MINUTES OF THE INFORMAL MEETING OF THE JOHNSON COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS:
DECEMBER 1, 1998
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Vice-Chairperson Jordahl called the Johnson County Board of Supervisors to order in the Johnson County Administration Building at 9:05 a.m. Members present were: Charles Duffy, Jonathan Jordahl, Stephen Lacina, and Sally Stutsman; absent: Joe Bolkcom.
Jordahl: Informal meeting of the Board of Supervisors for December 1, 1998. One month left. Review of the formal minutes for the canvass of votes for the General Election of November 10th and the East Central Regional Library Trustee of November 16th and the formal minutes of November 17th. Any revisions or comments? Hearing none, moving on to item 2 on the agenda.
Jordahl: Business from Lisa Dewey, Director of SEATS regarding the response to Heritage Agency on Aging's request for proposals for Senior Dining Transportation. Good morning.
SEATS Director Lisa Dewey: Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Board members. You don't have a copy of the actual response. You should have a copy of the summary.
Jordahl: Uh-huh.
Dewey: This isn't the response itself.
Jordahl: Thank you.
Dewey: What I'd like to do this morning is discuss the response to the Heritage Area Agency on Aging.
Jordahl: Would you please make a copy available to members of the audience that might like one.
Dewey: This item will need to be an action item on Thursday, on Thursday's agenda. Every year the Heritage Area Agency on Aging puts out a request for proposal for transportation for the Congregate Meal Program. That consists of transportation to the congregate meal sites and actually delivery of meals to homes for individuals who aren't able to get to those meal sites. Johnson County SEATS has always provided this service in the past so we've responded each year. Currently this service is provided in Iowa City, Solon and Lone Tree. In Iowa City, that covers individuals in the rural areas as well as in Coralville, University Heights, and the surrounding areas. We have an agreement with Heritage for Fiscal Year ‘99, which was a funding of $9,000. This funding was to cover 9,000 trips. 8,000 trips to the meal site and 1,000 for delivery of meals. In previous years, this service was divided in cost for $1.00 for delivery to the congregate meals of individuals and $.50 for each meal delivered to the home. However, this year, we would like to make a different proposal. Because a trip is a trip, regardless of whether it's an individual or a package. It still costs the same to transport it. Therefore, in this proposal , we're requesting that all trips be reimbursed at $1.00 and through the attachments that we have, and for those... I'm going to hand out to the audience for those that don't have this. For Fiscal Year ‘98...
Duffy: Do you have an extra one of those?
Dewey: Sure. Anybody else need one? For Fiscal Year 98 we did over 15,000 trips. We were reimbursed at $8,643 for those trips. The actual cost of doing that service was $129,659. After fares were collected and the reimbursement from Heritage, Johnson County's overall cost was $110,000. In Iowa City, we broke it out between Iowa City, Lone Tree, and Solon, because Iowa City has some funding in the contract from the City, from the 3 cities area. Their cost is more shared. Solon and Lone Tree is specifically Johnson County because those are rural areas. As you can see, Heritage's input or contribution to the actual cost is 6% overall. In Iowa City it's 6%. In Solon and Lone Tree it's 8 and 7% respectively, in Fiscal Year 98. In Fiscal Year 99 the projected is 6% in Iowa City again and 7 and 8% in Solon and Lone Tree. 2000 goes down another respectively one percent all the way around. As you can see, each year the cost gets a little more but Heritage's contribution, if it stays the same, goes to become less and less. We're asking in this response, to ask them to respond with $1.00 per trip, whether it's a meal or whether it's an individual, to provide a fair reimbursement of $1.00. That brings their total up to for projected Fiscal Year 2000 to $19,022. It is also requested that if... Heritage, in past years, has responded, we've always asked for a little more in our response and they've always come back with much less, almost 50% less. In this response, we'd like to make it real clear that if they do not come back with the amount, we'd like to not respond to this proposal. That does not mean we don't do the service. We can request that we do the service but they reimburse us with their coupons. What they do is they provide their consumers with coupons and those consumers give that to our driver. We then return that to Heritage for the reimbursement of $1.00 per coupon. It becomes their determination who receives those services. We would encourage them to make sure that Lone Tree and Solon get the majority of those because they have the rural areas and because there is other paratransit service available in Iowa City. That's the presentation.
Lacina: Good for you. Heritage is going to flip. It's about time we identify those costs and show them. This is one way for them to see that we have been subsidizing this and they've been getting by with not adequately funding it.
Stutsman: I think it's great that you have documented the cost and what this program actually is costing the County. The figures don't lie. This is there. It's there in black and white. These are the facts and it needs to be presented to Heritage to see where we go from there.
Lacina: This is nicely done.
Dewey: There is a difference in cost between Iowa City, Solon and Lone Tree and that is because of where the drivers are located and the actually efficiency of the service in Lone Tree and Solon. Because their located actually out in those areas and stay there, Solon bought their own vehicle. We provide the drivers. The cost to us is the driver and the overhead, the administrative overhead cost. For Lone Tree, it's the same, except it's our vehicle. The maintenance is much lower. The service is much more efficient. The cost of their trips is $5.98 per trip and in Iowa City, it's $10.45.
Lacina: Tom's a real stickler on numbers. He will probably catch, under Heritage Agency, we have 19,027 on revenues. But in the narrative, we're talking 19,022 rides. We're off 5.
Dewey: Right. I'll change that.
Lacina: Yes.
Stutsman: Lisa, when I was talking to you before, you talked about Linn County as doing this coupon system...
Dewey: Linn County does the...
Stutsman: ...and it worked out well for them.
Dewey: Yes.
Stutsman: OK, so that is a good alternative...
Dewey: Right.
Stutsman: ...if they don't accept this.
Dewey: Linn County decided to do that because Heritage did not want to go back... They might have asked for even more. I don't know what their actual proposal was but in my discussion with Linn County, they've gone to the coupon for reimbursement. It works out really well for them because they no longer have to do the monthly report or the audit that is required in the proposal that we do. It saves a lot of administrative time. According to Linn County, it's saving them about $25,000 a year just in that alone.
Stutsman: When you figure... I haven't had a chance to look this over real well. Did you figure administrative costs?
Dewey: Yes.
Stutsman: OK.
Dewey: That's figured in the trip cost.
Lacina: Nicely done.
Jordahl: Yes.
Duffy: Yes it is.
Jordahl: Charlie, any input on this? You're familiar with the situation.
Duffy: Well the Heritage on the Aging has a Board from the Counties that they cater to. I think, it's what 6 counties? I haven't been on that one but I know 2 or 3 years ago, for example, I think they decreased something like $3,300. If you went to congregate meal program it'd be all right but if you wanted to go to see a doctor or go to the hospital, they knocked off $3,300. When I found out about it, I hit the ceiling. That's the way it is. If they added it on someplace else or not, I don't know. I certainly didn't like it like that. Maybe they didn't think it was a big deal. I don't know. Anyway, there's $3,300 that we haven't been getting for that purpose. A person with disabilities or a senior citizen couldn't go to the doctor, it just didn't make sense to me.
Jordahl: So is Heritage going to get the narrative or some narrative comparable to the executive summary?
Dewey: Yes, they'll get a letter with that information in it.
Jordahl: So the idea of the hundred and some thousand dollars of actual cost is going to presented in this context.
Dewey: Absolutely.
Jordahl: Very good.
Stutsman: On Thursday we need to put this on for action that we want to send this contract on to Heritage. Then we'll just wait back to hear from then as to their response.
Dewey: Yes, in fact I'll hand deliver that because it's due on Friday.
Stutsman: OK.
Dewey: We got it last week but it's due on Friday.
Stutsman: Oh that was a quick turn around.
Dewey: I'll hand carry that up.
Jordahl: Will we have a copy of the cover letter at that time, on Thursday?
Dewey: Yes, I'll provide that to you before Thursday.
Lacina: At some point, we need to visit with Systems about their contract but that will be for another day.
Stutsman: Yes. I'm thinking too, maybe Goodwill too.
Dewey: For future, yes. It's my intention to discuss contracting with several agencies that have either stopped their contract or decreased it or are in the process because I think the cost of trips is a very important figure that they're not aware of. The amount of service that they receive is above and beyond ADA.
Jordahl: Very good. We're starting to track the actual cost of things. I think this is real progress in the County. I hope we see this across the budget. Nice to have you on board doing this kind of thing, Lisa.
Stutsman: Excuse me, Jonathan, while Lisa's still here... Do you want to give the Board a brief summary of our first Advisory Committee meeting?
Dewey: Discussion item? We had our first Advisory Committee meeting. I thought it went really well. One of the items discussed is actually on for discussion this morning and that is regarding the selection of the Committee members. I don't have all the stuff because I didn't realize I was going to (inaudible). There were 4 riders that were to be chosen and it was put out to the cities that they could get applications from the riders. There was a deadline for them to turn in. Coralville, however, did not respond with an individual in timely manner. However, they did, a few days before the meeting, send a list and had an individual's name listed as a committee member. During the meeting we had a discussion and it was thought maybe we should bring to the Board the allowance that we let this person preside on the Board, or on the committee. However, there have been a couple things come to light. One is, if this person is put on the committee, to allow Coralville rider to have somebody on the Committee, it actually makes the Committee now an even member board, which makes it very difficult when you're having items to be voted on. The second item was that the application was not in on a timely manner and it wasn't done during the time that everyone else had that opportunity. Although the Committee asked to bring this to the Board for them to decide, do we add this person or not, the recommendations from myself, as an adversarial, is that we not put this person on the Committee. They could actually be an ex-officio member and attend the meetings or they just can attend the meetings as public meetings. In June, we have a turnover. At that time, if that individual is still interested or Coralville has other members that might be interested, they could submit applications at that time.
Lacina: But as ex-officio they'd have a copy of the agenda and some documents (inaudible).
Dewey: Yes, they would get everything that the rest of the members get, just like we do in our Board members here.
Lacina: I like that idea.
Jordahl: Now for clarification, the idea of Coralville responding in a timely fashion... Coralville has a governmental representative on the Advisory Committee and it's not that that we're talking about here. We're talking about actually a rider, member of the general public, SEATS rider who is applying to serve on the Advisory Committee, who happens to be from Coralville.
Dewey: Absolutely. We had... The determination when the charter was put together was there would be 4 riders and it wasn't designated from what areas. It was just 4 riders. We do have those 4 riders. In the discussion, it was just thought well maybe we ought to let Coralville have someone who rides within their area. That is why that was motioned to bring to this Committee.
Stutsman: Mayor Fausett was OK with the recommendation.
Dewey: Mayor Fausett was fine with our recommendation not to do that at this time.
Jordahl: Yes, as we said in the composition of this Advisory Committee, we did not specify any kind of geographic distribution of the rider representatives. Perhaps that's something the Committee would like to talk about, whether they want to have that.
Dewey: At the meeting, we said in the future, when we put out requests we would make sure it was fairly distributed and allowed a fair response from all over. We would choose based on the fairness of all the riders. The reason we didn't want a limit was if you only get 4 riders from Iowa, does that mean you don't choose 4 riders from Iowa.
Jordahl: Iowa City.
Dewey: That's why we didn't limit it to geographic. But we would consider that when we're looking at the applications for next year.
Stutsman: I think we do that when we appoint all these boards. We try to look for gender balance and equal geographic location and stuff. I think that's a better way to go rather than saying there will be 3 from Iowa City, one from Coralville, one from University Heights and whatever.
Dewey: I agree. I think that's a better way to do it.
Jordahl: Again, in line with our general policy on appointments to boards and commissions, we tend to stick to the deadlines pretty strictly.
Stutsman: Yes, I really support that in respect for those people that do meet the deadline.
Lacina: Do you need action from our Board or can you deal with this internally?
Dewey: With the Advisory, I would take back the recommendation was negative...
Lacina: Oh OK.
Dewey: ...from the Board. Not to take it as an action item and not to make any changes at this time.
Stutsman: I might add that Bob Simpson was elected Chair. Marilyn Belmore was elected Vice-Chair.
Dewey: Yes.
Stutsman: Secretary, SEATS staff. That's another item we need to discuss on the agenda at some time, how we're going to staff this.
Dewey: How we're going to staff the meetings. I have a part time secretary. Her time is already used up. We'll bring that to another item when I'm ready for that discussion. Our next meeting is going to be in January, the Advisory Committee at the end of January.
Jordahl: Do you have a date, the end of January?
Dewey: I don't have my book in front of me.
Jordahl: OK, well that's all right.
Dewey: I think it's the 20th or the 21st. Let's see.
Stutsman: The 20th at 1:30.
Dewey: Right.
Stutsman: I might add that Lisa did a great job of organizing the meeting and chairing it and facilitating until Bob took over as Chair.
Dewey: Thank you.
Stutsman: Thank you.
Duffy: I was going to say the same thing. You did a good job. I thought we had a very good meeting.
Jordahl: That's the kind of thing I think the media would probably be interested in. I don't know what we can do to cultivate some coverage of this but I think with the controversy that surrounded the whole negotiation process of the contract that some sort of a release or invitation to the press would be appropriate.
Dewey: Maybe we that's one of the things we utilize the newspaper thing... I'm on that committee.
Duffy: Maybe we can meet here the next time if we have...
Dewey: We have discussed that and also discussed Coralville Library because they have a larger room also. We were very cramped. It was a very small room but it was the only one I had available.
Jordahl: Uh-huh.
Dewey: I think it went really well. Thank you very much.
Jordahl: Yes, thank you. All right then, having covered business of the Board of Supervisors item a discussion establishing County SEATS Para-Transit Advisory Committee in part, I think the item that Carol intended to put on the agenda here under 4a really was that we need to have an actual motion on Thursday to establish this Committee. Somehow we've appointed members to the Committee without actually creating the Committee in some formal way. This is more of a technicality I think. It should be on the agenda for Thursday.