the 8 times .24, that would be $1.92, rather than the $1.25. So the actual increase if you chose to go that route would be an increase in the budget of $2,787.00.
Jordahl: Or put another way, as I was cooking on the numbers a little bit. Mileage reimbursement, we usually talk about if it is 24 cents per mile compares to the $1.25 per eight miles comes out to 15.6 cents a mile that you're reimbursing. So the 24 would be more. So whether we want to do that or what effect that has on the budget, that just in terms of whether the one or the other covers the cost of the maintenance is significantly more would be paid at 24 cents a mile.
Welsh: Let me say on the mileage, Johnson County is low at this point with the 24 cents. In looking over the requests from other sub-contractors in nutrition bills, they are basically 27 cents, most of them are 28 cents per mile. We adjusted this request back down to the 24 which is in the current budget because research discovered that was in fact your policy of the 24 cents reimbursement. So we thought there could be a real case made to increase that to 28 cents.
Jordahl: Uh-huh, but anyway...
Welsh: Chose the conformity with your own...
Bolkcom: Sure and maybe it's an item where the Board should visit about when we get into budgets this year.
Jordahl: Well the point being that if these people are volunteers, we're basically asking them to subsidize our program by paying for the maintenance of their own vehicles and we're not covering that at the same rate we would County employees doing the same thing.
Clearman: Yes, it's certainly something worth looking into. So...
Duffy: I would say one thing though, that when it's cold, I doubt that the folks that deliver the meals, I would say they let maybe their car run while somebody, especially if there's 2 of them because it takes more gasoline to start a car to let it run anyway, but I'll be there's time after time that, knowing the routes that they might pull into the driveway with the car running, take the meal up to the door, come right back and away they go, so it, I suppose we'd be a little careful that mileage is the only thing. It's a good thing that we have volunteers. This program wouldn't be...
Bolkcom: Thank you very much.
Clearman: Very true.
Foster: Thank you.
Clearman: Thank you.
COUNTY RECORDER DEBORAH CONGER: AMENDING RECORDER'S OFFICE BUDGET FOR STAFF
Bolkcom: Well we're back on schedule, 9:35, business from Deborah Conger, Johnson County Recorder, amending a Recorder's Office budget for staff. Discussion. The Recorder's here, Deborah Conger, good morning.
County Recorder Deborah Conger: Good morning.
Bolkcom: Thanks.
Conger: I was actually hoping not to have to make this presentation this morning, but under the circumstances I think if we read through this proposal that I have here you'll kind of understand what the challenges are facing us in the Recorder's Office right now. When the budget was created, probably in 1995, submitted to you actually in 1996, the Recorder's Office anticipated the need to hire one full-time position for FY98 to accommodate the transfer of vital statistics July 1st. In fiscal year 97, the workload in the Recorder's Office increased by approximately 17% in just real estate. In FY98, the transfer of vital statistics has increased our work load by 48%. With the addition of vital statistics on July 1st, 1997, the document per day average increased from 88 a day to 130. This figure does not reflect the increased number of phone calls and requests for vital statistics assistance, where a document is not generated, but staff time is still expended. Nor does it reflect DNR licensing and registration requests. The Recorder's Office averages 1,200 contacts per week in telephone calls and counter requests, and I guess the bottom line is our workload has increased, and I don't think the one person that was budgeted for vitals is really adequate for the amount of work that we have facing us.
Lacina: I commend you for trying to hold the line on the budget, but I agree with you that the workload is far greater than we expected.
Conger: Yes. We increased personnel by 20%, but our workload has increased by 48%, so it's not a total loss because of course our revenues have increased with these documents, with everything except marriage certificates, the County does generate, we do generate a revenue for the County budget.
Lacina: And in fact operate without any property tax support at all, so you're totally independent.
Jordahl: How do those revenues compare to the cost of hiring new employees, Deb? The increase in revenues from the workload. Steve's noting that the office is operated without property tax support. Will that continue to be the case as these numbers increase? Are the revenues continuing to offset the staff costs?
Lacina: By several hundred thousand dollars.
Conger: Yes, I haven't actually looked at that, but they would have to even though with the marriage certificates, the whole fee for the marriage certificates goes to the State. So with those, we don't generate any income at all for the County. But with birth, marriage, and death certificates, yes it's $6.00 for each one of those.
Lacina: So procedurally, do you have a job description drafted for this or do you need to go to the County Attorney to approve one or can you just...
Conger: I'm just going to do a Clerk I, which is the least...
Lacina: OK, what you've got in place.
Conger: The very bottom, entry level position.
Lacina: So really what you need then is just to amend the budget to cover this.
Conger: By this 14, yes for 7 months. Then I'll put it in the 90, well I guess...
Bolkcom: 99.
Lacina: 99 budget.
Conger: 99 budget, yes.
Bolkcom: Sure.
Lacina: Sounds good.
Bolkcom: So we'll have to note this. I assume you've been talking to Lynnette.
Conger: I have been. I've had several phone conversations to try to figure out how to get around it. But I don't think there's any way to avoid this.
Bolkcom: It sounds like it's been coming. I know that you've been really swamped and some concern about that. As Steve pointed out you've held off trying to manage it and maybe it's time to hire that person.
Conger: We have 6 people. I think if we could operate at full staff with 6 people we'd be OK, but during the last 60 days we've only had 12 days when we're at full staff, because we have young mothers with children. We've had maternity leaves twice. You add that all together. So in order to be at full staff with the 6 people we need 7.
Jordahl: The slash here is real estate and vitals. So 130 and 22 on documents per day. Is that those 2 categories.
Conger: That averages 22 documents per person. That's what I'm trying to show there.
Jordahl: Oh I see. OK so 130 documents per day, 22 per person. OK.
Lacina: Come spring there may be another rush of birth certificates, passports. You don't do passports right now, but...
Conger: We do intend to do that though. I would like to start doing that, start doing passports.
Jordahl: So another employee would bring it down to just over 18 almost 19, so it would bring you back to the range of where you were in 97.
Conger: Right now we're having a very hard time of keeping up and I don't like to get behind.
Jordahl: Uh-huh.
Bolkcom: It's good. I'd like to also commend your staff and you. The Recorder Study Committee met last week and there was virtually unanimous opinion about how the transition has gone in the last 6 months, about the computerization of the office, people seem to be very pleased with what's going on over there.
Conger: I think we're making progress toward computerizing the office.
Bolkcom: Great. Appreciate you coming in. Anything else?
Conger: How do we get a decision on this?
Lacina: Lynnette will put together basically a bundle of all of the requests for amendments. We've got some coming from Health Department and other. Because of the expense of the public hearing process and everything, advertising, we'll do a bunch of them at once. So she'll have the dates and basically if you cover with her, she'll do all of the legal procedural stuff and then we'll just amend the budget.
Bolkcom: Is everybody OK with this?
Jordahl: Yes.
Lacina: So really while you can't over-expend the line item, you're safe. You could probably start advertising now, because you've got the money in the budget and with the pool of the budget, you'll be ready to go.
Conger: OK. Thank you.
Lacina: Thank you.
Bolkcom: Great. Thanks.
Bolkcom: OK, where are we at? Back to the Board of Supervisors. I have just a brief report. Also like to note I had an opportunity to go down to Hills on Sunday for the award of the Blue Ribbon School at Hills Elementary. Sally represented the Board and did a very nice job. She was also there. Attended the Heritage Area Agency on Aging Task Force Budget and Planning Committee meeting all day last Friday and talked about trying to expand congregate meal sites through the region. We had a presentation by all of the providers that provide services to seniors in Johnson County including SEATS and our own Nutrition Program and Elderly Services and people did a very nice job with that. The Task Force on Aging of Johnson County met yesterday and I want to let people know that on December 3rd at the Senior Center, it's a Wednesday, between 2:00 and 4:00 the task force will be meeting with our area State legislators to visit with them about the Older Iowa legislation and concerns of seniors in Johnson County. That's on Wednesday December third 2 to 4 at the Senior Center. Everybody is welcome to attend that. The Board will be meeting next Tuesday for it's formal and informal because of the Holiday, just so that people know that.
Jordahl: You might mention ISAC.
Bolkcom: Yes the Iowa State Association of Counties, would it be fall meetings I guess, are happening later this week, whatever week this is, November 17th and the Board will be attending Wednesday, Thursday and Friday in Des Moines to learn about what's going on around the state.
Lacina: In light of the budget meeting we were going to try to schedule this summer, early spring I wonder when we're up there if we check and see if they're going to conduct another one this fall. Just to see what changes may have been made in the Code and what we have to follow. I'm sure the Auditor will come back with some information too. Remember that one Jonathan we were going to try to go up to Ames...
Jordahl: The school?
Lacina: Yes.
Jordahl: Yes. Tom did go to that and I need to sit down with him and go over the details of that.
Lacina: That might be helpful for all of us though if we found something to sit down and have a work session. The State used to do that and with their budget cuts they discontinued that, which was unfortunate for the Counties.
Bolkcom: Good point. Item number 8. Inquires and reports from the public. Anybody have anything they want us to know about?
INQUIRY (JOE GJOVIG): FINDINGS OF RECORDER'S OFFICE STUDY COMMITTEE
Joe Gjovig: Yes I've got something Joe.
Bolkcom: Go ahead Joe.
Gjovig: I attended the last meeting of the committee that has been looking into the Recorder's Office and frankly I was very disappointed in the committee in their report. They were very superficial and didn't seem to have an answer at all, just seemed to scratch the surface. (Inaudible). So the report didn't tell me much of anything.
Lacina: Well they haven't written the report yet Joe. They did a lot of work in the other meetings. That meeting was basically set up to get a straw poll or sense of what direction they were going to go. Now they will start compiling a written document which will give a full report.
Gjovig: About all I heard there was opinions (inaudible).
Lacina: No you're right. That basically was what that meeting was scheduled to do was to get a sense of direction. But they met with Linn County's study committee and they had the Recorder's manuals and they really have been doing a lot of work.
Gjovig: (Inaudible) a list of all of the functions and see if there was even a fit (inaudible).
Lacina: They did that as...
Gjovig: I'm not sure they even did that at all.
Lacina: Well they may not have written it down, but they did look at it as well as the Linn Counties committee did as well to see if there was duplication or redundancies.
Jordahl: One second here. Andy, are we picking this up on the microphone here? OK. Sorry to interrupt.
Lacina: No, that was fine.
Bolkcom: Any more comments Joe? OK.
Gjovig: I was hoping that (inaudible) learn more.
Lacina: Well and Joe Holland is the one to talk to Joe and he's really the chair of that and can kind of explain how they proceeded to it.
Welsh: I think from what Joe raised, I was at that meeting also, and I would share some of Joe's frustration, because continually the statement was made in relation to cost efficiency, we don't know, we don't have the data or the (inaudible) to make that kind of determination. I don't know whether that's... I'm sure that's not the result with the lack of effort of the committee; it might be the lack of availability of that or lack of people sharing information. I'm not sure of all of the factors, but I did hear what Joe heard on cost efficiency we don't know. We don't have the data and that was at least disappointing to me as one person.
Lacina: Well and you did hear them express their frustration on some of those very points as well.
Welsh: That's right. That's right. That's why I said I don't think it's a lack of effort of that committee.
Bolkcom: Sure. Sure. No, I think they've worked hard. I understand we can anticipate a written report by around December 10th when they meet again, so you might want to get a copy of that Joe and see what it says. Any other inquiries from the public?
INQUIRY (DUFFY): CONGRATULATIONS TO HILLS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL ON UPCOMING AGENDA
Duffy: I got something.
Bolkcom: Go ahead Charlie.
Duffy: Maybe we should put on the agenda, memo of congratulations to the Hills Elementary School.
Bolkcom: Yes. I was thinking the same thing. That's' a great idea.
Duffy: Good luck to Lone Tree-Highland and City High this week.
Bolkcom: Do we want to put that on, the letter for next week?
Lacina: Sure.
Jordahl: Tuesday I guess.
Bolkcom: Karen could you get that. Thanks.
Welsh: Congratulations to Lone Tree and City High for being the State Champions.
Duffy: I think we better wait with that.
Bolkcom: It's a good thought though. Joe go ahead.
INQUIRY (GJOVIG): STATUS OF UNPAID PROPERTY TAXES
Gjovig: Awhile back you listed all the back taxes that haven't been collected. Some of them have gone back to years. What's been being done about this? Here I've got to be paying mine every year to have (inaudible) some people are getting by not having to pay their taxes.
Jordahl: Now there's a good question. What's the answer to that?
Lacina: The answer is you need to check with the County Attorney to see what is being done. That's basically from the collection standpoint, it's in his court. The Board of Supervisors really doesn't have a collection component or nor does the Treasurer and that's where it stands. Now some of the properties in the past when we've looked at this and we've looked at the cost of collections while there are some properties that the initial collection would be to the benefit, there are a lot of properties out there that may be 7 or 8 feet wide. For example when they widened highway number 1 up by the Highlander and ACT and that there were some strips of ground up there which were delinquent in taxes and were non usable and the people just walked away from it. Or if there is a terrible ravine or the river changes channels, there is a lot of property like that which is really worthless. I guess the question is does the County Attorney have the time to allocate an attorney and will we support that to allocate that attorney for those collection purposes and probably something we should discuss again during the budget round, but the last time we looked at it it was decided that we could not justify a full-time position. Now that was a few years back and maybe it's changed.
Gjovig: From that list it sounds like there would be enough savings to hire one person in that department to just do nothing but collect those back taxes.
Lacina: That may be the result now, they may have grown to that. But the other factor that came in to play was that legislation took place which charges one and a half percent per month penalty to taxpayers that are delinquent and a whole lot of taxes became current after that legislation passed. So really the ones that we would be after would be the old ones sitting out there now that's building up over time. But we can...
Bolkcom: It might be worth putting that on when the Board does budget, but we could conceivably put somebody on temporarily to work on that exclusively and when it's done the position ends.
Lacina: But we could ask Pat to recommend.
Lyness: Right, we're actually looking at trying to collect and do some work on that, but it just isn't the highest priority right now.
Duffy: We've already done that in the past I think. John Bulkley used to handle that and I think he did collect some of the taxes. Now not all of the taxes go to the Supervisors,but I guess it was a real battle to get it too from what I heard.
Lacina: But a good point.
Bolkcom: Anything else from members of the public? All right I think we'll adjourn the informal meeting.
Adjourned at 9:50 a.m.
Attest: Tom Slockett, Auditor
By Melinda McCleary, Recording Secretary