Committee members present: County Auditor Tom Slockett, County Recorder Kim Painter, and County Treasurer Tom Kriz. Also present: Recording Secretary Casie Parkins.

Convened at 1:37 p.m.

All motions carried by a unanimous vote unless otherwise noted.

County Auditor Tom Slockett: Looking at the agenda, we have discussion, action and unfinished business from the prior meeting. That's just sort of in case someone had an item from the previous meeting. I'm not aware of any. Does anyone have anything?

County Treasurer Tom Kriz: I don't.

County Recorder Kim Painter: No, none for me.

Slockett: Next is discussion, action and interview questions for the candidates. Casie distributed 10 questions that I came up with earlier. I have a couple more. I don't know what you folks have come up with but I thought we ought to discuss it. I've been thinking about the questions. If it's an hour and we have 10 questions, that would be 6 minutes per question, which would probably (inaudible). Although, if we have an opening and a closing, that would take from...

Kriz: Shorten that up considerably.

Slockett: I've been thinking about changing the opening and closing, while that's good, I think there ought to be some constraints on it because we don't want them to avoid answering our questions by filibustering. Some people are fully capable of doing that.

Painter: Exactly. It's a fairly typical 3 minute type of thing...

Kriz: 2 to 3 minutes.

Painter: 4 minute, 2 even...

Slockett: So 2 minutes could be up to 30 questions. Oh you mean on the opening...

Kriz: The open and close, yes.

Painter: Put a cap on it.

Slockett: In the length of responding to the questions, I've been thinking how many would be appropriate. If you had 20 that would still give us 3 minutes per question, less the opening and closing. You can make the argument that you make to a professor on an essay test when you have complete and thorough comprehensive knowledge about 2 of the questions, but the last 2 you don't. You fill up the test booklet with one and 2 and complain they were such important questions that there wasn't enough time. That's not going to get you very far in any class that I've ever taken.

Painter: No.

Slockett: It's easy to give a long speech. The difficulty is making it concise and so forth. We could think about that. I'm just throwing out things for consideration in terms of how many questions we want to ask and so forth. Also, I don't know how many questions you folks have but these are all pretty important to me personally. I also want to just throw out... I don't want to imply any kind of decision or anything but there is the possibility of asking for brief written responses to them in case we think we have too many questions to cover in an hour interview as well. I just thought I'd throw all that out at open just for consideration, to put in the back of everyone's mind. But what do you propose for questions? Maybe we should move forward on that score.

Kriz: I looked at having fewer, 8 to 10 maybe, in 3 to 4 to 5 minute duration, which could be a combination of some of these. I'm sure we'll find a consensus of some issues that we all are thinking about. I don't know whether we'd weight it that way or so... I'd almost say if we find some... We start with the ideas we have and if we have some common ground then we'll know that's definitely one question and then move from there. Then take each of our separate things that might be special to me or to you or to Kim and see how we combine that in, or try to identify at least a number of common ones that we all share. Hopefully they're there. I would think with this position there'd be.

Slockett: I agree with that. With the caveat that... the more general we make the question the easier it is to evade the controversial aspects of the question.

Painter: Exactly.

Slockett: The person I am voting for... I would like to know aspects of the question that I wouldn't like to see the ability of someone to avoid. For example, the question of increasing taxes... I ask the question, if you had to choose between increasing revenues for a program, which required a tax increase and increasing the taxes, what would you decide? Well if we said how do you feel about increasing taxes and revenues, they're going to say well as long as you can get the grants and as long as you can come up with additional revenues, I'm in favor of it, but I'm reluctant. That isn't the reality. The hard decisions are actually raising the taxes. I think that would be interesting thing for the public to know about how the person views it. That's just an example where I think sometimes the more specific question might be more useful.

Kriz: Well I think so. I think if we can make it reasonable specific, then we don't have that gray area where we just worked around it but have no answer. I think as a Supervisor, part of it is to be direct and get to the point.

Painter: I think we want some well tailored question that are specific enough that then within a 2 minute or 3 minute time frame... if we wanted to do more, because I am a little inclined to have a few more questions than a few less.

Kriz: Uh-huh.

Painter: They'd have the ability to hopefully do that and address them in a way that would meaningfully give us a representation of them.

Slockett: One of the things I think the general public isn't aware of is the incredible of breadth of impact that the Supervisors have on them and the scope of the decisions and the knowledge that they have to make.

Painter: That's why I have...

Slockett: I don't really think anyone other than a Supervisor fully appreciates that...

Painter: Yes, that's true.

Slockett: ...because there is so much that the general public isn't aware of that the Board of Supervisors deals with.

Kriz: Well perhaps we could start by accumulating some ideas. We can assign time based on what we come up with that we think are the most important 10, 15, or 20. That would dictate our time that we allow.

Slockett: Or we could let them allocate the time too and explain to them that we want them to cover the whole thing and see how they go about it. That's one of the really important skills of the Supervisor is to be able to be concise and operate within a time frame. Otherwise meetings can go on forever if people aren't able to do that. That's another thought. How do you want to go about proposing particular questions. One thing we could do is get the easel and write them down as they're proposed. We could just take the list and see if anyone is interested in any of those things and add to it, or subtract from it.

Kriz: I think that would be fine with me.

Painter: That sounds good. That sounds good.

Kriz: I think that's a good basis to start. I'd certainly look at the list that you have and there are certainly things that I have an interest in, so... let's start with that.

Slockett: Well the first 2, they were asked apparently the last time. My memory's a little cloudy on it, but that's according to the minutes. This is apparently 2 of the questions asked. The third actually was related to a broad category of questions that was requested by Nancy (inaudible) the last time. Does anybody have any views on those 3?

Kriz: I think the first two, I would say those are excellent. I don't know if those could be combined together. How you would enhance the strength of County Government and address what you feel are the weaknesses.

Slockett: Make that into one?

Kriz: Kind of made into one, perhaps, because it's easy to talk about what's wrong, but you also need to talk about what's right and how you make it better.

Painter: As one or 2, that balance is good to have.

Kriz: It would show me a thought train that I not only think everything is fine or everything is terrible but how that interacts to work together, perhaps.

Slockett: That sounds fine to me. Apparently, do you folks envision us meeting again to approve language that we come up or should we compose the question right now and this would be the last... That would be a process question we need to decide. How do you envision it?

Painter: I'd like to try and get it done today.

Kriz: Get it done.

Slockett: Get it done now? OK.

Kriz: I think we can.

Slockett: So what are the County Government's strengths and weaknesses? How would you enhance ...

Painter: The strengths and address the weaknesses.

Kriz: Address the weaknesses... Yes.

Painter: OK.

Slockett: Do you have that Casie? Do we want to move onto the third one?

Painter: Sure.

Slockett: This is, I think, the area, the environment is of increasing importance everyday, every year, every election. The Supervisors have a lot to say about that in terms of disposal of materials and how they surface the roads and in terms of using chemicals versus cutting weeds and so forth. It seems to me like it's a fairly important area. I noticed you said the first 2 you were interested in maybe...

Kriz: The first 2 I just thought flowed together as we took one through 3. I don't disagree on the environment. I'm not sure... should we do more or less? I hope we would do less.

Painter: I had an angle of asking for a couple of specific questions that sort of dovetail with environmental issues. One of which was, with some much welcome input, what criteria would you use in making land use decisions and what criteria would inform your decisions concerning road improvements, maintenance, and construction? Those are just 2 areas.

Slockett: I think more specific questions are better.

Kriz: Uh-huh.

Slockett: Otherwise you can just expound on how much you love the trees the environment without even... I think those would be... I like those.

Painter: I've got that wording right here. I guess I had that on there. It's these 2 right there.

Slockett: Is the wording on there, exactly as you have it?

Painter: Yes. What criteria would you use in making land use decisions? What criteria would inform your decisions concerning road improvements, maintenance, and construction?

Slockett: A big area of controversy in the past has been the pesticides on roadsides. What about adding the words weed eradication?

Painter: Sure, that would be fine with me.

Slockett: I agree with that. Does number 4... This has been a huge focus in recent years.

Painter: Right.

Kriz: To me, that and budgeting...

Slockett: Does that question cover it?

Painter: I don't know. It was pretty basic. What criteria would you use in making land use decisions? That allows them to talk about the Comprehensive Plan as a basis or to indicate that they are not going to use that as a basis. This is a fine question too.

Slockett: I think your question kind of covers it.

Painter: OK.

Slockett: So we just strike number 4? Do we agree on that?

Kriz: Yes, I just want to make sure we've got enough in about how they view the Comprehensive Land Use Plan, just so we bring that on strong enough. I feel that and the budgeting thing are the 2 areas that I saw are as critical as you can have for a Supervisor and their expertise, and their knowledge of it.

Painter: Right. Well you don't want it to be a trap for them, but in a way it does give them an opening to just speak more generically about land use decisions. But the trigger is there for people to say the Comprehensive Plan is something I really have studied and want to talk about.

Kriz: Right.

Painter: Or we might want to know that somebody hasn't really focused on that. I don't know. I'm open to any suggestions.

Kriz: I guess I sense if they hadn't, that would come out probably because I think this whole land use thing, to me, is a big issue.

Slockett: It really is.

Painter: It really is. It's on everybody's mind.

Slockett: I think this may be 2 questions depending on how you feel about it.

Kriz: I'm not so sure. Kim's questions and 4... maybe so. What's your opinion about the Johnson County Land Use Plan. Now maybe they touched on that in what we just asked.

Painter: That's right.

Kriz: What changes would you consider?. But I would just be interested in what their opinion is on it.

Painter: Yes.

Kriz: Not necessarily on what changes or anything. I think changes or anything would come out in their opinion, I would assume. I think for it, there is still some validity to your opinion on a Comprehensive Land Use Plan.

Slockett: The changes are implied in the first sentence possibly.

Kriz: Well they would to me. I'd try to look at it if I were interviewing, that would come out if that were the case there.

Slockett: One of the things I was thinking, is that often times with questions like that, people give a one the one hand, on the other hand kind of analysis. Then if you follow up with a how would you change it...

Painter: Yes, that's good.

Slockett: It kind of zooms in a little more.

Painter: I think that's true. Maybe we should go with the number 4 question, almost instead of...

Kriz: No, because I like what we had in there.

Painter: OK, well both?

Kris: Maybe we'll have too many and we'll go back or something there but I really...

Slockett: Do we want to put 4 in as well for now and we'll revisit it at the end.

Kriz: Revisit 3 and 4 maybe and see what we have come up with.

Painter: OK.

Kriz: I really like the other ideas we have there.

Slockett: The whole question of budget and taxes... I have some (inaudible) there but I'm certainly open to questions. What I tried to cover was trying to really figure out what the person's philosophy is about taxes. There's the philosophy that you need discipline in government and to stay within the revenues that you have available. There are others that feel the government should play an expanding role and that taxes are cheap considering the value you get from those expenditures for the public. I think the public might be interested on where the person fell on some kind of continuum there. That's what I was trying to get at there. On the next one... the impact and incidence of taxes. I think it's important that people understand what the effect of the taxes they raise is on the citizens of the county, the fact that they don't effect everyone equally, that some taxes fall more on some groups of people than others and that they can play a role on deciding which of those tax sources are used or whether charges should be made instead for fee for services kinds of things. I think also it would be very good for any potential Supervisor to study this question and be aware of it. That's part of it. Part of it is that it might provide sort of an educational function as well. Then this number 7 drills in on that. The question of fairness in taxation, that some taxes impact more on poor people than on wealthy people. Is there an awareness on this and what is the candidate's opinion of that? I think that would be of interest to the public. Then number 8, I guess an awful lot... I guess they're all on 8 through 10. I'll just summarize all of them. 8, there is a current controversy. We just had a sales tax election in Linn County and another one in Washington County and there's one on the ballot in late March for Johnson County. The question is how do you feel about Local Option Sales Tax. Certainly if there was a campaign, which is the alternative to us in appointing, that question would come up and they would be asked for an opinion on that. So that's why that's in there. Then the question drilling in on increases in taxes. Are you in favor of increasing them and if so for what reasons and how much, both for property taxes and sales taxes. Those are ten. Then I have 2 more which I just added. One is the question of centralization versus decentralization. Essentially the City and the University are very centralized forms of administration. The County is pretty much a classic decentralized form of government, and the question is basically how do you feel about that. Do you feel that we should move more toward the model of the City, and the University. The next is the question of, if the person isn't appointed, would they either petition for an election themselves, or would they... Generally the political realities are that the person denies that they involved in the petition and then there is another group that is doing it over their objection, or without their permission or whatever, and then they accept the candidacy of that petition drove. So that's why the wording is the way it is. Would you petition for an election, or would you run as the nominee in an election that was petitioned for this position. I think that would give an idea on how the person viewed the process here, whether they were willing to abide by the decision. I don't know if that is really an important question or not.

Painter: It could go either way, as far as whether it's important in our perceptions, but there is a political reality of the situation.

Kriz: I kind of think it is. That's exactly right. You can't avoid that. You could tie into something like that. The question I had is what are your plans two years from now when this position comes up. Are you looking to help out along that line or are you looking... I just think the learning curve for the Supervisors is so great that you hate to absolutely (inaudible).

Slockett: We do have quite a few unexperienced people on the Board.

Kriz: I think coming in the Treasurer's office I can speak to that just about as well as anybody. I have great experience in a lot of things but not great experience there. There is that learning curve and every time you change something it's regressive. We really take a step back sometimes.

Slockett: I remember when I was first elected to Auditor. I talked to Lee County Auditor, Paul (inaudible) was his name. He said you won't even know where to find your chair for 2 years. He said after that they keep changing the laws and legislature so you have to keep relearning the job anyway. I think that it's a pretty strange truth.

Kriz: Could we make this last one... I don't know if we have to keep these in any order but we seem to have a consensus on this last issue here, that there is some importance in what their thought is.

Slockett: I think there are 2 there. The very last one was, and I think it's extremely important, will you run for reelection if you're appointed. I think its a very important question.

Painter: Me too. Yes, I think that should be there.

Slockett: All right, so we agree on that one. What about the petition drive question? Is that in there? I think the public is interested in that.

Kriz: Could that be not coupled? If you are not chosen...

Painter: With the run in 2 years or is that a little too much? There is a potential.

Kriz: There's a couple different issues.

Painter: There are a couple of pieces to it.

Kriz: Yes, you're right.

Painter: There's if you are not the appointee of this committee, will you challenge. Then there's the question if you are the appointee, will you run if there's a special election. Well I guess they have no choice.

Slockett: Both special and 2 years... I want to know 2 years from now...

Kriz: You're right, Kim. That would have to be isolated.

Slockett: So the question should be, if you are appointed and an election is called will you seek your party's nomination, and secondly whether there's a special election or not, will you run again in 2 years. Can you think of a better way to word that?

Painter: Is that all our contingencies, do you think?

Slockett: I think those are our only possibilities. What about 4 years after that?

Kriz: That last one... I'm a little unclear. Are we posing that if you were the candidate would you... I guess what I'm looking at is if somebody's looking at this just for 2 years and then wants to leave, or are they looking for learning these two years and helping and then really getting into it. But you'd also almost have to be the candidate chosen. If you bring in that if you were the chosen candidate would you be looking to run again in 2 years versus you're just kind of asking anybody if they are going to run in 2 years. I guess I'd like to know based on if they were the chosen one. Maybe that's what we had said.

Slockett: What do we have there?

Recording Secretary Casie Parkins: I wanted to go over that just to make sure I had it right. If appointed, and an election is called, will you seek your party's nomination? If not appointed would you petition or would you run in an election that was petitioned for? Will you run for reelection if appointed.

Kriz: I heard the first one and the last one. The middle one is where I'm confused then.

Parkins: You didn't want that one?

Slockett: You don't want the middle part? What was the middle part?

Kriz: I thought that kind of tied to the first one.

Parkins: If not appointed, would you petition or would you run as the nominee in an election that was petitioned for.

Slockett: Yes, that says will you challenge the appointment.

Kriz: Right. (Inaudible).

Slockett: In other words, would you be part of calling an election? The whole reason we're doing this, in my opinion, is try to avoid those costs. I have gotten much feedback from the members of the public that they do not want one.

Painter: Likewise.

Slockett: So we really have 3 separate questions. OK, that's fine as long as they are defined separately.

Parkins: Do you want them put together as one question or do you want 3?

Slockett: Is the way Casie read it all right or would you like to have 3?

Kriz: I think the 3 is all right. I'd rather have the 3, I really would.

Slockett: You'd rather have 3 separate ones? OK.

Painter: They might get confused if we try to combine them.

Slockett: OK, I agree.

Kriz: To me, once again, the confusion comes well I didn't understand that you wanted that all there, where separately it seems like it's just kind of bullet, bullet, bullet.

Slockett: We'll make it into 3 and then when we're done Casie can circulate between the 3 of us for typos and editorial things and that sort of thing.

Kriz: That sounds good.

Slockett: Have we reached a consensus? All right.

Kriz: We're back to all the ones on taxes. One thing I had down was the Local Option Sales Tax because I think that's going to have to be addressed. It certainly could be tied into some of that. I guess there is merit to all those thoughts but it would be nice to bring it down into a couple of question if possible. I don't know if 5, which talks about the way the request for spending which requires tax dollars versus increasing taxes and then 9, are you in favor of increasing property taxes, I don't know if somehow that could be...

Slockett: That might be redundant.

Kriz: Well it could all be part of that kind of thing.

Slockett: So we can either combine or strike one of those.

Kriz: I guess I like 5 the best.

Slockett: 5, OK. Do you want to just strike 9 then.

Kriz: You're the author of it. You know which direction you were going with it.

Slockett: I think it's implied in 5.

Painter: I guess I do too.

Slockett: I guess 9... we've come through a period where Proposition 13 in California and there has been tax freezes and we've had tax limitations in Iowa. I was trying to say well is this a person who is in favor of that approach to local government or do we want local control and our elected officials to make those decision. I think number 5 will get to that.

Kriz: 5, right. Tell me what you're thinking about in 6, Tom?

Slockett: Well that's one...I know it's a little bit technical, but to me it's really important. These are people who are affecting people's pocketbooks. We aren't asking for donations; we're confiscating the impound moneys.

Painter: There you go.

Kriz: Our way or no way, that's right...

Slockett: To me it's really important that they understand what it is they are doing when they go about doing this. I'm open to discussion to the matter.

Kriz: I don't disagree. I think that is. I was just trying to see if that ties to any of the rest of that that's there.

Slockett: Well it does have to do with 7.

Kriz: Yes, I think it does.

Painter: Well that's true.

Slockett: I mean 6 is sort of the awareness of it, and then 7 is how do you feel about it.

Kriz: How do you feel about it? I guess I would want to state whether it's progressive or regressive. I don't know. We may differ on that.

Slockett: To me there isn't a subject matter that's subjective. Its well established.

Painter: It's a matter of a definition, an economic definition, almost, a textbook definition.

Slockett: I can certainly give you... There have been any number of studies...

Kriz: I've look at those. I know Joe and I went around about those for a while.

Slockett: So you'd like to... I guess one of the things where this comes from is it seems to me that there is a little bit of a cop out for elected officials in saying we're doing this and we have no choice. This is the hand the State Legislature dealt us.

Kriz: That's the easy way out.

Slockett: That's the easy way out because the Iowa League of Municipalities deals extensively with affecting the legislation that come out of the Legislature. The Iowa State Association of Counties does the same thing. The League of Women Voters holds a meeting once a month between elected officials and the State Legislature and the members of the public and all of us have no extensive contact with State Legislature so for us to throw up our hands and say we have nothing to do with the fact that we tend to tax poor people instead of people who can afford to pay more readily. In my opinion, I guess that's a subjective matter but at least we know that we take a higher percentage of the income of the poor people in our taxes then we do from the wealthy people. You can make the argument that wealthy people have a hard time paying their share of the taxes than the poor people or not. Maybe there is some subjectivity there, but there is no question that we do take a high percentage from the poor people than the wealthy people in our taxes and the question is does it matter to you. If so, what are you going to do about it. Is this something you would work with the Legislatures to address, and its not as though there aren't alternatives. Richard Nixon isn't seen as a Reagan liberal and he came up with revenue sharing which in a very dramatic way reduced the regressivity of local taxes. Including the leadership from our Legislatures has dramatically increased the progressivity of taxes by replacement of local taxes. The Mental Health and institutions tax relief from the State is a dramatic example of that. There are tools available and efforts ongoing so the question is are we in favor of this or is this something that we think ought to stop. There are arguments that we should let the wealthy people invest their income and that creates jobs and poor people are better off if they do that and so forth.

Painter: Right. This gives people... to make the argument.

Slockett: It's not as though there aren't 2 sides to the argument. Give people the opportunity to say what their point of view is on all these things.

Painter: They can talk about prosperity as a very effective economic engine in it's own right, that does certain things and make that argument, if they care to do that.

Slockett: And we had the trickle down from the Reagan administration.

Kriz: What if you had what do you know about the impact and incidence of Johnson County taxes and what, if anything, should be done about the nature of County tax options.

Slockett: I like that.

Painter: Sure, just literally take that word out.

Kriz: I don't want to assume that it's regressive. We could dialog that all day, Tom, but I think we're setting the precedence by using that way. But I think that the thought's there. I think we all want to know this. That may come out. The candidate might say that certainly it's a regressive situation. Then I learn something about that person by what comes from that question.

Painter: Sure.

Kriz: Does that make sense?

Painter: I really like having this array of tax questions. I just want to say it is a set of issues that are very important and webs out into so many areas of concern to Supervisors and to the voters. I hear from people about this sort of thing all the time and it's certainly a big area of concern. So I think it's well worth having a number of questions and not condensing it down too much.

Slockett: All right. Where are we now?

Kriz: Have we dealt with the Local Option?

Slockett: I don't think we've specifically dealt with that.

Kriz: That I'd like to...

Painter: See included, yes.

Kriz: Did we include that in something?

Parkins: I have number 6 and 7 on this sheet, but the way you worded it would be a 2 part question. Right? It would be like the same...

Kriz: What do you know about that impact and incidence of taxes? What...

Parkins: What, if anything, should be done about the nature of a County tax options?

Kriz: Yes, that's true. Would you rather split that up?

Painter: We might as well.

Parkins: You want it split up?

Painter: It really is 2 questions. If you put 2 questions into one, we can do that. There's nothing really wrong with that.

Kriz: OK, separate it and we'll go back and (inaudible).

Slockett: So now we're down to the local option question.

Kriz: Yes, kind of 8 and 10. Do you prefer taxes versus local option? Are you in favor of implementing the Local Option Sales Tax in lieu of...

Painter: Increasing property taxation...

Kriz: ...or taxing or...

Slockett: The reason I had 2... I'll just give you the logic. There's nothing special about it. One of the arguments for raising regressive taxes is because you can affect the regressivity by how it's spent. If you tax the money from the lower income level, but you provide services to them they wouldn't otherwise have, that blunts the regressivity of it. Where is it makes it worse if you're taxing the... a prime example would be Iowa City sewage rates. It taxes poor people at a much higher percentage of their income, elderly people on fixed incomes and so forth. Then it's mailed off to wealthy people who want a tax break for tax municipal bonds. So that's the classic example of what you don't want to do with the regressive tax. The idea of blunting the regressivity by providing welfare or bus services or something utilized by less wealthy people would be an example of a way to make a regressive tax more acceptable. For example, and Iowa City is doing this in their proposal, part of the money from the sales tax would be used for relief on the water and sewer bills which is more regressive than the sales tax which seems to me to be one of the better arguments that I've heard for the sales tax.

Kriz: Sales tax, yes.

Slockett: So that's why I was sort of trying to include in there if you were for it, for what purposes and how much because under Iowa law you can go up to a maximum one cent but you can have any fraction of a cent as well in a local option tax. Another question I think that comes up, I didn't include it, but there is a group of people in the county... I think a lot of rural people feel that the sales taxes the county gets ought to be spent entirely on the rural areas. That has to do with the formula by which sales taxes are distributed. In that formula the County only gets credit for its rural valuations and populations. The cities get taxes according to their population and the valuations in the cities and the Counties get a percentage according to its rural valuation. Even though most of our budget comes from, is spent on, city people, in the sales tax distribution, we don't get any credit for that. But I don't know if that's an issue we can ask about or not. It's just a thought (inaudible). You said you wanted to talk... you wanted to ask a question about sales tax.

Kriz: I'd like to know if they're in favor of implementing this local option sales tax. If so, for what and how much. I'm not sure in an interview like that I could even have an idea how much it should be. But I like your thoughts of are you in favor of implementing the outlook option sales tax. The question is how do you break down, and if so, how would it be used and for what. Then you're assuming they are by asking that kind of a question so...

Slockett: No, but it says if so. If they say, no, I'm not in favor of it then they wouldn't...

Painter: The second part is not applicable to them.

Slockett:...not applicable if they're not in favor of it.

Kriz: I would certainly leave any question that just addresses it because that may be one of the first huge things they have to address right away.

Painter: Yes.

Slockett: One argument against it might be that it's a controversial question because it's a current issue.

Kriz: But it's real.

Slockett: It's real and it's fair.

Kriz: The Land Use Plan is controversial as can be...

Slockett: That's true.

Kriz:...but it's real. It's passed. It's there and we deal with it.

Slockett: I just feel certain that if this was an election that they would have to deal with this question.

Painter: Oh yes. There is no doubt.

Slockett: So would you restate how you have your question worded again? Maybe we can just...

Kriz: Well I just pretty much had yours. Are you in favor of implementing a local option sales tax, if so, for what use, rather than the how much. Maybe the how much has some variant to you guys I certainly don't...

Slockett: Well, the proposal is for one cent so maybe...

Kriz: I think everybody's assuming that.

Painter: Yes I guess it is.

Kriz: I agree with you. It could be a half.

Slockett: It could be less but I don't think there's...

Kriz: But I think the mindset of everybody, the reality is, it's going to be a penny.

Slockett: The reality is it's either going to be one or nothing. Yes. I agree with that.

Painter: Yes, that sounds good to me too.

Kriz: You guys were ahead of me and I didn't formulate questions but I think one issue that's important and will have to be addressed is space needs for the County.

Slockett: Uh-huh.

Kriz: Be that jails, be that Human Services...

Slockett: Yes, that's a very important question.

Kriz: That's a huge question.

Slockett: It is.

Kriz: Not to get into the merits of rehabilitation versus jails and all that thing but just the functional space needs of what we need.

Painter: How do we formulate that?

Slockett: It's such a dilemma because traditionally what is done is you just stick your head in the sand until there's an emergency.

Painter: Yes.

Slockett: Then you throw your hands up and say, gee, there's nothing else we can do...

Painter: No room. Yes.

Slockett: ...when, if you planned ahead and saved money overtime, instead of having to borrow it and pay the interest you'd be so much better off.

Kriz: I guess my thought, coming from a fiscal standpoint, is in some form or fashion the County is running into areas of space needs. Would a person be in favor of the County going into debt to do that or how would you address dealing with that?

Slockett: Yes, I like that.

Kriz: At some time the County is going to have to look at debt.

Painter: Yes.

Kriz: Not saying that debt is bad in that respect but from a standpoint to operate like we have may not be the way we'll be able to operate in the future. You've got bond issues. You've got all kinds of things.

Slockett: Well for example the County Sheriff feels there's a huge need for very expensive additional jail space. There's no getting around that with all the regulations and so forth and what the cost would be, if we would do that. Human services needs more space. County office space... we're really pressed for space. There's no question we're going to be packed more and more like sardines or we're going to do something about it somehow.

Painter: I like the way you phrase that question though because that kind of takes it away from being a little too much of insider type question.

Slockett: Uh-huh.

Kriz: Uh-huh.

Painter: It has very broad implications that people should be able to speak to for this interview.

Parkins: Could you rephrase that?

Kriz: Go ahead Kim. Those were just thoughts kind of flowing...

Parkins Did you get it though?

Painter: I didn't write it down.

Parkins OK, this is what I have but I just wrote it down.

Kriz: That's OK because I was just kind of...

Parkins Would you be willing to go into debt to address the County's space needs?

Kriz: That was part of it.

Painter: That was part of it.

Reverend Bob Welsh: If I could interject, I heard his first question being how would you address...

Kriz: Yes.

Welsh: ...the County's space needs? It's a broad question and you'd... rather than giving them all the options.

Painter: That's right.

Welsh: That's what I wrote down when you started speaking, Tom.

Kriz: That was the gist of it. I then editorialized a little from the other side about the debt.

Slockett: That would just be a totally open question. How would you address the County's space needs?

Kriz: If there were questions... you might get a question back to your question like well what do you mean? Paying for it? Are you talking about Human Service needs, jail needs? Let them take it from there. Somehow I'd like to talk about the monetary system too.

Slockett: What if I brought in a little bit to say it's a question of do they perceive any space needs? Do you feel the County has additional space needs and if so, how should they be addressed? Maybe that's implied anyway, but we are stating that they exist and someone else might say, hey...

Kriz: That's true.

Painter: You're doing all right.

Slockett: Yes. I've heard this argument a million times. When you were elected you knew what the space needs were, or what the available space was, and you should operate within that. How do you...

Parkins How would you address the County space needs?

Slockett: Do you feel that the County has additional space needs and how would you address them? How does that sound?

Parkins If so, how would you address them?

Slockett: Uh-huh.

Parkins OK.

Painter: Yes that's right, that's right.

Slockett: Does that sound all right? If they don't feel there are any, then that would tell you something.

Kriz: I think candidates who have done their homework will be able to address that question.

Slockett: Yes.

Kriz: I know Kim has a bunch here. I just have one more then we can drop out of that and that's budgeting, experience with it, knowledge of it...

Painter: Yes, I mentioned that too.

Slockett: I agree.

Kriz: ...performance based budgeting, all those things we're looking at... thoughts on it.

Slockett: What kind of experience do you have...

Painter: Yes, that's right.

Kriz: Right.

Slockett: ...with budgets and...

Kriz: I looked back at some questions that were asked of the Recorder candidates. Do you have any experience putting budgets together? Have you had a chance to look at the budget? That's more specific than just do you have any experience putting budgets together? Because you're going to deal with all the budgets that come in and trying to make decisions and requests and those things so perhaps it could be as basic as do you have any experience putting budgets together?

Slockett: We have an ongoing discussion about performance based budgeting.

Kriz: Uh-huh.

Painter: That's right.

Slockett: I think just asking them about that particular...

Painter: Topic...

Slockett: ...topic would be worthwhile.

Painter: I think that would be very good actually.

Kriz: Yes, I thought of that too and then I thought that's just me entering into that but if we can get that across and you don't think that is, that's fine.

Slockett: No. I don't. Let's include that too.

Parkins Do you have any experience putting budgets together? What is your knowledge of performance based budgeting?

Slockett: How do you feel about performance based budgeting?

Painter: How would you address the issue?

Kriz: The problem I've got there... if they don't have any experience putting budgets together, I bet they're not going to have a clue what performance based budgeting is.

Painter: Sure, but they can just say that.

Kriz: Yes, yes.

Slockett: They're going to have them ahead of time, remember that.

Painter: That's true.

Kriz: You're right. You're right. That's right too.

Slockett: It wouldn't hurt people to find out a little bit.

Kriz: Yes.

Slockett: They can talk to the Supervisors and...

Painter: It's kind of a take home exam.

Slockett: Actually, I hope that these questions will stimulate conversations between them and current members of the Board of Supervisors for example.

Painter: Yes.

Kriz: So you've got, do you have any experience putting budgets together and...

Parkins: I was going to say what is your knowledge of performance based budgeting.

Slockett: I would sort of like to see not only knowledge because...

Painter: How would you address...

Slockett: ...you can... Yes, but what is their opinion of it?

Painter: Yes.

Kriz: Uh-huh.

Parkins What is your opinion on it?

Slockett: Yes.

Kriz: Of performance based budgeting...

Painter: Yes.

Parkins: (Inaudible) how do you feel?

Slockett: How do you feel about is what I said. Right.

Kriz: Uh-huh.

Slockett: How do you feel about it? That might even be a little less strong. How do you feel about it? What is your opinion? How do you feel about performance based budgeting? A little more low key...

Parkins: Do you want that in one 2 part question?

Slockett: A two part question.

Kriz: Sorry, Kim.

Painter: No, that's good.

Slockett: As Reverend Welsh knows because he's been around for a while, and I'm sure everyone else for the most part knows too, but there's always a fad. There's a current budgeting fad. You know we had zero based budgeting...

Painter: That's right.

Kriz: Uh-huh.

Slockett: ...and program budgeting. They're all useful techniques. They're just a different way of organizing a budget. I doubt that 10 years from now we'll feel that performance based budgeting is the end all and be all of budgeting. In fact, there's more of a tendency even now to move away from...

Kriz: To move away from...

Slockett: ...performance based towards bench marking and those sort of things. But those are also concepts that are included in performance based budgeting. The County and the State has moved heavily toward performance based budgeting and I think the federal government as well and certainly Human Services, a big part of the County. If some of the Supervisors have their wish, the County is going to be moving into it too so it'll be interesting to see how they evaluate it, what they think about it and what their knowledge about it is.

Kriz: So, Kim, you had some.

Painter: I wondered if we should ask a question about our boards and commissions and how they might go about selecting from applicant pools or a question of that nature?

Kriz: What their criteria would be for the selection of people to serve on...

Painter: Right, or how would you go about selecting from a pool of applicants to serve on County boards and commissions.

Slockett: That's a good one.

Painter: We could amplify that a little. I've got kind of a longish piece here. Then going on to ask the applicant how they think the Board of Supervisors should relate to their appointees on those commissions and how they should relate to the commissions and boards. But that might be a little much to chew on. I don't know but I think at least giving them an opportunity to talk about that sort of thing.

Kriz: I think the first part of it...

Painter: Yes.

Kriz: ...might lead to the second part. That's a good area.

Painter: That sounds good. Then I had one more that kind of goes back to... I have several of these that are pretty general and probably too much a slow soft pitch they could hit out of the park. So, I'll move along. I had a question... describe your approach to balancing economic and business interests with interests in the health and well being of citizens and environmental concerns. Now we've sort of covered that and maybe we don't need to go into that anymore. I don't want to necessarily imply those things are at odds. In fact, I want to give people an opportunity to talk about the ways in which business and economic interests should and can compliment interests in people's quality of life. But what do we have for environmental questions? What is the County's role in protecting the environment? Should it do more or less and how?

Slockett: Would you read yours again? Maybe we could substitute yours for that one?

Painter: Describe your approach to balancing economic and business interests with interests in the health and well being of citizens and environmental concerns.

Slockett: That almost seems like another question.

Painter: Yes, yes.

Kriz: I do too.

Slockett: Maybe we should just...

Painter: Edit.

Slockett: Put it right... put them together.

Kriz: Edited it up to follow up with the first one.

Painter: Just put it up there next to Tom's.

Kriz: Kind of a follow up question after that... It leads to that I think.

Painter: Yes, yes.

Slockett: It's more specific.

Painter: Then I wanted to add just a little bit to balance it out and give people a chance to talk about their economic ideas and their feelings about business.

Parkins: That would be the second part to which number? 5?

Slockett: Number 3.

Painter: Yes, number 3.

Kriz: Wasn't that the County's role...

Painter: In protecting the environment... Isn't that what you've got, Casie?

Slockett: So it would be like 3B.

Parkins Yes, we took one of your questions for number 3 instead of...

Painter: Yes, that's right.

Parkins ...what is the County's role in (inaudible).

Painter: Land use. Yes.

Slockett: I thought we ended up accepting 3.

Parkins: No we didn't use 3.

Painter: We changed it a little bit.

Parkins: We changed it to...

Painter: I think we modified it but I don't think we...

Parkins We took number 3, instead of what you wrote for number 3, we took a question you had which criteria would you use...

Painter: For land use and then what changes would you consider making to the comprehensive plan. Did we leave that in?

Welsh: Yes.

Painter: That's what I thought we did. I don't know.

Welsh: Along with criteria, you said planned use and road improvements. Tom Slockett added weed eradication.

Slockett: That's right, weed eradication.

Painter: Yes, OK. So do we still want to take this latest as an additional question after that or is that too much? I don't know if it's worth it.

Slockett: So we don't really have a text on exactly what the question is at this point without listening to the tape and so forth.

Parkins: No, Kim had the wording. I thought it came from you.

Painter: OK. What criteria would you use in making land use decisions?

Parkins: Right.

Painter: I've got that as one question. Then I've got what criteria would inform your decisions concerning road improvements, maintenance and construction and weed eradication somewhere in there? So then we got rid of all of number 3? I guess I hadn't thought we'd really replaced it.

Slockett: I sort of like having a... I think the environment is such an important issue for the people...

Kriz: See I thought that tied together with this.

Slockett: ...locally here in Johnson County.

Parkins: OK. I thought you said weed eradication...

Slockett: To be added in.

Parkins: ...to be added in. We didn't need the part about the environment because weed eradication is bringing up the environment. It was...

Slockett: Yes, but it's only one part of the...

Kriz: Yes, but dust and everything else...

Parkins Because you said you'd... just talking about the environment was too broad and people could start talking about trees and how they like trees and everything. You went with Kim's question instead because you just said environment was too broad.

Slockett: Uh-huh. That's true.

Painter: Yes, that's true.

Slockett: Yes, I agree we did decide to do that. I'm just not sure that we shouldn't give people an opportunity to talk about how they feel about environmental protection, recycling and so on and so forth. Maybe it will be all right when we see the list.

Parkins: So do you want to keep what you have for number 3 then now? To give people an opportunity to talk about the environment?

Slockett: Well, I guess sort of what I'm thinking... I was just thinking to myself that it's difficult to do this when we don't actually have the questions in front of us. Originally, I was thinking about bringing in a flip chart and we could write them down. But then they tend to get crossed out and changed so much you can't read them anyway.

Kriz: Uh-huh.

Painter: Right.

Slockett: Another way we might do this is we've got resources on the tape, decisions we've made and notes and what people have brought to the meeting. Maybe after Casie puts it together, we could also propose additional questions if we saw them. As long as there's a consensus and we all agree to them there's no real reason why they have to be formally adopted if we, by consensus, agree to them. Although we do want to make sure that we inform everyone of what they are.

Painter: Right.

Slockett: But if we did that, if we could do this consensus thing, we could recess. How about that? Why don't we recess and put the questions together and then... is everyone going to be here today?

Kriz: I'll be here. I've got a staff meeting at 4 though.

Slockett: So as long as it's before 4?

Kriz: Yes.

Painter: Yes.

Slockett: As long as I can get in there. Kim had one last one that I think is identical.

Painter: Oh, identical.

Kriz: Just perfect. What is your vision, long range vision for Johnson County? I look for a person who looks to the future to probably 10 years or 20 years so I think that...

Slockett: I like that.

Kriz: ...that would be a great summation question to bring in too.

Slockett: Right, but I think that sort of thing will probably be covered in summation, but if not, maybe this will enhance (inaudible) to let us know. Were there any more questions? I didn't mean to...

Kriz: No.

Painter: No. No. I had a question about time allocation. We had mentioned that earlier in the context of how we might invite them to proceed through the questions, about balancing or budgeting their time, but I'm not real committed, necessarily, to that. Do we want to ask them about how they foresee they will balance the many, many demands on Supervisors' time.

Slockett: Uh-huh.

Painter: See what their concepts might be in advance of those demands. I don't know.

Kriz: One question was asked in the 94 thing. Would you have adequate time to devote to the position which kind of opens up...

Slockett: Isn't that... Can you imagine someone saying, no, I won't?

Painter: Exactly, exactly. That's why I had doubts about some of these questions because I can just foresee people saying I'm good at prioritizing and I'll be able to manage this really well or tell us... I don't know if it's too soft of a question.

Slockett: It is a good question because there's a huge demand on time. Partly it depends on how they choose because Supervisors have different styles. Some Supervisors try to attend every possible meeting. Any meeting that is scheduled, if they don't already have a conflict, they will go to it. Others feel that isn't the best use of their time and they spend more time here in the County building dealing with County Government questions, rather than community questions. So a lot of it depends on the sort of approach and perspective. Maybe that's an interesting question. I see people that have probably had well over a 40 hour week and others who have spent considerably less time. So I'm just not quite sure how that would affect our decision.

Painter: Exactly.

Slockett: I don't know... I'm thinking out loud here.

Painter: Yes, it's almost one of those questions that's sort of designed as of a point of information to all. As priority Supervisors there will be heavy demands upon your time.

Kriz: We're assuming that they know that.

Painter: Yes.

Kriz: They should, they certainly should.

Painter: I'm...

Slockett: So let's take what we've got and if we can...

Painter: Yes.

Kriz: ...we'll try to put the heat on.

Slockett: If you listen to the tape and so forth just...

Parkins I'm not going to have time to listen to the tape for this I'm going to go by the notes. I was going to ask you if I could make a photocopy of that.

Painter: Yes, absolutely.

Parkins I'll try to refer to the tape. But we've been in here for over an hour and if you have a staff meeting at 4...

Slockett: Well but...

Parkins I don't have time to tape...

Slockett: That's the trouble with tapes there's no way of really fast forwarding. You have to listen to the whole thing in order...

Parkins I have a pretty good memory of what...

Kriz: Each thing that came back I think is pretty darn close. I certainly think we could refine quickly from what Casie's notes are.

Slockett: So you'll just make up the list and then we'll add it. That would be a good way to do it.

Parkins Yes (inaudible)...

Slockett: If she misses something, just insert it and we'll get...

Parkins Did we want to reconvene?

Slockett: Yes. I hope when we reconvene we have something we can approve. What I would like for us to do is to circulate it and make an edit and so forth before that and then maybe at 3:30... Do you think there'll be time? That's only about 40 minutes from now. Think there will be time to put it together and circulate them Casie? Maybe not?

Parkins 3:40.

Slockett: How late do you work today?

Parkins 6:30.

Slockett: 6:30. So you have plenty of time afterwards maybe we should just...

Kriz: Should we reconvene at 4 or 4:30?

Slockett: ...reconvene tomorrow morning.

Kriz: I've got to keep mine very short.

Slockett: Oh OK.

Parkins I thought we would get this done today and since Myron's interview was Saturday I told him that I'd get them out in the mail today. Not the mail... I told him we'd get them on the internet today, the questions.

Kriz: I can bring mine to a halt so I can sneak right back in here at...

Slockett: At 4:30?

Kriz: If that doesn't inconvenience anybody...

Slockett: Oh OK.

Painter: That's fine because tomorrow's not a day that I'm gonna be...

Slockett: Oh that's right. Tomorrow is Friday. I keep forgetting. (Inaudible) a question or 2.

Welsh: My suggestion, since you're going to give these out, is that there are some natural groupings of those within your layout. You could space those and in such a way that... like a series of questions on the budget. There's a series of questions in relation to land use...

Slockett: Taxes.

Welsh: ...the environment. There's a set of questions if you're appointed, if you're not appointed. If some how in the spacing of those, you can put those out then I know those questions... That would help me if I were a candidate to be able to address those within a block.

Kriz: Within a block.

Slockett: (Inaudible).

Painter: Uh-huh.

Welsh: Then how people choose to even answer those questions in a block becomes... It says something to you about...

Kriz: (Inaudible).

Parkins Do you want the question do you have any question of us at the end?

Slockett: Which question?

Parkins Do you have any questions of us?

Slockett: Do you have any questions of us? Sure.

Painter: It's kind of a stock.

Slockett: I think. Well how do you feel?

Painter: Sure, it's fine.

Kriz: I think we've got plenty to fill an hour.

Slockett: Yes, because we're going to have opening and summary statements.

Kriz: We'll keep that to a couple of minutes.

Slockett: Yes.

Kriz: Just time it and cut it off.

Slockett: If we have that expectation, we should let them know. We could list an opening statement...

Painter: That's right.

Slockett: ...opening... how many minutes shall we say?

Painter: Say 2.

Kriz: 2 minutes.

Slockett: 2 minutes. And closing statement?

Painter: 3.

Slockett: 3?

Kriz: Uh-huh.

Slockett: 3 did you say?

Kriz: I think 5 is more than sufficient.

Painter: Yes. Or we could go 2 and 2. I'm not wedded to...

Kriz: See you've got to remember we have these scheduled every hour which means we can't go the full hour.

Painter: That's right.

Welsh: Still talk customers (inaudible).

Painter: That's right.

Kriz: We need just a break. We really need to have maybe 52 minutes or so.

Painter: Yes, yes. What do have for a...

Parkins Are we recessed? I don't know.

Kriz: Yes, recessed.

Painter: Yes. Do we have to move?

Kriz: We probably need to move to recess.

Welsh: I'm fairly knowledgeable.

Kriz: Motion to recess.

Welsh: I wouldn't have the faintest idea how to answer that question.

Parkins I wouldn't think so.

Welsh: I'm not sure your Supervisors would.

Slockett: Well, there a great new study out that deals with...

Kriz: We're just recessed at 3:00.

(Continued in Part 2)