MINUTES OF THE INFORMAL MEETING OF THE JOHNSON COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS:
OCTOBER 13 AND 15, 1998
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chairperson Bolkcom called the Johnson County Board of Supervisors to order in the Johnson County Administration Building at 9:03 a.m. Members present were: Joseph Bolkcom, Charles Duffy, Jonathan Jordahl, Stephen Lacina, and Sally Stutsman.
Bolkcom: Good morning, everybody. Thanks for being here. Number 2 is review of the formal meeting minutes of October 8th. Everyone seen those? We'll have those on for Thursday for approval.
DISCUSSION: SCHEDULING OF FIVE-YEAR CONSTRUCTION PROGRAM MEETING FOR SECONDARY ROADS
Bolkcom: Item 3 is business from the Board of Supervisors, a) is the discussion of the 5 Year Road Construction Program for Johnson County Secondary Road. Just to update the Board, I visited with County Engineer Mike Gardner. They are on track to be ready to visit with the Board on Tuesday, October 27th in a work session, 5 Year Road Plan work session for that day. I understand we have in the morning some discussion of the Space Needs report. So I'm wondering if we might want to schedule an early afternoon work session, here or out at Roads to begin that discussion.
Duffy: On the 27th?
Bolkcom: On Tuesday the 27th. I'm thinking the Space Needs, we want to make sure they have plenty of time in the morning.
Stutsman: That Space Needs agenda item will just be an update from the Committee as far as where we're at in our discussions about space needs. I think they're looking for the Board to give some direction as far as priorities and where we go from here. So I... it was the feeling of the Committee that they be put on a morning when there weren't a lot of other agenda items so they're would be plenty of time to discuss their report and things.
Bolkcom: All right.
Duffy: Did you say 1:30?
Lacina: What time...
Bolkcom: I'm thinking like 1 or 1:30 on the 27th. I'm also wondering if we couldn't do that here. I know they do have some maps they want to share, but...
Duffy: (Inaudible)
Bolkcom: ... that location is just not very accessible to members of the public that might want to attend. We do look at a couple of maps, but I don't think there's an excessive amount of visual stuff that they would be required to have out there. It's more of the listing of what roads and costs and those things. I would suggest we consider at least, holding it here in this room.
Jordahl: I think it would be good to have the map here available for people who come in here and what to talk about roads. I have one that's sort of a photocopy or something up in my office, but it would be nice if we had one that was really available.
Bolkcom: The current 5 Year Road Plan map.
Jordahl: Yes.
Bolkcom: Sure. I think that's no problem. So...
Duffy: One o'clock.
Bolkcom: ... one o'clock on the 27th. Is there any objection to doing it here? Then I'll have Mike and Al and whoever else they want to bring (inaudible). Thank you.
DISCUSSION: MEETING WITH AREA LEGISLATORS
Bolkcom: Item b is discussion regarding meeting with area legislators. This is an annual opportunity for the Board and our department heads to visit with our State representatives and senators about the upcoming legislative session and issues of interest to the Board as well as our various departments. We've had this... I think last year we met roughly on the 1st Saturday in December. Is that right? Something...
Stutsman: Seems like we've changed. It's been on... I think the first year we did it on Saturday...
Bolkcom: Maybe it was then.
Stutsman: ... then I think since then we've done it late afternoon or in the afternoon. I think we almost had better response during the weekday than we did on a Saturday. On Saturday it meant department heads had to come in...
Duffy: Should we ask them their schedules?
Stutsman: Was Carol working on a schedule or checking with people?
Duffy: She might have.
Lacina: I don't know.
Bolkcom: I don't know if she was or not. I think a weekday would be better, as well.
Lacina: Why don't we see when they can schedule?
Stutsman: Weren't we thinking of doing after ISAC like the 1st of December or something?
Bolkcom: Right.
Stutsman: After we...
Lacina: Yes. Have the positions...
Stutsman: ... from ISAC. So maybe we could look at maybe December 3rd before everybody gets too terribly busy.
Deputy Administrative Assistant Deana Pillard: Do you have marked on your... remember your afternoon (inaudible) ?
Bolkcom: Right, that would be...
Pillard: I don't what the 3rd is.
Bolkcom: ... a clear one.
Bolkcom: The 3rd is a Thursday. We have budgets on the 2nd.
Stutsman: I wonder if we could just kind of tentatively do that and send letters to legislators, so that they can put that on their calendar because they start getting so busy. Would that be...
Duffy: Good idea.
Bolkcom: I think that makes sense.
Duffy: Yes.
Lacina: (Inaudible)
Stutsman: 3:30, is that too late?
Bolkcom: No that's fine.
Duffy: In a case like this, I don't...
Bolkcom: Maybe even later. I know we have... Mary Mascher is a teacher and...
Stutsman: That's right.
Bolkcom: I think we have...
Duffy: Why don't we ask them maybe, that'd be the best thing.
Jordahl: Thursday is early release day though, they get out at like 2:30.
Bolkcom: Do they?
Jordahl: Yes.
Bolkcom: Early release day. OK. 3:30?
Stutsman: Four?
Bolkcom: Four. We met at...
Duffy: Is that... When, the 27th?
Stutsman: No, December 3rd.
Bolkcom: December 3rd.
Duffy: Oh, December 3rd.
Jordahl: I like 3:30 because that way people walk into the building they get the impression that things are open and they haven't come to the wrong place and so forth.
Stutsman: That's a good point, yes. Should we do 3:30?
Bolkcom: OK.
Stutsman: I think a note needs to be sent to department heads, too, so they can start thinking about position statements or whatever.
Bolkcom: All right.
Duffy: 3:30.
Bolkcom: Anything else on that? We'll have this on again to talk about agenda items and issues.
Duffy: Now what are we going to do on the 3rd?
Bolkcom: December 3rd, one more month...
Duffy: Oh, December 3rd.
Jordahl: It would be nice to have some refreshments there. Give people a chance to...
Duffy: OK, 3:30.
Jordahl: ... want to mix, you know.
Stutsman: Yes. I think we did that.
Bolkcom: Sure. Yes.
Stutsman: Just cookies and...
Jordahl: Uh-huh.
MINUTES RECEIVED: HAWKEYE AREA COMMUNITY ACTION PROGRAM FOR SEPTEMBER 9, 1998; AND JOHNSON COUNTY NUTRITION BOARD FOR SEPTEMBER 21, 1998 HAWKEYE AREA COMMUNITY ACTION PROGRAM FOR SEPTEMBER 9, 1998; AND JOHNSON COUNTY NUTRITION BOARD FOR SEPTEMBER 21, 1998
Bolkcom: OK. Item c is minutes received. Item d is reports.
Bolkcom: Let's hold reports and maybe go down to item 4, business from the County Attorney, a) discussion regarding County's proposals for the Administrative Unit in the Sheriff's Office Collective Bargaining Agreement. Janet Lyness is here with us this morning.
Assistant County Attorney Janet Lyness: Good morning.
Lacina: Good morning.
Stutsman: Good morning.
Bolkcom: Good morning. Come on up.
Duffy: Thank you, Janet.
Stutsman: Thank you.
Lyness: I don't really have much more to say. We incorporated what we had discussed last week regarding wages and the other proposals from the department heads for the Administrative Unit, for the Sheriff's Office. So these are our proposals. I think we're scheduled to start negotiations later this month in the Admin. Unit and early in November, I believe, with the Sheriff's Office.
Bolkcom: OK. Any questions from members of the Board? All right. Thank you. Appreciate it. We look forward...
Lacina: We need to present a copy...
Bolkcom: Jim?
?: I needed to get a copy of that for Joe; she wasn't available.
Bolkcom: No problem.
Lyness: I had brought (inaudible) copy actually (inaudible)
Jordahl: If anyone else would like a copy...
Bolkcom: They're available. We look forward to sitting down with both Units and working on an agreement. Thanks for coming in. Janet, did you have any other business?
Lyness: No. Thank you.
Bolkcom: Thank you.
Bolkcom: We're back to reports from members of the Board. I guess I'll start out with just a report. We had scheduled this afternoon, a department head meeting, but due to the fact that the agenda is fairly sparse we've decided to reschedule that meeting. Certainly the meeting with legislators could be one new topic for that agenda. So the meeting this afternoon at 1:30 p.m. in this room has been canceled. I guess maybe we need to talk, maybe we can do that now, about the possibility for a rescheduling date.
Stutsman: We're meeting the 10th with elected officials.
Bolkcom: All right.
Stutsman: I wish there would be some way we could combine these meetings.
Lacina: In a way, unless we have really good agenda items, I'm wondering if it's warranted for right now. I mean they're all...
Stutsman: What? A department head...
Lacina: ... working on their budgets and they've got a lot going on right now.
Jordahl: You mean having separate meetings or...
Lacina: No, just not having one until we have...
Bolkcom: Just not having a meeting.
Lacina: Unless we do a joint meeting and have everybody in at once. We could do that.
Stutsman: That's what I was wondering, like maybe on the 10th we meet at one o'clock with department heads to talk about those joint issues like the legislative meeting coming up.
Lacina: OK.
Bolkcom: Uh-huh. That's good. We could check in on the budget... There's a few just kind of check in things. Salary survey is one of the items on the agenda that will probably be ready to go. This attendance record question will probably be something... We don't want to put that off too darn long. So do you just want to piggyback on the 10th, before or after?
Stutsman: Yes. Before or after. Because it seems like so many times there are joint times of discussion, too, between elected officials and department heads.
Jordahl: Yes, it's really... I remember one time we had a meeting of elected officials and we had a whole bunch of really good discussion. Then we got into a meeting with all of the other department heads and we'd already talked about it and people weren't forthcoming. Yet there's value to sitting down like the old ratskellar and chewing over ideas with other elected officials. You can't do that without a formal meeting.
Bolkcom: Right.
Jordahl: So...
Bolkcom: So that's (inaudible)
Jordahl: I just want to toss that out there too. That there's value in those meetings, it's just that...
Bolkcom: Yes.
Jordahl: ... they sort of conflict with the value of the other meetings.
Lacina: So are we going to have a joint meeting or one after the other?
Jordahl: I'm for the joint meeting idea, at least in this instance...
Stutsman: Yes.
Jordahl: ... because of the budget crunch.
Lacina: Fine. That's good. I think so, too. That way if there's discussion about the budget, everybody can hear it.
Bolkcom: All right. I'll communicate with Pat about that (inaudible). As you recall, Pat is the Chair of the elected officials meeting. I'll just check in with Pat on that.
Lacina: The other thing will be issues for the legislature that we can put on for agenda items.
Bolkcom: Yes. The other item for today on that agenda was this external County news. I'll hopefully have something to report. I'm meeting with Linda Schreiber tomorrow about their interest in having kind of a regular County news session in the community news. So we'll be ready probably with a little bit more information at that point. All right.
Bolkcom: Reports. Charlie, do you have a report today?
Duffy: Yes. I attended the Iowa City Area Chamber of Commerce Ag Committee meeting this morning. Hi Susan.
Susan ?: I missed it.
Duffy: Yes. You forgot it. I do that quite a bit.
Lacina: Me too.
Bolkcom: I did, too.
Stutsman: I didn't know about it.
Duffy: One thing, one farmer south of town here starting out combining his corn, one field went 205 bushels to the acre which is great.
Stutsman: Wow.
Duffy: The next one, right next to it across the road, went 60.
Jordahl: Gee.
Stutsman: Was it because of storm damage?
Duffy: Well, some of the storm, but then again there's some wet areas around.
Lacina: Oh, yes.
Duffy: Too they have a legislative report that's about like last year. I'm not saying that I agree with every issue, but that was interesting. One was on liquid manure, that we're concerned about some of these dams. The way they're breaking, you know, kind of a pond type structure that really aren't for that. Different counties might have different suggestions when it comes to raising hogs. I know different states do, like over in Illinois you hardly ever see a hog confinement. Galesburg, Illinois, I've been over there several times. They're all out in the field. But that was a pretty good appointment. I got there in time, I didn't get a ticket for parking which is unusual. Senior Dining meeting yesterday afternoon, we had a good meeting. The biggest thing coming up is don't forget next Monday at 6 o'clock is a voluntary dinner. Especially you Jonathan, the way you worked it last year. You used to work in a cafeteria. If it wasn't for the volunteers we wouldn't have a great program like we have. This is not taxpayers' dollars, this banquet that we put on. There was money through wills left to the Congregate Meal Program. I think that's a good place to spend a little bit of it. So I got out of there about 5:30 and I came down here. I sat through the entire Planning and Zoning Committee meeting. I sat in the back, didn't say anything. I got a lot of input, so the next time around I won't have to leave a meeting to go out and take a look at what's going on. If you get out Highway 1, Buchmayer Bend, you know that approach the highway. Our County Road Department is doing a great job on that. It has to come out to a T and it's good weather to work on it. Then I went up to our proposed trail at the West Overlook. I don't know if any of you have been up there since that road was... But I'm sure Joe has. So it'll be interesting to see how that comes out. Saint Peter and Paul church, Bill Zenishek was up here. That's kind of tourism. He's kind of hard to get a hold of, in fact I tried to get a hold of him this morning. But if you get time... or maybe some of you have been up there. This tourism, I think we're really missing the boat that some folks, say out of New York City, Chicago or anyplace else would enjoy going out in the rural area and see what this state's all about. I guess that's it for a while.
Bolkcom: Thanks Charlie. Steve?
Lacina: Nice article in the paper on Charlie, about his trip to Ireland. That should be commended...
Stutsman: Where was that at?
Lacina: ... and we'd all like to go along.
Jordahl: It was Saturday...
Bolkcom: Sunday's...
Stutsman: Sunday's Gazette?
Bolkcom: Yes.
Stutsman: Oh, I'll have to...
Lacina: Do we have a contractor working with the stuff on Buchmayer Bend, because I didn't recognize all of the equipment up there.
Duffy: I think it was... the County employees were doing it.
Lacina: OK, was it ours?
Stutsman: Yes, I think they were too.
Duffy: Al Miller was up there.
Lacina: OK. We might have gotten a new hydra-hoe, but I didn't recognize some of the stuff up there.
Duffy: I don't know if they're going to have any more help or not, but our County employees are really moving dirt up there.
Lacina: There's a letter circulating through from Carroll Edmonds and Pat White in relation to the change of the magistrates. I wish Janet would have been here to go into a little more detail, but apparently there's been a change of when they meet which puts kind of a hardship on the County Attorney, since he wasn't informed and has to go in and prosecute the cases. But I thought that was interesting. The only other thing I've got is just a question on the exempt status of employees. I'm assuming when Lora is ready to put that policy out she will do that administratively because that will just bring us into compliance, it's not for discussion. So we should be in good shape on that then. That's all I have.
Bolkcom: Sally?
Stutsman: Few things, I had a Department of Human Services Labor Advisory Committee yesterday morning. Talked about a number of issues, one was concerning space needs at Department of Human Services and what the short-term as well as long-term plan is for the department. They've done some reallocating of office space, but they're still terribly cramped over there. I think there are 4 offices where there are 2 people sharing an office. They tried to work it out between part-time employees, but there's still overlap when people have to be in their office at the same time together. So it's not the best work environment. There also is a lot of problems with the parking lot. They need probably at least 10 extra spaces there. So Cheryl is working with the landlord to see if there can't be some expansion by laying some gravel on the west side of the parking lot. So she's working on that. One of the individuals at the meeting was talking about, he came into the office one day and somebody was dropping somebody off at the front door. It was an elderly person and it was taking them a long time to get out of the car. There was another car behind that car, there was a UPS man, there was this particular case worker, and the Pepsi truck which was still out on Governor Street trying to get into the parking lot. So it really backed things up. So he did a little brainstorming about what are some ways that maybe that situation could be alleviated.
Lacina: Couldn't they have dropped them off at the west door? Is that... is there a curb cut there? Instead of right of in front (inaudible)
Stutsman: I don't think so. I think that door... but it still would back up. It would even back it up even more. The west door...
Lacina: No, down...
Stutsman: ... I see , this door on the side.
Lacina: (Inaudible) over to the side on the other side (inaudible)
Stutsman: Yes. Right, I was just thinking you were talking about that east door.
Bolkcom: Got to keep a clear lane for that Pepsi truck. Get in there and go.
Stutsman: But anyway that gives an indication of some of the problems that they're having over there. And there are worse days, like they were talking the day when they had foster care review. There's a number of people that need to be there for each one of those review cases, lawyers, family members, case workers, that it really creates a real shortage in the parking lot. Also talked about the compressed work schedule at Department of Human Services. They have made a decision following the lead from the Iowa Department of Human Services. That people that work in the compressed work schedule during those holiday weeks, they will be working 5, 8 hour days instead of the 4, 10 hour days. It's not an ideal solution. One of the people at the Committee meeting expressed her displeasure with the decision, but it's just one of those things there's no good solution for. So for the time being that's what they are going to do. So for 11 weeks out of the year those people that are on those compressed work schedules will be working a regular 8 hour day. Administratively it was just a nightmare to try and figure everybody's time off when they had a holiday week. So this will at least help that. Talked a little bit about staffing issues. There will be requests during the budget time for additional staff at the Department of Human Services. My question was where are you going to put these people. So that will be a question yet to be dealt with. Overall it's a good meeting, it's a lot of information sharing. So I think it's really good for people to get together and do some brainstorming, talk about issues that can be dealt with early on before they become real problems. At a Legislative Council meeting this morning with the Chamber... I'm serving on the Health and Human Services Subcommittee and we are writing a position on empowerment zones that we will be presenting to the legislators through the Chamber. That's it for right now.
Lacina: I have 2 questions. The legislature has had several major initiatives to make transitions. One being, we had to invest 125,000 (inaudible) to get more efficient management of that fund. Then we had Welfare to Work transition. Before we meet with the legislators, I would like to know if we've had any reduction in employees or reduction in cases. If not I think we should go and tell them that all of their great initiatives have failed and lay it right on the line to them. In fact it's costing us more. We're putting on more staff, we're having to build buildings, apparently. What's going on?
Stutsman: I think Craig said yesterday he's proposing at least 2 new social workers in his unit.
Lacina: And the Welfare to Work proposal was to eliminate the people that were on these programs, that they get them into the workforce. So something isn't working and we need to be able to go back to the legislators and tell them what's going on, what was your intent, what are the efficiencies, or is this more shedding down on the counties. I don't know maybe Cheryl and Craig and Sally can come in and give us a report sometime.
Bolkcom: In terms of mental health issue, we're a growing county; we have more people coming here. We have more people using (inaudible) Senate File 69 was an efficiency in how we managed our money. But with Johnson County being a growing county, we have more people and when you have more people in the system, we need more staff. In terms of my read on the other issue, Welfare to Work if the theory of we just pull all of this money and tell people to get jobs. I think we've discovered that people need supports in the community. If they're going to get out and get a job they need child care, they need training. While the theory is it should cost less it actually in the short run requires more resources, more people doing the work.
Lacina: We need to show them that...
Stutsman: Right.
Lacina: ... because when they cap our limits... The other thing on Senate File 69, all of these people that are coming to us now, are they ours? We need to be able to track them. If they're not then we go back to the county of residency or back and push this issue with the State, State papers or whatever it takes.
Stutsman: Now Craig did say they had a sizable carryover in their balance last year and he is attributing that to managed care and reducing cost of things. But I'm sure he'll have that laid out during the budget time and explaining that to us. I think there is some cost savings. Like Joe said we are a growing county and more demand for services. I don't think there's really a demand in the FIP programs and the Welfare to Work, case workers there, but child abuse reports are up. There's just...
Lacina: But that's what we have to be able...
Stutsman: ... problems with a lot of families.
Lacina: ... to show on paper. Someone comes to me and says, Welfare to Work why aren't you reducing... why are you thinking about building a building. I don't want to talk to them in generalities...
Stutsman: Yes.
Lacina:... I want to be able to say because child abuse is this.
Stutsman: Yes.
Bolkcom: Right.
Stutsman: You're exactly right, Steve.
Lacina: That's what we have to be able to show our legislators too.
Stutsman: Yes. You're exactly right, we need to document that. That there's reductions in some areas, but there's increases in others. We just have to recognize that and illustrate it.
Lacina: But I did have that presented to me the other day. They said, well, Johnson County's unemployment rate is unbelievably low, in fact we're doing all of these things to bring people in. Are you bringing in more problems and what is going on. And we need to be able to get some numbers and show this.
Bolkcom: I hear that. Anything else, Sally?
Stutsman: No, that's it.