Bolkcom: All right. Number 5...

Stutsman: Thanks, Mike for that.

Bolkcom: Thank you.

Bolkcom: Business from Sher Hawn, Program Director for the Employee Wellness, regarding the Employee Assistance Program. Sher, good morning.

Employee Wellness Program Director Sher Hawn: Good morning.

Bolkcom: Come on up. You have some visitors with you.

Hawn: A little bit, it won't take long.

Bolkcom: That's fine.

Hawn: A little background, at the July 14th Board of Supervisors meeting you asked me to form a small Committee with the purpose of researching local employee assistance providers and to return to you with a formal recommendation. The Committee consisted of Sally Stutsman, Carol Peters, Lora Shramek, and myself. We basically contacted local employee assistance providers and invited them to submit a formal proposal for an Employee Assistance Program that would be designed for our County employees and their family members. Basically, we contacted ASAP of Iowa City, Family Service Agency, Marchman Psychology Associates, Synchrony which is affiliated with MECCA, and the University of Iowa Behavioral Health. The Committee agreed upon content for the proposal and we also agreed upon a formalized evaluation criteria which included ratings in the following categories: accessibility, confidentiality, contract terms, cost, references, relationships with health care providers, reporting, reputation and longevity, service strengths, staff credentials, and training including training for managers and for employees. Basically, we received proposals from 4 of the 5 providers that I said that we contacted. Just to sum it up and make the formal recommendation to you, after reviewing and scoring each proposal the Committee's prepared to make a formal recommendation to the Board which is that we recommend that you contract with Synchrony of MECCA and the University of Iowa Behavioral Health. They basically submitted to us a joint proposal, the 2 of them going together. So we're recommending that the Board go ahead and contract with them for that Program, for our Employee Assistance Program. They are here today, Ron Burge is here from MECCA, and also Paula Kelly, and Lance Clemson, and Scott... Gothmiller, I just met Scott this morning; basically to answer any questions that you might have regarding their particular proposal.

Bolkcom: All right. Thank you.

Lacina: My understanding is that if an employee comes to us with a substance abuse problem that we have certain requirements, as far as assisting them, and that this would fit that need. At $20 per employee, I think that's a very reasonable expenditure.

Bolkcom: Other questions?

Lacina: Sher, then we'll enter into a contract is that the idea? Which will be, how soon like Thursday? How soon do you want to do this?

Hawn: I would like for us to enter into a contract just as soon as we can put that together.

Lacina: OK.

Hawn: The Committee hadn't gotten as far as the details of the contract; we've just made our decision and came here to make the recommendation. But I do want to move as fast as we can.

Lacina: Is there a template for pre-existing... For example, I think you had worked with Proctor & Gamble on a proposal, do you have a contract or something drafted?

Hawn: We have sample contracts for our other companies that we can easily... like you said a template that we can to (inaudible). If we wanted to put that together even as early as October 1. We can work with Lora to figure out what we need to do for orientations, employee notification, and set up some training for supervisors and managers on how to use the Program.

Lacina: OK, then physically how will this happen? Say somebody has a problem and goes to a department head, the department head they then go to Lora?

Synchrony Representative Paula Kelly: No. Basically, there's a couple of different ways that people can access the Employee Assistance Program. Any County employee that has any kind of personal problem, be it substance abuse, personal family problems, can contact the central number by themselves. And just say, I'm an employee of Johnson County I need to talk to a mental health counselor, and EAP counselor, and set up the appointment. That's all they need to do. If it's a situation where an employee is experiencing performance problems, the personal problems have crossed into the work place, the supervisor can then recommend that the employee go. The supervisor can make the phone call. Oftentimes the way that works is they're sitting right there with the supervisor, the supervisor calls and says, I've got so and so in the office, they make the appointment. So it can work either way, but the confidentiality of the Program is essential; so it's important that employees can access this without supervisors or HR knowing as well.

Hawn: Steve if I could add to that too, I would see the Wellness Program still in my capacity, I would still be referring people as well.

Lacina: OK.

Hawn: In the past I've referred people to mental health professionals in the community, now I've got this intermediate step. So I'm hopeful that we'll have a lot of reciprocal referrals back and forth. They might be referring people to the Wellness Program too.

MECCA Representative Ron Burge: If I might add we'll be working with Sher so that we collaborate it terms of her existing Wellness Program, so that we don't duplicate what's already being offered. As well as perhaps accessing what more could be offered and doing some joint (inaudible) ...

Lacina: Training prevention.

Hawn: Yes.

Burge: Exactly.

Lacina: OK, great.

Bolkcom: So what's the total cost of the Program. Do we have a budget?

Burge: $20 per employee per year.

Bolkcom: Right. Do we have a total?

Hawn: I think it's 8,500 is what we wrote into the grant for the 425 employees. Is that real close Carol?

Peters: Yes. The number of employees, of course can fluctuate.

Bolkcom: Where are we getting this from Board, in terms of the budget, is this Central Services? Is this out of our Health Insurance Pool?

Jordahl: I would think...

Bolkcom: Ending balance, we do need...

Stutsman: That's a good question.

Bolkcom: We were going for the grant. We were going for the grant. We didn't get the grant. We just need to make a decision on where we're going to fund it from.

Peters: I would recommend, 18 Central Services that's where you have your flexible spending account for administration.

Bolkcom: Where's our block grant for the Wellness Program is that on 18 as well?

Peters: Yes.

Lacina: I thought that was...

Bolkcom: That's out of the pool.

Peters: Yes. Well...

Stutsman: It's out of our budget isn't it?

Peters: No. It's out of... I'm sorry, it's out of the Block Grants which would be 20. I'm sorry, not 18.

Bolkcom: OK.

Jordahl: The rationale for associating this with the Insurance Pool would be that this would reduce the demand on the Insurance Pool, theoretically. So it would make sense. I wouldn't see it as raiding the employee contributions, quite the contrary this is providing a benefit which is essentially a mental health benefit which is covered under insurance.

Stutsman: I think we need to have a discussion about where this comes from because I see some... During the budget process, for this year I have no problem with 18, but I think we need to think about in the future where this is going to come from.

Jordahl: What is the... There is no upper limit on this, I see the costs floating. If you had a person that had a severe incident of some kind, your chart here shows critical incidence stress debriefing, $125 per hour. This could pretty readily balloon up past $8500 a year and so...

Hawn: Those are additional costs.

Jordahl: Right. That's what I'm saying, that that's...

Kelly: So for the basic employee the capitated rate, unless you have a horrendous year where you'd be calling us in for a lot of critical incidents, I can't see where you would get additional hourly charges. Those are... That's kind of just the crisis, that's your safety net in case something awful would happen and you need us to come in and do a CISD.

Burge: Built into the proposal each employee and their dependents would have up to 3 counseling sessions and in a sense becomes kind of a mini critical incident debriefing. Obviously the critical incident is defined by that family member, by your employee. We added the option, and it's strictly an option, of the critical incident debriefing for a much larger catastrophic situations. Let's say you had a department that had a significant trauma and someone in the department made the decision that they wanted special services exclusively for that department. So all of these optional services would be on a case by case basis and would only occur with the appropriate notification and authorization of whoever (inaudible) with that.

Jordahl: This critical incidence stress debriefing would not occur in a normal run of an individual having an incident?

Kelly: No. Those are organizational services so the basic capitated rate is for your employees then that additional chart is above and beyond. Like you said if some kind of tragedy would happen in the workplace.

Bolkcom: So if somebody is having a mental health issue at work and...

Kelly: Regular mental... a regular mental health issue.

Bolkcom: ... yes, whatever, maybe they've lost a family member or they're stressing out at... their workload.

Kelly: They just call us and that's part of the contract, yes.

Bolkcom: So they would call... they need to see a therapist, they get 3 visits.

Kelly: Right.

Bolkcom: After the third visit it would be... They'd be hooked up with somebody and it would be at what rate at that point?

Kelly: Then what we would do is we would work with them regarding what their insurance coverage is.

Bolkcom: OK.

Kelly: So that's another...

Bolkcom: So just pop into the insurance plan.

Kelly: That's part of the work we would have to do with Lora, would be to educate ourselves about what your mental health benefit plan is.

Bolkcom: Sure. Right.

Burge: The $20 also covers on site training here for supervisors and employee groups, orientation (inaudible) as well as access to training at Synchrony that we provide to all of our contractors. Those training topics range from dealing with difficult employees to supervision 101. We try to cover a variety of workplace training issues that the employees would have access to.

Duffy: This would be voluntary program for County employees.

Burge: It could be both voluntary and something that the supervisor could refer to them to if they're trying to deal with a performance problem.

Jordahl: This is closely related to human resources questions, you're talking about training here. I see that as essentially the function of... it would be something between Information Services and Human Resources probably. Lora's not here, I assume she's had some input into this process. It sounds like you were part of this Committee. Where does Lora fit into this picture I guess is the question.

Stutsman: She worked closely with Synchrony in setting up training. I think with input from staff as far as what our needs are. I think that Synchrony has an history or record of working well with employers and so I don't think that that would be a problem.

Burge: Jonathan, maybe just to answer that, one HR department has described us as her mental health department.

Jordahl: Uh-huh.

Burge: Her mental health division of the HR function. It's very difficult anymore as you're working with employee groups to separate their mental health issues from the workplace issues. The HR department would need to address the workplace issues and we would be the resource to address the mental health.

Hawn: Jonathan, Lora was on the Committee so she did review all of the proposals, and did the rating. We discussed very thoroughly... I followed up on references from each of the submitted proposals and we discussed all of that at great length. So she was very involved.

Jordahl: I'm sorry, I didn't either recall that or remember the mention earlier in the meeting, that Lora had been part of this Committee.

Hawn: I just wanted to clarify.

Stutsman: I might add too, as being part of the Committee, we had good proposals. We were pleased at what we had, but I think Synchrony's was by far the most complete and the most thorough, and really addressed everything that we identified as things that we were interested in. I think they're longevity, the reporting, the type of training that they would be available to do for us; I think it's a good match for our employees.

Bolkcom: All right. Any more questions? We'll put this on for Thursday... or as soon as you can have a contract to us we'd be ready to go and figure out how to fund, where we're going to fund it from.

Stutsman: We will fund it, Joe.

Hawn: This is really exciting. I really appreciate the Board's support of this Program.

Bolkcom: We appreciate your work on it. It's been a long time in coming, I know it's been kicked around for some time and it's great to finally be at a point of being able to make it happen.

Hawn: Great.

Bolkcom: We look forward to the orientation. Thank you for coming in everyone.

Bolkcom: We're going to jump over to item 7, business from the Board of Supervisors, a) discussion regarding proposal for architectural services for the Johnson County Jail Sheriff's department. Good morning Dwight. Come on up. Nice green tie. Wow.

Stutsman: You must be related to Charlie, that's the first thing I thought when you walked in.

Bolkcom: The subliminals.

Lacina: Charlie has a coat like that.

Duffy: Yes.

Architect Dwight Dobberstein: This is like the second time I've worn this tie.

Duffy: It looks nice, you ought to wear it everyday.

Dobberstein: Hopefully, last time I was here we established a need to look at further study for the jail. The Space Needs Committee had talked about going further and so we put together a proposal which I sent to Sally for additional study. We need to answer the big questions yet. How many beds do we need? We need to reassess that at the Site Space Study and what will happen inside and are we going to add on or is it going to be new construction? How much will it cost? What size staff is needed and all of those things that referred to at last meeting. So this is going to go far beyond our scope of our present Space Needs Study and we feel we better keep going ahead on this because the time frame involved in getting this done, in getting the building designed and funded, we're going to be a few years down the road and by that time the situation could be critical at the jail. So we have a proposal in to do this study and basically it's a generic architectural proposal with one exception and that is that this is undefined at this point. So what we have in there is a clause that says that we would just work on an hourly basis until this gets defined. Then we'll switch over to a %age basis, which is normally how we work with the County. In addition, I guess I'm here to recommend that the County look at hiring a consultant because what we're getting into now really goes beyond our expertise. In fact, Bob Carpenter has been very helpful, but I think he mentioned that it's also going beyond what he's prepared to do also. I think what we need to do is look at how the jail operates, what kind of addition should the jail think about adding on and what kind of staffing they need to provide. We need someone who has more experience in that. A couple of consultants that I have names of here, one is Dennis Kenny, Kenny and Associates from Champaign, Illinois. One is James Roundhorst from Rapid City. Both of them are working with the National Institute of Corrections. Actually both have written the book on small jail design, so to speak, and I think they would be very good. What I would suggest is that the Board would ask me to put together a request proposal and have them send in, for your review and approval, what they propose to do. Generally I would expect that it would be a 2 phase thing, kind of a needs assessment, which would reaffirm what we've already talked about, and then get further into the actual operations of the jail and be a lot more intense work with the Sheriff. Then they would follow up with a second phase which would be the design phase where they would help us with the actual design of the jail and picking out security and all of the specialize pieces of the jail. I've contacted them to find out what kind of a range we're talking about here. Their study for them to do this would run in the range of $20,000 per phase, but they said they would break that up for us and you could take a look at what it all costs and make a decision and see if you want to proceed. So those are the 2 things I'm here with today. One is our proposal because all these consultants would work through a local architect, they don't work alone. So we would get on board with a proposal to work on an hourly basis because we really don't know what the size or the scope of the project is until we define it. Then proceed with the design after is has been approved by the Board. Secondly, get proposals from consultants to help us. I think this is a logical next step in this process for the jail. Of course the third I haven't brought up is how do we fund this? I guess that's... We need to know how much it's going to cost before we can look at that probably. This is what this stuff will do.

Duffy: I suppose still the big issue is if we can acquire more land to the west. But that doesn't seem too feasible.

Dobberstein: You mean at the existing site?

Duffy: Yes.

Dobberstein: Pat and I did meet with the University and talked about those potentials. They are willing to give us a little space, but not really much.

Duffy: Oh really? Boy, that's a step up thought. I didn't think...

Dobberstein: Basically taking maybe the alley and the roads is what they're allowing or they would agree to. But no, they're not going to sell or want to give up any of that land around there. They have plans for all of that themselves. So I think it would be very important for us to look at that location and the limitations versus maybe another site where we could build for future expansion. With that comes all of the discussion about being close to the courthouse and the number of trips to go back and forth and whether we do video conferencing. That all has to do with how the Sheriff's Department is run. That's where we start to get into an area where we really don't feel competent to start dictating or telling the Sheriff how he should run his department. These people have experience. I know this James Roundhorst used to run the County jail. So he has vast experience in that. Dennis Kenny, again, he is widely sought after and working on a number of projects all over the country and he's right over in Champaign, Illinois, which the proximity I though might allow us to get him to take a look at this project. Before anything is decided I think you can look at a proposal from him and see what you thought.

Lacina: Sometimes you wonder why we can't transport a judge into a courtroom facility at the jail, as opposed to loading up a dozen prisoners and loading them back and forth.

Dobberstein: Exactly.

Duffy: Yes.

Lacina: But these are just some things that we probably need to take a look at when we do design work to see if we couldn't have an arraignment room. You don't need a full blown courtroom because you don't want to conduct court in the jail, but for the initial pleas and those things where it's a 10, 15 minute item you would think that it would be easier to have the judge travel there. But again, I think before we do any planning financially, we need to know... Some type of needs study had to be conducted. So I think you're right on track.

Bolkcom: How does... Go ahead Sally.

Stutsman: I was going to say, this is the recommendation of the committee. We've done this preliminary analysis and now we're to the point where we need to get a lot more detail before we can proceed ahead. So it was the consensus of the committee to move onto this next step. Even working with the University. They asked just exactly what are we talking about here? So we can't present that information until we have a much more detailed study.

Bolkcom: All right. So how does this... I recognize that this is a high priority for the County jail space. We're also studying other space concerns and priorities of the County. How does this relate to those? In other words, this is going to consume some resources which we need. There is no way around hiring some consultants to help us. If we're going to spend 12 or 15 million dollars on a jail we're going to have to spend 20, or 30, or $50,000 planning for it. That makes sense to me. How does it relate though to our other space needs as they compete with one another? Like Human Services, I know there is some definite interest to make some decision in the next year or 2 or some period of time with that 5 year lease to move ahead.

Dobberstein: Uh-huh. I think the other study, it needs to keep going on. We intend to keep coming to the Board with more information on each department. Yes, I think there is a priority that has to be set here by the Board as to what goes first. The Committee, I think has kind of come up with a bit of prioritization on their own, just by the way we're presenting the different departments' needs. So we thought that Human Services was first priority, just because of the time limits on their lease. We thought the jail was maybe second priority, but really we're not trying to make that decision for the Board. I think the Board has to make that decision. But just the time frame of planning a new jail with...

Bolkcom: It takes some more time.

Dobberstein: You've got to get started now.

Bolkcom: Right.

Dobberstein: Even if you decide this is not top priority, by the time we get this done it may be the top priority.

Bolkcom: So Dwight, explain the role of Neumon Monson in this in terms of you'd over... Because you were suggesting we'd want to find another consultant who knows how to design jails, understands operation of jails, but they aren't going to give us a blueprint for a jail or are they? How does it relate to the architectural services you might provide? Or you would just be overseeing the gathering of kind of all of that data for the County?

Dobberstein: Yes, we would be the architective record so to speak. They would work through us. I think initially they would take the lead role in working with the Sheriff, in trying to figure out how he might change his operations and what that means in terms of space. We would attend those meetings and take in all of the information. When it gets down to actually designing the jail then I think we would have to start working more closely with them and I would expect that we would do that together. Actual doing the construction drawings, then we would do that and of course they would advise us and have review capacity. So where it starts out, they would take the lead and I think it ends up that we finish up with the construction drawings and construction administration. Being local here we can do that much better than they can and they're not really prepared to do that. They're willing to come in and do the space needs and help with the design and the considerations and specify security equipment, but they would not draw the actual plans.

Bolkcom: Do you have any sense of how many hours? In terms of looking at the specific contract that's on the agenda this morning to keep you involved. Can you give us some sense of the cost of this? It's uncertain... You're proposing an hourly rate.

Dobberstein: Yes.

Bolkcom: What's the hourly rate and do you have a cost to get us to the next phase, whatever that phase might be, with the jail project?

Dobberstein: We have a schedule of our hourly rates there, but I think if I were you, yes, I'd be concerned of a open ended... I really don't know what it might take. Usually studies that we do for other facilities run into the 15 to $20,000 range. This is a different animal, so to speak, because we'd have a consultant involved. But I was telling Sally if you felt more comfortable putting a limit, so that you knew exactly what you're committed to then we don't have any problem with that. We can go along and keep the Board informed as to where we're at.

Bolkcom: All right.

Dobberstein: If we're getting to the point where we're beyond our fee we'll have to let you know and see if we can come to some agreement.

Jordahl: So you're talking about an initial, a preliminary, a looking at, a needs assessment. We're not really talking about design at this point. Or are we?

Dobberstein: Well, right. There are kind of 2 phases there and one leads into the next one. That's what I think the proposal would help clear up. It would be a needs assessment first and that has to do with reviewing information we have and going further into and talking with the Sheriff and maybe looking at different methods of operation. Part of that then, gets into design. Part of what I handed out last time was making decisions on what type of supervision we're going to have. Is it going to be a direct supervision versus more of an intermittent surveillance, which is pretty much what we have now. What type of facility that we're going to have makes a difference as to what size it is and what the design is? So the 2 kind of work hand in hand and yes, the needs assessment will start to dictate what the design will be. But then the second phase would actually be sitting down and drawing up a building and working with the Sheriff as to exactly how it would work at a somatic level. Now whether that's an addition or a new building makes a big difference also. I think that needs to be decided in that somatic phase I guess.

Jordahl: So after we have had some feedback from phase one...

Dobberstein: From phase one, then we could go into phase 2, so...Yes, you wouldn't want to go into that phase 2 until you have an agreement on phase one. What is the need and how big is it going to be? What type of facility would it be? We need to bring the Sheriff and the whole department along with that idea because we can't just plop it on the...

Bolkcom: So phase 1 would bring in one of these outside contract consultants, we'd choose one and they'd work with us and we'd work with the Sheriff and come up with a plan.

Dobberstein: Those are just 2 names that I had. The Sheriff may have others, or you may know others from other counties. I think Dennis Kenny, for example, is already working with Muscatine and Story County. There is a consultant working with Davenport right now and I've forgotten her name, I have it in the back of the office, but we could get more than the 2 proposals and discuss the merits of each.

Stutsman: One of the problems is the availability of these consultants too. It seems like there is a lot of demand for their time. A lot of communities are dealing with jail issues.

Dobberstein: Yes, this is unfortunately a booming business now. Jails are being built all over. I think it is very important, this first phase, the decisions you make right now make the biggest impact on the overall costs. Whether I'm talking 5 million, or 10 million, or 15 million, and those decisions are made right at the beginning. As we get further down the design process the decisions are smaller in terms of the cost of the project. So it's important that they initial decisions are correct ones. That's why I think it would be good to the right people in to help us with those.

Jordahl: So what is the price tag that we can expect for this phase one needs assessment kind of proposal of which way we should go, that we could expect to pay combined to you and to the consultant?

Dobberstein: I don't know if that is completely defined yet. You would get part of that in this proposal from the consultant. They'll have their prices in there and you could pick or choose as much of the study as you want, as I understand it from them. As far as our part of it, we could put a top limit on that of whatever you comfortable at and tailor our time to that number. I would suggest $20,000 if that is agreeable and that at least gives you the security of knowing that it's not going to be an open ended thing. If that works out for you then we can continue on this process.

Bolkcom: So we're talking probably 30 to $40,000 of the phase one with your time and an outside consultant assistant.

Dobberstein: Yes, just the ball park number I got from a consultant would be like $20,000 for phase one and then maybe $20,000 for the design phase 2. But of course, that could vary quite a bit depending on the project once they get more information on it they'll be able to give us the more exact numbers and a proposal that you could take a look at.

Jordahl: That'll be like each, so we're talking about 40 to $50,000 here perhaps for the combined labors of yourself and consultants for the first phase of this thing.

Dobberstein: Sure.

Jordahl: Then, if I look at the last page of this on fee schedule for addition and remodel, in a facility of only 5 million dollars. I say only, I guess this is the world of government, but a $5 million facility, your fee at 6% for the full architectural services taking it through to completion I calculate would be in the realm of $300,000. Is that a good ballpark?

Dobberstein: Well, sure I guess. That's the correct math I think. The whole question is how big is this? What we've done is put in a schedule there with architectural agreements that are on a %age basis it's usually a sliding scale because a smaller project would have a larger %age fee because there is basically the same hours. With larger projects the %age fee goes down because there is less work compared to the whole project.

Bolkcom: Economy of scale. Deconomy of scale.

Dobberstein: So I think we've given you a very favorable fee schedule there. Part of that, I don't know if you want to get into the details of that we can, is favorable because we have during the construction administration portion an hourly rate there also. Because lately Pat Langenberg has been handling that and that's worked out fairly well on the smaller projects and I think saves the County some money. Now on a bigger project like this I guess you'll have to make a decision of whether you want Pat to be in that role.

Bolkcom: He can do it.

Dobberstein: He was sort of in that role on this facility that we're in now. As we're gone through all of the County projects he's grown and done more of that. So now I think he feels comfortable about taking that role and we would support him. So not knowing what the total scope is there we just said well we would do that on an hourly basis if that works. Otherwise if he's not in favor of that, or if you're not in favor of that, we could go back and include that into our %age fee. We'd have to re-look at those %ages then I guess is what I'm saying.

Lacina: I think it's extremely important that Pat be involved in this. I think we've got 2 things to discuss there. One is we're assigning him huge project, which given the other responsibilities I think we need to talk about some type of compensation for that. The other factor is once the facility is constructed and then it's turned over to Pat for ongoing maintenance he needs to have the blueprints, schematics, know how things lay out and really needs to be involved in the ground up construction. When we did the residential facility for 6th district up there and Taylor Ball did the construction, but we had the consultants come in and there are a lot of things you don't think about. For example, blind spots in you halls, which if you're dealing with criminals you can't have. The location of your cameras for surveillance and your electronic door locks so you can have a secure lock down in the case of an incident. Lots of things that are involved not just in the construction of a building like this, but for a security facility much, much different. Safety glass so that they can't use the glass as a weapon. Those types of things. So I think you're right. We need the specialist to come in and delay this thing out. But for the ongoing maintenance it's also really important that Pat be involved.

Stutsman: Pat is on the Space Needs Committee so he's... It's certainly something that we'll talk to him and see what he's most comfortable with.

Lacina: But if you stop and think, if they're going to have a fee if they do it themselves, obviously Pat is saving us that money on this side by doing it. But it's a much greater responsibility that he's carrying as well as his normal workload. But we can discuss that later.

Jordahl: We're being presented with something here that we're expected to sign off on in the very near future, like Thursday, to get this ball rolling... My question here is globally I would rather see the Space Needs Committee report on like all of the needs and then let the Board discuss priorities and discuss consultants to deal with this, discuss the question of whether we're building one facility or 7 and on what kind of a schedule. If we sign off... I'm perfectly happy with the idea that we may need to contract with you in some way differently to continue to have your services as we go through this process of assessment, but this seems like it's very focused on doing the jail. I'm wondering if... I guess I'd like it if the Board had an opportunity to discuss the whole space needs question as a Board before we commit to large expenditures or a sequence of doing things. I don't doubt that the jail may be the first priority of that we may need to do this right now, but we have not as a Board discussed that issue of what are the priorities? I'm uncomfortable with committing to this until we've had that discussion I guess. Tell me I'm nuts.

Duffy: You're nuts.

Bolkcom: I think there is a point there. My sense about this particular one is that this project is so far down the road that we need to begin by taking this first step. I think it's a big enough priority that we're going to have concurrent priorities. I think we're going to have to work on one of these things... We're going to have to work on things more than one at a time to make any progress, particularly with Human Service space needs.

Stutsman: That's kind of the way the committee has approached things, that we're looking at a number of options and looking at all of these. We're not saying well OK everything else has to be by the wayside because we're going to focus on the jail. We have some things that we're looking into at DHS, but I think we're to the point with the jail to move ahead. I don't think there is any point in holding off because I don't think that the needs of the jail are going to go away. I think that is what the conclusion of the committee has been. But too, I think if the Board wants an update from the Committee we certainly can arrange to do that and have a presentation for the Board, whether in a formal meeting or if you want to have a work session or what. The Space Committee is going to meet again on the 30th.

Bolkcom: Maybe after they meet they could come and visit with the Board, give them direction and come back and tell us what you're thinking about. Charlie?

Lacina: But the scope...

Bolkcom: Charlie has been wanting to say something.

Duffy: I use this term a lot is are we gaining on the enemy? Evidently we're not. If we have chronic violators and people that don't obey the law, it's really costing the taxpayers money. I think you're going to see, well the laws are stricter now than they were in the past. The jail looks to me, and maybe Duane will agree with me here, it's built very well. But did we ever look into, being as we can't get the land from University, if the University would want to buy the jail? It looks to me then they would own the whole block. Maybe that would be something that could be worked out. I don't know if we could or not, but I don't know how we can hire a consultant because we really don't know what we're doing. A consultant for a new jail, remodeling the jail, what do you mean by consultant?

Dobberstein: That's what he would help us decide. Whether or not we could add on at the present site and make it work and what size and how many beds and whether or not we could do that. It may come back and say well, here's the choice here's what you can do here and you decide no, it's too confining and maybe you want to look at some other use for that building.

Duffy: You mean it might go up, I get, maybe another floor on it. There is a little space towards the south.

Dobberstein: If there is space on each end. It was designed to be added onto on each end, but whether or not that's adequate is really the question and how that changes the whole operation of the facility. The whole interior, all the support spaces are interior, so they can't expand, so if you're adding more rooms, more cells, and you're not expanding the support, how does that work? It really is a more complex issue than just extending what's there now.

Duffy: Take our parking.

Doberstein: Yes. That's a whole other issue.

Stutsman: The other whole issue is what we give up by remodeling that current facility too as far as the double bunking issue and things. There's just lots of issues to weigh with this whole thing. And then giving up that space, location, location, location. Everybody wants to stay close to the courthouse. So that's going to be another whole discussion. If we are better to just give that up and move some place else. But I don't know if we're ready to make that decision yet.

Duffy: I was going to say we should. We have to do something.

Stutsman: That's the process we're all going to have to look at and just weigh all of those and the consequences of them and see what's going to serve our needs best.

Bolkcom: Can I make a suggestion. I think we should proceed with an agreement with Dwight to continue specifically to help us get closer to a decision on the jail which is finding out what the project is and what it's going to cost. I would like to set the limit not at $20,000 but at $10,000 and when they get to a point of coming to that they come back and see us and that we go about trying to find a consultant to help us and have Dwight lead on that. I would propose we consider doing that Thursday. That would keep us in touch with his costs. I'm a little uncomfortable setting it at $20,000 if we're thinking the other consultant is going to possibly be in the range of $20,000.

Lacina: How realistic is that Dwight. Sometimes you get what you pay for and if you come to low you don't get something that's realistic or they...

Bolkcom: He can come back in. I'm saying... it's a way for us to keep track of where we're at.

Lacina: I'm just simply asking the question if he thinks it's realistic.

Doberstein: Yes I think we can get a long ways for that and then we see how we're doing and it really depends on what we get into with a consultant and I really don't know yet.

Lacina: Will that limit who would consider being the consultant? I mean are we sending a message right up front that some are going to walk away?

Doberstein: No.

Stutsman: No.

Bolkcom: No. I'm just suggesting a mechanism for us to keep track of what we're spending, not the quality of work.

Lacina: So your saying a report after 10.

Doberstein: We'll come back with a consultants proposal and you'll get ideas on those costs.

Stutsman: These are just Dwight's costs to get this in.

Doberstein: To help facilitate that and keep it going, and to help Jonathan with this idea that this is not just going to keep going forward without your approval. I mean there's going to be stages here where you have to approve this to go ahead. The first stage is obviously getting a consultant. It's not like we're already deciding the jail is a priority.

Jordahl: I guess my question though is one of the suggestions that has been made is that we build one facility that may not be realistic in terms of many discussions that the Space Needs Committee has had. But I've only been to maybe one possibly 2 of those meetings. Suppose that we decided ultimately that the way to build this would be to build one facility that would incorporate the jail and Human Services and everybody all in one building. The consultants efforts that had gone into the design and consideration of a separate jail facility would be changed. All of these considerations would be changed by that shift to a different conclusion of how we might choose to do this wouldn't they?

Doberstein: I still think we need that needs assessment first and that work will be valid no matter what the option is and you can still take that information if you want to build one big facility and use that to design a larger facility. So before we go into the phase 2 portion of this we'd need to make that kind of decision.

Bolkcom: So phase 1 is simply needs.

Doberstein: Yes. Programming and the needs assessment.

Lacina: We'll have to decide, to construct a maximum security facility your costs per square foot is going to be high. To utilize that for office space may not be realistic. But if we're spending 85,000 now for DHS space maybe the space needs if we rent or go to a commercial facility might go to 100 but in terms of the jail we're looking at a multi-million dollar project that we're going to have to have lead time if we're going to pull this off. So the scope of the size of this is big enough that we better have lots of time especially given the possibility of this tax freeze coming back on us which it looks like it will. So I think we need to keep it moving.

Doberstein: The cost per square foot varies quite a bit also depending on what kind of facility they finally end up recommending. I mean if it's just direct supervision type that's a facility where you just have normal doors, hollow metal frames, and it's a lot less costly than right now where we're trying to build it so that it holds them in and keeps them from breaking out and have little surveillance. That's the most costly form of construction. So it really has a big influence on that total cost, is what type of facility we end up recommending and the needs assessment. That's where we need to really zero in as kind of an outgrowth of the space study.

Bolkcom: Well maybe we could have the Space Committee come in and report to the Board after their next meeting also. I had one final question. In terms of your services with the Space Committee where are we in that contract. I mean we're saying now the jail is some extra effort and we're going to do this contract. Where are we to have you continue to help out with the overall space.

Doberstein: Well I think that study needs to keep moving forward. We've used up our fee about 5 times already. We had a limit of $4,000 on that and we're well past it.

Bolkcom: All right. Are you thinking that's a separate agreement or is this part of this?

Doberstein: No we would still just keep that separate I think and continue to work on that. We have not come back to ask for an additional fee. I'm getting a little bit of static from our bookkeeper.

Bolkcom: Well maybe you could talk about that at the Space Committee Meeting and come back with a recommendation in a few weeks on that same topic.

Doberstein: All right.

Lacina: Vice President huh? I see your vice president now?

Doberstein: Vice President yes. I still don't watch the fees too much.

Bolkcom: We appreciate that.

Duffy: We do, we do.

Bolkcom: Any other questions from the Board? If not, thank you Dwight. We're going to take a very short break would that be OK?

Recessed at 10:12 a.m.

(Continued in Part 3)