Bolkcom: Item a, discussion/update regarding Space Needs Committee.

Stutsman: The Board had requested an update on what the Space Needs Committee had been doing. So the Committee, or most of the Committee, is here today. Dwight Dobberstein is here, Cheryl Whitney, Mike... was here a minute ago, Mike Sullivan, Pat White, and Pat Langenberg. Bob Carpenter couldn't be here this morning. The Committee has met since December of '97. The first thing we did was ask Dwight to go and visit with all of the identified departments that were having some space concerns and to do an inventory of those departments to write down what their current needs were and then what their future needs. Then we were going to review... or we did review that list and come up with some priorities and began looking at some options. Some of the options we've looked at are the Sycamore Mall facility for the Department of Health and Department of Human Services. We've also checked into Osco Drug. We did a tour of the armory to see if that would be an option for us. We've met with Iowa City and Karen Franklin to look at what they're doing with the Capitol Street and the vicinity there. We've done some work on a Mall Drive location. Also have been in touch with the University of Iowa and have talked about their plans for around the jail and things. Also have looked into land north of the Administration Building to see if there are any options there. That's kind of just a brief overview of what the Committee has done thus far. What we need now, we need some direction from the Board as far as priorities and commitment of dollars and where we go from here. The Committee has kind of targeted the jail and Department of Human Services as 2 of the most pressing space needs. The jail for obvious reasons, it's been documented that it is sort of space right now and without even identifying it's future needs. Department of Human Services, there are a lot of concerns there just running out of space. People are sharing offices there, the parking lot is a real problem, plus there also is a lease that will be up in about 4 years that we need to decide whether we're going to renew that lease, stay there, or do some relocating. So that's basically where we're at right now. Dwight has done a lot of work on this project. He is at the end of his contract terms, what we originally set up for him to do. The Board has directed him to work with an architect, who specializes in jail facilities, to begin looking at some options with the space we have at the jail. That is such a difficult situation because we're so limited with land there and that if we get into making any drastic changes in that building then we run into problems with the double bunking that we've been able to use. I don't know if Pat wants to add anything, or Cheryl or any other members of the Committee. That just kind of gives the Board a brief overview.

Bolkcom: All right. Questions from the Board or comments?

Jordahl: The Human Services, we've got... I'm thinking of Jan Peterson, Decat for example was located in another area.

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

Jordahl: One possible solution to the situation there would be to farm out other things. We've relocated the Veterans Affairs, for example. We could continue to do that type of thing.

Stutsman: I think Cheryl's looking into an option. I don't know if you wanted to talk about what you're thinking about with that.

Department of Human Services Area Administrator Cheryl Whitney: We simply don't have enough room. So we've got to do something. I have been hesitant to think about continuing the sort of... do that farming out because it takes a fair amount of resources to do that. We end up with several leases instead of one. We end up with duplication in equipment needs. We end up with not always the most effective use of staff because of being spread maybe, some staff being spread around different locations. However, that may be our only option, is to (inaudible). If building large enough to house all of us adequately is not an option then we have to look at an alternative.

Jordahl: Uh-huh.

Whitney: One of the things that we've talked with the Board about is the desirability that Sycamore Mall... That mall area, would be an ideal location because Kirkwood College is there, Workforce Development, quite a number of human service agencies are located there. I think that is a direction that I want to sit down with the Space Committee and talk more specifically about. I've sensed, maybe right or wrong, a hesitancy on the Board's part about a building, that would very expensive. So I feel that it's my responsibility to (inaudible) the other options. What other options can we look at. So we all can make a more informed decision.

Jordahl: I represent the Board on the East Central Iowa Education and Training Consortium Board, it's JTPA Workforce Development, kind of. They are doing a co-location of services such as what you're talking about, in Cedar Rapids around Kirkwood and Kirkwood with Workforce Development and so forth. But they're not doing it at a grand central Human Services location, they're doing it at kind of joint shared building that is unique to their situations. But going along the lines of fragmentation if you did sort of a... if you took a component of Human Services that would be reasonably co-located in that area, wouldn't necessarily mean moving the whole shop. That might make sense given our constraints in this area. I'm thinking particularly of the cost of the rent in the facility that we have now, being reasonable relative to the cost of anything new we might do. We could retain that efficiency, the low rent, for the County taxpayer and then maybe other types of efficiency by distributing the services while losing some, but we would retain the financial advantage, is my thinking on it.

Whitney: To a certain extent, if we look at separating our staff there's certain things that... For instance, a server, right now we have one server that is adequate for our entire facility of nearly 70 people. If we separate our staff, we take a chunk somewhere else, we're going to have to buy a new server.

Jordahl: Uh-huh.

Whitney: That's about $17,000. You think in terms of phone systems, probably we would have to buy a new phone system. Our current phone system cost about $42,000 if you take just a chunk of our staff we're going to have to have another phone system. Certainly if would be less than $42,000 because there wouldn't be so many staff.

Jordahl: Uh-huh.

Whitney: But you've got a chunk of money there. I think that certainly there would be maybe some ways we could by looking at our other partners, like you say, Workforce Development, Promised Jobs, whether we could be as efficient as possible (inaudible). But regardless it's a give and take kind of thing. We're going to spend some money that we wouldn't have to if we all stayed together. But as you say we would continue to have the (inaudible) we have now. Regardless of that, if we continue to stay in the building we're in, there will have to be some improvements. That building is, I think, 28 years old at this moment and you just can't continue without making some improvements.

Bolkcom: What do you mean stay in, like indefinitely?

Whitney: Right. We really have put off... We put off carpeting, and these are relatively minor things, there's probably (inaudible) heating/cooling systems are more expensive things. Those are, I think, 28 years old. The County pays the utilities there. We don't have energy efficient furnace and air conditioning. At some point if we're staying in that building we've got to look, I think, at the long term because how much would we save by heating and cooling if we got into a more energy efficient (inaudible). Lighting, all of those kinds of things. I think if we all make a commitment to stay in that building then we really need to do kind of a thorough inventory. Some of that has been done, Dwight did some of that.

Bolkcom: All right. Other questions? What's the story... You mentioned Eastdale Plaza as a possibility, is there space available there in adequate amounts?

Whitney: I don't know whether it's adequate. It may be. There's some space, I think, that will becoming available whether it's adequate for a unit, I don't know for sure yet.

Stutsman: You're talking about just moving out a unit from DHS so that they would...

Bolkcom: I see.

Stutsman: That's not the whole relocation of...

Whitney: Absolutely not.

Bolkcom: I think we should be targeting the whole relocation of this organization of new space.

Stutsman: Cheryl brings up good points and maybe that's what the Committee needs to do is a real analysis of is there savings with 2 different locations. Is it offset with the cheaper rent at DHS going to save enough to justify separating the office into 2 spaces. One other thing that you didn't mention was custodial service. There's another one that you're going to have to have 2 contracts for. The bottom line is the convenience for people. It seems like I'm hearing more and more talk about integrated services. When we talk about the whole Human Service delivery system, talk about one stop shopping, (inaudible) defeating what seems to be the trend right now by having DHS in 2 different locations. To my knowledge Cheryl, just thinking off hand, is there any other DHS office in the state that separates their units like that?

Whitney: Burlington just separated their Income Maintenance staff out, that was done a month or so ago. They are co-located with Workforce Development and Promised Jobs.

Stutsman: OK.

Whitney: What's happening in Cedar Rapids is that the intake portion, some like Income Maintenance Eligibility Staff, are located at the new Kirkwood facility at, wherever it is, 6th Avenue or something downtown. Not the entire income staff, but a portion of it. Waterloo used to be separated, they're now together. Black Hawk County took an old... it was formerly a hospital, then it was County care facility, and now the Human Services offices are in that facility. It was remodeled and it's a nice facility.

Stutsman: The irony of this is that the very people that you're serving through Human Services are the very people that don't have access to reliable, good transportation. So you make it even more difficult for them by having an office here and then having another office across town in another office. These are the people that have to get on a bus to make transfers with 2 or 3 kids. I think we forget that. We think, oh well let's drive a couple miles, but those are the people that don't have access to cars and transportation that a lot of the other people we serve do.

Bolkcom: What can we afford?

Stutsman: That's the big...

Jordahl: There you go.

Bolkcom: We're spending what 100 grand, we're spending 85,000 approximately, on rent a year at this location. Plus probably utilities that are probably a little more than we would pay in the new building maybe, maybe not. When can we... One thing, I think would be helpful to the Board, is to look at some sort of what's it cost to make an improvement and then what do we pay every year to pay it off. Because obviously we don't have the money to go out and spend $3 or 4 million on a new building. But we do have money that we're paying every year, in terms of paying off some sort of loan or something.

Whitney: Remember that you do get Federal reimbursement. You would get... right now the way it figures out, you get about half. Our Department of Human Services, the State expenses, you get about half of that back from the Federal government. So when people... when Counties have purchased a building then you can appreciate it over a period of time and we claim that on that local administration expense form. So essentially the Federal government helps you pay off that building.

Bolkcom: All right.

Jordahl: The question I think needs to be kept in mind is that of desirability versus necessity. It is clearly desirable that the entire Human Services operation be located in one place and that it be one stop shopping and that it be close to Kirkwood and Workforce Development and so forth. That all makes sense to me. Looking at the Space Needs Committee's real function is to on one hand is to assess the needs and bring in factors of desirability, but then also as part of the needs is to look at an ordering of what are the priorities in terms of necessity. At some point necessity is still relative. The jail is crowded now and if we can count on our growing population to result in an increase of jail population, it seems to me a reasonable expectation. Then we're going to reach a point, at some predictable future point, probably not very distant future point, where we're going to have to start housing prisoners elsewhere because we simply don't have room in our own facility. That's another calculation that has to be brought into this. What does it cost then, to farm out prisoners versus building a new jail. And what does it cost to distribute the Human Services staff. These things need to be weighted one against the other.

Stutsman: I don't know if we want to get into weighing one against the other. I think they're both needs, different kinds of needs, but I think they're responsibilities that the County has. I think we have to look at each individual situation and say, we have needs in the jail we have needs at Human Services, we have needs in the Health Department, we have needs at the County Administration Building. We can't do them all, but I really caution against getting into a situation of putting one need against the other.

Jordahl: I think that's what we have to do.

Stutsman: Well.

Jordahl: That's what we're here for is to... It doesn't mean choosing one instead of the other, but it means saying, how does it balance out. What are the pluses and minuses of this option versus that option and what, as Joe said, can we afford to do. Obviously we need to do something with Human Services. I'm back to Joe's question, what can we afford to do. I said I'm in favor of co-location, the whole shooting match in one place. Can we afford to? Or how do we afford to, maybe is a better question?

Stutsman: Yes. I think we have to look at what can we afford short term and then what we can afford long term. Short term, co-locating may be the best option, but weighing it out over the long term, is that the best way to go?

Bolkcom: What do we have 4 years left on the lease now?

Whitney: I think it's about 3 1/2.

Stutsman: Right.

Bolkcom: It would sure be nice to be ready to move at the end of this lease and not... and try and just eke it out there, not move people... not move... Have 3 or 4 sites developed in the next 3 years.

Stutsman: What... I'm sorry Cheryl.

Whitney: One point to make is if we move then we probably would look at a 10 year lease. If we move and do the whatever improvements we would have to make to make it a decent office space for us. I don't know a lot about remodeling. I've heard the figure of $35 a square foot for building up a space. Does that seem in the ballpark?

Dobberstein: Depending on the space, yes.

Whitney: Yes. So we would be putting... even for one unit, we would be putting a chunk of money into building that up to meet our needs so we could deliver the services that we've got to deliver in the next 10 years. You wouldn't want to put that kind of money in on a real short term kind of (inaudible).

Bolkcom: Yes. I'm thinking we build a building and we own the building. That would be my first choice, that we make an investment. How many times... I've asked this before. How long have we been at this building on...

Whitney: 28 years.

Bolkcom: So how many times have we bought this building? A couple times maybe.

Lacina: Before we get to rationalizing...

Duffy: I don't...

Lacina: ...too much, I've got to say that I'm really disappointed in the entire process. The rent that we're paying is half of what we would pay with any comparable rental. We're paying $6.33 a square foot versus, in the past when we've looked, $12 to $14 a square foot if we were at some other site.

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

Lacina: Out of this $6.33 this individual is paying property tax so we get part of that back. What we've done is we're pitting the jail against DHS against Health and everything else we're talking about we're supposed to be so collaborative. I don't want to give the Board a project that you're going to fall flat on your face. But next door... and we've talked to the National Guard Armory, they'll swap us that for a piece of ground. They're not talking any money and we've got a campus here and we've got a kitchen and space that we could have employee daycare. They've got a gymnasium that generates 22 to 24,000 bucks a year in rent to offset programs. There's so much we've got next door in exchange for a piece of ground for them to build a new facility. We roughly have an idea of the bottom part of the County farm which is bare ground. We don't have to give up all of that. Plus the fact it's going to take time, they're saying 7 to 10 years. But if we remodel the jail our resources are going to be limited. If we do DHS more resources limited and then you've still got the problem of Health and us and everybody else that has space needs. So you're pitting one against the other and you're not looking...

Stutsman: At the...

Lacina: ...you're looking at Band-Aids in my opinion. In my opinion, if we're serious about this and Colonel Weineke , now has been transferred to Des Moines. We met with Colonel Rogers, the Facilities Coordinator for the State, who seemed to think that we could pull this off. I still say we're missing a huge opportunity with this complex next door.

Bolkcom: It sounds great, but 7 to 10 years, maybe. We've got immediate needs in all of these locations. It sounds very simplistic and great and I like the idea of employee daycare as well, but 7 to... We can't wait 7 to 10 years...

Lacina: I think...

Bolkcom: We need to do this next year...

Lacina: ...the Board needs to do some planning. We talk about...

Bolkcom: What do you think we're doing.

Lacina: OK. You're justifying that's what you're doing. If you're going to build a DHS building then just throw your numbers out there. But if you take this rent which is 85,000 and you look at... OK, what is the rent per square foot for Sears mall?

Whitney: I don't know for Sears mall. You're right, Steve, that any other place we're probably going to spend about 1.50.

Lacina: Now the other thing is from a realtor that I talked to, they're saying they're not going to allow office complexes to go into that. It's going to be retail. Did they change that?

Whitney: No, we're not talking about...

Bolkcom: We're not talking about Sycamore Mall.

Whitney: ...Sycamore Mall.

Stutsman: No, Sycamore Mall...

Bolkcom: We don't want to be at Sycamore Mall.

Stutsman: ...that was an option that we looked at and that was the reason why it wouldn't work is because they wanted to keep it commercial. They were not interested in it, but I just wanted to point that that's one of the options that we looked at. Because people say did you look here, did you look there, and we have been looking at anything that's been brought to our attention.

Whitney: If we're thinking 10 years down the road for the armory then what I would say to you is that we should enter into a 10 year lease for part of our office.

Lacina: I would disagree. I think we need to go to the armory and say, if we're going to make this deal let us lease part of the armory now. So we start working in there and see what we can do. There are...

Bolkcom: Pick up... Go on ahead, go on ahead.

Lacina: I can not start a project for this Board and have them fall on your face. You have to have the...

Bolkcom: You've been...

Lacina: ...guts to carry this through.

Bolkcom: You've been talking to them.

Lacina: Exactly. That's one of the reason why we had the Space Needs Committee step in there and... Sally and Jonathan were there, I said I will excuse myself now, because realizing that I was going of the Board. If you're going to do it, you need to know what you need to do.

Bolkcom: OK.

Lacina: But what I'm saying is as a taxpayer, I think, given the coordination of the Treasurer's Office and the parking and the way this entire campus would lay this is the logical spot to go.

Bolkcom: So you're saying do DHS, Health... What else do you want to put next door?

Lacina: I'm saying be creative.

Bolkcom: I'd just like to be clear on what your proposal is.

Lacina: My proposal is to look at that property and as time moves forward, you've got space over there.

Bolkcom: (Inaudible).

Lacina: You can build a complex over here as you remove part of it if you had to on the rest. You've got space that lays together instead of being scattered all over the town.

Bolkcom: So we're...

Stutsman: So...

Bolkcom: It's good this is on the agenda today and figure out what we're doing.

Stutsman: Well, yes and that's what we came here to do. To give an update to the Board but to get some direction about what the Board wants. Do you want us to start, continue, to look at central locations, where we're all a complex in one area. Do you want us to look at the cheapest possible alternative, short term, just Band-Aid approaches to this. We need to know what direction the Board sees for this.

Jordahl: Well cheap is important but we shouldn't be cheap and unsatisfactory.

Stutsman: Well and that's the problem. You may be cheap in the short term but does it really address what we need in the long term.

Duffy: Yes Joe.

Bolkcom: Dwight, did you have something you wanted to add?

Dobberstein: Well, I think everything you said is right on. Right now we've documented the need. We have every department needs some space and now we're here looking for direction from the Board to tell us what options you want us to look at. (Inaudible) we can go over there and look at it and lay out plans for how that might work and figure what that might cost. I think that's one excellent option. There may be others. We've kind of zeroed in on Human Services and the jail, but there's lots of needs at the Courthouse too. They have the Clerk and District Courts and the County Attorney, that's the other end of the jail side of the equation and they need space too. So they have to be factored in...

Bolkcom: Next door.

Dobberstein: ...and maybe there's options of adding on an annex up there or maybe we want to rethink that and put everything down here in one big campus.

Lacina: At one time we had talked about a wraparound complex, staying low so that we wouldn't block the view of the Courthouse, but a horseshoe on the back side of the Courthouse. Given the topography you wouldn't have to do a lot of excavation, but the problems would be in the footings and... I don't know if that is feasible, I'm not sure... Probably what is necessary now, if we've identified need, is to do some feasibility studies.

Bolkcom: Feasibility studies.

Lacina: Pat's shaking his head no.

Bolkcom: OK. Feasibility study.

White: We're...

Bolkcom: Pat?

White: We're not gaining any ground here this morning.

Duffy: Yes but, I'd like to make a statement.

Lacina: If you want some direction, we can just direction, but if you want something that's going to work for the County, Pat, you don't want to ram through this too fast.

White: We need both. Maybe part of what we've identified this morning is you need to rethink whether you want a Space Needs Committee or what you want it to do. You don't need a Space Needs Committee to find ways to have DHS relocate part of its office. Cheryl and the Board can do that. What we thought you created the Space Needs Committee for was to look across the board and identify long term needs, long term being anywhere from 5 to 20 years. What the Committee's identified is DHS, Board of Health, Ambulance, Jail, Courthouse, Admin Building. It's looked at a lot of options and generalities all of which have big price tags and that's where the tough decision making comes. That's part of why we need to keep you updated. I don't think the Space Committee is going to be able to come up with any magic way to do this at no cost. These are all going to be expensive fixes. The reality is that County government has put nothing into it's physical... long term physical plant growth in about 10 years and we're going to pay a price for that. There's going to be a short term cost. What the... My description of what the Committee has done so far is identify the 2 highest priorities which are DHS, partly because their conditions are the worst that we see in terms of people and what they're in and the immediacy of a decision is greater there since their lease now has 3 1/2 years to go. There is a necessity to make some sort of decision there and the sooner the better. It's the recommendation of the Committee that the long term plan be to locate a site, build a structure, and put all of DHS in that structure. And it found a location, I'm certainly going to make no claims to the location that we found, that it's the only one that's out there or that there will never be any others. But that's another element of the way that these issues work is that at some point you have to translate the identified need into a specific proposal. So the Committee in consultation with Cheryl who strongly recommends the southeast side... the Mall Drive side in Iowa City. That's something that we do need specific direction on. I need to know whether to tell that property owner and their agents that we don't have a continuing interest or that we do. And if we do then I need to do more work to bring back to the Board. As you're working these long term plans you just need to be prepared to deal with a short term specific. The University is a good example of good long term planning. They identified a need and then when property becomes available they budgeted themselves to be able to take advantage of the property availability. The Mall Drive site for DHS is not exclusive of acquiring the armory site. The Committee assumes it to be a given at this point, that Johnson County would like to acquire the armory site. All of the indications that we have are that that really is a 5, 7, 10 year effort. We're in continuing communication with them. The next step is, we're actually send a delegation to Camp Dodge to meet with them to continue to flesh out a timetable. But that doesn't answer the short term DHS need. We need to make a decision to relocate them, to relocate them in some broken up or short term fashion or to relocate them in a long term permanent fashion. We need to make that decision fairly soon. The other option that hasn't been mentioned yet that... This is a specific that I do need guidance on, and I have a very strong recommendation to you, is the Committee has talked about the land north of here. The block bounded by Benton, Dubuque, Clinton, and Lafayette and possibly some other attendant properties. The Committee assumes that long range County space needs, 5, 10, 20 years or longer, make that location one that we ought to take a serious look at and take advantage of market opportunities if and when they're available. If somebody in that block is ready to sell their property we ought to budget ourselves in a way that we could take advantage of those opportunities as they come up. I'm at the point where I'm ready to initiate contacts with those people to alert them that we have an interest. But I don't want to do it unless I know the Board agrees with that long term goal and, that if and when a particular parcel is available, we have the funds budgeted or prepared to acquire that. Assembling a parcel of land over there that would be large enough to put parking or another building or some combination of it, probably also is a 5, 10, 15 year project, conceivably longer. On the assumption that we're not likely, as has long been County policy, we're not likely to... regardless of what are need, to want to go in there and start condemnation. We would prefer to let people know we'd be interested, identify that as a growth site and then use the marketplace to acquire it. The jail is a priority, less because of immediacy of need for construction than immediacy of need for a decision as to whether that's a viable site. The University has fairly comprehensive plans for all of their land south of Burlington Street. The Committee believes that it's economically sound to try to expand at the present location rather than to abandon that jail investment and move to a totally new location, for a variety of reasons. Economics, being a factor in almost all of them. So what we need to do, vis-à-vis the jail, is just make a decision as to whether we can make that site work as expansion, notify the University, negotiate with them for whatever land we need. That's a fairly pressing priority, but we're not going to come back next year and say, OK now we need to find $10 million or $30 million to add onto the jail. We're increasingly going to find problems with the jail, but we're still no where near problems that other jails in other locations are experiencing. But if we don't act now to pin down the site, we risk being out of luck and forced into limited choices and having to abandon that site because it wouldn't accommodate expansion, we just don't know. So that's the project that the Committee recommended and you've authorized Dwight to begin to work on. That isn't... when he's done that isn't going to lead us to be right back on your agenda saying, we need to expand the jail next year. But we've got to make the decision as to whether that site is going to work. We have mentioned Courthouse only in passing because the Committee senses that to be, at this point, probably the last priority. We may not see the need to do anything there for 10 years. There's certainly things that could be done, the need is there if the funds were available, but realistically they're not because they are higher priorities and very difficult budgets. I actually think the Space Needs Committee has worked fairly well. It's certainly been time consumptive. I think it succeeded in identifying issues that we now need to put in front of you and get specific guidance on. Do you agree that we ought to position ourselves to acquire property in the block north of us? Do you agree that we ought to continue to work with the Guard to try to acquire the armory site when it becomes available? And I say when, advisedly I don't think it's a question of if, I think it's a question of when. Even more narrowly, however, do you want us to pursue the Mall Drive site for DHS or do you not? And if you do not, do you want us as a Committee to continue to pursue DHS new lease or new build sites? Or would you like them to explore renewing the lease and arriving at some shorter term solution in other locations? The Committee doesn't recommend that, but the Committee certainly understands that you've got to make judgments about budgets and money and what's available. And that would be in short term dollars certainly much cheaper than building a new location or even leasing a new location. There are all sorts of options in between, lease purchase agreements, long term leases, condominium purchases. We've explored most of those, not in great depth, but specific DHS proposal that we're ready to proceed with if you want us to is to try to negotiate a purchase of that Mall Drive site. There's without... I don't know what we'd be able to buy it at. I think there's no doubt we're talking about close to if not in excess of a million dollars to buy it and probably $2 to $3 million to build.

Bolkcom: All right.

White: That would depend somewhat on whether you incorporated the Department of Health and that's another one we haven't mentioned today. Their facilities are pretty inadequate too. They can get by, they're functioning OK, but a new Health Department site is a long term need the Committee's identified. Again, that might be 10 years, might be 15 years, if you could do it sooner you'll have a better, more efficient operation. But you can only do what you can afford, there's no question about that.

Bolkcom: All right.

Duffy: Yes...

Lacina: Could the site...

Bolkcom: Charlie?

Lacina: ...handle multi-agencies?

White: Yes, yes it could.

Bolkcom: Charlie?

White: In fact, Steve that site... I'm sorry, Charlie. That site potentially could even handle some non-profits. One of the concepts that we've...

Lacina: (Inaudible) all of DHS...

White: ...looked at would be enough land and that site would allow us to... If as a matter of our policy we wanted to do that, to contact some non-profits to see if they'd like to cost share and co-locate.

Duffy: Pat I did visit the Health Department about a week ago. The remodeling they have done down there... And it cost money to do that.

White: It sure did.

Duffy: There's a lot of dollars that we spent, Chatham Oaks is another one, but I think they could get by with that for quite a while.

White: What's quite a while?

Duffy: What?

White: What's quite a while, that's the question.

Duffy: It all depends. Everything is growing and it looked to me like they've remodeled down there. There's more office space and things like that. But it looks like a pretty good building. They won't have to do anything for a while.

White: But, Charlie, I don't know whether this is disagreement or not, but the Committee's view of this is, knowing that they're OK for a while isn't the long term answer. We need a plan that says, OK in 10 years or 15 years there's a need for more space for the Health Department and we've got to begin to plan to do it so that when... We'll have something available before we reach the crisis stage. All of us speculate a little bit on this. Part of my own speculation right now is that Coral Ridge, more clearly than when I said this a year or year and a half ago, is the most significant land use impact Johnson County has ever experienced. I think if anything I underestimated it. I think the population of the County is going to grow even more rapidly than we've envisioned. I think North Liberty, Tiffin, northern and western... well, northern Coralville, they can't go west anymore, are going to grow by 10 or 15 thousand, maybe 20,000 people in the next 10 to 15 to 20 years. That population growth for Johnson County which is going to continue is going to add yet more pressure to DHS and the Department of Health. Those are... and to this building, you're already out of space here because when we built this building the Board was too timid about what it built.

Duffy: (Inaudible) agree. You're talking about the long term, there should be some planning done.

White: Right.

Duffy: Indeed, I started out... I wasn't on the Committee, but I went to a few meetings and there were already 2 Supervisors. So I didn't think I needed to get caught up in that.

Stutsman: No there... Charlie...

Duffy: There was some that...

Stutsman: No, Jonathan only went to one or 2 meetings.

Duffy: No, there's one that we had over... One over here at the armory was another one. But there were times there were 2 Supervisors. Getting back to the Human Service building, when I first became Supervisor, another Supervisor and I kind of looked around whether it was cheaper to rent or buy. Especially with a landlord like that and we came up with it was cheaper to rent because you have to, indeed, figure the taxes that are paid on that building for... How many years is it? 20 some years including about $20,000 this year. Plus what it cost in interest if we had bought a building like that or built one, interest on our tax dollars, plus we'd probably start remodeling about now. I think we've... It's not a pile of junk. It's a pretty good building, but... What happens to Juvenile Detention, we talked about that for 3 or 4 months, it kind of dropped off to the side. But what are we going to do if Cedar Rapids says, well you better build your own. Indeed, the jail is another one, there are several others, but...

White: Juvenile Detention didn't drop off the site. The Board decided it...

Duffy: No, but...

White: ...didn't want to invest any capital funds.

Duffy: Yes. But I mean we haven't talked about it that much.

Bolkcom: We think it's solved, at least in the short run, (inaudible) Linn County's proposal.

Duffy: Well, we're talking about long term though.

Jordahl: Uh-huh.

Duffy: I'm not so sure that building cost us any money. Up there I think we had a...

White: Well, it's going to .

Duffy: ...(inaudible) and...

White: We're going to pay for it as we...

Bolkcom: (Inaudible) check somebody in.

Duffy: What? What building?

White: Juvenile Detention.

Bolkcom: Juvenile Detention.

Duffy: No, I'm talking about the...

White: Oh. Whether it's cheaper to buy or rent depends on what you buy or rent.

Duffy: I suppose it does. Now if we're going to condemn these properties that pay taxes...

Stutsman: We're not going to condemn...

White: No, Charlie, nobody said we're going to condemn any properties.

Duffy: You said... You said you didn't like to, but...

White: I said I assume the County won't do that because it never has.

Duffy: We didn't listen to Steve a few years back because the State does not pay taxes that own this armory. We thought when he looked into it that will probably never happen.

White: No, the Committee does agree with him that's a very...

Stutsman: Oh, yes.

White: ...logical thing to do.

Duffy: Yes, but I mean back when this first started...

Lacina: No (inaudible) there's (inaudible) million dollars in...

Duffy: First started.

Lacina: ...and that's this... The (inaudible) was trying to buy the armory at that point.

White: I see.

Lacina: There were a number of other factors that shut the door on that. On the property north, one of the first things we need to do is to talk to Dick Gibson and make sure the University doesn't have a plan.

White: They don't.

Lacina: OK. Because they own the property right across north and we don't want to lock horns. Second of all, I think for long range planning we should take a look at that property.

Jordahl: Uh-huh.

Lacina: Just like when this building was built it took them a long time to set those revenue sharing moneys aside and they did a lot of planning. So I think that is a viable option. I think the National Guard Armory, we should continue to aggressively pursue that. On the question of Mall Drive, I guess there again we need to look at a feasibility study. If we're looking at a $4 million complex, I'm not real wild about building space for non-County government when we have our agencies crunched for space. If we could place Health, DHS, those components, that's fine, but...

Stutsman: Even if they generated revenues. We rented space out.

Lacina: They're going to have to cover their bill, but if you look at 10% interest on 4 million, we're looking at... We're going to have to sit down and look at the feasibility of this.

Stutsman: Right, right.

Jordahl: We give them a lot of that money too.

Lacina: But they're going to have to carry their weight. Otherwise, why are we subsidizing one agency, why doesn't everybody...

Bolkcom: No, I assume we wouldn't. I assume we'd price it at...

Stutsman: Right, fair market value.

Bolkcom: Cover our cost.

Lacina: So those are some things that we probably need to do some...

Bolkcom: All right. I want to back up and go through these one by one and see if we've got 3 votes to pursue any of them. All right? Want to try that?

Stutsman: One thing I was going to add about the Mall Drive, I think to... I see if we went that direction that that would be an investment. I think if, at some point, we did put this all together with the armory, and property north, that would be an asset

Lacina: A salable.

Stutsman: ...that the County could sell. I'm very optimistic that I think that would only grow in value.

Lacina: That's an important point because if you could roll that asset into another one if needed or if things worked out and you didn't have to it would still have value to the County. That's an important point.

Stutsman: Just like the Health Department, we own that building, that's a building that we would sell if it ever got to be that point.

Whitney: That's a little bit like deferred comp. If you participate in deferred comp you feel like somebody else is putting some money in as well. And with the Federal government paying... Reimbursing the County for some of that, we're putting an investment in, but I see it like deferred comp. (Inaudible) once that's paid for and it's Johnson County's the Feds have (inaudible) to do with that.

Bolkcom: Yes. The difference between that and deferred comp is that the stock market can go down and affect your deferred comp fairly substantially in a short period of time...

Whitney: Well, you didn't have to bring that up.

Bolkcom: ...if what I'm saying.

Stutsman: That was not nice.

Bolkcom: If what I'm saying.

White: Theoretically real estate values could go down too.

Bolkcom: They could, but I don't think they're going to like deferred comp.

Jordahl: I'd like to address one point on this Mall Drive question here, in the terms of the long range planning idea which I think is an important piece in this we need to all hang onto. The County is growing, I think it'll continue to grow. I think we're going to... I hope that we continue to put aside a substantial amount of money permanently in a building fund. So that whether we're talking about repairs or we're talking about purchase or whatever that we will be ready to take advantage of opportunities when they come up. That we will be planning ahead for things. We'll be able to have a Space Needs Committee that sits down and looks at this stuff. But in terms of that long range view if Steve's talking about, and your Committee is looking at, the possibility of acquiring the land next door here in a time frame as slim as 7 years. And we're talking about a 3 1/2 year lease on the current facility of DHS. I have to wonder about building. It's sort of like the 965/Deer Creek question. We're building a parallel facility out here, will we not want to have DHS next door if we have the opportunity to do so.

White: That too is one of the decisions that needs to be made. The Committee discussion, and Cheryl's carried the day on this, in essence said, neither the block north nor the armory site would be preferred locations for DHS by comparison to the Mall Drive site because of it's proximity to DOT, Kirkwood, Goodwill...

Bolkcom: Systems.

White:...Workforce Development. She has clearly preferred and recommended the southeast Iowa City location. Now the dissenting view is I live in Coralville and it takes me forever to get to southeast Iowa City and this would certainly be a more central location. These are balancing so there's no perfect...

Stutsman: There's no perfect...

White: ...right or wrong.

Jordahl: This is where the factor of cost enters in.

White: Yes.

Jordahl: If we could... There's an existing building next door. In the 7 year near term...

White: Let me (inaudible) yet...

Stutsman: Yes, yes.

Bolkcom: (Inaudible) knocked down.

White: Don't look at acquiring the armory site thinking that building is going to be functional for what you need to do.

Bolkcom: OK.

Lacina: All right.

Jordahl: All right. Let's tear it down.

Stutsman: Dwight has given...

Lacina: (Inaudible) for offices, but it's going to have to...

Stutsman: ...an opinion about that.

White: It will have limited...

Lacina: ...there's going to have to be a new.

White: ...utility.

Jordahl: OK. New building. Let's say...

Lacina: Other...

Jordahl: We've got new building versus new building here. I think that washes. It's just a... But there's also the... There's no land acquisition cost over here. Where there is over there. So it's... If you build the same building here or there, it's cheaper here.

White: Yes.

Stutsman: But timing is everything.

White: Yes.

Jordahl: But we've got... We're halfway there on the current lease. We're 3 1/2 years out on the lease if it's 7 years to get this property next door, we're talking about 3 1/2 years.

Stutsman: We talk a 7 or 10 years, there are lots of things that have to fall into place for that to become available next (inaudible). We all may have the best intentions, but not only are working with things on the local level, we're even going to be working with things on the Federal level, Defense Department budgets and things. I'm certainly supportive of the idea of working towards that goal, but there's got to be a lot of things that fall into place to make that a reality. I just would hate for us to get down the road 7 years from now and think, well things just didn't exactly fall into place the way that we wanted them to so now let's look at another 7 or 10 years.

White: But that's exactly the sort of policy guidance we're ready for. If the Board's says, now we recognize there's a long term need for a different DHS location, but we want it to be adjacent to this facility. That's exactly the sort of decision making that we're ready for.

Lacina: Other than Goodwill all those other agencies rent, right?

Stutsman: Systems doesn't.

Whitney: Iowa Workforce Development has a 10 year lease...

Lacina: OK.

Whitney: ...that they're into about a year or so. Kirkwood Community College is in that location and they own... I'm sure they own...

Lacina: They own it.

Whitney: ...the facility there. Promised Jobs also leases, it's a long term lease. Systems I'm sure owns...

Stutsman: I think they own their building.

Whitney: ...theirs and Goodwill owns theirs.

Lacina: But we're not building a residential facility and like Kirkwood as an example. While our client may use it, I'm not sure that our caseworkers have to be beside it. I can see more of a need with Systems and Goodwill, in terms of some supervision. But I'm wondering if we build a complex, in the case of Systems, and you talked about those providers co-locating with us, they can sublet a 10 year lease to someone else unless there's provisions in it. I'm not sure that the location is as important as we give it because even Goodwill, in time, that structure can be sold and they could relocate.

Jordahl: This co-location of Workforce Development people, Promised Jobs people, could be from their end a staff person being available on our site or it could be the entire office being available on our site. But instead of us dividing our service they could divide their service and do that sort of coordination by coming to us.

Stutsman: I think the Committee's rationale was that we're looking at the service and the customers that we serve. It only makes sense that you go to the location that it's convenient to the customers. I think that's what we were looking at here. Quite frankly, that is an area of town where there is a high density of lower income families.

Jordahl: Uh-huh.

Stutsman: So it just makes sense that that would be a good location for that. Things could always change. Nothing is forever. But for right now I think that that is probably a good...

Whitney: Workforce Development, how long were they in their other building that they rented.

Lacina: A long time.

Whitney: A long time. Then as long as the site meets their needs they've put money into that in remodeling that. They're not going to be anxious to move (inaudible). That site works well for them because it has that enclosed space. So they actually have to rent less because people can spill out into the covered area there in the mall. Everything... if we sent a staff person, which we do now, over to Workforce Development, they send somebody to us. That's a compromise, it's not the most efficient way of doing our doing business. It doesn't meet the best needs of our customers. It's a compromise which we do compromises all of the time. What we've talked about in our Space Committee meetings, what would be the best way, let's sit down and talk about what would be the best way for us to meet the needs of the people we're trying to serve. I think Pat has outlined that very well.

Bolkcom: Yes, Pat did a very job summarizing, I thought.

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

Lacina: The clock is ticking, correct, on this piece of property?

White: Yes, maybe I'll take a minute to elaborate on that. There's no assurance that we could actually acquire that site. I've met with the realtor and developer. Not directly without the owner, I've had several phone conversations with him. They're marketing concept was office condominiums and structures similar to the one that located at the northwest intersection of Mall Drive and 1st Avenue where Sueppel's Flowers is. They had a concept of developing 4 similar buildings on this parcel. They're only... they were initially cool to the notion of selling all of this land, but that door hasn't been closed. I'm sure they're pursuing other marketing options. They indicated they had one prospect for one of those buildings that was fairly close to closing. So yes the clock is ticking. That's one of the things that you deal with the situation that you're in. You can't create either the perfect site or the perfect timing always, you've got to go with what's available and the situation that it's in. But the fact that the clock is ticking is precisely why we need guidance on that particular site. There will certainly be others regardless of which way we go, but if we're going to be interested in that one we do need to move fairly quickly, with no assurance that they'll say yes.

Lacina: Assumption would be made that the infrastructure is in place for sewer, water, those things are there.

White: Yes.

Lacina: That without a building that if we made that investment it wouldn't go away, it can't burn down. So that the money would...

Stutsman: Yes.

Lacina: ...in the event something else happened that could be liquidated and rolled into something else.

Bolkcom: (Inaudible)

White: Yes.

Lacina: OK. So the other factors that we need to consider are price terms and where are we going to get the money.

White: Right. I haven't discussed with them, for example, whether they'd be interested in a contract sale. That's always one of the options that's out there for the purchaser is to propose that we buy it on contract over some period of time.

Lacina: Because the dilemma that we've got is that while we are concerned about this rent we're paying this will not stop the rent. In fact it's the first million dollars in a multimillion dollar complex while we continue to pay the rent and get this constructed.

White: Yes, that's correct.

Lacina: It's going to take some planning to be able to figure out where this is coming from.

Stutsman: I would like to reiterate what Pat said earlier. I think all of these options seem just overwhelming as far as the cost and they are. But I think we just have to realize we have not done anything and we are just paying for what we have just ignored for 10 years.

Duffy: I don't agree with that, Sally. I've got a lot of... We did not... The former Supervisors did a job. We have purchased buildings, we have remodeled buildings. Say we just didn't do anything for 10 years, I think we got a good deal out there.

Stutsman: Maybe that was a poor choice of words. Maybe I should have just said we haven't kept up with...

Duffy: Because we remember there's tax payers and this City too, you pay $20,000 a year in taxes that's a lot.

Lacina: I would be willing to look at the details and the terms of that property because that's not making a commitment, but I think to let it go by would not be responsible from the standpoint of the tax payers either.

White: The approach that I would propose to take if the majority of the Board wants to look more closely at the Mall Drive site is I'd go ahead and negotiate an arrangement. Developers get pretty nervous about dealing with public agencies because it's a different forum and there's... You don't have the confidentiality that you do otherwise. But the way we did it, back in the days when we were actually in the market for property, was I'd negotiate an agreement subject to approval by the Board of Supervisors. Then we'd bring it to a public meeting, put it on your agenda, so the public could hear exactly what the dollar proposal was and the location before it became a done deal. That's the approach that we'd take this time too.

Bolkcom: All right.

White: I wouldn't want to spend the time, because it'll be fairly time consumptive, unless a majority of you really wanted to look at that.

Bolkcom: All right. Let's find out. Do we have a majority that wants to look at that?

Jordahl: I think that the idea of an investment is a rational one. The thing that comes to my mind about the investment is the question of it's long term value. We have... Sears has moved out of the mall. What are the prospects for, in fact, turning this property over and selling it and re-renting it? It's been vacant there for quite some time while development has gone on around the area. Now the mall is emptying out, is this land really worth what they're asking for it. I think we need to maybe enter those negations with our eyes wide open about what that land may be worth. How flexibly we could in fact liquidate that property if we made a different decision about what to do.

White: That's an aspect... explanation that I've left out. We've consulted with an appraiser and we would actually ask him to do a full blown serious appraisal as part of deciding whether to make an offer and bring that back to you. He's looked at it close enough to give us a range of figures. I have a sense of what the owner's expectations are and I'm not at all certain that we'll be able to reach agreement. But that part of town is changing.

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

Lacina: Are there strings on the property that some builders will sell the property subject to your using them as the contractor? And we'll run into a problem of going out for bids and getting into...

White: Yes.

Lacina: Those are the things you probably need to discuss with the owner.

White: We already have. Again, the concept that they were attempting to market was exactly that.

Lacina: Sell (inaudible).

White: I told them that that would pose significant legal problems for us and they've continued to speak with me. So I'm assuming we can get over that hurdle...

Bolkcom: Work around (inaudible).

White: ...if we want to focus on an actual purchase.

Bolkcom: All right. I want to ask the question again. Is there support to continue to look at this proposal, Mall Drive?

Jordahl: Yes.

Bolkcom: All right.

Stutsman: I support looking at... giving Pat the authority to pursue it.

Bolkcom: OK.

Lacina: I think until we know the numbers...

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

Bolkcom: OK.

Lacina: We have to generate something...

Bolkcom: Yes. I think that has to be part of it is...

Duffy: It doesn't hurt to look so...

Bolkcom: ...what can we buy it for and how are we going to pay for it.

Duffy: ...I'll go along with it. It doesn't hurt to look.

Bolkcom: OK.

Duffy: I was just thinking is there a possibility out at the County farm... A lot of people have their eye on that.

White: They certainly do.

Duffy: But I was wondering... I haven't changed on this, but it would be the south side, southeast of the road, that is very poor farmland. It's not... one, 2 or 3 if we could sell some of that, say somebody did want to build some houses there. Whether we could swap... I'm just looking at this money thing because we already own property.

Bolkcom: Yes.

White: You will never have a problem disposing of the County Home property...

Duffy: That's what I mean...

White: ...if and when you decide...

Duffy: ...but I would like to have...

White: ...you want to do it.

Lacina: The City wanted to buy it.

Duffy: I don't mean the whole County Home, Pat, because...

White: Or as much of it as you...

Duffy: ...some of the Counties are going that way, but...

Bolkcom: All right.

Duffy:...I think that is one possibility to kind of do some swapping. All I see are bond issues coming out of our ears plus higher taxes.

White: If not trading Charlie, it's certainly an asset the County has that would be available if a Board of Supervisors wanted to utilize the asset to raise some funds.

Bolkcom: Right.

White: You're right lots of folks would be interested in that property.

Bolkcom: OK. There're 5 people that are saying go ahead, to pursue... figuring out what it would cost and maybe some more details on how we'd pay for it. Is the Board interested in getting any closer about the cost of a joint DHS/Health building at this location? Do we have... We've got a ballpark of $2 to 3 million, is that for both of those?

White: No.

Bolkcom: OK. That's just for DHS?

White: Yes.

Bolkcom: OK.

Lacina: Around...

Stutsman: I think...

Lacina: ...14,000 square feet?

White: 15.

Lacina: 15.

Jordahl: What's the Committee's recommendation about Health at this site?

Stutsman: I think... Depending on how much of that property could be acquired, I think there was a choice...

White: Right.

Stutsman: ...for Health to go there too. So that is...

White: We didn't...

Lacina: That property could (inaudible).

White: ...explore in any great detail locating Health out there, for a couple of reasons. One, the very one that Charlie mentioned, they've just invested a little money and they weren't at the top of the priority list as we saw it. Also, the owner's realtor was initially somewhat cool to our looking at the entire parcel and only toward the end of the discussion did it look like they might be willing to entertain our acquisition of the entire parcel. At that point we just haven't met and haven't talked about Health Department. There certainly would be space, but one of the policy issues would be that would appear to take a lower priority and move it up in terms of how you spend your money.

Bolkcom: Right.

White: So we just hadn't come to grips with that.

Lacina: Unless there's a synergy.

White: Yes, right.

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

Lacina: But I think, to the County's fault, in the past one of the things that they've sort of done has been pound wise and penny foolish in terms of, they've looked at a third story on this structure and because of cost didn't do it.

White: Did the same thing with jail.

Stutsman: Yes.

Lacina: I think if we're going to look at the site we need to look at...

Bolkcom: I agree.

Lacina: ...the entire site because once you lose that opportunity. Exactly, like the jail, now we've got parking problems.

White: Yes. We'd love to be able to add a story to the jail and the footings are not there to do it.

Stutsman: And how much more it's going to cost us to do anything now.

Lacina: (Inaudible) that entire structure.

Stutsman: Where at that time... at the time it seemed like a lot of money, but when you...

Lacina: Build for the future.

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

Lacina: Yes.

Stutsman: Look back. Johnson County is not... I think it's pretty well agreed we're going to continue to grow. We're not going to lose population.

White: One of the things that if Graham were here he would interject so I'll do it for him, is we own their current Gilbert Court site. So if and when they are relocated that's an asset that we have that we'd be able to market to apply to whatever our cost are.

Lacina: There's a good example where we were able to expand onto an existing structure and get some office space. But we ate up parking and caused other support problems as far as people being able to get in there and utilize those offices. So we have to look at a site with parking and all of the other... bus and support elements.

White: It's also an example, Steve, of where we just didn't have our act sufficiently together when the adjacent property became available.

Lacina: Yes. I agree.

White: We weren't sure whether we wanted to stay or go and we didn't have funds to step up if we were interested in acquiring that site.

Lacina: There were a few things, like that buried gas line, which we would have had to relocate. Right. We just didn't do some long range planning in that area.

White: To try to show you, I think there's a middle ground between the parent disagreement between Sally and Charlie. Don't forget the Governor and the legislature had us frozen for about 5 years at a spending level that did not include any money for capital expansion.

Jordahl: Uh-huh.

White: But when the freeze hit we weren't setting aside, we weren't budgeting money for capital expansion. So we got frozen at a no physical plant growth stage.

Lacina: That's why I like (inaudible) across the (inaudible).

White: Yes.

Bolkcom: Here's the other... So we're clear on Mall Drive?

Lacina: Yes.

Bolkcom: All right. The armory, mentioned a meeting at Camp Dodge. Is that going to happen sometime?

Lacina: With Colonel Rogers.

White: Yes. That's the next step.

Bolkcom: All right.

White: The Committee certainly recommends we continue to go that route.

Bolkcom: OK.

Lacina: At some point we will need to bring our Representatives into play on that as well.

Stutsman: Uh-huh. Right.

White: Yes. This will be... Talk about your complicated intergovernmental coordination. This will involve Congressional appropriation, State Legislative appropriations, the Defense Department budget, the Guard, us. There are a lot of hoops to jump through.

Bolkcom: Department of Transportation.

Stutsman: Big project for the next 7 to 10 years.

Lacina: Although Iowa's on the cycle (inaudible) center.

Bolkcom: All right. So that's... keep working on that.

White: Depending on where they go it might involve the Corp of Engineers or the City of Iowa City or...

Bolkcom: Yes.

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

Lacina: They're on site for... Since they built the Stark Center they are now on line in the cycle to build another National Guard Armory facility. So that's...

White: Somewhere. But where...

Lacina: ...to our advantage. Yes.

White: ...is to be determined.

Bolkcom: Block north.

Stutsman: Yes. I was going to say, a decision about...

Bolkcom: What do you want to do on the block north of here? Do you want to say let's keep our eyes peeled for anything that comes on the market?

Jordahl: Yes.

Bolkcom: Buy it?

Stutsman: Or take a more assertive approach and have Pat start contacting.

Jordahl: Uh-huh. I'd be for contacting because if we could get it, it would be great.

White: I was actually at the point where we were ready to do that when we started to focus on the Mall Drive property. In terms, of budgeting my own time I held up on property owners north to focus on Mall Drive.

Bolkcom: So what would that entail? Just maybe sending a letter?

White: Yes. Call them, sending them a letter, letting them know we're here and...

Lacina: I would like to generate a letter to the University stating we are going to be looking at this area. So that we have something in writing.

White: OK. We're in touch with the University...

Stutsman: Yes, he...

White: ...again, I haven't mentioned that today, but I met with Doug True who is the vice-president for Administration and Finance. My self once, Dwight and I went to a meeting the day of the great... June 29th, because we were there in the middle of the storm to look at their plan and let them know that we were exploring jail expansion. We're certainly in touch with them on space. I've actually... I'll touch base with him about the block north. The agency that I've been in touch with about the block north is the City of Iowa City, to let them know that we had begun to discuss both the armory site and the block north since they were doing planning, not for acquisition but zoning and development planning.

Bolkcom: All right.

White: They're aware.

Bolkcom: The jail thing was more immediate about, decide now and whether space is going to be available and that continues to be talked about.

White: Yes. We're on track for that. The only thing I don't remember is whether Dwight has proposed a consultant and whether that decision has actually been made or not.

Bolkcom: Yes. It has been.

Dobberstein: We did send out letters to a number of consultants to get proposals back from them for your consideration.

Bolkcom: OK.

Dobberstein: Those are due back November 5th and then we can take a look at what you might want to do. I'm (inaudible) positive that with the help of a consultant, can look at the operation down there and come up with some operations and solutions that aren't nearly as expensive as (inaudible) maybe there's some interim solution there.

Bolkcom: Great.

Dobberstein: I think that we can report to, I suppose initially to the Space Needs Committee about those consultants and submit it to the Board.

Bolkcom: Great.

Lacina: Dwight, is it not feasible to build an office complex and turn the existing offices, which appear to be somewhat secure in the lower level, into cells of some sort? Is that possible or is not feasible?

Dobberstein: I think that's possible. Again, it changes their operation and they have to do a little more classification on inmates. As far as separating some of those who aren't so dangerous (inaudible) work release or some of the people in just for a short term or drunk driving or whatever. Then maybe keep the more secure someplace either upstairs or... So there are lots of options there, I think, to look at.

Lacina: But the consultant will give us that feedback?

Dobberstein: Yes, they'll help us with that.

White: What we need to figure out there is what the footprint is going to be. So we can go to the University...

Bolkcom: Keep that property.

White: ...and say, here's the space, here's the land we need.

Bolkcom: OK.

Dobberstein: As soon as we figure out what kind of facility it is then we can figure out what that footprint will be.

Jordahl: But this intermediate solution idea concerns me. We've been sort of faulting ourselves here for not thinking 20 years into the future. While we may get an interim solution I want to be looking at what's the 20 year solution, where are we headed with this, what's the next step. Let's not be blamed by the next Board of Supervisors 5 or 10 years down the road for saying they didn't put the footings in.

Dobberstein: I agree with you.

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

Bolkcom: OK.

Stutsman: That'll be another policy decision by the Board once we get the information back from the architect.

Dobberstein: Right.

Bolkcom: Is there anything else?

Stutsman: I appreciate, and I'm sure everybody in the community, the Board's direction on this. This has been real helpful.

White: Yes. Appreciate you're confidence.

Stutsman: The Space Committee...

White: It'll be a long trip.

Stutsman: Pardon me?

White: Its' going to be a long trip.

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

Bolkcom: Yes.

Lacina: You've got to take the first step though.

Stutsman: The Committee will be meeting again on November 20th. I hope everybody got that notice.

Bolkcom: All right. It would be... just a suggestion, it would be maybe helpful once the new Treasurer starts to get him involved in this. In the sense that, we're going to be talking about various financing mechanisms. He would probably be a really good asset to us there.

White: I actually had a meeting with Tom a couple weeks ago and agreed that he and I are going to start an ongoing series of meetings. That was one of the things that he and I discussed, is whether there isn't a role for the Treasurer in, at least advising on...

Lacina: Investment (inaudible).

White:...financial planning and investments.

Bolkcom: Very good.

Jordahl: Uh-huh.

Lacina: We probably... different agenda item, back in the Senator Welsh gamble days, we established, I think, a finance plan. We probably need to review that.

Bolkcom: All right.

Jordahl: Yes. That's for our budget focus, this budget go around, I think we're going to have to amplify our set asides for building.

Stutsman: Yes. Right. That's why this discussion is good too. So that the Board is well aware of what's ahead as far as financial needs with building.

White: There's no question, if you can do that you should.

Stutsman: Uh-huh.

White: That's going to be a tough budget year for you.

Stutsman: Oh boy.

Bolkcom: Poor guys. Yes it is.

Stutsman: Thanks.

White: I keep reminding people you've really invested in your employees which is still the highest priority, but the employee investments are going to make it tougher. You've got some health costs to absorb this year that are... we've also put off.

Bolkcom: That's a pretty picture. OK.

White: There are lots of staff needs coming in even as we speak.

Stutsman: Yes.

Bolkcom: That's what we hear. Well we can just say we don't have a place for them so we can't...

Jordahl: Yes.

White: That's a factor, that is. You don't have... you need more staff.

Jordahl: Uh-huh.

Bolkcom: All right. Anything else on this? Thank you everyone for working on this. We appreciate it.

Stutsman: Thank you.

Bolkcom: Let's take 5 minute... On item 5, let's take a 5 minute break and then we'll come back and do the Prairie du Chien discussion

Recessed at 10:37 a.m.; reconvened at 10:46 a.m.

(Continued in Part 3)