Thank you. Good morning ladies and gentlemen, Denton County Commissioner's Court for Tuesday, August the 11th, 2009 is now in session. This morning our invocation will be given by Dr. Bing Burton, Director of our Health Department, and our pledges will be led by Bennett Hall, our County Engineer, will you please stand? To pray with me, this is the day the Lord has made. We will rejoice and be glad in it. What we thank you for your steadfast love and endures to all generations. We ask your blessing upon this meeting of the commissioner's court and pray that all that is said and done here today would be pleasing to you. We ask your blessing upon this county and our state and our nation and all who serve it both at home and abroad. We ask your special special blessing upon those who stand in harm's way that no harm would come to them. We pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen. Please, I'll make a pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one state under God one in We have actually three public hearings this morning. We're going to go to item 4A first. 4A is a public hearing for the purpose of passing a resolution confirming the Denton County's inclusion in the North Texas Groundwater Conservation District. Per section 8856.003B of subtitle H, Title 6, Special District Local Laws Code. 8856.003b of subtitle H, title 6, special district local laws code. With that, we need a motion to go into our public hearing. Public hearing. Motion by Commissioner Ead, seconded by Commissioner Mitchell. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed say nay. Motion to scare. Just for a little review, Senator Estus carried Senate bill 2497 in the 81st legislative session to create the North Texas Groundwater District, which includes Denton, Collin, and Cook Counties at this time. That doesn't mean that TCQ can add more in the future. But initially it's Denton Collin and Cook County. Last week we appointed our three temporary directors, I should say board members, representing Denton County. One being Mr. Thomas Smith, who is with us today. Mr. Todd Marina, who is the director of utilities in the municipality in the county that uses the most groundwater that would be the city of the colony. They proposed three recommended names of board members in priority order and Mr. Tadmarna was their first choice. And then the legislation also requires us to contact the groundwater suppliers. Thank you. And the Sergent County and get their three, up to three recommendations in priority order. Their first choice was Mr. Chris Boyd. And so he has been appointed as Todd More Marina has to our temporary board of directors and then this body the Punisher's Court appointed Mr. Thomas Smith as the representative at large representing Denton County. The other two counties Cook and Colin have done the same thing by holding the public hearing today as required in the legislation. The law in completion of the public hearing this body will take a vote to essentially ratify what the legislature did by creating this district in Senate Bill 2497. Is there anyone in attendance that would like to address commission's court on this issue? Mr. Smith, I made the effort to come this morning. We appreciate your being here and we appreciate serving on this district. Board of Directors would like to be offering you the opportunity to say anything that you'd like to learn in the public hearing. If you so desire. I've communicated with Mr. Swiss several times via email and telephone, but I think is the first time we've met faith to space. It's nice to meet you. Thank you all very much and thank the commissioners and the judge for their service to the county. We have a lot of environmental things facing our state and water usage and availability is a big thing and I think it's good that we start taking a proactive look at it and we need to utilize it to the extent practical so that it can be there for generations to come. It's a valuable resource and I think this is a good tool in the first step towards it and I'm honored to be a service and hope that I can add value to the team. I'm sure you will and we appreciate your offering to do so sir. It should be stated also that by creating this groundwater district legislatively we were able to include the gas and all industry as among the parties that will be charged a fee for groundwater usage. Just for clarification I think the newspaper, this is for your benefit. I think in your last article you stated something about the groundwater district specifically being targeted at the gas and oil industry and it's really not. It's anybody that uses groundwater over 35,000 gallons at a time. And so yes, I felt it was important that we included the grass and oil industry in Denton County just because it's it's so big in Denton County. My concern was that if we did not get this done legislatively when T.C. Cue creates a district they do not include the gas and oil industry and for Denton County I think that would be a huge issue. But this one does. So, anyway, on the tennis it would like to address commissioners court on this subject. Anybody in favor of or opposed to the district that would like to address the court? Hearing none, do we have a motion to close our public hearing? Opposed to public hearing. Do we have a motion by commission Eads? Seconded by Commissioner Marchin. All in favor, please say aye. Aye, opposed to the same name? Motion does carry. I'm gonna read this resolution. Resolution of the Commissioner's Court of Denton, County Texas Confirming Denton Counties Inclusion in the North Texas Roundwater Conservation District. Whereas Senate Bill 2497 was passed by the 81st legislature regular session and signed by the governor on May 27, 2009, creating the North Texas Brown Water Conservation District. And whereas the district is a groundwater conservation district and Colin Cook and Denton counties created under an essential to accomplishing the purposes of Section 59 article 16 Texas Constitution and whereas the district is created to serve a public use and benefit and whereas all of the land and other property included within the boundaries of the district will be benefited by the works and projects that are to be accomplished by the district under the powers conferred by subtitle age title. by subtitle H. Title VI, Special District Local Laws Code, Chapter 8856, and by Chapter 36 of the Water Code. And whereas Dintn County Commission's Court appointed temporary directors on Tuesday, August 4, 2009, and conducted a public hearing to confirm or reject Dintn County's inclusion in the district on Tuesday, August 11, 2009. Therefore, it resolved that Dintn County Commission's Court confirms Dintn County's inclusion in the district on Tuesday, August 11, 2009. Therefore, it resolved that didn't kind of commissioners court confirms didn't kind of inclusion in the North Texas groundwater conservation district as provided in section 8856.003B of subtitle H, title 6, special district laws code. Down in open court on the 11th day of August 2009, Chair will move for approval. Seconded by Commissioner Eanes. Any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Posting. Motion does carry. This action therefore makes our temporary directors now permanent directors of the newly created district. And Mr. Smith, just for your knowledge, I have communicated with Todd Marina and the colony. And once we get all of the contact information for all three counties, representatives, Mr. Marina is going to be contacting everybody about the first meeting just so you know. Thank you. Just so you know Thank you Okay, and we're now going to go to our second public hearing which is 4b This is a public hearing before Denk County Commission's Court to discuss abandoning an portion of tiff circle located in Denk County Commissioner precinct 4 We need a motion to go into the public hearing. So moved. Motion by Commissioner Eans. Seconded by Commissioner Marchin. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposite a need. Motion does carry. Commissioner Eans. I'll, I'll bend it to speak about this. I'm sorry. It's been, it wants to come forward to speak about that this is an abandonment of a small piece of road that was not constructed years ago. I don't know if there's anyone in opposition or in favor of it. They're welcome to speak. Want to hear from Bennett first. morning. Morning. Morning. Morning, Quirk. This portion of TIF road we were approached by the landowners in the area to abandon it. It has not been constructed. The portion of TIF circle that has been constructed does end in a cul-de-sac, so it's not a dead end road. Thank you. Are there any questions or members of court? So you don't have to construct the road? No. Sorry, I didn't. It had not been constructed. Not this portion of it, no. So the portion that has not been constructed, you don't have to construct it, right? This is the portion they want to abandon. They want to abandon, give it to the county. So we'll have to still have to construct it. They want abandoned it and they want the county to abandon the right way back to the landowners. Oh, okay. Sorry, cut it to the wrong way. We're giving rid of it. Okay, he did that clarification. Sorry. Thank you. Is anyone in attendance that would like to address commissioners court on this issue either in favor of or opposed to? Good morning for the record if you will state your name and address Absolutely James McAden property owner at 1640 Karen drive so my wife and other ones that put in the request So just want to be available for any questions or concerns that may come up. I appreciate you guys taking the time to review this force. Appreciate your being here this morning. Thank you. Is anyone else in attendance that would like to address commissioners Court of the City of the favor of or opposed to? Here none do we have a motion to close the public hearing? If we close the public hearing, pushing back commissioner Eans, seconded by commissioner Mitchell. On favor please say aye. Aye. Opposed say aye. Motion does carry. Okay, the only one is on the right. This portion of, okay, thanks. I move we abandoned the portion the tickets outlined in the. Oh, I beg your pardon. Oh, you're correct. I had them. I know it's and I didn't do it. I'm sorry. Well, let's go to 14D. I knew that. And I still missed it. I'm sorry. Thank you, John. 14G is approval of abandoning a portion of TIF Circle located in an unoccupied area. It didn't kind of commission for as follows. One, didn't county here by advantage any interest it may have in the portion of TIF Circle of described as track each or not. So I track two, got a little smudger in exhibit A of the attached portion of right away abandonment to Michael W. Dunn and Linda F. Dunn whose address is PO box 258 Argonne, Texas 76226 and two didn't come here by abandon and he interested in a half and the portion of Tissarkel described as track three in exhibit A of the attached petition for right away abandonment to James McAdden in Rachel McAdden whose address is 1640 Karen Drive or L. Texas 76226. The chair will make that motion is our second. Eads will second is there any further discussion? Clarification. Here none. All in favor of the motion, please say aye. Aye. Opposed to the name? Motion does, Carrie. Thank you. Thank you, legal for all your help with that. A lot of emails. Okay, we're going to go to the public hearing. A lot of emails. Okay, we're going to go now to 4C. 4C is a third and last public hearing. Public hearing is to be held by Denton County is designated applicant that didn't county. The city of Denton in the city of Louisville are seeking grant funding under the Edward Burn Justice Assistance Grant program for $77,524. As we need a motion to go into our public hearing. Motion by Commissioner Eads, seconded by Commissioner Mitchell. On favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, Cinean? Motion does carry. So anyone in attendance that would like to address Commissioner commissioners court either in favor two or in favor of or opposed to the proposed inclusion Or I should say designated applicant that didn't county city of Denton and city of Louisville seeking the grant funding under the Edward Bern Justice Assistance Grant program Anyone in attendance in favor of or opposed to? Here none let's have a motion to close our public hearing. Motion by Commissioner Mitchell. Seconded by Commissioner Eads. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, aye. So any discussion by court members? All right. We need a motion to approve. Motion by Commissioner Mitchell, seconded by Commissioner Coleman. Hearing no discussion. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed, any? Motion does carry. Okay. We have some guess with the, I can't talk this morning. We have some guess with us today and this is concerning item 13A. Consideration of their time. I'd like to go to that item. 13A is acceptance of private roads in the Butterfield Junction subdivision for county maintenance. This is placed by Commissioner Coleman. Would you like to address this first, and then we'll call on your guests. Yes, ma'am. First of all, I would like to state that there is a typo in the agenda placement. This is, these are public roads that have yet to be adopted for public roads, the public and ride on them. It's funny because actually, you know, we commissioner Ead and I worked tremendously on this thing and debated it back and forth with the legal department. And when I asked Steve to do the agenda placement for me, he took the heading off the policy. And the policy heading is actually wrong, it should say. Because it says private roads. And Steve and I had a long debate. I was like, you know, you needed to have that in there and he's like well the policy is labeled that like people. Yes but this is one of those situations where it's a it is roads that are open to the public is right off 455 and a lot of trucks and stuff have been using this subdivision as a method to cut the corner from off of 455 down to St. John's Road. And a result of this, there's a lot of overweight trucks and all sorts of gravel stuff and haulers that have been going through this area. This is a subdivision that was built well built and we had if you all look at the engineering report and Bennett I talked to him extensively, he's going to recommend it. It's going to be accepted into the road maintenance system. But we need to grab this subdivision before it gets bad. It right now, it's in a state where we can actually maintain it. If we start accepted and we won't have any problems and pursuant to policy, it'll be last on the list for maintenance. But if we get in there right now and start maintaining it, things will be fine. If we let it go a drift for 10, 5, 10 years, there's going to be problems in this subdivision. I was contacted by Constituents who were interested in having this subdivision brought into the County Maintenance Program. When I was the attorney for the Sheriff's Department, this whole subdivision was a huge source of contention because it was at public roads but they were not subject to public maintenance. They didn't fall within the definition of a public road for law enforcement purposes. That means they couldn't give trucks overweight tickets. That means people could ride there for wheelers, willing nilly through the subdivision. People could go pretty much any speed limit. They wanted. This is one of those ideal situations that Commissioner Eads and I had extensively discussed. So I would like to hear from Mr. Thomas and our Mr. Kezler, if he would come up, Mr. Kinzer. And they could tell us, I know they each have different issues that they would, I think, are important for us bringing this in. Thank you, Judge Lauren. Thank you for being here. Thank you, Judge Lauren. For the record if you'd state your name. My name is Thomas Kinzer. I live in Butterfield, Junction. I'm a landowner, a homeowner. Thank you, commissioners, for giving us an opportunity to come in. Thank you, Hugh, for spearheading this thing. The thing that is most concerning to most people out there that have children, as I do, is when these big trucks cut through there to go to St. John's Road, they don't care about the speed and they go around those corners and the gravel's flying. It's a little scary. Last year one of the school buses came through and hit a chuckle, a little tired. There's 12 kids on the bus. Fortunately some of us were home, so we got the kids taken care of. And it was okay. One of the neighbors currently that lives on, I believe it's Sand Hill Road. There has got to cut another path outside as gate because there's a whole biggie can't get any tractor over. And we would so embrace the county to come help us and maintain these roads and give that area a sense of being that would help the children and the school buses go through there and just be a nicer place to live. I think there's about 55 homes out there now that go from an acre to 17 acres and Everybody loves Denton County and we just want to have a little safer place to live. Thank you county and we just want to have a little safer place to live. Thank you. Appreciate your time. Appreciate your being here this morning. Certainly understand your concern. Good morning. Good morning. For the record if you'd state your name and address. Yes. My name is Bruce Thomas. I live at 99.99 for horse trail and pilot point and resident of the Butterfield Junction area and like a thank you for just taking the time to hear what I'm sure for you is a very minor issue because there are only five or six small roads out there and I think we're coming upon our 10th anniversary that's been an area out there. And my sense is it's just the next step in our evolution as a community. And I can only add to what Mr. Kinzer said about this being primarily a public safety issue just to bring the roads up to standard. And also what Commissioner Coleman said that we sense that the time is now because the roads have been maintained, but more or less on an ad hoc basis where it's sort of bust and fix and you can see that with without uniform standards we start to have things breaking down. So we would just hope as we go into our second decade is a community that you all will consider this issue. Thank you and appreciate you being here this morning. Thank you. Very familiar with the area, beautiful area. And um, I would have served to the court. Basically there's definitely a public purpose served. There's a lot of children in the community. The school buses need to be able to access it. There needs to be good roads for the M.S. and fire to be able to get down there. The report describes the situation. It'll be on the last of our list for maintenance but they do pay county taxes but for the developer not really kind of following through this would have been accepted so I would move that we approve this agenda item with the resort with the amended with the new order that I had Mr. Felt. Being public road. Public. Yes. Yes. Because I asked Mr. Felt to give me a new order and he provided it. I know. Isn't that correct, Mr. Felt? Yeah. That's right. Okay. So I can tell. All right. We have a motion that Commissioner Coleman seconded by Commissioner Ease's discussion. The minute's coming up. I have a couple questions. I have a couple of questions. I've been in. I'm glad you walk. It says that in the notes here, I read your engineering report of it and you say that it meets the minimum standards that are set in the new policy that we just approved a couple of weeks ago. But there was a point in there where there is a paragraph, I don't know if it's a waiver, is the right word, where the county is not responsible for the existing lighting that's there. How does that language get put in to where future people will be able to look at it. I saw it in your notes. I just wonder how this that get communicated to that home owners. Are you aware of that? That the lighting that is currently there, that that I guess remains a homeowner association? I have a non voluntary homeowner. It pains the little garden and the lights. And I wanted to be clear, I mean, Mr. I'm sure been it can speak to this, but we're only accepting the roads. We're not accepting the lighting, we're not accepting the drainage. Right, but what document is that put in? I mean, how does future generations understand that we don't have that? I think some of the, in some of our discussion in the past, there's a lot of unclear things that weren't put in documentation that today we don't know if we have responsibility or not for. That's that's the only question I'm asking. It's not that I would be involved. I guess would be the document. My report would be attached to the corridor I would suppose. The other thing that I wanted to bring up was, like Commissioner Comet said, the county is proposing to accept what's within the right away and not the drainage easements beyond the right away, because there are significant drainage easements beyond the right away in that subdivision. And that will still remain the responsibility of someone other than the county. And they understand that. Yes, ma'am. Feather, deed, the friction and subdivision rules and regulation explicitly states that the homeowner, the person owns a life will maintain the sewage or may not. The drainage. The drainage. Lose losing any more coffee and the drainage easements okay appreciate the clarification are there any other questions or clarifications needed for a clinch for squirt all right we have a motion in the second all my favorite please say aye aye pose? Any motion carries? Any answer? We appreciate your being here this morning. All right. Let's go back to item number one. Item one is a public input for items not listed in the agenda. If there's any member of the public that would like to address commissioners court, we ask that you please complete a public comment form available from the aid of the court. We'd be glad to hear from you and to remind everyone please turn off your cell phones and pages. Item two is the consent agenda members. I'm sorry. I just did we get it one second ago got word that we got it and then it was a favorable result. Oh, okay. Okay. We're thinking we're going to have to pull two a nine, but now we don't. So they can go forward, but I do need to make a clarification. It's Rodenbridge West, not Rodenbridge East. That we will be approving today any other clarifications or questions concerning the agenda items consent agenda I should say we have a motion for approval by Commissioner Eads seconded by Commissioner Marchant here no further questions on favor please say aye aye opposed in in motion does carry. Consent agenda today consists of two a, with the, let's see, a new hire justice of the Peace Precinct six, new hire in the county jail, two promotions within the Sheriff's Department, one demotion within the Sheriff's Department, a lateral transfer within the Sheriff's Department, a new hire in gel health, promotion in Constable Pricing Six, and a new hire in Broden Bridge West. 2B is approval of the Intra Department of Transfers, 2C is approval of Renewal of Contract for Genotaryle Paper Products. This is bid number 06081914 to Renate Paper and Chemical. 2D is a Proof of Award of Pharmaceutical Services. Public Health bid number 0609193 to Dent Prescription Shop for Denton and Avia Partners for Lewis Home. 2E is a Proof of Budget and budget amendment quest 101-7000 for various line items for criminal district attorney in the amount of $13,343. To F is approval of budget amendment quest 101-710 for printed material for tax assessor collector in the amount of $4,000. 2G is approval of budget amendment quest 101-720 for repair maintenance for Mary and Jim Horn Governing Center in the amount of $19,500. To H is approval of budget amendment quest 101-730 for electrical water service for emergency management facility in the amount of $6,000. And to I is to approval September 15, 2009 at 9.05 AM, is the date and time to conduct a public hearing to consider and approve the second reply of lots 1 through 4. Marietta Village 1, Savannah, Phase 9. This is increasing 1. Item 5A is approval of the bill report payments from CSCD, Community Corrections, TAAIP, Shares Training, Shares forfeiture, VIT, Interest, DA Check-Fee, and DA forfeiture funds are presented for recording purposes on the, according to James Wells. According to John's and commissioners, I ask bills to be approved with the two deletions and six additions that are noted on second. On the separate page, they're in there of the additions, most are for last minute travel expenses, but there is one large payment out of road bond funds, 2009 road bond funds for the Schluter Old Stone Smith project that's been previously approved in court. That's all corrections I have. Thank you. Other questions or members of the court? Do we have a motion for approval? Motion by Commissioner Marchin? Anybody done a second? Thank you. Seconded by Commissioner Coleman. In favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, aye. Motion does carry. 5B is acceptance and approval of the county investment report for the quarter ending approval as required by statutes. It is the report is in a format that makes the requirements of the PUNTS Investment Act and approve of the County Trade Room myself. Does the detailed our investment position and investment, position and status for the last quarter. I just have to go ahead and answer any questions. There's not particularly any good news in it. Yeah, really. Do you have questions and members of court? Here, thank you. We have a motion for approval by Commissioner Marchin, seconded by Commissioner Mitchell. Here, no questions. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, the name favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed to the name? Motion to scare you, thank you James. 6A is acceptance of donation above from the O'Connell law firm to the Dant and County law library. Motion by Commissioner Mitchell, seconded by Commissioner Coleman. Other questions? Your none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed to any? Motion does carry. Six B. Is approval of the evaluation committee's recommendation to wearing CHA incorporated as the most qualified firm for design services for the Roof Replacement at the Ditton County Law Enforcement Facility? We'll call them Beth Lennon. Good morning, judging commissioners. We received non them Beth. Let me in. Good morning, Judge and commissioners. We received nine responses to this RFQ for the roof replacement. This project's included in the AAA bond program at approximately $3 million for construction. So we are recommending the ranking as recommended on page 133 of your packet with CHA is the number one Conley Group is number two roof tech is number three Thank you other questions remembers the court Thank you. We have a motion for approval by Commissioner Marchant seconded by Commissioner Coleman Here are no questions. I'll in favor please say aye aye Posting motion does carry we'll come back to 7A and 7B. Go to 9A, which is approval of renewal contract with the Texas Department of State Health Services. I believe that is for a city's readiness initiative funding for fiscal year 2010. Dr. Burton, good morning. Pretty routine contract for us that works with our Public Health Preparedness Program and enables us to make sure that we're prepared. Other questions of Dr. Burton, and do we have a motion for approval? I don't know. Motion by Commissioner Mitchell, seconded by Commissioner Marchant. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed to the please say aye. Aye. Oppositing. Motionless carry. Thank you, Dr. Brinnell. 13B is approval of David Costa's appointment to the jury donation citizen committee. This appointment replaces Joe Crutchfield, who recently resigned. Oh, should it approve? We have a motion by Commissioner Marchand, appointment replaces Joe Crutchfield who recently resigned. Oste proof. We have a motion by Commissioner Merchant, seconded by Commissioner Coleman. All in favor, please say aye. Aye, the post-syname. Motion carries. 14A is approval of the Interlocal Cooperation Agreement for Property Tax Collection between Dint and County, Texas and one, Oak Point Water Control and Improvement District No. 1, two, Oak Point Water Control and Improvement District number one, two, Oak Point Water Control and Improvement District number two, three, Co-Earth Municipal Utility District, four, Denton County Municipal Utility District number four, and fifth, Denton County Municipal Utility District number five is recommended by the Ditton County Tax Assessor Collector, the chair will move for approval. Seconded by Commissioner Eans, are there questions? Your none on favor please say aye. Aye. Posting. Ane. Motion carries. 14b is approval of the Interlocal Corporation Agreements for Property Tax Collection between Ditton County, Texas and one, the town of Argyle, two, town of Lilliam, the three city of St. Gers recommended by the Denton County Tax Assessor Collector. Motion by Commissioner Mitchell. Seconded by Commissioner Eans. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed to the name? Motion is carried. 14C is approval of interlocal cooperation agreements for property tax collection between Denton County County Texas and Dint and French Water Dint and County, the first water supply district's Numbers 1B and 1F is recommended by the Dint and County Tax Discessor Collector Motion to approve. Motion by commission Marchant Chair will second. I'll in favor please say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed to the seat. Motion is carried. We've already taken care of. D will vote for 14 E, which is acceptance of donation of 5,000 plus or minus cubic yards of top soil from Omega CDS LLC for county road purposes. This is placed by Mr. Prussend Ford. Yeah, I'll county road purposes. This is placed by Commissioner Pristint Ford. Yeah, I'll move for approval. Thank you. We have a motion for approval by Commissioner Eans. Seconded by Commissioner Marchand. Are there questions? Here none all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, say nay. Motion is carried. We need to pull 14 F. There'll be no action on 14 F today that will be reposted correct mission. Yes, ma'am. A item 15 is executive session. This is under 15 A is under Texas Government Code 551.072, deliberation regarding real property closed meeting to deliberate the purchase deliberation regarding real property close meeting to deliberate the purchase or exchange of real property. Where deliberation and open meeting would have a detrimental effect on the position of governmental body and negotiations with the third person, regarding the purchase of real property located in Dyncanny Commissioner precinct 1. In 15b is under Texas Government Code 551.071A, consultation with attorney in the Closed Meeting when the Governmental Body 60 Advice of its Attorney about contemplated litigation regarding the claim by Cossero Sirhaegan for alleged damage to rural property. This is in Commissioner Prusing-1. With that, we are in executive session. We convene from an executive session. There will be no action on 15A or 15B today. Are we ready to go right into the budget or do we need a break? Ready. Ready? Okay, let's go to item 70 and we'll call on Donna. Good morning, Judge and commissioners. I gave you each and agenda this morning. There's only really a handful of things left for us to consider today. The first thing we have on our agenda is discussion of the placement of the construction manager position. Last week the court did agree to fund the position. However, there was discussion on what department and who this person would report to. I also included a note on the agenda that we may need to consider discussing car allowance for the position or some sort of transportation Depending on where the court decides to place that department Members Special concerning the construction manager position. Do you want to? Well, if I, I mean, I think what would be appropriate, my thoughts would be appropriate that the construction manager will be placed under been in hell in the planning side of the engineering department, not the road bridge side, but the planning side. I understand that because of a vacancy there now that all the infrastructure, if you would, is in place to office, the collateral, like the computer, the desk, everything that was dispensed in this group as well as the aid of other employees to help with anything that that person needs to do. So if it were my recommendation, I recommend that we replace that person under Bennett Howell. Now, as far as supervising this person, I think that to me there needs to be a limited amount of supervision from Bennett because of the nature of his work, but I believe that that person needs to be put in some type of hierarchy or structure within the planning department. That's my first thought. Mr. Collins? Good idea. I hadn't talked to you. It's a microphone. I mean, to make sure. I hadn't talked to Bennett about it last your microphone. I mean, to make sure. I hadn't talked to Bennett about it last week, but I did have the time opportunity to talk to him in the interim, and he said he would be OK with it. When I asked about putting an engineering, I really hadn't talked to anybody, because I'd gone through the whole litany of places that I thought would be a good, you know, maybe purchasing, auditing, something like that. But I think it would be great to have them. I think it would be a good place for them to put them in there in the planning department within engineering. I think it helps. We haven't figured out whether we're going to get somebody with an architectural degree or construction management degree or an engineer. But if we do get an EIT, that would be helpful because it is a PE. I was going to also let you know Ron, you know, we did get rid of one of our employees and they have come in bed from Road Ridge East and there's going to be a, I know an empty office and I think an empty computer has resulted at that and hadn't been used. So I think there's room over there to place it. And I like the fact that at least we would structure it now is that I think Ben, Ben it would, you know, approve his vacation and all that, but that he would still report to us and be in charge of our construction projects. And it would be good to have him in that area field of, you know, bounce ideas off of our other construction manager and the engineer and planning. What's that? Question and Commissioner Cohen. Do you envision this person as requiring an engineering degree. No. I just thought it just in case we, because I asked Amy about that and she'd suggested we might get somebody with an architect degree or a degree in construction management. I know a and m in Texas tech have good programs. Or if they did like we got the engineer or somebody who would be any correct me if I'm wrong. Amy, we don't have any particular requirement, do we? The John description requires it for you, me, I don't remember. Does it also say, or, you know, experience in the field that would, you know, we need what we need is some highly organized person that to oversee all this. And I don't know if we need or want to limit ourselves to the degree. I don't know. That's a question. need or want to limit ourselves to the degree. I don't know, that's a question. I didn't write those requirements, but my understanding was that it was to be a degree position. And I think Commissioner Coleman and my discussion about it was that that would have an impact on the fair labor standards classification and so if we substituted Experience that would change might change the nature of the job and the exempt status of that job Much rather have this job be an exempt Okay, well, that's why I asked the question Any other questions or comments commission Mitchell? What's up? God comments? have this job be an exempt. Okay, well that's why I asked the question. Any other questions or comments, Commissioner Mitchell? What's up, God comments? I'm not gonna be voting for this new employee anyway, but my preference with this employee that as I stated before, they would report to the Commissioner's court, not go and advance it. I think that hamper is his abilities to do what we as a court. That's what I saw as talking about needing. We need somebody to be a project manager for these projects that we're about to come on board. I personally don't see this person as a full-time employee forever because while we may have projects going on right now, we're not going to have those projects forever. To me, even looking at a firm to maybe have this person, a part of this firm, so we could utilize this person because I don't think him doing the projects is going to be a full-time job. I just, this is not what I was looking at, what we started talking about the project manager for another employee to go under another employee. I want this employee to be a high profile employee that's going to guide these projects that we are about to do, is building projects and take care of them rather than taking care of the normal everyday stuff. And that's the reason why I say I don't think it has to be a full-time employee. But I'm not going to be voting for it anyway because it's a new employee. Any other comments? The only other comment that I had is part of the job description and in part of this position. First of all, I think there was an evaluation committee that was recommended to evaluate the applicants in this job. We want to find out that's still the way direction that the commissioners want to go. was made up of Danny, Bath, Donna, Kevin, I think that was that correct? Inazona. Minus Donna. Minus Donna, okay. And then I believe that since it is an important role for the commissionerers court that we would have opportunity to be part of either that committee or to have input in the selection of that person. I know we have the ultimate input by the selection of that person by authorizing through court action, the hiring of that person, but I'm talking about the actual input and the choice of the applicant, as well as since this person will be direct, not directly, but would be placed under Bennett that be part of that process as well. Mr. Ease. Ron, are you saying that this position would report to Bennett or office in engineering? I think that Commissioner Coleman made a valid point that if this person directly, I mean there are a lot of issues that are day-to-day issues like for instance, who does he ask for time off? Does he ask for time off? Vacation time, who keeps up with that? I mean, does he keep up with that himself? Does it go through planning department, whatever their procedures and I was trying to look for a little bit more structure of this person. And by placing him under Bennett, he will be accountable just like another employee under Bennett. As it comes to and as it relates to human resources or our vacation are keeping up with that, I just thought that there needed to be a structure. I think to see more. So, I think we would settle the administrative burden. The deal is going on here. To say it's a sink, I think we would settle the administrative burdens for managing the employee on Bennett, but he would report to the commissioner of court. Looks pretty. In regards to a car allowance, I would say, let's get him one of the trucks that we might put in the auction and maybe that would be the best rather than... Well, either something in in surplus. I think vintage. I think he didn't have a vehicle assigned to her. She used one that was for lack of a better term and might say a pool car for planning and engineering. Kathy herself was paid a vehicle allowance. We have vehicles available. I guess my question to the court is if I think it needs to be real clear for me to make sure that if we're just, if my department's responsible just for the administration side of it, but not evaluating his performance or her performance or making sure they're doing their job, that needs to be very clear because I don't want to assume one thing, then you all assume the other thing. That's the way I interpreted how many other court members? The day-to-day administration yes,, but as far as we determine, is this person doing what commissioners court wants them to do, that would be our responsibility? Well, this person would be evaluated, performance-wise, by the court and not by me. Correct. But concerning vehicle, you have a vehicle that they could use. It's not going to leave them in all the time I don't think. And I would make, I would like my input is, if you do provide them a vehicle, I don't want it to be a take home vehicle. I want it to use the policy. I mean, stipulated it's not a take home vehicle and do you need supplemental funding for gasoline for your office or? Probably not at this time. We can probably handle it. funding for Gasoline for your office? Probably not at this time. We can probably handle it. We'll just have to play that by ear. That also based on what I understand, comparable pay to the other construction manager. Now, the other construction manager does have a take on vehicle. So... If in charge... I think... Whether you're doing a different job or not, I mean, my wishes are they just didn't take a take on vehicle. Regardless of it, I mean, I think we'll approach it that way I mean I think what we do is just give him a a pull car for now in a year we reevaluate it we can reassess there it takes maybe we decide they both need to take home the vehicle, maybe we decide the other construction managers should operate in the same manner. But I think we just need to be in an interesting process because we're going to be building stuff for the next seven years and we're spending an awful lot of money. So I don't think we can make all those decisions today, but I think we can do a pretty good forecast if we can get a pool vehicle reevaluate I agree with the pool vehicle. I don't agree with the take home I think we just need to reassess Make that decision now and then it's a progresses see how it goes Here the questions comments Who's the let's clarify the hiring committee? I have a question. Any other questions? Who is the, let's clarify the hiring committee. Welcome back to this. clarify the hiring committee. I remember right and I don't have an in front of me. I apologize but I believe that the way this was set up was that, first of all, I had questions. Who was this person answer to? There was a recommendation that there was an evaluation committee as well as another committee that this person would be answerable to. I think we've already answered that. But the evaluation committee for the hiring was set in place as I said minus Donna which was Beth Kevin, Danny, now Bennett, I wanted to include Bennett in that. And then I don't know, I don't know if there needs to be a representative from the Commissioners Court that's part of that or Well, if we're how do we vet that I don't I would prefer them to screen maybe screen it down to three people but if they're going to report to us I want to interview them. Is the finals? Do I see all applications and if it in a recommendation from the community. It's going to answer to the court more than I were going to be doing the reviews and all that then I want to be a little bit more involved on the big front end. I'm going to serve on the committee. Well, are you saying like interviewing like we do in exact session when we're at a department head or yeah I agree with that. Have the committee vetted down to three? Yeah. And then bring it to us. Good to meet you. Good either way but. Oh good. That's a good thing. You get anything else clarified on them? Probably just a motion to place it in the county planning budget. Okay, I'll make a motion then to place it in the county planning budget I Should say the construction manager position Seconded by Commissioner Marchant for the discussion And all in favor please say aye aye Posting. Aye. There is four in favor, one opposed. She voted no, but she'll like it when this year. This is just a little bit of a row. Okay, item number two on the agenda's discussion regarding jail health. I know you each received an email last week from Dr. Burton about the problems that he's having, filling, especially health care specialists, two positions. I've included some information in your packet starting on page A56. It includes the memo that he did send to court along with the rationale behind the adjustments. There's also a memo that he sent to Amy Phillips dated July 29th. There's also a copy of all the positions that are help specialists to positions. That's what we're going to be talking about today. You'll see that that impacts eight positions in the department for a total of $16,701. What this basically does is adjust the pay grade that Evergreen was recommending from a pay grade eight to a pay grade nine, which is more in line with the salary that they feel would be appropriate to attract applicants for this job. And being here for any questions. That's 16,701. So you're just saying that we're addressing, addressing the recommendation that I bring in those minimums up into a different, into a grade 9 is at the right terminal. Changing is to a grade 9. This is exactly what you'll be doing. It's bringing the employees below Minimum of great nine to the minimum and how would we pay for the 16,071? It would be my recommendation that at this point in the process we lower our unappropriated contingency By that amount. I don't think it's a huge amount and it wouldn't Causing issues So by doing that tax rate is I don't think it's a huge amount and it wouldn't causing issues. So if I do that. I think it's where our tax rate is. So it wouldn't match with the recommended tax rate, is that correct? Correct. I'm still having problems, Dr. Burton, with this being a 11th hour request. I don't blame it. I do too. And for the record, I'm not going to be supporting it, but I still want to give you a chance to apologize. I will begin by apologizing to the court and to the budget office for bringing this at a late hour. It's awkward time to do it. The only thing I would rather do less is to come to you and say we let something happen because we didn't have the staffing and so I not wanting to do that the reality is we have multiple staff vacancies and we've had them for a while we have two few applicants we we went to a consultant and thought that that would help us solve the problem it has not helped us solve the problem and the reality is our staffing is not competitive. But we have very significant responsibilities and those responsibilities have to be addressed. As does every other employee in county? Well that certainly is the case. The people that we deal with are life and death and we're managing okay, but this latest issue where now we have an organization competing the few staff that we have, if we have a couple of those go over, then that would swing us into a very awkward position. And so I felt compelled to bring it to you despite the reality that it's the wrong timing to have to do it. Despite my clumsiness in the process, I think the budget officer and HR have put together a solution that may help us to deal with the problem and I sure like to give it a try. Are these the equivalent of LVNs? We use LVNs, we use paramedics, we use medical assistance. All three of those people fall into this same pay grade. They have to have considerable experience to meet this standard, but we do have people in all three of those categories that fall into this pay grade. Medical assistant, is that licensed by the state? It is a certified position. I think this is a reasonable solution to an immediate need. Unfortunately, it came up at the time. It didn't. But you would be derelict in your duties if you hadn't brought it to our attention, too. I don't think it's a solution that's going to last forever. But it will definitely rest an immediate problem, not only with filling positions, but also with the salary scalers recommended by Evergreen. I'm in favor of doing it and funding it in the proposed by Donna. Just to clarify, the grade eight was recommended by Evergreen, but that eight was recommended by Evergreen. But that really wasn't a benchmark position. Amy may want to go into a little more specific. I was about to ask where they didn't have a lot to compare to, correct? That's correct. They wouldn't have had, I don't know if they had anything to compare to because the counties that we survey outsource this function, done and I had some discussion about the pay grade and the pay level that was identified as where we could attract employees. And it was very, very close to the minimum of the next pay grade. So I went back and reviewed the pay grades that Evergreen assigned along with the points that they got when they evaluated positions and it was clear that they took the points as well as the market into account where they had market data. And so we felt like it was consistent with the work that Evergreen did to consider the market data. It was not the original recommendation from Evergreen. Thank you. Also, along the lines of contracting this service out, it's maintaining that while other counties contract this out, they go through a lot of different contracts. They pay more money. I think a lot of them go for RNs rather than LVNs and consequently the contract costs more money. And then also there are, seems to be always re-contracting with somebody new. And when you don't have continuity, then something falls through the cracks and somebody doesn't get the health care that they should have gotten and things like that. So I think it's important that we address this and address it in this proposed manner. Commissioner Eans, did you have something else? I'm not going to approve. The government has to be nimble and change some things, but I'm kind of with Commissioner Mitchell on this as far as the timeliness of it. And I look through your justification and I don't think except for another county soliciting our people. I don't think that's any different in August as it was in April. I don't think so. I think we really ought to take a close look at the contracting. I mean, maybe that's a way to go. There's obviously negatives with everything, but nursing is, I was saying but it's not, you know, nursing is a profession that's somewhat in demand and working in a jail is not the most attractive place to be providing health care when you can go work at a Presbyterian or something like that, you know, here in town. So I know there was an obstacle there, but I then makes everything out. I don't know if I could. I'm going to support this one for you. I can tell you this. I know it's anecdotal. I'm looking at the salaries, but my wife used to do skill now. She's in she is bilingual, but you know, we get two or three calls a night on our answer machine for $10,000, $20,000 signing bonuses if she'd be willing to go back to doing skilled nursing. Well I just you know I'm just like I can't leave. Well I just think you know the salary is just anecdotally looked very low compared to what I know they're paying other people who are working in other settings and I can tell you from my experience working in the jail it's very important that you have people who are used to working in that environment if you get nurses who are working PR in or in another type environment it's it's a specialized practice it's not like a hospital it's not like schools I think it's very important that we have people who are accustomed to doing it, who know what's going on, knew the rules and policies, go through the security checks. People don't realize that contraband is a big problem in jails. And you need to have people who are familiar with the policies and procedures. And if I think you go through a temp agency or a contract, it would just lead to problems. I'm in favor of doing the $16,000. I think it'd be money well spent. You know, it's my opinion that every job is important. I agree. As a matter of what job you have, you can have problems in it. And I don't make no mistake. I am certainly sympathetic to the fact of jail held, but I am sympathetic to every job at DIM County. Commissioner Ains. Amy did ever did ever green recommend this when they did their study. Did they recommend the pay grade? This, this, right. No, they recommended pay grade eight. And it, as I told the floor, but that's what she was saying. They didn't have comparable, comparable. They weren't. This is not the only grade that has had to be adjusted because of a situation. We had issues, I think I told the court before, where we sent the grades out to departments and sometimes we had someone who supervised and incumbent and they were both in the same pay grade and so we had to adjust one of them. There were other situations like that where we've had to adjust the grades. In this situation, I'm recommending adjusting the grade because I don't believe that Evergreen had market data for this position like they would have used in benchmark positions. My point is we spend a lot of money on this evergreen. You spend a lot of time being, all these departments spend a lot of time. And for this, this is such a pressing problem. And for this not to be, y'all to be standing on the rooftops making this to ever green's attention. There's a problem there that I have and I don't know who it's with. But if that was not brought up and if there wasn't benchmarks go find them. I mean, this was such a problem. I just, I just have a lot of heartburn if I've spent a lot of money on that plan and then there. And I know there's going to be things going to tweak and you go along, but this is such a big pressing problem. And it doesn't even make the break in the day, or it was processed weeks ago and months ago when we did that. And now it's the last minute. Like this crisis just blew up on us. I mean, it's not only just this issue, I think there's a, we spend a lot of time and effort and then For this to be overlooked and the process is something wrong Mission mentioned. Yeah, I mean the industry has been in a crisis mode with health care workers for years And in other life I was in in healthcare industry and didn't regional. I mean, no, that was our competition. Didn't community hospital just down on Bonnie Bray and part of my duties through marketing was to go out and find them. And that's why you have contract companies like this CHC. This is a contract company. This is not Colin County trying to solicit it only through its this agency, employment agency that that it is hired which is correction care. And the only way that they're able to offer bonuses is it's a private company. I mean the private company themselves are putting up those bonuses. It's not a direct result of the counting putting up the $1,000 in bonuses. And I guess my big question is, like Andy said, have we even looked at contracting with a company like this to fill positions that become vacant as an additive, not as a search, but as a contract company where you have vacancies and you bring them in for a temporary position and then once you fill that, then that person goes away. It's basically on call as a contract. Have we ever done anything like that? Well, and I'm not sure this addresses your question because we did employ an agency. No, I'm not talking about an agency and employment agency that goes out and finds a full time employee. This is contract, isn't it? Is this company that this flyer is? It's a contract, nursing nursing or a health care. In other words, they try to do placements. Where there's a temporary or permanent? Yes. Another difference is Colin County is privatized. So this agency is seeking applicants for their private company. That is because whether people realize it or not, almost every emergency room in a hospital in this area has a management contract that there's a physician group that manages that ER for the hospital and they make their own placements through a private company. And so I'm asking, have we ever approached that idea of using a private company to make placements in our healthcare? I think we have not. I think it hadn't seemed like a cost effective approach, but I mean, if evergreen, if evergreen could not find enough data because enough counties do not do as we do and they've gone to the private, why have they gone to private and not stayed with the model that we have in place here? I don't know that I can answer that question, Commissioner, but I can tell you that just today, I received an email from a list survey mail from a county in Washington struggling with this same issue. They're contracting. They're asking, if you do this in-house, what do you pay in your people? Because we're considering going back the other way, which is saying, to me, contracting isn't working well for them. This issue is an issue that counties all over the country whether they're doing it in-house or whether they're doing it privatizing it, they're struggling. There's no- At this my point. There's no great way to do it. And so, you know, one way or another, they're having to make adjustments. I would acknowledge there's no great to do, great way to do it. But the reality is, we've been pretty successful in a very cost effective approach for the 17 years that I've been working here. And we need some help right now. And what's changed? If it's been successful for the last 17 years, what's changed? I would say the market has outpaced our salary and it's time to consider an adjustment. Okay, well then let me, and I bring up what was said on this side of the aisle. But then why was that not a consideration with any interviews or anything with an evergreen to say we need to address that? And the only thing they came back with is a solution, I guess, what we're coming to right now, which is $16,000. I would say that rather than trying raise salaries, we thought maybe if we go with this outside firm and they bring us some applicants, that might be a solution. And it was a solution without having to address salaries. That might have been an error on my part. Maybe the thing to do was to address salaries six months ago, rather than pursue this other firm because clearly that didn't work. Well, we have had to adjust salaries periodically before as the market has outpaced our pay great scale. I mean, we've come to court over the years and I'll be honest, sometimes Bing has called or Doug has called and we've it and I said well I'd rather we do this first I'd rather we try that first I don't want to go to Commissioner's Court and ask them to address sellers until we've tried everything else we know how to do and I think what's different this time it may be the timing it may also be that we're asking you to actually not just adjust it by making exceptions for that department each time, but to set the pay grade close to where that salary would be, that we would be sending exceptions for so that we don't have to set exceptions. But it isn't anything really new. It's something that we've had to address on an ongoing basis because that market is so. And I guess what I'm saying, I wish that it could have been addressed six months ago within evergreen for us to at least have it before us, that this is where we need to adjust it. And we did that with IT. I mean, now we back off IT because the market is now dictating what those people are being paid. I think we did, I think we did mention to ever green the hiring issues that we have in different areas. I'm just assuming that they didn't have data for this area because when I look at the counties that we would have surveyed, they outsource it. You know, that's how it's done. Judge May. Judge Masby? Yes sir. I think there's two separate issues here. Okay. The one issue is why did Evergreen overlook this? And then the second issue is what do we do about the problem we have? I'm sure you all have read the Dallas Morning News and the problems that they've had with Dallas County. And believe me, I am tremendously empathetic to your concerns, Commissioner Mitchell, about I believe we need to tear each all our employees equally. You're right, they all do a good job. Unfortunately, you know, the jail medical staff is some of our very urgent needed frontline medical people. We don't ever want to get into the situation that Dallas County has gotten into or other counties. I'm not saying those employees are more important, but if you would compare them to the IT people, believe me, the IT people are very important. We would all agree that being able to access the video for the internet is probably not as high on our list as providing health care to an inmate who happened to be you know from my own personal experience very litigious and it's an issue that's become very pointed on people's minds right and $16,000 I mean James what is our total budget now for the county? for the county? $200 million. $16,000 that might be able to head off a lot of troubles in the future in relation to or may not, you're right, in relation to $200 million budget. I think it's just we really, we need to very much consider it. I'd like to hear from Captain Sanders what he thinks about what's going on over there and from, I understand. I would hope he would. Please do. I know. I would never, you know, I'm just telling you, commercial Mitchell, that I think an ounce of preventative medicine in this situation would be a good idea. I've had the chance to work with jail medical for several years. Frankly, I think they do an excellent job. I'm having to deal with some of our other neighboring counties. I won't name names trying to deal with them in their regards to their medical issues for inmates that got shipped up to them. I think, you know, we can actually get our people on the phone to discuss issues. I think they do a great job, but I'd really like to hear from Captain Sanders and, you know, hear what he has to say, you know, maybe he could provide us information, push us one way or the other. I'll be honest with you, Commissioner Mitchell. I haven't made my decision yet. I'm leaning towards it's a drop in the bucket in regards to our $200 million and if it could save us one lawsuit I think it would be worth it. But I'd like to hear what it may or may not. That's what I said. I still haven't made up my mind, but I'd like to hear what Captain Sanders would Doug would like to have to say. Maybe he can push us one way or the other. Morning. Morning, Judge, good morning, commissioners. Awkward times, I understand. Gravitational health, I rose in responsibilities, unlike many jobs in the county, or complex and wide ranging. I will tell you while coming at the end of the budget talks that this certainly isn't welcome, it's not by design. We lost some key people at the last minute. And on top of that, we have some key people at the last minute and on top of that we have some key people that literally are going out on surgeries, going to have long periods of recovery time. I have, and so we keep declining with people on board to maintain provider patient ratios. Hard of our efficiency in cost and operations and standards of care is we use a tiered provider discipline, much reflective of what's in the community. We don't pay Arians in physician assistance to do the work of a pharmacy tech or phlebotomist or to do intake screens. We use medical assistants, EMTs, paramedics, and nurses in accordance with their disciplines. We get extreme provider efficiency that way, and we make greater use of physician time that way. We're able to attend to more things on site versus sending them out into the community. One thing as far as our operation versus some of the contract operations, I am well networked. This is what I've been doing this for 15 years and I've been supervising correctional health care in Dent County for 13. I'm on network. I know these folks in these private agencies are great friends of mine, but I will tell you that there are, as many government run correctional health, is there our private? Good can be said about either one, but in all honesty, I've evaluated this and we truly have the most efficient system out there. I can demonstrate that. I know this isn't the forum for it, but I can demonstrate that the tiered system that we use has been mirrored by other Denton County, by other Texas counties, a particular county in Oklahoma, and a private contract agency that have reached out to us to do things our way. There are 3,300 to some odd jails in the United States. There are only about 1,500 nationally certified correctional health providers in six of them are right here in our facility. This outstanding and a sexual ordinary. So as far as the successes, it's real hard to stand up sometimes and just demonstrate each one as it is. But we serve successes in standard of care, efficiency of staffing, and maintaining Denton County's strength in their posture against liability prone situations. I say in one 24-hour period we had two inmates that were care-flided, one inmate that slid his throat before he got to the jail and into the salary port, I drug withdrawal and sustained seizures and one suicide attempt. We have to have quality people. You know, I know we can get into a lot of formal studies, but the years that I've been here in the results are in and it's pay. It's staffing., its pay. But by doing a tiered system, we keep a reasonable approach to what that staffing cost. We've been to the universities, we've been to the network associations, we do continuing education, our outreach contingencies have just been exhaustive. We hired a staffing agency and the particulars one that we hired were touted. They did tout health care providers working in correctional and gel medical. You know, the talk was cheap beyond so we got two people. They both viciously failed the background checks. So we've been there. Thank you. Thank you. Questions? I just want to make comments. These, we're not losing these employees. We're just asking to pay more money. So I want to press to be sure that they know that we're not getting rid of these employers, which asking them to have more money. And Doug, I know, you know, you and I have talked many years, so I know I appreciate the jobs that you do, and I know what all you do in jail health and I do appreciate it. But I just want to make sure that we know that these employees, it's not like we're losing employees, you know, we've been hit hard. Our economy has been hit hard. We have, you know, our friends, our neighbors, our relatives, losing jobs. We have businesses going bust, banks going under, and it's tough out there. It's not reflective in the healthcare field, and that makes it even more impopular. The fact is, there is a nationwide nursing and paramedic shortage, and we're not una more impopular. The fact is there is a nationwide nursing and paramedic shortage and we're not unaffected by that. And a lot of folks that have been hit hard or taking shelter in those areas. It's difficult, but the healthcare field, in general, at times can be unpopular. Whether you're dealing with your own providers or insurance, it's just, but right now we just need to be competitive. And there are, because of the shortage, there are so many facilities and services that health providers have to choose from. It's like, what do we tell them, why do you want to come work in correctional health? You know, there has to be some incentives there. The difficulty is getting on or great, but we just don't have a lot of carrots to entice people out of other options that they have. Thank you. Any other questions? Motion? Sure. Motion that we accept the proposed salary grade adjustments to jail health that represent a $16,701 adjustment that will be funding. Funding will be approved. I'm not going to repeat this unappropriated contingency by that amount. By 16,741, that's my motion. Motion by commission, motion. Chair, we'll second the motion. Is there any further discussion? Any further on favor please say aye. Aye. Opposed to the name? Aye. Motion carries three in favor to oppose. Thank you for being here, both of you. Thank you. Thank you for being here both of you. Thank you Donna could we go to the other discussion number five Yes, we do have a real quick reduction that was offered I received an email from Sherry Adelstein the district clerk yesterday With regard to a conference that's been canceled. So she was offering a reduction in the training and education line of $1,070 in the jury and grand jury department. Sarah was so moved. I heard a chorus of seconds, but we'll say Commissioner Eads, all in favor, please say aye. Aye, a opposed please say aye. Aye. Opposed to the name? Well she carries unanimously and we thank you, Sherry. Yes, and under five I understand that the court may want It was an email that Jim Allison sent to Commissioner Mitchell, because she serves on the tack board. Commissioner Mitchell afforded it to me. And it has a couple of different issues in it, but specifically, I was talking about House Bill, I'm sorry, Senate Bill 1685. So this legislative session adopted several changes in court filing fees? Most of these including the new County and District Court technology fee will be, well automatically the effect of on January 1, 2010. However, there is one fee that requires Commissioner Court action as part of the budget process. Senate Bill 1685, the effective June 19th of 9, creates a new district court records archive fee, not to exceed $5. It is separate from the new county and district court technology fee created by House Bill through 3637. To implement the new district court records archive fee, the commissioners court must adopt the fee, and the fee must be set and itemized in the county's budget as part of the budget preparation process. It must be approved in a public meeting, which this is today. The issue of the fee is restricted to preservation in restoration of district court records and requires a plan submitted by the district clerk and approved by commissioners court. And notice will be posted in the District Clerk's office that the Commissioner's Court has determined that the fee is needed. If you wish to implement this fee, discuss the project with the District Clerk and include the following in the County budget. Well, Statutorily says, personnel to section 51.305, government code, commissioners quoted in county adopts a district court records archive fee of $5 may not exceed $5 for the filing of a suit including an appeal from a new failure court or cross-action counterclaim intervention, contempt action motion for a new trial or a third party petition in the district court in this county. The fee should be effective with implementation of this budget. And shall remain in effect until further action of the commission's court. So the question to court members and actually our district court in our auditor is, do we want to implement this $5 fee? James, do you have some thoughts on this subject? Yeah, I don't think it's worth the effort myself. It's previously had not, I don't believe it had not generated much interest. This is a fever limited use for the records archive. This bill caught pretty much copies previous statute for the county court record archive. But the primary thing is it's a $5 fee on civil suit filings. It's the same on the same kind of filings that the law library fee is assessed on. Based on those annual collections, we're only looking at about 25,000 a year. So, if there's a short of a real need to archive the old records at this time, I don't, it's just, it's a lot of effort for not very much money that has a very limited use in my opinion. I could. I do have some email correspondence earlier, James. I've posed the question. We asked the district clerk about this and she didn't have any interest in it. Didn't actually see the need because it is tied directly to archiving records. Is that something we can pay for an additional employee for her department that would work with archiving records? If they were providing the service of archiving records, maybe microfilming or scanning. I'm thinking records management with Teresa, because in the archive records. But I don't think those are the positions that the top of position she was requesting. She was wanting business. No, the district clerk wasn't. But I'm looking down the road for expansion of records management in Theresa's area. I think the additional fee in House Bill 3637 is going to give you much more money on that. That's the county. The New County District Court Technology fee. Agreed. That's another one in that too. That's the same bill. But besides that, bill the county and district court technology fee, which has other limited uses for technology in the court. There's appears to be in section 8 of that bill, chapter 51, 708 of the government code. There's a new $10 fee. And it's addition to all, on each civil suit filed in both county and district courts, to be used for court record preservation for the courts of the county Does the law specifically require that be part of the budget process? Times is a mandatory fee once the bill takes effect Usually these are January 1st fees sometimes their September 1st, but this one's mandatory. The one in Senate Bill 1685 is only optional when I've seen. And it's in, we're sticking just to district court filings and it's half the dollar amount. So you're looking at a 25 to $30,000 annual fee at one versus about $140,000 based on the one for work record preservation. And there's a little bit of library uses on that one. Okay. House bill 3637 that you quoted for the County District court technology fee. That could in the future be used to offset district clerk's expenses or just records management. No, it's technology. It's not it's not records management at all. It's in the same bill. Okay. It's a it's not records management at all. It's in the same bill. It's a it's a $4 court call stone convictions in district or county courts and It's either of them needed to Equipment for It's actually limited the use of this got very long list of uses. It's limited to the cost of continuing education and training for county court, statutory court, district court judges and clerks regarding technological enhancements and the purchase and maintenance of technological enhancements for those courts with a long list of items. It does not say anything about funding, personally, or ongoing basis whatsoever. That's one of the lines of equipment and training. Yeah, it's much like this one again mirrors the JP Court technology fund. We've had for quite a while, but it's either training or equipment, including computer systems, computer networks, hardware, software, imaging systems, kiosk, rocket management systems. You know, I mean, it looks to me, I'm not a great interpreter of these things, but it has a long list of uses and it omits personnel per se. It was sent about 16.85 you're seeing that cannot be used for personnel at all. Your interpretation. It won't find anybody. One thing it won't find even one position current rates. And it's, and it's for, you've got, you know, it just depends, again, it's got to be within the plan that the district clerk would adopt for preservation and restoration services providing connection and maintaining the archives specifically. An archive is junior, is records she specifies, but again, those are generally older records that have not been into the indexing digitizing process. All right, that's what the county court did. Okay, so it's just limit, I mean, that in favor of another fee. It just, you know, just to get on the plan she has, or it doesn't say you can't do personal expenses, it won't fund a even one full time person, but you could use it for that if that person, again, it would be in the plan would have to say what that person is gonna be doing on a regular basis with the archive of records per se. So we can study this issue and check out what other counties are doing and get a closer determination of just if it will be beneficial to what degree and take it up next year at budget time if we decided to implement it. It sounds to me like the only time you can implement it is with your new budget. Correct. It sounds to me like the only time you can implement it is with your new budget career That's a very specific language that has me power it has to be adopted during the budget, right? That's why I quickly brought it up today and see if anybody was interested in that I don't think we have enough information concerning the district clerk's plan I know she or he has communicated some with Dallas County on this, but I at least wanted to bring it to everybody's attention and we'll probably talk about it again next year at Budget Time. I wanted to talk about, I know Donna had mentioned that Sherry had also said, I don't know if she sent you all emails but about the criminal court violence. Basically I guess from 2004 to currently they've increased about a third Donna. Got a little sidebar going right here. I didn't. Go ahead done. patient going on over here. We're trying to work on a situation or a solution for that, but I didn't hear any questions. sorry. Did you see the email that Sherry sent out regarding her request for an additional position for her department? I'm about one from recent. No, I did not. I did not. I did not. And he's got it. He can afford it too. It's reiterating her in her mind her need for it. I think her original request was for two people and the latest email said she needed at least one right away, basically, as well. I was just going to ask you if you I guess I was incorrect. I assume that she had sent this to everybody and perhaps to you. But in commission needs, did you forward it to Donna? I just did. I was just wondering in assessing her department's needs, had you considered those statistics or verified them? Perhaps not, maybe. The positions are also, it was requesting a course now, but they're also tied to the new district court. Once it's created, she referenced that in her original request that with the creation of that she was going to definitely need those two positions and With the action that the court took for that not to be effective or the law is not effective until next fiscal year Pretty much went with the courts directive of no new house without a lot of Extra thought and attention put into the statistics. I mean I do agree, district clerk filing are way up. They have increased in share he is a very conservative elected official. If you could give James and I a minute to talk about something We are in recess for our budget directory and our auditor to confer I'm going to put to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to go to the next room. I'm going to start with the first one. I'm going to start with the first one. I'm going to start with the first one. I'm going to start with the first one. I'm going to start with the first one. Okay. Okay. In a lot of discussion about the records management fee and the automatic increase that we're going to be seeing, we found a solution I think that might be appealing to the court. We could actually transfer slot number 07 RM, which is in the assistant records manager slot that's in general fund under Teresa Rogers. I did call in contact. I am sure that this position would fit the requirements of being paid for out of our separate records management fund and this position certainly will, the value of that position with benefits, sour end benefits is $64,772. So we could actually transfer that slot from general fund to be funded in the records management fund, freeing up sufficient funds to fund the one position that Sherry Adelstein had emailed each of you which is the assistant department supervisor for a cost of $59,000. With that, of course there's a little bit of difference there. You could add money back to non-departmental contingency and make that pretty much an even wash. And we'd still be at the tax rate that we were looking at coming into the meeting today. Once again, the done is work from Angie. But it'd be for, I mean, you're gonna take it out another fund. We would actually transfer. Go ahead. Go ahead, done. We would actually transfer the position from General Fund. Okay, so you can. To fund 41, which is the records management fund, which is funded by a separate fee. Okay, so that would free up money to for the court to fund this assistant position. One. One's assistant supervisor, assistant department, supervisor position in the district clerk's office. That would also give you $5,770 that could be added back to non-departmental contingency. We did reduce that a little bit earlier today, but that would give us a cushion to add a little bit more back into that. Again, I've talked to Theresa Rogers and she doesn't have a problem with this. I'm just from this. I'm just remembering the court. I'd like to hear Miss Adelstein would that be a adequate solution? Not yours. The other time, I'm kind of the only one. I think you're not going to be the only one. Okay, so we're not talking about that at Newfee. No, we're talking about an existing fund of trace arrived. That's right. We're in a different position. We're not in the same position. Art collective. Listen. It's a different. Not the $5 Newfee. We're not addressing them. 3637 okay. It's wonderful with me it's going to if it's going to get me this position. By the mind the answer to that question is yes I will. Yes definitely. But it but importantly also is that it it does not change anything as far as the proposed tax rate that we've come up with at this point and it doesn't change anything else. And it's certainly within the rules and regulations concerning the records management fee. Absolutely. And Donna, what's the exact title of the position? Assistant supervisor. Assistant department supervisor. This would be for felony for the felony records. It would be on page one of your changes sheet. The second position was to there. It is grayed out right now, but it's $59,000 and $2 that's salary and benefits and a new phone. I would move for approval since it's being paid for out of the, it went on. Records management. Records management. A motion by Commissioner E. Seconded by Commissioner Marchant. Any further discussion? Management. Motion by Commissioner Ead, seconded by Commissioner Marchandt. Any further discussion? Any none? No in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye opposed any? And I'm assuming Commissioner Ead included in that motion was to take the balance, the $5,000, whatever dollars that Donna mentioned and put it back into, what is that called? Non-departmental contingency. Non-departmental, unappropriated contingency. Absolutely. You read my mind. And one more amendment to your motion to transfer slot 007RM from the records management department to the records management and preservation fund. Right. Take that. Let's restate that then to transfer the position from slot number 0, 0, 7, R, M, from Theresa Rogers. Records Management Department and General Fund. Who? We fund 41, records management and preservation fund records management preservation fund Yes, and then transfer the $5,770 balance into non-departmental contingency That's my motion Okay Okay. Motion by Commissioner Eid seconded by Commissioner Marchin for the discussion the clarification needed hearing now and favorably say aye I Pocini Motion does carry Nana's like Okay, other than Tax rate discussion that we covered everything that you need Donna Scary Roger Tax rate discussion have we covered everything that you need Donna Scary right here. Thank you. Mm-hmm welcome to you. Thank you. Yes, that's all we have left judge Okay, I do have a spreadsheet that I can hand you out real quickly This page are 95 I have a couple more to provide for you as well. Okay. I'm going to put to go to the bathroom. I'm going to have to go to the bathroom. I'm going to have to go to the bathroom. I'm going to have to go to the bathroom. I'm going to have to go to the bathroom. I'm going to have to go to the bathroom. I'm going to have to go to the bathroom. I'm going to have to go to the bathroom. I'm going to have to go to the bathroom. I'm going to have to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'm going to go to the bathroom. Okay. Are we ready? Yes. Okay. Under this agenda item, I just want to give you a quick snippet. Truth and taxation laws are designed to regulate the calculation of the rates. And if the commissioners court determine that the proposed question looks, if the commission wants to know, it is, I sorry. If the commissioners court determines that the proposed tax rate will exceed the effective or rowback rate, whichever is lower, the court has to vote to place a proposal to adopt the rate on the agenda today. So with that, we have an agenda item that based on our discussions here and we've pretty much finalized our budget, we can now propose a rate. We have determined the amount of money that we need to raise in order to fund the budget with all the action that the court has taken. And just to give you on page 8, or 95 of your packet, just to give you a quick synopsis of the rate, the current tax rate, we have now is 0.23577. The rate that we are going to be proposing after action today is 0.2498, which is a 3.16% increase above the effective rate. I also gave you two additional handouts just a few minutes ago so you could see the average home value, the one that has 2008 and 2009 listed in the text. The average home value in Denton County was $211,710 dollars that has increased to $212,370 in 2009 which is a 0.3% increase in the home value. So with the proposed rate that we're looking at annual county taxes or currently $499 on the house, would be $531, which is an increase of $31 per year or $2.61 per month. I also gave you a comparison just to look at round numbers of $100,000 home or $200,000 home and that information is provided to you as well. So on $100,000 home you'd be looking at $1.17 per month increasing the tax rate. Any other questions from the members of the commissioners court? Okay, as required by the property tax code, we need to take a record vote on the proposed tax rate. But I don't think this portion of it has to be stated in any particular way, just that we've proposed. Well, I'll make a motion that we propose the tax rate of 0.2498 per $100 evaluation as the proposed tax rate for tax year 2009 and fiscal year 2010 also. Second. Seconded by Commissioner Marchand. Is there a discussion or other questions? Hearing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed say nay. Motion does carry unanimously. Now I do want to remind everyone that we have. We also need to take action to schedule two public hearings. Right. That not need to be a record vote. The proposed tax rate is a record vote, yes. Generally, never mind. Yeah, it is. I'll talk to you about it later. Under 15, I'm sorry, 17A is the public hearing on Tuesday, August 25th at 10 a.m. on proposed tax rate, schedule, and announce meeting to adopt the tax rate within three to 14 days. It's not less than three or more than 14 days. We'll be doing that. You're not going to be here on August 25th? Well, we can still, as long as the... Passing the public hearing though, you're not voting. No, we're going to have our first public hearing on the proposed tax rate on this 25th. I'll vote on it that day. You will vote for the public. And so I'll be okay. Okay. And then the second next public hearing is 17V, which is on Tuesday, September 1. And notice this is at 7 p.m. on the proposed tax rate. And we'll schedule an announcement meeting to adopt the tax rate. And here again, it's not less than three or more than 14 days. And then 17C is 10 a.m. Tuesday, September 8, 2009. Public hearing and proposed budget at the Courthouse on the day of September 8th, 2009, public hearing and proposed budget at the courthouse on the square here during the commission's court and then same date, September 8th, 2009, the public meeting to adopt the budget in the tax rate. Okay. Do we need a formal motion on that? We need a motion to set those two public hearing dates and time, date time in place. Thank you. Motion by Commissioner Coleman. Seconded by Commissioner Mitchell. As I just read out in agenda item 17, ABC and D. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, Cine? Motion does carry. Is there anything else that you need, Donna? I don't believe so. This fall again prompt us placing a quarter page ad in the newspaper, announcing the two public hearings. There will be information posted on our website. We'll also be posting and filing the proposed budget with the County Auditor, County Clerk, on our website, our four public inspection as well. We will have a slideshow presentation for both public hearing relative to the text rate. All right. It's upstairs, so leave it. Thank you very much. I believe we concluded our business for today. Have a great day. We're adjourned. You're done.