MINUTES OF THE INFORMAL MEETING OF THE JOHNSON COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS:
SEPTEMBER 22 AND 24, 1998
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chairperson Bolkcom called the Johnson County Board of Supervisors to order in the Johnson County Administration Building at 9:02 a.m. Members present were: Joseph Bolkcom, Stephen Lacina, and Sally Stutsman; absent: Charles Duffy and Jonathan Jordahl.
Bolkcom: Good morning everybody.
Gertrude MacQueen: Good morning.
Bolkcom: Hi. Item 2 is review of the... Actually Supervisor Duffy is in Ireland today. A little break, much deserved, and Jonathan is sick. His family has the cold and the flu. He has been nursing kids all week and now he has got it. Number 2 on the agenda is review of the formal meeting minutes from September 17th. I don't know if you've seen those or not. We'll have them on for Thursday.
Bolkcom: Item 3 is Business from Linda Severson the Human Services Coordinator for the Johnson County Council of Governments regarding introduction of the new United Way Executive Director. Good morning.
JCCOG Human Services Coordinator Linda Severson: Good morning.
Stutsman: Good morning.
Severson: I just thought we'd stop by today and I'd give the Board an opportunity to meet Beverly Weber who is our new United Way Executive Director. Beverly has been with us since the middle of August. I always get nervous. I'm not supposed to play with those. She comes to us from the greater St. Louis area where she worked with the United Way down there. It was a 13 county United Way Program and they had a budget of $57 million and a staff of about 120.
Bolkcom: Wow.
Severson: So quite a change, but we're pleased to have Beverly here and I just thought she could take a few minutes and introduce herself and then if you would all introduce yourselves I'd appreciate that.
Bolkcom: OK.
Severson: OK, Beverly?
United Way Executive Director Beverly Weber: It's a pleasure for me to be here today. As Linda said, I am new to the area. I have only been here about 6 weeks, but I'm certainly not new to the United Way. As Linda said, I have been with the United Way of greater St. Louis for about 10 years. I must say that during the short time that I've been in this community I have been very impressed by a number of things. I've been impressed by the cleanliness of the city. I have been impressed by the friendliness of the people, the beauty of the community, and I must say that I've also been very impressed with the spirit of collaboration and cooperation that exists among the providers of various types of social services. I think probably the one relationship that exemplifies that spirit of collaboration and cooperation the most is the one that exists between Johnson County and the United Way in the annual allocations process. It's a very unique and innovative relationship. Of the 1,500 United Ways in the country I know of no other United Way in the country that enjoys that kind of relationship with a government entity. So I think that you should be very proud of that. I am very pleased to be a part of it and hope that we can continue not only that collaboration, but continue to explore other ways of improving the social services delivery system here in Johnson County. My goals for the United Way, my long term goals, are to continue to raise and allocate money as fairly and effectively as possible. That is a United Way tradition of supporting the local health and human service agencies. Currently we support about 41 of them. I wish to continue that and hope to do it even better in the years to come. But I also am very firmly committed to working within and through the service delivery system here in Johnson County to not only enhance the effectiveness of the system, but also to maximize resources that we have for it. I think that the key to that is going to be through collaboration. So I want to applaud you folks for the visionary thinking, for setting the great example with the collaboration that has been developed with the United Way and say that I am looking forward to working with you in the future. I have a couple of brochures and a card so you folks will know how to get a hold of me. Let me pass them around for you and hope that you'll feel free to give me a call if you have any questions or anything that we can do to assist you.
Bolkcom: Great. Thanks.
Severson: Would you care to introduce yourselves?
Bolkcom: Sure. I'm Joe Bolkcom.
Weber: Nice to meet you.
Stutsman: I'm Sally Stutsman.
Lacina: I'm Steve Lacina. Welcome.
Bolkcom: Any questions from the Board? Any comments? I had one. Just in general. We are pretty pleased with the collaboration, being involved in the joint funding process. One of the things that we've talked about over the last few years is trying to get the University of Iowa to play a bigger role, not only in trying to get more money into the system, but also in terms of some of the planning components of things that they do in the area of mental health and substance abuse in particular. I know Story County apparently has a funding process where I think it's a student senate or student government is involved at the hearings because they have some resources apparently that they spend. I don't know if that's something...
Weber: That's a great idea.
Bolkcom: It would take some work to do that probably.
Weber: Absolutely.
Bolkcom: But that may be a goal out there.
Weber: Certainly the University is a resource that we should look at.
Bolkcom: Great. Other thoughts? Thanks for being here. Thanks for coming. We appreciate your taking time to come over and visit with us.
Weber: Thank you.
Severson: Thanks for your time.
Bolkcom: Good luck.
Bolkcom: Item number 4 is business from the Planning and Zoning Administrator, a) discussion regarding Application Z9809 of Donald Ballard to correct the legal description.
Planning and Zoning Administrator Rick Dvorak: Good morning.
Lacina: Good morning Rick.
Stutsman: Good morning.
Bolkcom: Good morning.
Dvorak: When this first came before you back in April, the Health Department had a problem with the location of the zoning lot of 1.18 acres. At the time we chose to move the zoning lot to a better location. But when we moved it and you folks approved it, we typed in the wrong description. We typed in the original application description. So at this time all we're trying to do is to bring the description correctly to you so the ordinance can be changed.
Lacina: So it's just a technical on the legal and we could do that Thursday without a public hearing.
Dvorak: That's all it is.
Bolkcom: OK. Any questions? All right. We'll see you Thursday.
Stutsman: OK.
Dvorak: I'll be back on Thursday.
Bolkcom: Thank you Rick.
Dvorak: Thank you.
COUNTY RECORDER DEBORAH CONGER: PERSONNEL
Bolkcom: Item number 5 is business from Deborah Conger, Johnson County Recorder, regarding personnel, discussion. Good morning.
County Recorder Deborah Conger: Good morning.
Stutsman: Good morning.
Bolkcom: Go ahead.
Conger: On September 1st a Deputy in the Recorder's Office resigned effective September 14th to take a position in the Johnson County Treasurer's Office. At last Thursday's, I guess it's really not last Thursday, maybe 2 weeks ago Thursday, at your meeting Pat White, the County Attorney, notified you of this vacancy of the Recorder's Office and it was briefly discussed. It is my assessment that one Deputy in the Recorder's Office is sufficient to supervise a staff of 5 clerical employees. I am therefore proposing that the current vacant Deputy position be reclassified to a Clerk II. I have discussed the situation with the Director of Human Resources Lora Shramek and also Pat White our County Attorney and both support this reclassification recommendation. So I'm just here this morning to present that to you and to answer any questions that you might have.
Bolkcom: All right. Any questions from the Board?
County Attorney Pat White: We drafted a proposed resolution, which you should have seen, which we sent down last week, that would be the form of action on your agenda for Thursday.
Bolkcom: OK.
Lacina: Pat, I should remember, but why does it take a resolution? Why can't Deb just do it? Is it because of the Code and because the Deputy's position under elected official is tied to that?
White: Yes. Right, even under elected officials the number of deputies, assistants, and clerks for each office shall be determined by the Board and the number and approval of each appointment shall be adopted by a resolution recorded in the minutes of the Board. I think it would be fair to say that there likely have been occasions when that particular provision has been overlooked. The payroll authorization system is always formal Board action. That's the most frequent way that it's done, but given that we were making this shift, it's my recommendation that we do it by this resolution. Part of the theory behind a resolution in your minutes is so that 20 years from now if a Recorder or a Board wants to figure out why we have this number of employees, you'll have some record to do it. We might also expand this discussion just slightly to alert you that this particular discussion and a request from an employee that we have under the contract to review her classification, have triggered the discussions that Deb and Lora and I have had, have been a little more comprehensive than just this one position that we have in front of you today and Thursday. I think it's likely that we'll be back to you soon to talk about maybe making some other modifications. It's nothing terribly significant in the grand scheme of things, but one of the realities of going to a Clerk II instead of a Deputy is at the current budget level that may well give us the opportunity to give the Recorder's Office a little more staffing, either in upgrading one or more positions or conceivably even creating another position within the existing budget.
Lacina: But that would be an administrative adjustment as opposed to (inaudible).
White: It depends on what we end up doing. If there is going to be a reclassification of anyone we would need to come back to you and if there is going to be the creation of new position we would need to come back to you.
Lacina: In the event that it's in the bargaining unit.
White: Yes. The probability is that we'll be reporting to you regardless of what the Recorder ends up deciding to do here. I do recommend adoption of the resolution. Deb's description of our involvement is accurate and I won't presume to speak for Lora, but I think it's fair to say that we agree that this is a good idea and recommend adoption of the resolution on Thursday.
Bolkcom: All right.
Stutsman: Deb, can you review your staffing for me in your office? You have you and another Deputy...
Conger: Uh-huh, and a Clerk III.
Stutsman: One Clerk III?
Conger: One Clerk III.
Stutsman: OK. That's... All right.
Conger: One Sec II. One Sec I. One Clerk I. That's it.
Stutsman: OK.
White: What would happen here, assuming you adopt the resolution and this new Clerk II position exists, is that under that contract it'll be posted and current employees have a chance to bid for it before it is advertised.
Bolkcom: All right. Any other questions? We'll have that on for Thursday.
Conger: Uh-huh.
Bolkcom: Come back Thursday?
Conger: Uh-huh.
Bolkcom: Great.
Conger: OK.
Bolkcom: Thanks.
DISCUSSION: DESIGNATION OF FLOATING CHRISTMAS HOLIDAY FOR BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OFFICE
Bolkcom: Item number 6, business from the County Auditor, a) discussion regarding department revenues and expenditures through 1998. Is somebody coming up? OK. Maybe we could move down to item, oh, I guess we'll just go to the holiday. Item 7, business from the Board of Supervisors, discussion regarding designation of floating Christmas Holiday for Board of Supervisors Office. Carolyn?
Administrative Assistant Carol Peters: According to the administrative (inaudible) the Board needs to administrate the floating holiday.
Bolkcom: OK.
Peters: Christmas this year is on Friday and I would recommend having the 24th as the floating holiday.
Bolkcom: All right. It would be Thursday the 24th.
Peters: Then we'll let the other departments know of your decision.
Bolkcom: OK. So we'd basically be making a determination for virtually every department except for the County Attorney?
Peters: No.
White: No, you'd make it only for yourself. Only for you own office.
Bolkcom: I see. OK.
White: It's kind of an interesting provision, but it works and I don't think we've ever had a year where we had any variation. This is one that's clearly already being discussed around the County and the choices are Thursday the 24th or the following Monday. I think almost everybody is indicating a preference for Christmas Eve rather than the Monday after Christmas, which is what we're planning on doing.
Peters: After you make your decision, I'll send out a memo letting them know what you did.
White: You have a bully pulpit for the other departments.
Bolkcom: This seems very odd to me. Yes. Right.
White: Well, the theory under the contract is every department may have a unique problem that they need to speak to themselves. It's worked.
Bolkcom: OK. The 24th.
Stutsman: Are we going to have a discussion about informal and formal meeting on the 22nd? Or maybe just not have meetings that week?
Peters: I haven't put it on the agenda yet because it's... But I'd be glad to do that on Thursday.
Stutsman: Yes, let's do it on Thursday, so we can make plans.
Peters: Sure.
Stutsman: Plan ahead.
White: Obviously you can exercise more control over your appointed departments within the unit if you wish to do so. Physical Plant, Information Services, Zoning, would be the department heads you could probably tell to do it the way you wanted it.
Bolkcom: Is this the result of our collective bargaining contracts of State Code?
White: Yes. Yes it is. Collective bargaining agreement provides this. The floating Christmas Holiday is an innovation that's also frankly worked very, very well. Before we had this collective bargaining provision, Christmas Eve particularly was a real headache. We had people doing bits and pieces of everything. We had offices that were closing in the middle of the day, but sometimes without announcement. So this was a negotiated provision to try to bring more predictability both for employees and the public. I think it's succeeded remarkably well.
Lacina: I can remember some of those closing us downstairs in the old Courthouse right before Christmas.
White: Yes.
Bolkcom: We're going to retrograde back to item number 6. Business from the County Auditor, a) discussion regarding department revenues and expenditures through August 1998. Good morning Rosemary.
Bolkcom: Good morning Rosemary.
Deputy County Auditor Rosemary Stratton: Good morning.
Bolkcom: How are you?
Stratton: Good. How are you?
Bolkcom: Good.
Lacina: Revenues look good, don't they?
Stratton: Pardon me?
Lacina: Revenues look good. 11 million.
Stratton: They're looking better. They're looking better. I thought we would start there. As you can see, if we were at an even flow of revenues we would be at about 17% at this point. So I've highlighted the ones that are the most material by both percent of budget and the part that is not collected. What you can see that I've highlighted there are all of the tax accounts. The accounts where we are affected by tax collections. That would be Central Services, Block Grants, and on the last page MH/DD. So hopefully next month that will look even better.
Bolkcom: I like starting with revenues.
Stratton: Uh-huh. It's always fun.
Bolkcom: It's a change.
Stutsman: Uh-huh.
Bolkcom: All right. Expenses.
Stratton: OK, on the expenditure side, that PR at the top indicates payroll. At this point, at the end of August there have been 5 out of 26 payrolls. AP, that would be accounts payable, we've had 9 out of 52. So anything that is highlighted are departments that exceed 19% on expenditures. Starting with the first one, the Recorder is at 21%. The line item record storage is at 49%. I noticed there is an amendment for $5,000 for that. The next item is Block Grants. Actually, the next 2 items are grants, which those are not evenly distributed throughout the year. So that makes sense. Juvenile Justice is at 23%. The transfers, those are not evenly done either, those are at 26. Again, Block Grants at 22. Then, Secondary Roads was at 20%. I brought all of the detail in case anyone has questions on either revenue or expenditures, I can look it up.
Bolkcom: OK.
Lacina: Actually, I thought Roads would be worse because of the construction season and all of the money going into that.
Bolkcom: All right. Any questions on expenses or revenues? Looks good. That's kind of different. Item b is discussion regarding resolution naming depositories.
Stratton: OK. The Treasurer has requested the addition of the Exchange State Bank in Swisher. The Sheriff has requested an increase in maximum balance from 20 to $40,000 at Hills Bank. Then also listed are all of the current levels for each department at each bank.
Bolkcom: Why has the Sheriff requested an increase in the balance at Hills Bank?
Stratton: They apparently feel they're going to have more activity there.
Stutsman: More activity?
Bolkcom: What does that mean?
Stratton: I can ask them in more detail and get back to you.
Bolkcom: OK.
Lacina: Is there a reason I guess that we put the cap where it's at? I know in the past we have ran into audit reports where we've exceeded the authorized amount. Pat, maybe you can tell me why don't we just say, for example, 15 million limits on these banks instead of 7 or 12's? Then we wouldn't exceed that cap. There's probably a logical reason, but over the years I don't recall what it is. I do remember we've been dinged on audit's in the past when we've exceeded the depository amount.
White: This is... I don't claim to be able precisely to interpret either the legislative requirement that the system work this way or the historical judgments about amounts, but the basic goal is provide some oversight for the Treasurer's Office through the Board to avoid what you for your own reasons would perceive as putting too much money in one location. It's sort of a check and balance. Consistent with the check and balance would be then trying to set a realistic ongoing ceiling rather than an unlimited amount in each location. I doubt that there's any legal reason why you couldn't raise them considerably if you wished to. I think that is an audit item. They frequently would look at depository authorization and my guess would be an auditor would be a little nervous if they saw unlimited open-ended depository authorization here.
Stutsman: Well, I was just going to ask is there a reason why they're not more balanced. You know like I noticed that the Sheriff, First National Bank is 4 million and the other banks are quite a bit less.
Stratton: I don't know. I'm guessing it's that individual's, that department's choice.
Stutsman: Do we ever get in trouble with the auditor for not being more balanced. Do they...
Lacina: Well, I think it depends upon the plans. We had a bank come in and wanted greater amounts of money, but the competitor gave us free checking and did a certain number of clerical things for us in clearing checks and it basically gave us some service for free. So from time to time they do come in and ask that question and in the past we've sat down and said well, what do you have to offer. If it's a higher interest rate. Some of these are probably higher interest rates.
White: Well, and you have variations in bank size too. To take the Treasurer again, the historical approach has been to use every bank in the County, but 7 million at First Trust and Savings in Oxford relatively speaking is a lot more than 15 million at First National in Iowa City based on bank size. So balancing would be measured a couple of different ways. Again there is no requirement that would prohibit you from having the same amount in every bank.
Lacina: But after the first of the year it would probably be good to sit down with the Treasurer and talk about the investment plan, review what we have on the books, because when we had the Welsh scandal years ago, the counties sat down and we did develop an investment plan, it probably needs to be reviewed.
Bolkcom: I've got a question. The money that the Sheriff has, that's like he's holding money that's owed to people. I can recall like land condemnations and the checks go to the Sheriff's Department. Is that what that is? I don't understand why the Sheriff has more than 4 million dollars in these banks. I guess I should know that by now.
White: I doubt that he does.
Bolkcom: Is that what that means?
White: Your revenue budget that you just looked at reflects that the Sheriff has operating revenues of a little more than half a million dollars a year. I don't know whether those are going to the Treasurer or into separate accounts. You'd need to...
Bolkcom: They must be going to... I mean they're payments from the cities for law enforcement principally, aren't they?
White: Well, there are lots of payments to the Sheriff for lots of different reasons, service fees, foreclosure transactions when they foreclose on a piece of property, and have a Sheriff's sale, or a levy against a judgment. Those would all be types of funds that they would handle.
Lacina: Document services, when they serve somebody. These are the upper limits they can't exceed. So they can have $20,000 in that account.
Bolkcom: (Inaudible) $4,000,000. All right.
Stratton: Sometimes it fluctuates also. The Treasurer at $15,000,000, at tax time when taxes are collected, it might get that high. But other times of the year it won't.
Bolkcom: Any other questions on this one? Item C is discussion regarding amending the Fiscal Year 1997 County budget.
Stratton The public hearing is set for this Thursday at 9:00. It reflects on revenues a net increase of $4,810 . Net increase of expenditures of $524,091.
Bolkcom: We're going the wrong direction here. All right. Any questions? This is laid out nicely. Good description. We'll have the public hearing on Thursday. Any questions about that? Item D is discussion regarding appropriating amounts through December 31st.
Stratton: This appropriation gives us the authority to pay expenditures through the end of the year.
Lacina: Does it take into account the budget amendments that we've made then, too?
Stratton: Yes it does, half of those, and some cases the entire percentage depending on how it's paid out.
Bolkcom: All right. Good. Any questions? Any other business?
Stratton: Yes. I do have 2 other small things.
Bolkcom: OK.
Stratton: OK. This was a resolution that didn't make the prepack. It's transferring from the General Basic to the Capital Expenditures Fund for the purchase of an ambulance. The budgeted transfer was $73,610. We'd like to do a transfer for $39,874.52, then at that point there would be a remaining amount budgeted of $33,735.48 that could be transferred at a later time this fiscal year.
Bolkcom: Any questions? So we've taken delivery on this ambulance at this point?
Stratton: Yes, we have.
Bolkcom: OK. All right, anything else?
Stratton: Yes the other thing was just for your information. Tom wanted me to mention that the National Association of Counties bill is in and it's for $1,694 this year, an increase of $47. That's for the calendar year of 1999.
Bolkcom: OK. $1,694. Do we need action on that?
Stratton: No. He just wanted me to mention it to you.
Bolkcom: Great.
Stratton: And that's it.
Bolkcom: Great. Thanks.
Stutsman: That's for the entire county, that's just not for the Supervisors, that's for everybody.
Stratton: The County. Yes. That's based on population. That's how they get that amount.
Bolkcom: All right. Thank you.