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KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT
Regular Session
Monday, April 10, 2006
9:00 a.m.
Commissioners' Courtroom
Kerr County Courthouse
Kerrville, Texas
PRESENT: PAT TINLEY, Kerr County Judge
H A."BUSTER" BALDWIN, Commissioner Pct. 1
WILLIAM "BILL" WILLIAMS, Commissioner Pct. 2
JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Pct. 3
DAVE NICHOLSON, Commissioner Pct. 4
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I N D E X
April 10, 2006
PAGE
--- Commissioners' Comments 5
1.1 Consider/discuss approval of Proclamation for
National Day of Prayer 12
1.2 Consider/take action to approve contract between
Kerr County and Mountain Home Volunteer Fire
Department for the long-term lease of 2.1 acres
of land owned by Kerr County 13
1.4 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action on
request to install sign(s) at Flat Rock Lake Park 19
Consider/approve proposed Bylaws of the Advisory
Board of the Butt-Holdsworth Memorial Library 28
1.5	Consider/discuss, take appropriate action for	
	Revision of Plat for Lot 60, Wood Trails Ranch,	
	and set public hearing for same	33
1.6	Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to award	
	annual bids for road base, cold mix, aggregate,	
	emulsion oil, corrugated metal pipe, and equipment	
	by-the-hour	53
1.7	Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to	
	consider abandoning, vacating, and discontinuing	
	approximately 89.83 ft. of Drummund Drive, set a	
	public hearing for same	56
1.8	Revision of resolution in support of Special	
	Prosecutor's application for renewal of VAWA	
	grant funds for F.Y. 2006-2007, to include	
	language required by CJD	61
Consider/discuss, take appropriate action on
interlocal agreement between UGRA and Kerr County
that provides match funding required in TWDB
contract for preliminary planning & engineering
for Center Point wastewater collection system 63
1.10 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to
authorize Request for Proposals/Qualifications
process for consultants and registered engineers
to provide basic and special engineering services
for Center Point wastewater facilities project 67
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	I N D E X (Continued)	
	April 10, 2006	
		PAGE
1.11	Consider/discuss, take appropriate action on	
	hiring consulting engineer to review subdivision	
	engineering documents	69
1.12	Consider/discuss responses to organization	
	development survey, plan an approach to identify	
	changes in the organization of County's work that	
	will improve productivity and/or functioning	70
1.13	Consider/discuss, take appropriate action	
	regarding restructuring the Kerr County Juvenile	
	Detention Center, including, but not limited to,	
	personnel, salaries, and building configuration	89
1.14	Reports from the following Departments:	
	Animal Control	--
	Extension Office	90
	Environmental Health	96
4.1 Pay Bills 99
4.2 Budget Amendments 100
4.3 Late Bills ---
4.4 Approve and Accept Monthly Reports 112
5.1 Reports from Commissioners/Liaison Committee
Assignments 113
--- Adjourned 129
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On Monday, April 10, 2006, at 9:00 a.m., a regular
meeting of the Kerr County Commissioners Court was held in the
JUDGE TINLEY: Let me call to order this regularly
scheduled meeting of the Kerr County Commissioners Court
posted for this time and date, Monday, April the 10th, 2006,
at 9 a.m. It is that time now. Commissioner Baldwin?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. If you'll stand,
have a word of prayer with me, and then we'll do the pledge of
allegiance.
(Prayer and pledge of allegiance.)
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you.
JUDGE TINLEY: At this time, if there's any member
of the audience or the public that wishes to be heard on any
matter that is not a listed agenda item, we're happy to have
you come forward at this time. If you wish to speak on a
listed agenda item, we would ask that you wait until that item
is called. And it would help me if you would fill out a
participation form at the back of the room so that I don't
miss you when we get to that item. However, if you haven't
done that and you wish to be heard on that item, get my
attention in some way, shape, form, or fashion, and I'll give
you the opportunity to be heard. But right now, if there's
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any member of the public that wishes to be heard on any matter
(No response.)
JUDGE TINLEY:
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I just wanted to say that I
had a good time through the 150th birthday functions that we
had. Got a little hangover from the city park, and I don't
even drink. But -- little bit wild for me, but it was great,
and I think that the old-timers were honored and the right
thing was done, and it was a great happy birthday party. If
anybody's looking for a sporting event to see this week,
tomorrow and Wednesday is the 27-9A district track meet
championship, and it'll be held here at Kerrville, Tivy, on
the brand-new nine-lane track. And it's a beautiful venue for
a track meet, you know, got all the new aprons and the finest
quality of field and all of that. So, tomorrow and Wednesday
is -- and I think there's one in Ingram starting today, but I
don't know for sure. But a great sporting event, and it's
happening right here in Kerrville, so I just want to remind
you of that. That's all I have to say.
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JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Commissioner Williams?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I just want to follow up on
-- on Commissioner Baldwin with respect to the
sesquicentennial activities. There's so many people to thank,
it's just incredible. I tried to make a list of them, and
particularly Joe Herring, Jr., for chairing the 150th
committee; and the Chamber of Commerce people, B.K. Cody and
Brian Bondy and his staff; Sue Steele and all the ladies that
worked with her in putting together the parade; Walter
Schellhase and the Historical Commission, Clarabelle Snodgrass
working on static displays at the Union Church; and Republican
Women of Kerr County, Janet Maltman, all the fine preparations
they made for the governor's luncheon. It really was a
splendid weekend, and what was great about it was to see how
many people participated. It really was neat. Had a good
time. Thanks to everyone who had a part in it.
JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Letz?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Echo what the first two said,
They did a really
good job of getting that parade route set up and taken down.
I don't see how they did it so fast, really. I mean, I knok
30 minutes ahead of time, all the traffic was flowing
everywhere, and 30 minutes after it was over, it was back all
flowing again. They did a good job of really organizing that
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and having their departments out.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's true.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I noticed that. But other than
It's green, but it is dry.
I just echo
bounty, of course, is the fire. We had two pretty serious
fires starting on Friday. One started on the Hill Country
Youth Ranch west of Ingram, and spread -- got very close to a
residential housing area	in	Ingram, and	thankfully,	nobody was
injured there, or had --	no	structures	were -- were	damaged or
destroyed. And then the bigger fire started Friday afternoon
on Cherry Springs Ranch. It's an old ranch that was broken up
years ago and sold off in 10-, 25-, 100-acre plots, populated
largely by hunters and campers, but -- so there's a lot of
little hunting camps back in there, and there's also some
million-dollar houses, so it's a hodgepodge. It's really
rough. It's behind -- the fire started behind the Guadalupe
Ranch Estates; you probably know where that is. You pass --
the entrance is there on 1340 just before you get to Mo Ranch.
We don't know for sure what started both -- either
of the two fires. I've got some clues, and probably will
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pursue -- be worth pursuing. The firefighters -- the Hunt
firefighters think that somebody burned a brush pile; that's
about the first thing they found when they got out there, was
a large pile of brush burned, so we may need to do some
follow-up on that. Those men and women worked about -- right
at 48 hours. Over 40 hours, I know. They were still working
Sunday afternoon; got out there Friday afternoon. When I
first got there, the first people I ran into, for example, was
a retired -- a guy about my age who was vice president for a
big company.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: He's your age, you say?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: God, what was he doing out
there?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Fighting fire. And a woman
that's not much younger than me was, with all her protective
gear on, crawling up and down the sides of the ravine. And
some of the firefighters were having to -- we got the beast in
there, and they got close enough, some of them, where they
could get a hose to where the fires were, but it was down in
some really steep ravines. Quite a number of firefighters
were carrying water down there on their back. They have about
a 15-minute supply of squirting water, and climb back up the
ravine, get some more water. So, those men and women do a
terrific job for the county.
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COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, they do.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: If I can follow up on fires just
briefly, the -- and I haven't decided if I'm going to put the
burn ban back on in my precinct or not. It's still not on,
COMMISSIONER LETZ: They were not -- when the
what they were last Friday, you can't burn in the state of
Texas, so -- under T.C.E.Q. rules. And I really -- you know,
I don't know; there may be a way to get some attention to
that. Maybe we can put it on the next agenda. I think I'll
have to have Rex kind of go over what the penalties are, and I
would really like to see our law enforcement people and the
County Attorney socking it to these people that do fires. I
don't care if there's a burn ban on or not; if they're not
following state law, I'd like to see some pretty big fines
levied, and maybe they'll quit doing this stuff. It's
ridiculous when you have, you know, 5, 10 percent humidity and
25 mile-an-hour winds, like we did last week, to be lighting
any kind of a fire. And, so -- you know, so the other side of
that is, under certain conditions right now, this may be the
best time to be burning. There's certain -- you know, certain
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bit of cloud cover, a little bit of drizzle. And that's why
I'm leaving it off in my precinct, because it's illegal to do
these fires -- start these fires that have been the problems,
and it's going to get worse, it looks like, before it gets
better, unless we get some substantial rain.
JUDGE TINLEY: I was --
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Let me follow up a little
bit, Judge. Last Friday, we were under a red flag order, and
one opinion I've heard from over the weekend is that -- that
to cause a fire like this when there's a red flag alert on is
a felony crime. I don't know that that's right, but it's --
it's certainly very serious.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And that's another thing. The
burn ban was on in Precinct 4 when these fires started, so, I
mean, I think this burn ban issue -- certainly, we can draw
some attention to it, but it's not -- the fact that we say you
can burn has nothing -- is not -- state law has to be followed
either way.
COMMISSIONER WLLLIAMS: I think your point's a valid
point, but the problem is, while state law prevails and they
shouldn't have been burning in this particular instance,
people don't look that far. All they look to see is whether
the burn ban is on in Precincts 1, 2, 3, and 4, or whether
it's off. Nothing else makes any difference.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: But it was on in his precinct,
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and they were still burning brush piles.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: To get to where the -- if
started, you have to pass the Ingram Fire Department and the
Hunt Fire Department, and both of them have signs up that says
burn ban on, so I don't -- it'd be pretty hard to claim
ignorance.
~ JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I think the ignorance issue is
probably more prevalent here, irrespective of whether the --
irrespective of whether there's a burn ban or not. What we
need to rely upon more than anything else is good judgment and
common sense. Even if there's not a burn ban in effect,
anyone with a modicum of common sense knows if the wind's
blowing 15 or 20 miles an hour, that's not a real smart move.
And if they've got any question about it, what they ought to
do is just pick up the phone and call a representative of the
local fire departments or law enforcement and say, "Hey, burn
ban's not on	and I'm	thinking about	burning.	Anything I need
to know about	that?"	It`s probably	more of a	common sense
issue than anything else, and it's unfortunate that some
people don't -- don't rise to that.
And with respect to the sesquicentennial, as
thank; of course, the lead organizations, the Historical
Commission, the Kerrville Area Chamber of Commerce, Mr. Bondy
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and B.K. Cody, and, of course, the committee headed up by Joe
Herring, Jr. All of those people did -- did the lion's share
of the work, and the committees that they formed with them, as
indicated by Commissioner Williams, Sue Steele and, of course,
the Republican Women did a wonderful job at their luncheon.
Our own Maintenance and Facilities people did a -- did a great
job out here getting things ready for our celebration, the
kickoff on Friday afternoon, when the governor was with us.
And, of course, we're grateful to Grimes for furnishing the
tents and some hydration for the people that were there. And
we're really happy for all of those who participated.
Primarily, I was just ecstatic over the parade crowd; I think
it was far in excess of -- of anything we've had in any
parades here previously, at least that I've been involved with
for 35-plus years. And events down at the park went well, and
as Commissioner Letz said, we owe a lot to the City, too.
Their -- they provided a lot of law enforcement assistance.
Their Public Works people did an absolutely fabulous job with
their barricades and their -- and the work that they did in
all of these events through the entire weekend, and it was
just a huge, huge team effort that I think was a tremendous
success, and I thank everybody who participated.
Let's get on with the business at hand. First item
is to consider, discuss, and approve a proclamation for the
National Day of Prayer. I put this on the agenda at the
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request of Reverend Fern Lancaster. This is an annual thing
that has occurred. Ms. Lancaster has asked that the
representatives of the Court participate in that, as they have
in the past, and I'm sure, assuming this is approved, she'll
be contacting the members of the Court to take part in this
ceremony.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So moved.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for approval
of the agenda item and the proclamation for the National Day
of Prayer. Any question or discussion? All in favor of the
motion, signify by raising your right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
i (No response.)
i JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. Let's go to
Item 2, if we might; consider and take action to approve a
contract between Kerr County and the Mountain Home Volunteer
Fire Department for the long-term lease of 2.1 acres of land
owned by Kerr County located on State Highway 27 in the
Mountain Home community. Commissioner Nicholson? Looks like
we're right on target, time-wise.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: This morning in your in-box
was the latest and maybe last version of the contract. So,
the one that was attached to your -- the agenda item there has
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been	changed	some.	Not -	- not	significantly,	just	tweaked.
But	about two	years	ago -	- less	than two years	ago,	this Court
approved a contract to lease this property to the Mountain
Home Volunteer Fire Department, with some quid pro quo's,
particularly understanding that they would provide us with a
stable water supply for our Raad and Bridge truck and provide
us an area to store materials. The -- the fire department
have met with the fire department board, I'd say about five
times over the intervening 18 months or so, addressing some of
their concerns, and recently they've developed some energy for
finding funds to expand and improve their -- their department.
So, they -- they've changed their strategy and now, instead of
just using the facility that we have there for parking some of
their vehicles and storing some stuff, they want to start from
scratch acid build a new firehouse, and they think that they
can get grants and raise funds to do that.
So, the deal that we approved something less than
~ Bridge use. In earlier schemes, we were going to tap into one
of the neighbor's wells, and now they plan to drill their own
well. We have a large tank out there. I can't remember what
size it is. Len, is it 12,000?
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MR. ODOM: 15,000.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: 15,000 gallons. And
they'll keep that full so that when -- they'll use it to fill
therr trucks, and when we're out there working on roads, we'll
have a readily accessible supply of water. They'll fence in a
space that -- to store Road and Bridge materials, provide some
security for that. There's an asphalt tank on that property
that we use, and they'll keep that and maintain it. They'll
allow us access to the restroom facilities for employees in
the new -- new firehouse. In exchange for that, they get a
25-year lease with two 25-year guaranteed renewal options.
Essentially, we'd be entering into an agreement that would
provide them the opportunity to build on that and know that
they're going to be there for up to 75 years. So, I make a
i motion that we approve the contract for the lease of
12.1 acres near Mountain Home to the Mountain Home Volunteer
Fire Department, and authorize the County Judge to sign same.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for approval
of the agenda item as indicated. Any question or discussion?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Commissioner?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Go ahead.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is there any monetary
considerations here at all?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: No.
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~ COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay.
~ COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is the -- this is to the County
Attorney. He's approved the form, and by that -- or he's
I~ involved in this, so I presume that there's no problem with
the length of the term? It seems long, but --
MR. EMERSON: That's up to y'a11. It's a policy
decision.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's longer than we've done, but
I don't have a problem with it, really,
JUDGE TINLEY: The other considerations are, of
course, there's going to be a well on the premises that the
Department is going -- it will be obligated to drill within,
what, 180 days, I believe?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I didn't see that anywhere,
Judge.
JUDGE TINLEY: Maybe that was in the earlier
agreement.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, there's -- I'm looking at
the older version. There is a version, "within five years,"
the one that I'm looking at, Paragraph 2.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: No, that's --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm looking at that. I didn't
bring in the newest version from my box.
MR. EMERSON: There's not any time requirements in
the current version.
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JUDGE TINLEY: Okay.
MR. EMERSON: Up to y'all to put them in there. The
five years that Commissioner Letz is referring to is in the
version that was forwarded from the fire department.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. And they are going to build a
permanent structure there, which, of course, will -- will
revert at the end of the lease term and become part of the
property, so those two will remain with the property at the
end of that lease term, whatever it may be, 25, 50 or 75
years.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: It's the intention to do it
right as soon as they have the money to do it, and it's
probably more to their advantage to get that water supply than
it is to ours. They -- it's a very -- it's a nuisance for
them to get water in their trucks now, and this will make it
real handy.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is the term important to them,
to have it that long?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yes.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: 75 years?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I don't know what the magic
number is; 50 years might be -- might be acceptable. The
issue is, they're probably going to have to go for some
financing, and whoever's going to loan them some money is
going to want to make sure that they have that facility long
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enough to pay for it and amortize it. We want -- we're
discussing it in our negotiations. I said, "Well, 50 years is
quite a long time; won't any of us be left around here then."
And Tom Syfan pointed out that he's been a member of the
department for 50 years. He says it's not a long time.
(Laughter.)
COMMISSIONER LETZ: My only concern is that it's a
little bit of a longer precedent. 7 think a lot of our leases
are in the 40- to 50-year period. But I -- the reality is
that once that's used for this purpose, they're going to have
it as long as they want it, whether the term's 25 years or 75
years. So, it's more a precedent issue to me, but I don't --
I don't have that big a problem with it if that's what they
feel they need.
JUDGE TINLEY: Any more questions?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I was looking for the
reversion clause, Judge. I don't see that. Where is that?
JUDGE TINLEY: Reversion?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah. You mentioned it, and
I --
JUDGE TINLEY: Well, of course, by law, any -- any
improvements that are affixed to the land automatically go
with the property at the end of the lease tezm, whether --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay.
JUDGE TINLEY: Irrespective of -- of whether you got
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anything in the lease or not. Any other comments? All in
favor of the motion, signify by raising your right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
DODGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
(No response.)
DODGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Let's now go
to Item 4, if we might. Consider, discuss, and take
appropriate action on the request to install signs at Flat
Rock Lake Park. I put this on the agenda at the request of --
of Mr. Bob Palmer. Is he here today with us?
MR. PALMER: Yes.
JUDGE TINLEY: Oh, there you are. Okay.
MR. PALMER: Thank you. I have some show-and-tell
that I'd like to -- would y'all like one of these? -- give to
each one of the Commissioners.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Just hand them all up and
I'll pass them around.
MR. PALMER: Okay. See if there's enough. Missing
one?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Thank you.
MR. PALMER: My name is Robert Palmer, and I --
actually, I think I live in Precinct 3, but 1 utilize the park
that's in Precinct 2, which is Flat Rock Lake Park, I believe.
And, like I've said, I discovered this park after I'd been
here only 15 years, and one of the reasons is I didn't know it
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was there, even though I probably passed by it. What I'm
suggesting is that there be a park sign be placed there which
would inform the public just exactly, one, that it's Kerr --
that it's Flat Rock Lake Park, and it's also a Kerr County
park. And I don't believe there are any signs on any of the
Kerr County parks or -- and I'm suggesting that that would be
a really good thing to do to improve the -- it'd be a good
P.R. thing and enhance overall the -- Kerr County. If you
look at this picture, there is the main entrance to Flat Rock
Lake Park, and it's a beautiful setting along the river. And
you -- one reason you know it's a park is 'cause it says, "No
Overnight Camping. Deputy Checks," so that gives you a pretty
good idea that you're going into a park and you better not
stay overnight.
So, what I am suggesting -- and there's an idea for
a park -- a sign that I put -- that I made up myself, and as
you can see at the bottom, I tried to indicate exactly some
characters there who were doing the things that most people do
in Flat Rock Lake Park. There's a person there walking their
dog; there's some people there who are there with their own
barbecue pit making some hamburgers, and then the fishermen --
the fishing and the boating. And people come there and just
hang out or enjoy the park, but those are -- these are what
I've observed have been the main activities in the park. So,
that's just an idea for a sign. So, if y'all see that big
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tree right at the beginning on the left, right behind the
sign, I thought that that would be an ideal place to put a
post up and put a sign, perhaps a wooden sign that informs you
that it's Flat Rock Lake Park, and it's Kerr County. It would
be well out of the way of the traffic, and would be a nice --
right under the arch of that tree would be a fine place for a
sign. One reason you know that's Flat Rock Park is there --
there is the flat rock. I think there might be two or three
right there at the entrance, and that is -- that makes it Flat
Rock Lake Park. So -- so, I'm asking y'all if you'll put a
park sign there.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay.
JUDGE TINLEY: Any -- any member of the Court have
any questions for Mr. Palmer?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I qot a question in
general. What kind of facilities do we have there? Do we
have boat ramps?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yes.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Restrooms?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Not yet.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Not yet.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: They've been in the works for
years.
(Discussion off the record.)
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COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think it's a good idea. I
think -- and there's -- we should probably sign all our
parks, including the Lions Park and Ingram Park, to show that
They're used and
It's a matter of finding the
with making the public aware that this is a dog-friendly park.
I see you've changed that somewhat from the first time we
spoke.
MR. PALMER: Well, I know that it's -- it's a
dog-friendly park, but it's not only a dog-friendly park. We
want to, you know, have everybody who wants to come to the
park to utilize it, and everybody share the park together.
And so -- you know, so this is just not one interest.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: My idea for signage is -- is
a wooden-type, probably cypress, which we'd carve into the
face of the wood boards what the park is and so forth. In
this particular case, however, I think any signage that we do
would have to call recognition to the fact that a lot of the
funding for improvements have come from the Lower Colorado
River Authority. They certainly deserve credit for their
involvement with this -- this particular park. Other parks
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that the County owns and provides funding for improvements
And that
I'm
COMMISSIONER LETZ: My thoughts are -- I mean, I
think that what we can do right now, 'cause budget is an
issue, is to have a plaque similar to a street sign made for
all parks so people are aware they are Kerr County parks. I
think our sign machine should probably be able to handle that.
Leonard, is that correct? We can make a couple, put it on a
post? I think we can probably get that done within our
budget, and I think it's appropriate. I also think that this
park, which is kind of the crown jewel of the county parks
anyway, probably deserves a nicer entrance, and I think that
we might look at that, you know, maybe in the next budget
year, look at it. I think a sign is probably appropriate to
recognize L.C.R.A. They may even pay for it.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Never know.
rock there; maybe we can incorporate it into it and do
something a little bit fancier at the main entrance. I don't
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know if Mr. Palmer's aware; we're in the process, I think, of
installing a bridge across Third Creek, 'cause the park's also
on the other side of Third Creek, and somewhere in that area
may be a good location, make that more of the main entrance of
the park where it splits off in two sides. I think we have
appreciate you coming forward and pointing out this
deficiency, 'cause I think it is -- we have neglected to sign
JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Williams has been the
one who's primarily taking the lead in areas relating to
parks, at least from the time that I've been here on the
Court, and it might be well if we -- if he'd be willing to
allow us to task him to kind of get together a preliminary
plan to handle that signage at all the parks, what his
thoughts are, and take a look at who's been responsible for
improvements at the various parks so that appropriate
recognition might be given, and maybe come up with a proposed
plan on how to do that.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's fine; we can do that.
MR. PALMER: So, are you suggesting that they just
temporarily put -- or not temporarily, but put up some signs
that are -- that would indicate that those are parks?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right, similar to like you see
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on the state park -- like on the state highway signs.
MR. PALMER: Right.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: That just say, you know, "State
Park." Put up a "Kerr County Flat Rock Park" sign.
MR. PALMER: That'd be --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And maybe a couple of them. I'm
thinking, you know, one where you're speaking of, at that
entrance, and one further down where there's kind of another
entrance towards Third Creek; put one in both locations.
MR. PALMER: Maybe one right off the loop where it
comes in at Riverside --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right.
MR. PALMER: -- Drive, so people will know when they
can turn off the loop and get on --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's probably where a
metal sign on a post should be, would be there.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right.
MR. PALMER: Right.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, similar to more
informational-type signs, and that can be looked at, you know,
maybe next budget, or look for a source of funding for an
entrance -- you know, a little bit nicer sign for Flat Rock
specifically. We could probably -- you know, I would imagine
we could raise the money relatively easy in the community if
we, you know, didn't have it in our budget to -- I mean, we're
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not talking about that much money, and through community
you bringing those ideas to us.
MR. PALMER: Well, I'd really appreciate it if
you'll do that, 'cause I think the parks deserve it. All of
the city parks have it, and, you know, it would be really good
for the whole county. Some people just know the county from
those parks. They come off the highway, off of I-10, and --
and I put out a flyer indicating that dogs -- people with dogs
can come over there at different motels and hotels, and so
you've got people coming there from all over the state, and
just stopping here sometimes because of that park.
JUDGE TINLEY: Visitors to our city?
MR. PALMER: Visitors.
	JUDGE TINLEY:	Well, that's	great. I'm	glad that
they're	being made aware	of that. If	that makes	it more
accommodating to our visitors, we certainly want that.
MR. PALMER: Well, there -- so when -- now, like,
when in the future do y'all deal with things like this?
JUDGE TINLEY: Well, for a permanent solution, we're
probably going to be looking at some budgetary things, and
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that's going to be coming up in the summer and on into the
early fall when we finalize those. The one thing I would
mention to you, Mr. Palmer, is that government is
frustratingly slow on occasion.
MR. PALMER: I understand.
JUDGE TINLEY: So, just bear with us. Like I say, I
think you've planted the seed, and I think we'll get there.
The timetable, I can't give you today.
MR. PALMER: Okay, thank you.
JUDGE TINLEY: I'd like to, but I'm sure I'd end up
getting a telephone call and saying, "You said this; why
aren't we there yet?"
MR. PALMER: Right.
JUDGE TINLEY: But I appreciate you coming to us
with the idea and planting the seed, and I think -- I think
we're going to go forward with it. i
MR. PALMER: Thank you. ~
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Just one thing I wanted to
add. Since -- since the entrance to Flat Rock Lake Park is
Riverside Drive and it connects to two state highways, I would
imagine we could talk to TexDOT and get the road signage up in
a reasonable period of time.
MR. PALMER: That would be great.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: The road signs. But I think
if I'm going to bring back a plan with respect to signing Flat
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Rock Lake Park, Ingram Park, or Center Point, I'm going to do
so in a manner that would be a long-term sign, suitable for
each, that reflects the hill country, not just a metal sign
with plastic numbers and letters on it.
MR. PALMER: Right. Sounds good.
JUDGE TINLEY: Something of permanency. Thank you,
sir.
MR. PALMER: Thanks.
JUDGE TINLEY: We appreciate you being here with us
~ today.
MR. PALMER: Thank you.
JUDGE TINLEY: Let's move to our 9:30 agenda item,
Number 3; consider and approve the proposed bylaws of the
Advisory Board of the Butt-HOldsworth Memorial Library.
Commissioner Nicholson?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Interlocal agreement
between the City of Kerrville and Kerr County requires that
both governing bodies approve the bylaws of the
Butt-Holdsworth Library Board of Directors. And we -- the
bylaws were significantly changed in that the operation of the
Advisory Board was significantly changed, particularly to give
it a -- a direct role in formulating budgets. So, on -- on
the 13th of March, the bylaws were reviewed by this
Commissioners Court, and there was some concern about detailed
language in there that dealt specifically with definitions of
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capital budget items and that sort of thing, so the Court
language that -- saying this agreement deals with that; that
needs to be dealt with in the language. And then on
March 27th, we had it on the agenda again, and we had revised
bylaws that had been prepared by the City of Kerrville and
approved by them, but the package inadvertently did not
include the revised bylaws, so it's back on the agenda again
for your review and approval, and I move to approve.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for approval
of the bylaws of the Advisory Board of the Butt-HOldsworth
Memorial Library as presented. Any question or discussion? I
have one minor language issue. And the language that cleared
up the redundancy I think is appropriate, but when we mention
interlocal agreement, "in accordance with the provision of the
interlocal agreement," nowhere else in these bylaws is the
interlocal agreement referenced by that name, and so it's for
that reason. And in the second paragraph, the very end of it,
where it says, "by written contract between the two entities,"
that that be referred to "by interlocal agreement between the
two entities," because then it will tie together. It's a --
it's a technical thing, but that identifies what the
interlocal agreement is. I can't find "interlocal agreement"
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anywhere else in those bylaws.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Are you proposing it's going
to say "between Kerr County and the City of Kerrville"? Is
that what you --
JUDGE TINLEY: Or at the tail end of -- of the
I Section 2 --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm.
JUDGE TINLEY: -- of the interlocal agreement, you
can add, "between City of Kerrville and Kerr County." Either
way. That will tie it together. It's more of a -- more of a
housekeeping and reference situation more than anything else.
It has nothing to do with substance, but, you know, 25 years
from now, if somebody's looking at this, if it lasts that
long, they're going to say, "What is this interlocal agreement
that we're referring to?" And we need to be able to tie it to
something else to identify it.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: How do you propose to
proceed from here? Do you want to send it back to the City of
Kerrville with recommended changes?
JUDGE TINLEY: Well, the logistics -- it's
unfortunate, but I think we need to tie those two together.
That's my feeling. The Court may have other feelings.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Mr. Martinez?
JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, sir. Mr. Martinez?
MR. MARTINEZ: If I may make a suggestion, I can
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prepare an agenda bill for City Council's next meeting. If
you will prepare your documents and let me have two signed
copies by Thursday, I can have that agenda bill prepared and
have your language presented to City Council.
JUDGE TINLEY: That would be at the second meeting
of this month?
MR. MARTINEZ: It would be the April 25th meeting,
but I need to get it in by the end of the week.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: It would be a consent agenda
item for them, so they wouldn't have to spend much time on it,
I would suspect.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, our motion's going to
stand contingent upon us tying these words together?
JUDGE TINLEY: You know, I --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I mean, let's move forward
with it.
JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And get it over there.
MR. MARTINEZ: Well, what I'm suggesting is that you
can go ahead and approve your language, and let us have
written copies -- two copies with signatures, and I'll present
those to Council.
JUDGE TINLEY: You've got the -- the bylaws on disk,
I presume, and could make that change very readily and furnish
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it to us?
MR. MARTINEZ: Yes.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Okay.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Specifically, what language
are we adding?
JUDGE TINLEY: I would suggest in the second
paragraph, where it says, "by written contract between the two
entities," to have it read, "by interlocal agreement between
the two entities," and I think that'll solve it. And then
that'll tie back.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I'll amend my motion to
include the revision that Judge Tinley just referred to, and
to authorize him to sign the -- well, we don't sign this. I
just -- the motion's to approve the agreement with that change
to add -- change "written contract" to "interlocal agreement."
JUDGE TINLEY: And your second --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: My second stands, yes, sir.
JUDGE TINLEY: All right. Any further question or
discussion? All in favor of that motion, signify by raising
your right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
(NO response.)
JUDGE TINLEY: If you'd be kind enough to run those
bylaws with that change, and then we -- the clerk can get you
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a copy of the court order to attach to that, and you can carry
that to the Council.
MR. MARTINEZ: Okay. And the agreement with your
language also? I'll need that. You approved it at your last
meeting with your language.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay.
MR. MARTINEZ: But I need a written copy with
signatures of that also.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Okay.
MR. MARTINEZ: Okay?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Right there.
MR. MARTINEZ: Thank you.
JUDGE TINLEY: Anything else on that particular
agenda item? Let's move forward, then, to Item Number 5;
consider, discuss, and take appropriate action for the
revision of plat for Lot 60 of Wood Trails Ranch, as set forth
in Volume 4, Page 98, and located in Precinct 4, and set a
public hearing on that.
MR. ODOM: Yes. Good morning. May I ask -- I will
have Truby get with Commissioner Williams, I guess, on the
wording for these -- for the parks that you want -- want to
put on a sign. Am I correct in that assumption?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Let's meet and talk.
MR. ODOM: Okay. Lee Voelkel has requested this
revision of plat be done in the alternate plat process. It is
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up to Commissioners -- to the Commissioner of the precinct to
interpreting the new rules correctly, these are the items that
need to be considered by the Court. One is the lot size. An
existing subdivision within a community water system which is
approved by T.C.E.Q. is allowed to divide until it reaches an
average of 3 acres, with the smallest lot being 1 acre. Wood
Trails is 506 acres, and currently has 125 lots in it, giving
them an average of 4.04 acres. This additional two lots will
make it 3.98 acres. This revision of Lot 6 is acceptable if
they use the Wood Trails water system. However, Wood Trails
water is not currently approved for any new water connections,
and -- but may be in the future.
With this agenda item, we sent you the letters that
we had from -- I think from the water system to Lee saying
that -- I thought they implied that it would be this month,
sometime in April, they might get a decision from T.C.E.Q. to
upgrade their -- their property. Also, you have a letter from
Headwaters from Mr. Williams -- Gene Williams, and in relation
to that, the possibility of drilling a well for a 5-acre
tract. Headwaters' current rules still support the 5-acre
rule. Therefore, you should approve this -- should you
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All lots meet the lot frontage of 150 feet. Two of the
proposed lots are in the special flood hazard area, and the
finished floor has been set on each lot.
There's a structure on Lot 60, as shown on the
aerial photograph, and it will be shown on the final plat.
Lee has already made -- addressed that, but I didn't think it
was necessary till the final plat. And the date for the
public hearing is May the 22nd, 2006, at 10:30 a.m. So, the
Court needs to consider whether or not you would go to this
alternate plat process, and I would assume that on -- the idea
is that if they couldn't -- and correct me if I'm wrong, but
if the water system is not updated to put them on, I guess
that they propose to drill a well on 5 acres as it is now, but
if you subdivide this, I would assume that it would be a -- an
agreement. It would not be a water system, because it's not
15 connections.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let me ask you a question.
The new rules say 3-acre average.
MR. ODOM: 3-acre average.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And that is based on --
MR. ODOM: Community water system.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- water availability, for
the lack of better words?
MR. ODOM: Right.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And we don't know, today,
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whether they -- T.C.E.Q. will allow the existing system to add
on more hookups, and we don't know if they're going to drill a
well?
MR. ODOM: That's right. And I have --
Mr. Voelkel's here --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Stop, stop, stop. How can
we -- how can we approve a plat when we don't know where the
water's coming from, period?
MR. ODOM: I don't know. That's --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I mean, just -- I'm not being
argumentative. I just -- that's a question that needs to be
answered for me.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Let me ask Lee. Isn't
there currently a water well on this property?
MR. VOELKEL: Do you want to come up, too? Let me
introduce to the Court Mr. Joe Siff. He's from Houston. He's
the owner of the property. And either one of us -- you go
ahead. We'll address that.
MR. SIFF: Well, gentlemen, the answer to your
question, there is a -- a very shallow well on the property
now, but we have a permit to build -- to build a much deeper
well, and that's what we would do if the Wood Trails water
system weren't allowed to increase its size. But, according
to the owner of the system, they've been verbally told that
they will be approved, and they should be able to start work
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in the summer, but I have a choice either way. I mean, if
they are approved, I can elect to use the Wood Trail water
supply system, or I could drill a well. Frankly, at this
point, I probably will drill a well if I'm approved.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, are you -- are you --
MR. SIFF: I have a permit.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You're basing your decision
whether to wait on the State to move or drill a well on what
we do today? Is that --
MR. SIFF: Sure.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I see it the other way
around. I see our -- us making a decision on whatever you do.
MR. SIFF: Well, I have a permit --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's the way I see it.
Show me where I'm wrong.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think I -- I looked at our
rules and how -- you know, trying to -- you know, what our
rules say is a plat note goes on here that says no individual
water wells will be drilled on any of these three lots,
period. If they -- if you choose to drill a well and put in a
small community system, then that would not be an individual
well, and you can do that, but you're going to have to get
a -- you know, do an agreement for a community water system.
But it'll be a -- you can use your personal community water
system or you can use your -- T.C.E.Q. or Wood Trails' water
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system, but you cannot use individual wells.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Looking at it from the
water availability standpoint, there's a well there now that
is inadequate. He wants a better well. He's going to abandon
that well, drill a better well, so there will still be the
same amount of wells. One now, and there will be a
replacement. Under our rules, I think it is okay for one well
to serve three properties.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes, but they have to do -- they
have to form a -- do a -- it'd basically be a water system.
JUDGE TINLEY: Joint well agreement.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Joint well agreement.
JUDGE TINLEY: It wouldn't qualify -- it wouldn't be
required to be registered with --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: No.
JUDGE TINLEY: -- the State? Or --
MR. ODOM: Doesn't have 15 connections.
JUDGE TINLEY: I think it's got to exceed five
connections before that's -- is it 15?
MR. ODOM: 15.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Is that sort of agreement
Commissioners Court business?
JUDGE TINLEY: No, that's a private, civil matter
between the owners.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: We have other properties
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where water wells are shared.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: All we need is a plat note that
says no individual water wells, period. Now, you know, that's
just -- you're going to -- that tells you and future owners
that they're going to have some sort of water system, whether
it's a small one or a part of the Wood Trails.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I certainly agree, they
can't drill two more -- three more wells. They can only drill
one replacement well.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I think, actually, we have
language in the Water Availability Requirements as to what
that plat note should say. It's fairly simple.
MR. VOELKEL: My question would be, he's already
permitted for one well on a 5-acre tract. We put that on one
of those tracts, and then the note says that no other wells
will be on any other tracts. Is that my understanding?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think it's a -- well, if
they're -- it's not an individual water -- he's not drilling
an individual well. It's -- he's drilling a community well.
Our note says no individual wells. Now, if it's a 5-acre
tract, --
MR. VOELKEL: I hear you. Yes, okay.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- if he leaves it as platted,
then it's -- you know, it's not an individual -- it's an
individual well, but it meets minimum requirements. Now, you
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can't -- what you couldn't do is -- I don't know why you'd
want to do it anyway, but you can't do this revision and then
drill individual wells -- an individual well. It has to be a
community well.
MR. SIFF: Sure. And that would be the purpose of
getting the revision to do a community well?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right.
MR. SIFF: If Wood Trail water supply didn't get
what it expects to get. For the Commissioners' information, I
don't intend to need a community well, or need additional taps
for at least six months, if not a year or so. I have -- my
son and I have one house on the property now. My intent over
time is to build a second house for my daughter, and a third
house, ultimately, if there's any money left over, for myself.
I figure in the meantime, one of the two of them will let me
stay with them, you know. (Laughter.)
MR. VOELKEL: Hopefully.
MR. SIFF: Yeah. I've got my fingers crossed.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. So, we --
MR. SIFF: That's my plan.
MR. ODOM: But my understanding would be that he
needs to drill the well now under the 5 acres without platting
this?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, there's just a plat note
needs to be on there, no individual wells -- water wells. And
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that will -- they can do a community well.
MR. SIFF: Yeah. The only reason I'd drill a well
would be for it to be a community well.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: How does -- how does the
memorandum from Mr. Gene Williams of Headwaters fit into the
equation here, where he says once a well is drilled on the
property, the current Headwaters GCD 5-acre rule should be
enforced by Kerr County repLating. This scenario would not be
acceptable to Headwaters under present rules?
MR. ODOM: Well, sir, I have Mr. Williams here now.
And --
COMMI5SIONER LETZ: Back here.
MR. ODOM: Back here? Okay. Would you like to
address that, sir?
MR. WILLIAMS: I'll answer whatever questions you
have. When Mr. Voelkel first came to me, I related to him
that the current rule is 5 acres to drill an individual well,
and he wanted to know about drilling a well and then
subdividing the property. So, I guess that comes under the
Court's jurisdiction. If you make it a community well, it
will no longer be what he's applied for, an exempt well. It
would have to be a permitted well. I guess our concern is on
just shared wells, we have no jurisdiction over shared wells,
and if you have ownership changes and the person on the lot
that has the well cuts the other two off, and then they come
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to Headwaters and say, "We have no water," then we have no
choice but to allow them to drill another well.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: But you could enforce our plat
note, which says no wells. I mean, you can -- you can enforce
our laws, so to speak.
MR. WILLIAMS: Well, if you get into a scenario
where they have no water, I don't think we can. I don't think
we can tell them they cannot have any water.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: But I think we can tell them
through the County Attorney that they can't drill a well. I
mean, if it's our rules that they cannot -- there's a plat
note that says no individual water wells, I mean, 7 can see
civil -- I can see a lawsuit starting over that, but I don't
see how it is going to force another well to be drilled,
unless the District Court says it or something.
MR. EMERSON: My only comment would be -- and I
think this is what Buster was saying, is that your Subdivision
Rules say that you can't subdivide unless you have water
availability, and you're subdividing, but you do not have any
water.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Absolutely.
MR. EMERSON: Through either way at this time.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: So he has to decide.
MR. EMERSON: Which I think is the same thing that
Headwaters is saying.
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COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, they need to -- he needs to
decide how he's going to do it, and then put a plat note on to
that effect.
MR. EMERSON: I'm not sure how you can subdivide and
stay under the rules if you don't have any water, which is the
situation they're in.
MR. WILLIAMS: We've issued the application -- or
the authority to drill on the 5 acres, and if he changes that
prior to drilling, then the application will not be good. You
know, it will have to be -- it would have to be an exception
from the Board to allow him to drill, like, on 2 acres or
whatever that division would be.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: But, I mean, I think -- I guess
-- I understand that, but I'm going back -- well, he can
revise his application and make a small community system. The
issue that I would say, though, is that, you know, you said
that what if he cuts off water to those two lots. Well, what i
if T.C.E.Q. cuts off water to someone 'cause they won't pay
their bill, and those people come to you to drill a well?
It's no different, whether it's a public system or a -- I
mean, a small public system or a big public system, to me.
MR. WILLIAMS: Well, I don't know. If they're
already tied onto a public water system, then that's a whole
different problem. If you've got a house on a lot that has
absolutely no access to water other than drilling a well, then
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I think Headwaters will be bound to allow a well there.
JUDGE TINLEY: If I'm hearing what you're saying,
sir, the -- what you see chronologically is that this property
owner drills his well on his 5 acres under your permit, then
comes to this Court and says I've got the water availability
requirement satisfied by virtue of a joint well agreement that
runs with the land for the benefit of each of those owners,
whoever they may be from time to time, where their rights are
set forth in a document in the public Real Property Records,
and that along with the request for the platting that
otherwise satisfies our rules. Is -- is that what I'm
hearing?
MR. WILLTAMS: (Nodded.)
COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, the individual needs to
decide how he's going to do it first, do the revision or -- or
apply for a community well, and then come to us for the
revision and have a community well as part -- you know,
approved.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Wherein the joint well
provision contracts come in play?
JUDGE TINLEY: That -- that's his responsibility
with the private landowners. That's a civil matter between
the owners. And it's not a particularly complicated one, but
it's one that needs to be done.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Where are we with the water
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system?	Have	we applied to	T.C.	E.Q.	to	expand? Lee?
	MR.	SIFF: I can	tell	you	what	the owner and the
owner's operator have told me verbally. Neither of them would
put this in writing, although they did sort of -- Mr. Mayhew
did, sort of. He said in his letter that he expects approval
from that organization that you just mentioned in the month of
April, and assuming approval, he would start the work on the
expansion of the water system in the early summer, June or
July. And I don't know how long it would take him to get
increased capacity, but at whatever time he got increased
capacity, then I would have a choice, I believe, if I had the
replatting done now, of using water from his -- applying for
two additional taps from his system. And we have an example
of Lot 56 -- I'm Lot 60 -- which is virtually contiguous to
me, that subdivided into four or five sub-lots. I'm asking
for three. And -- and each -- when there was capacity from
the water supply, Wood Trails Water Supply Company, they
each -- each of these smaller approximately 2-acre lots got --
got a tap.
So, one concern I have is, if I don't get a
subdivision now -- and the subdivision we've applied for would
make an average for the entire deed-restricted -- you know,
the whole Wood Trails Subdivision, the average lot size
29 becomes 3.9. As -- as the gentleman, Mr. Odom, stated, you
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know, I don't -- if you drive out there, there are lots of
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people with less than 1-acre lots, and I don't know how many
more will come to you or -- or independently decide, whatever
process takes place. I don't want to be left high and dry if
the average size gets below 3 acres, and not be able to do
this just for my own family.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think we can -- we can set a
public hearing today, but you're going to have to have the
water issue resolved one way or the other before we do a final
plat. We can do the public hearing in 30 days, and if you
have permission from Wood Trails to add on, then that will --
then we can -- that solves it. And if not, you have to have
an agreement and apply for a community well through
Headwaters, and have that agreement in place.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It just seems to me the
simplest way to do this thing is -- is go with the -- the
water company that's out there now.
MR. S1FF: And I intend to do it as soon as they
have capacity.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So you don't have to deal
with hardheads like Gene and Buster Baldwin and those nuts.
And, to me, it's a lot easier to do.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Let's go ahead and set the
public hearing.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let's do it.
JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah.
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COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: And things may clear up
more by that time. And they still haven't given final
approval. So, I'm going to make a motion we set a public
hearing on the revision of plat for Lot 60, Wood Trails Ranch
Subdivision, for 10 a.m., May 22nd.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 1 second it.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded to set a
public hearing for the revision of plat for Lot 60 of Wood
Trails Ranch at 10 a.m. on May the 22nd of this year. Any
question or discussion?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make a brief comment. This
is just really for Mr. Voelkel, so I don't have to call him
later. We are looking at some additional -- there was a
revision made in 2003 in the Subdivision Rules, the state law.
We're looking at that to see -- there's some question about
whether that really applies to Kerr County, and that may make
this process easier on some of these revision of plats, and be
able to get rid of public hearings, but still have to go
through the same process, not really save any money. It will
save the County, not -- well, it's not going to probably save
the landowner or the developer any money, but will save the
County possibly money from having to do public hearings all
the time. But we're looking at that; Rex and I are looking at
that. That's just a comment before Lee leaves.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I've got a question for
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Commissioner Letz, our water guru.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I should be quiet.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I've talked to some other
water gurus about this. The reason for restricting the number
of lots in a subdivision under the average size is, in our
part, water conservation, protecting the aquifer. What
difference does it make if three residences are using one well
or three different wells?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think you get into a -- a --
the more penetrations into the aquifer, the higher the
likelihood of problems, of damaging the aquifer. And also,
you get into usage, things of that nature. You have septic
systems that can leach into it. So, I mean, we've kind of
taken a policy that fewer wells are better.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: So, it's science.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Within a -- yeah, it's a reason
to do it. Rather than have a well every acre, it's better to
have one well every 10 acres.
MR. SIFF: At the risk of seeming like I want to
lengthen this hearing, and I don't, I -- I want to make sure
you realize that my goal really is to just have one
penetration, and that's the deep well I want to drill. That
would be one well, but there would be branches to the other
two sub, you know, plots. And, frankly, real estate agents
and other residents have told me that this particular water
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supply company has said a lot of things in the past that have
never come true. And there are many lots for sale, physical
pieces of property for sale in the subdivision that the real
estate agent is obligated to say up front to a prospective
buyer, "There's no water taps, and we have no idea when there
will be."
COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's what we're saying. If
you decide to drill your own community well, it needs to be
noted on the plat that these lots are served by this community
system, and you can call it whatever you want. And that way,
anyone that -- down the road, there's some recourse that, yes,
there's a community water system, and here's the name of it,
and they're going to serve these plats. At least it would
give someone some civil action down the road if someone tries
to cut somebody off.
JUDGE TINLEY: If you didn't get the right warm,
fuzzy feeling from the community water supply people out there
that you're -- you have the appropriate assurances that you'll
have the number of taps that you need, I -- I think what you
may be looking at is spending some of your children's
inheritance a little bit early, instead of looking to the end
to see what's left, for you to drill a well to serve all of
you.
MR. SIFF: Well, that's my dilemma. If I -- I have
no debt on this property right now, frankly. And my goal is
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to subdivide the property so that when I do get debt on the
house that I've spent a lot of money to build, it's just on
the land that's under that house, not on the entire land, so
that then I have two more pieces of land that I can build two
more houses on, and that's part of the thinking behind all
this.
MR. VOELKEL: Question. I'm not real clear. If he
decides to do his own well and do the shared with the other
lots, is the permit he has for that well adequate now, or does
he need a new --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't believe so. Headwaters
says it's not adequate.
MR. VOELKEL: Okay. He'd have to reapply for a
different type of permit?
JUDGE TINLEY: Well, or would he? Before he plats,
if he goes ahead and drills a well now on his 5 acres, he's
good to go under your permit now.
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, on the 5 acres. Yes, he is.
MR. SIFF: And then, if I do a subdivision of those
5 acres, I can reapply for a community -- or a branch system?
JUDGE TINLEY: I'm not sure you have to. When the
well's in place, I think -- I think it's then a civil matter
to do a joint well agreement for the -- to run to the benefit
of the three tracts that you're asking to subdivide it into.
MR. ODOM: And you could make that decision before
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this date, what you're going to do. Or you can --
MR. SIFF: So, before the 22nd of May.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think that that's
circumventing the rules a little bit, though. I think if the
intent is -- when you drill that well is to be a community
i well, it needs to be permitted properly to start with.
MR. WILLIAMS: That's correct.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think you're -- that's, you
know, just -- I don't think that's ethical. You know, I don't
think it's a problem. I don't see how it's going to -- I
mean, maybe the fee's a little bit more. It probably won't
change the cost of the well particularly, but I don't know
what it -- I have no idea.
MR. ODOM: They can't -- it's not going to be a
water system, because it's not 15 connections. That's what
Gene is saying.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: You can have a water system less
than 15 connections. It's just not regulated by T.C.E.Q.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Up to 15.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's still a water system, just
not regulated by T.C.E.Q. We have many in this county that
are less than 15 connections.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right. Anything 15 or over
is T.C.E.Q.
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MR. ODOM: Okay.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Or 15 -- 14, whatever it is.
JUDGE TINLEY: Any further question or discussion on
the motion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising
your right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
(No response.)
JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Let's go
to --
MR. SIFF: I'm confused on what the motion was, I'm
sorry.
JUDGE TINLEY: To set a public hearing.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: To set a public hearing.
JUDGE TINLEY: That's all we've done at this point.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: May 22nd at 10 a.m.
MR. SIFF: No recommendation --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: You have to decide what you're
doing prior to that date -- or prior to us taking action.
We'll do the public hearing, but then prior to us finalizing
it, you're going to have to decide if you're going to Wood
Trails or your own community system.
MR. SIFF: Okay. I don't know how I can decide that
before I have some idea of if and/or when Wood Trail Water
Supply will ever get additional plats, and then if they do,
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whether they'd grant me to --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I don't think we can --
all we can do is a public hearing until we know how water's
going to get to those lots.
MR. SIFF: And if I told you that I was going to
build the well, I'd have to build it before you could take
action?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: No.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. All we're doing is a public
hearing right now, which is a requirement of the state law
that we do a public hearing before you can revise.
MR. SIFF: Okay. Thank you very much.
JUDGE TINLEY: Let's move to Item 6; consider,
discuss, and take appropriate action to award the annual bids
for road base, cold mix, aggregate, emulsion oil, corrugated
metal pipe, and equipment by the hour. Mr. Odom?
MR. ODOM: Yes, sir. I thank y'all for the
opportunity to be educated on water.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's a continuing education.
MR. ODOM: Continue -- it will continue May the
22nd. What I have before you is our recommendations for
acceptance of the bids, and it is as follows: Wilson
Culverts, the corrugated metal pipe; Ergon for emulsion oils;
Martin Marietta for cold mix, black base; Vulcan Materials for
trap rock or paving aggregates. The equipment by the hour is
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by Mr. Schwartz, who is the low bid, and we recommend as first
contractor, but to retain that option for the others in case
there's certain equipment that we need that's bigger sizes and
all. Also, that we recommend that Lucky 3 gets the base
material, our Type A, our limestone rock. We put out 23 bids
-- or we contacted 23 people, sent out the packages to 23
people. I think there were seven to eight that were in
materials, whether it was Type C material or Type A. We got
one bid there as far as material, and that was Lucky 3, but we
did send out 23 packets. We called each one of them to make
sure that the address was correct, that we didn't miss it, and
they talked to them personally, and so we sent it out. We
thought we had a -- we had pretty good bids. And --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Where is Lucky 3?
MR. ODOM: Lucky 3 is towards Center Point, right
before you get into Center Point, to the left there.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Just right -- right after
Sutherland Road going east.
MR. ODOM: Yes. There's that tractor place that
does -- Corky's, and then there's a tractor place, and right
past that is a road that leads back down in there a couple of
miles back.
JUDGE TINLEY: Caldwell place.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: The old Caldwell place on
the north side of the road.
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MR. ODOM: Right now, we also recommend that there's
other places. I don't know why Jerry Wheatcraft didn't bid.
Walter Masters is out on 479. I've just been contacted by
Alan Keller Quarry; they have one out Harper Road. So, we
want that option to do that. And we certainly will use Lucky
3, but we still have by law that we can use other people up to
a certain point, and that has to do with location and trucking
and all. And even if I'd got that, I would have asked the
Court for multiple bids.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, you will use Lucky 3 if
they're the cheapest?
MR. ODOM: If they're the cheapest, they're the
closest in there, but we'll give them the opportunity to have
the first choice on it. But if I'm out there on 479, I
certainly don't wish to truck it from Center Point there. I
would go to Walter Masters out there.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I move approval of the bid
awards as recommended.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for approval
of the award of the bids as recommended by Mr. Odom. Any
question or discussion on the motion? All in favor of the
motion, signify by raising your right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
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JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Thank you,
Mr. Odom.
MR. ODOM: Yes, sir.
JUDGE TINLEY: Let's go to the next item, if we
might; consider, discuss, and take appropriate action to
consider abandoning, vacating, and discontinuing approximately
j 89.83 feet of Drummund Drive and set a public hearing for the
i same.
MR. ODOM: I don't see Mr. Jons here. Do you,
I Buster?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, I do not.
MR. ODOM: This is an item that came up last week,
and so I didn't get the chance to talk to Rit. He had left it
up here and talked to Buster, but this has to do with about
89 feet of road going into his boy's place right there. Rit
owns land, as well as his son owns property, and I've tried to
lay that out. It also fronts Lot 1 and 2 -- I'm sorry, Lot 2,
and Mr. Jons owns that, Lots 1 and 2. He also owns the one to
the left of Lot 2, as well as his boy owns up above. We have
no problems abandoning that. I had not had a chance to talk
to Rit, but on this -- on this plat for the property here, you
can see Paul Avery comes in within 23 feet of the corner of
Lot 1, and in Lot 2, there is a 30-foot private easement, and
we can -- and it's just on Lot 2. Our question would be -- or
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mine to Mr. Jons would be, does anybody else have access --
some type of access to -- to Drummund? Whether it's Paul
Avery or whether it's MacRae; I don't know.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I asked him that question,
and he told me no.
MR. ODOM: Okay. That would be the question I had.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'd rather for him to say
that in here, but --
MR. ODOM: If he doesn't, then, like I say, I -- we
have no problems. It's just 89 feet. The road turns back to
the left. It's of no use. It belongs to the property owners.
Mr. Jons owns the property around it. As long as no one has
access -- to my knowledge, from what he said to Buster, nobody
else has access.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Also, in the -- in his
petition to discontinue a road, a long time ago -- and we
haven't done -- we really haven't discontinued very much roads ''
in Kerr County through the last 20 years, but a long time ago,
when we were going to discontinue some footage like we're
talking about today, we would -- we would put a sign at the
beginning of the discontinued area and a sign at the end of
it. You know, somewhere in the law, it said that. But I
think there's a -- I don't know under what statute that is,
but there seems to be maybe a little bit of confusion over
which statute we're dealing with here. Do we -- and it seemed
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to me that's what he was saying, or that's what he said to me
verbally, is that, you know, you all -- the County has to go
out and put a sign at the beginning of the -- the property and
at the ending of the property. And we used to do it that way.
But I think Rex doesn't think that way. And I -- and I'd like
MR. EMERSON: Well, my theory on this matter is that
when you have a general law like the Transportation Code, and
you have a specific code that addresses subdivisions, which is
the case here, 'cause you're in a platted subdivision, the
specific statute takes precedence. And because of that, I
think you have to follow the rules that you have adopted under
your Subdivision Rules to discontinue this section of road.
MR. ODOM: And that's 6.OS.C, and it says that if
you abandon the -- the plat, or an easement or road, then
there is a procedure -- you go under B and C to do that. And
that's taken directly out of 232 Governmental Code. So, we've
always -- for 15 years, we've done that you have to put a
public notice for three weeks prior to that -- to that
abandonment. Now, Rit is saying 20 days, and I don't know
where that comes from, that he can post a petition. But this
is a platted subdivision. And, I mean --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And that brings my real
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something, but does Mr. Jons understand where we're coming
from? Does he need to understand? We don't care what he
thinks? We're just going to do it the way we think is right?
Or should we postpone this thing, or -- you know, I'm just a
little hesitant about doing something.
JUDGE TINLEY: Your question is do we need to follow
both, I think.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah.
JUDGE TINLEY: Both our Subdivision Rules and some
more general provision of state law that may indicate you got
to put a sign out there.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, he's thinking one way.
I don't -- you know, I don't want to cram something down his
throat until we understand. Did you have a visit with him?
MR. EMERSON: I called him and left a message, and
did not get a return phone call.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Why don't we set the public
hearing? We can act -- we can have the public hearing; they
can do their lawyer stuff and talk to each other.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Work out the details. That's
fine. That's what I'd like to do, but I'm just a little bit
hesitant of having -- having him thinking that we're doing one
thing, and we're really doing something else.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: He needs to be comfortable we're
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doing it the legal way.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: He needs to get his chops up
and fall in line with government.
MR. ODOM: What are we proposing? Are we saying,
"County maintenance ends here"? Is that what we're proposing
to do?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. Buster's saying that under
the Transportation Code, we have to post notice on the segment
of road for "X" number of days that says we're abandoning this
portion of it.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I didn't understand that,
I either.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's the way it used to be
~ done.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And Rex is saying, well, that's
well and good if you're not in a subdivision. If you're in a
subdivision, we follow Subdivision Rules.
MR. ODOM: Follow Subdivision Rules.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I move we set a public
hearing at 10:15 on May 22nd.
MR. ODOM: 10:15 or 10 o'clock?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 10:15.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Actually, I'd like to do it
about 10:13, just to -- you know, they stay --
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JUDGE TINLEY: Is that your motion?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It is my motion.
JUDGE TINLEY: And you want to make it --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 10:13, please.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: 10:13 it is. Motion made and
seconded to set a public hearing for discontinuing -- consider
abandoning, vacating, discontinuing approximately 89.83 feet
of Drummund Drive on May the 22nd, 2006, at 10:13 a.m.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you, Judge.
JUDGE TINLEY: Any question or discussion on that
motion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising your
right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
(NO response.)
JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Let's move
quickly to Item 8, resolution in support of Special Prosecutor
application for renewal of the V.A.W.A, grant funds from the
Office of the Governor, Criminal Justice Division, for Fiscal
2006-'07, to include language required by the Criminal Justice
Division. Yes, ma'am?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Before you launch into this,
I just have one question, and then I'm a very happy camper.
The word "revision," does that mean that we've changed
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something since last year in the verbiage?
MS. BAILEY: Actually, you've changed something
since a month or two ago, when you actually approved this
resolution. There were two typographical errors on there that
needed to be fixed, but more importantly, what I did when I ~
brought it to you a couple months ago was just copy the
previous year's resolution which had been approved by them.
In the interim, I guess they've added the requirement for the
i last two lines there in the resolution that says, "In the
event of loss or misuse of grant funds, the governing body
will return all funds to the Office of the Governor, Criminal
Justice Division." That, apparently, must be in there or they
won't approve the grant. So --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, that's a revision that's
I added?
MS. BAILEY: That's what I added from a couple
months ago. Otherwise, you've already approved it all. The
other two corrections were I had a typo on the date in the
first paragraph, and I was told that what I had done
previously is put the last -- this current year's grant
application number on there, and they're giving us a new
number, which is going to be e-mailed to Judge Tinley sometime
very soon, and then he'll be providing that to me, and that
will be the new number.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I move approval of the revised
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resolution.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for approval i
of the revised resolution as presented.
MS. BAILEY: Thank you. ~
JUDGE TINLEY: Any question or discussion? All in
favor of the motion, signify by raising your right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: Al] opposed, same sign.
i (NO response.)
JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. We'll move to
Item 9; consider, discuss, and take appropriate action on
interlocal agreement between the Upper Guadalupe River
Authority and Kerr County that provides match funding required
in the Texas Water Development Board contract for preliminary
planning and engineering for the Center Point wastewater
collection system. Commissioner Williams?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you, Judge. There
currently exists an interlocal agreement between U.G.R.A. and
Kerr County with respect to the responsibilities of the
parties for the Kerrville South wastewater project. That was
pretty detailed; goes into a lot of things that at this point
are not necessary for the Center Point wastewater study, which
is partially -- will be partially funded by T.W.D.B. What
this proposed agreement does is memorialize what's taking
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place; that the County has, in fact, received -- got favorable
approval of an agreement from T.W.D.B. for 50 percent of the
match required to do the study, and the U.G.R.A. is putting up
over $60,880, or 50 percent. And it talks about our
responsibilities as the contractor, which is required under
certain that happens and so forth. This has not yet been
reviewed by the County Attorney, and if the Court moves
forward with an approval, I would ask that it be pending
approval pending his final review of it.
There are a couple places in the agreement that need
to be changed. I would look -- under 3c, on the third line,
it talks about, "Similarly, County agrees it shall have no
responsibility for payment..." That should be "U.G.R.A.
agrees that it shall have no responsibility for payment to the
engineering consultants)." By contract with T.W.D.B., we
would be the ones to do that. Mr. Buck called to my attention
also that the signature line on the last page should be
changed to reflect Ronnie Pace as president, as opposed to
Janet Robinson. So, those are the explanations. Ready to
take questions, or I would move -- move its approval pending
final review by the County Attorney.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I want to discuss it before --
JUDGE TINLEY: This proposed agreement is similar to
one that was provided in the earlier arrangement when U.G.R.A.
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assisted with the Kerrville South wastewater project?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's different, Judge, and
it doesn't go into such things as ownership, which that
agreement goes into, construction, turning over the project to
U.G.R.A., and how they -- and then, finally, their dealings
with the City with respect to treatment of wastewater. This
merely deals with --
JUDGE TINLEY: Preliminary engineering.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- preliminary engineering
and the requirements of the match and so forth, and doesn't go
beyond that.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: My concern is that -- I mean,
i unless there's a time reason that we have to do it today, I
would rather get a final version the County Attorney has
looked at before we vote on it.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We can do that. We are
under -- well, I guess we still have time. We're under a June
constraint to have everything signed and put together as a
package for T.W.D.B.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: 'Cause I just -- I hate to have
things approved that -- while they're still working copies.
JUDGE TINLEY: Let's assume for the moment that the
Court takes this up at our second meeting of this month. Is
there going to be adequate time for the U.G.R.A. Board to
staff it and work it and approve it before the deadline that
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you're looking at?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mr. Buck, do you know the
answer to that?
MR. BUCK: The answer is yes. Yes, we can.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You still have plenty of
time for your Board and so forth?
MS. BOCK: We can accommodate that.
JUDGE TINLEY: If we can still get under the June
wire for T.W.D.B., that's fine. We'll send it down to the
County Attorney and get his point of view. Okay. Anything
further on that particular agenda item?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I've got one question.
What is a regional wastewater facility plan? If I had one
here, what would I be looking at?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Regional wastewater facility
planning is how T.W.D. designates a certain pot of money, and i
that money can be for either water or wastewater purposes. i
That's more their designation than it is ours.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think your question is, what
are we -- what's the end result of this 120,000? What are we
going to get for 120,000?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Will it show me all the
connections, for example?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What we're going to get is a
plan -- an engineering plan that will detail for us the -- the
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whole scope of the project, territory. It will detail for us
the best options in terms of which way the effluent goes, east
or west. It will -- it will give us enough information so
that we can refine that down and know what the ultimate cost
to the ratepayer after hooking on should be per month and so
forth, all that detail. I misunderstood your question,
Commissioner.
JUDGE TINLEY: Anything further on that agenda item?
We'11 move to the next agenda item; consider, discuss, and
take appropriate action authorizing a Request for
Proposals/Qualifications process for consultants and
registered engineers to provide basic and special engineering
services for the Center Point wastewater facilities project.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: This, too, is required. We
have to do RFQ's to find engineers or consultants willing to
move forward and do this work for us for the prescribed
amount, in accordance with the scope of work that was approved
by Texas Water Development Soard. Grantworks has offered to
do the administration of the RFQ process for us pro bono, and
all I need is the Court's approval to get this process
underway.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I like that pro bono part.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Was that a motion?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll second it.
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JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for approval
of the agenda item in accordance with the -- with the
materials furnished. Any question or discussion?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah, I do have a question. Why
are they doing it pro Bono? I mean, I know Grantworks is --
we've done work with them before. They're -- I can't imagine
them doing it unless they're expecting something at the end of
this or at some point during the process.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, because they've done a
lot of work for us and have been paid for it. They don't
typically do work of this nature under T.W.D.B. It's a little
new for them. I think they'd like to do it. They've not
managed the process under T.W.D.B. guidelines in the past.
They also were probably anticipating future opportunities with
Kerr County.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, they're -- because of future
and -- past and future dealings, they're -- this will be a
good way for them to keep their foot in the door.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's the way I see it.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay.
JUDGE TINLEY: Any other questions or comments? All
in favor of the motion, signify by raising your right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
(NO response.)
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JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Item 11;
consider, discuss, and take appropriate action on hiring
consulting engineer to review subdivision engineering
documents. Mr. Letz?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Brief comment before we
ultimately pass on this today. The -- I was hoping to have
some names to bring forward, or a way to approach this,
really, and I really don't have that finalized. The -- I've
talked with some engineers about this, and what I've come up
with is -- what I'm hoping to bring back next court is, one of
our adjoining counties has some engineers that do this basic
function for their counties, and trying to maybe bring that
engineer in on a contract basis. The reason I like that
approach is that it avoids any conflict or having local -- one
local engineer pointing the finger at another engineer, which
they're very reluctant to do.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I agree. Great thought. Are
you talking with somebody in Kendall or Gillespie?
CQMMI5SIONEF. LETZ: Gillespie.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Good, I'm liking it more.
Good deal. Great thought.
MR. WILLIAMS: So, anyway -- and, again, I just
missed -- Wayne Wells is the individual, and we just have not
been able to hook up by phone to see if he has any interest in
pursuing this or not, so I have no idea.
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COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I like it.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: So I'll bring that back at the
next meeting, hopefully. That's it.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Anything else on that agenda
item?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge, I need a break. I'm
having to think.
JUDGE TINLEY: Be patient. Be patient, I'm going to
get there. You're reading my mind. I want you to know that
your mental telepathy is working very, very well.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And it's wearing me down;
that's what I'm trying to tell you.
JUDGE TINLEY: We are at the witching hour now, so
we'll be in recess for 15 minutes. Is that going to be
adequate?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's pretty close. Pretty
good.
(Recess taken from 10:31 a.m. to 10:47 a.m.)
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, let's come back to order, if we
might, and get back to our agenda. Item Number 12, consider
and discuss the responses to the organizational development
survey and plan an approach to identifying changes in the
organization of the County's work that will improve
productivity and/or functioning capability. Commissioner
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Nicholson?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: l put this on the agenda
we're going to make any decisions today about how we might do
things differently. I gave each of the members of the Court
a -- a document that I prepared, just going through them, that
had ideas about big pots of organization functions, how -- how
things could be grouped together. T did that from a point of
starting up Kerr County tomorrow, would we organize our work
like it's organized now? The answer is probably no. It's
evolved over time and you've picked up different things, and
it's a bit of a patchwork organization. So, I -- I went
through the various functions of work that are performed in
the county and classified it into basically six different
buckets of work that has -- has some similarity in function,
and then tried to place each of those in those categories.
The first one I called Code Enforcement, and that's
one -- I don't pretend that these are accurate or the way that
you would sort things out if you were starting from scratch.
It's just a document that might stimulate some thinking about
opportunities for doing things different. So, when you look
at the work that's done in terms of the function, being
enforcing court orders or laws, you include, for example,
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O.S.S.F., Solid Waste, Animal Control, subdivision rules,
floodplain rules, perhaps county engineer work. And then I
went on with the category of General Administration, Law
Enforcement, Buildings and Maintenance, Financial
Administration, Judicial, and some miscellaneous functions.
Here, again, they're -- sorting things out that way is not the
start of a proposal or a recommendation to do anything
differently. It's just a document that might stimulate our
thinking about how we can better organize our work. Really,
what I'd like to see come out of our discussion today is a
plan for where -- what we're going to do next. We got a lot
of information from supervisors and elected officials, and
what do we want to do with that information?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think one of the things I'd
like to see is that we've received surveys back about what
they're doing. I would like to put it out for the elected
officials and department heads to let us -- give us some
feedback back. And I see Barbara sitting in the audience, so
I'll pick on her. You know, she has her constitutional
duties, and then she has a bunch of other stuff that we've,
one way or another, got into that office. I don't know if it
was before her or after her, when you first came --
MS. NEMEC: Before.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Before. Do those -- does that
make sense from your standpoint? I mean, is there an easier
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way to organize? And I'm just kind of -- kind of thinking out
of the box on a lot of this stuff. I know we -- the Auditor
and that department reports to the District Judges. You know,
some of what they do, can they come under -- it seems we have
a real duplication there. I know we've got to follow the
logic for Auditors being under District Judges. Okay. we --
that's the law; we have to do it that way. But a lot of the
auditing function of paying bills and going through that, it
seems to me, could come out of the Treasurer's office. I
mean, it's just -- I don't understand what really -- so I'd be
really interested to hear from -- you know, because, to me, an
audit function is very different from what our Auditor is
doing, or our Auditor's office is doing. "Audit" means to
check to make sure things are done right. We pay all our
bills through the Auditor's office. Well, why? Anyway, so
that's the kind of thing that I look at as to -- you know, I
would like to put it out for other elected officials and
department heads to kind of say, do they see some things that
we could reorganize, reshuffle things a little bit?
MS. NEMEC: There are a lot of counties that have
the Treasurer's office. How it got switched around, that was
before my time; I don't know what the logic was for it.
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COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I'm -- it's a little bit of
a -- on that, the reason I brought that one up, it's a
little -- somewhat self-serving, I guess, from the Court's
standpoint, is that things under the District Judges, we don't
have a whole lot of control over, And we don't have a whole
lot of control over things in your office either, but we
probably have a little bit more control over how things
operate in your office than we do things that operate out of
the District Judges. And not that I want -- you know, and I
just think we need to kind of look at how things are
organized, and just the whole thing, I think now is a good
time to look at it.
The other thing, you know, a lot of the -- the
personnel side of it, you know, to me, there's no reason or
logic that it's in the Treasurer's department. I mean, that's
not a logical thing, in my -- that's an H.R. function; it's
not a Treasurer's function necessarily. But there's some
other things that we do that are probably more in that -- to
me. So, anyway, I'd just be interested to see what they think
about it, get some feedback from them. And, probably -- I
don't -- it's such a big topic; I don't know how you cover it
in a workshop and get something meaningful done. But also, I
know everyone's busy, and just by putting it out, asking for
them to give us feedback, they probably don't have the time
and likely won't do it.
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COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON; Well, our questionnaire
asked for feedback, and we got -- we got some. Not --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: No.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Some chose not to answer.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Maintenance had a -- go ahead,
Bill.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I just had a couple -- just
a couple notations here. I'm curious about it. I appreciate
Dave taking the time to study county government and its
organization, 'cause it's unlike anything else in our -- in
our life, however it's structured. But we've already -- and
we've made some departures, which I wonder how we get things
back together. For example, Dave shows subdivision and
floodplain under Code Enforcement. The reality is that it's
under Road and Bridge, and Road and Bridge is a separate
department totally from Buildings and Maintenance. The
Auditor and the District Courts are linked because the
District Courts', I guess, appointment of the Auditor is a
check-and-balance type function, which the District Courts, by
state law and Constitution, becomes a check and balance on our
budgetary and -- and things we do, and so I'm curious about
that. I'm also curious about Juvenile Probation, as to
whether or not it is under law enforcement, or does it fall
under judicial? And then I note that voter registration,
which is an important thing, must -- unless I missed it, I
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didn't see it there, and that -- that falls under Tax
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: One of the things that
organization experts look at when they look at organizations,
the cost of management, and they usually measure things like
span control; what's the average number of employees reporting
to a supervisor? So, if one organization's got 14 reporting
to a supervisor, and the other one's got seven, well, the cost
of management might be twice as -- twice as much. And the
other one is levels of management; do you have different
levels of supervision you can -- when you can do it with two?
And then the third thing is whether or not you ought to be
i doing the function at all, and that's where outsourcing comes
i gin; things that can be done better and less expensively by
somebody else, they should be done that way. So, when you --
when I group them into these large organization buckets, I can
see that we -- compared to some organizations, we've probably
got too many chiefs compared to the Indians. And, again, a
whole lot of that's driven by -- by state law. You have to
have one of these and one of those, and so you're limited to
what you can do.
JUDGE TINLEY: Well, as Commissioner Williams said,
the anomaly of organization of county government puts some
mandates on us to -- that are a given start point, and that
may not comport with using the normal management practices or
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personnel management or structuring of function like you're
~ attempting to do here. You're basically coming with a
function-based breakdown, but I think the start point
necessarily is, as the -- as the survey went out, what are
your -- what are your constitutional duties in this
department? And that's a given, and you can't change the
model there. You've got to start with that, because state law
mandates that or Constitution, one or the other.
But then, beyond that, you get to look at
functionality. Which is -- which makes better sense? Which
flows better? Commonality of function, things of that nature,
and that gives you a -- maybe some efficiencies that you don't
otherwise have if they're located somewhere else. But as to
the nonconstitutional or state law-mandated functions of each
of those offices, I would certainly be interested in what each
elected official or department head was doing now that they
feel is more appropriate somewhere else, and why they feel
that way. And, on the other hand, as to those
aren't doing now, but they feel like would be appropriate
because of function or -- or particular abilities that they
have wLthin their office, would be more appropriate in their
office, and why as to -- as to that change. That's what I'd
really like to see, are those kinds of responses from those
two areas.
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COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I still -- I still think --
and I think we're getting close to what we're trying to do
here. I actually have not been able to really capture your
vision on this deal, but there's some things I like about it,
and I think -- and my thinking is, I want to go a step outside
is -- is constitutional duties. If we could list those things
is to provide for the County Clerk and her office to run in an
efficient manner -- I can't remember how all that's worded,
but we're -- we're supposed to do all these wonderful things,
and then have the separate list of the things that we do do,
throughout the years that we've added on. As an example, all
the social organizations; Big Brothers, Big Sisters --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: CASA.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: CASA, all of those. You
Constitution, and evaluate those things. I mean,
Constitution -- as the Judge says, you know, I clearly see
that that's not a debating point at all. We do those things.
But I think that we will see layers and layers of things that
we do and spend public money on that's just been laid on top
of our -- our duties, and I'd really like to see -- and I've
been talking about this for years. I'd really like to see us
sit down and evaluate all of those things and see what we can
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live with and what the taxpayers -- I think we've come to that
point financially, I really and truly do, of what the
taxpayers can -- what can they afford? That's the question.
We'd love to do lots of things, but what can you afford to do?
And I think that this county is at that point. What can you
-- what can we afford to do? And look at those things that
are outside the Constitution that we do, and see what we can
live with and what we can live without. That's what I'd like
to see.
I don't think that there is -- in the County Clerk's
office, I don't think that they do many things outside the
Constitution at all. I think probably Barbara does, because
she's been asked to, like insurance and personnel and those
kinds of things. But we do a bunch. I think this Court
probably does all of them combined; spend money on things that
we're not required to do, it's just a nice thing to do, back
when Kerr County was a bunch of rich kids, that we had a lot
of money. Before the juvenile facility broke us, we had the
money to do all these things, and through the years, just
added them on, added them on, added them on, and added them
on. And now is a super appropriate time to take a look at
that and be real about it, I think.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: So, for a little bit, I
think, from the lack of an economy of scale, if our population
in Kerr County doubled overnight, we wouldn't have to increase
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our employment by double. In other words, I think small
counties like us have more difficulty being efficient on a per
capita basis than a big county like -- like Harris County. I
don't know that. That's pretty extravagant, but logically,
you might think that might be the case.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's amazing how population
drives all of this. A former County Commissioner gave me a
copy of a budget about 13, 14 years ago, that this Court
approved, and it was about one-fourth the size of the current
budget. Population drives a lot of things.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Did it -- has the budget
grown in proportion with the population growth?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Population and the tax base,
mm-hmm, sure.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Where do we go from here?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Lunch. (Laughter.)
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think, you know, I recommend
putting it back on the next agenda again. I think there's a
-- I'd like to recategorize your categories a little bit.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I think a little bit
different. I think -- like, the library's not on here.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I made some notes while
everybody was talking.
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COMMISSIONER LETZ: A few things that aren't there.
I'd probably structure it a little bit different. We're going
i to have a County Clerk; we're gong to have a Treasurer. Kind
of look what's under there, and, I mean, that's the framework
we have to work within. Then you have to figure out what
works best in those departments. I mean, they have their
constitutional duties, obviously, but some of these things are
more flexible. As an example of something, I mean,
Collections. To me, that's a financial thing, and it ought to
be tied in with other financial offices; doesn't need to be a
whole department. I mean, basically, we're paying the
supervisor there and paying a supervisor somewhere else for
doing the same thing. Or it should go under -- maybe under
judicial. I mean, they're mostly -- the collections that
they're doing are coming out of the judicial side. Maybe
~ that's where that belongs. But it seems that, you know, the
functions are necessary, but I don't know that we need
departments for each of these. I mean, we have a lot of one-
or two-people departments.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think we could have some
I think that`s where Commissioner
Nicholson was originally coming from. He's got a pretty
lengthy background in -- in management, particularly personnel
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management, and I think he should be the chosen one to keep
wrassling with this problem for us. That's not to mean that
the rest of us don't have input, but I want to keep massaging
it.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, as Commissioner Letz
mentioned, the library and two other three other things
that -- as I glance at it, that are also part of it. EMS, a
big-ticket item for us. Indigent health care, big-ticket item
for us. These are things that we're called upon to do; in
some cases, mandated to do, like indigent health.
JUDGE TINLEY: In connection with the indigent
health care, there's a kind of sort of proposal out there that
maybe we're going to bring that back in-house, as opposed to
continuing to handle it -- the administration aspect of it
outside. And you -- we're kind of at the beginning point, as
you said, if we were, 150 years ago, figuring out how we were
going to structure this. So, that would certainly be one of
those items.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And another thing just to keep
in the back of our minds. We will be making a change out here
within -- at the end of the year, as our -- as Kathy goes on
to her new judicial responsibilities, and we need to keep that
into the mix as to how that fits in. And whatever that
replacement -- whoever that replacement is, you know, look at
needs that we're looking for.
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COMMISSIONER BALDWIN
But
turned into a major, major expense for the taxpayers of the
county. First of all, I -- I'm a fan of the indigent health
care program. I -- I believe that the government -- the local
government, if we're required to do anything, is to take care
of our needy neighbors and our needy citizens, those folks
that truly -- that truly make the indigent health care list.
I think that government is supposed to take care of those
folks that are down and out, have absolutely no other place to
go. That is what government does.
However, I believe that the indigent health care
]ist has -- the criteria -- I just think it's turned into an
unfair issue. We have people on there that are tapping into
the system that are property owners, that are vehicle owners,
that are -- you know, that kind of thing, and so it's -- I
didn't know about the move to move it back into the county
system, but I'm all for that. I just think if we ran -- if
that thing was run right, then we would be doing the right
thing. Those people that are really in need are the ones that
would be used. But I was going to ask Number 4 -- you said
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that he was the chosen one? Is that like --
JUDGE TINLEY: In my mind, he's the chosen one.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Or is that ordained, "The
Ordained One"? Or, "0 great and mighty one"? Or --
JUDGE TINLEY: A11 of the above.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All of the above,
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Or the retiring-soon one.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, that's what I'm afraid
I of.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Well, at least I'm here to
defend myself, unlike when I was assigned to be liaison to the
library.
JUDGE TINLEY: We might be able to figure out a way
to make that more permanent, if you'd like.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Permanent?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I recommend we put it on the
next agenda and kind of discuss it again, and maybe try to
come up with a formula that Dave can look at.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Let's all of us come up
I
with some more thoughts about it between now and then.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Glenn has a --
JUDGE TINLEY: Mr. Holekamp?
MR. HOLEKAMP: I have a comment, possibly question.
When we -- I know we got into a new computer system here in
the courthouse. Now, we've been using the same format, the
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same line items for as long as I can remember here. At some
point, it would really be nice if we could retool that thing,
shuffle stuff around and get them properly placed, See, we --
each year we compare line item to line item. I'm going to --
just for example, I might be unusual from the standpoint I got
four budgets, but if we could move them around a little bit,
not change the bottom lines, total, but change them around to
where they would reflect more closely what those people
actually do and where they work, it would be very helpful.
And, you know, I -- I'm not faulting the Judge by any means,
because he has these numbers that he's given on -- on the
schedule. But I think -- I think we're at a point where we
could identify and place these budgets properly. I -- I think
it would reflect better what they actually do, especially my
department, where I've qot so many different areas that we do.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think -- in that vein, I think
we could do a whole ]ot of simplification in that process. We
have office supplies; we have -- I mean, there's so many
different categories. Lease copier supplies, regular office
supplies, lease copier maintenance. I mean, those are all
basically office functions, and it would give -- we could get
rid of all these budget amendments we're doing if we could
have broader categories that, you know cover running your
office. I mean, I really don't care if it's going for lease
copier paper or -- it real]y doesn't make a bit of difference
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JUDGE TINLEY: What you're talking about is -- is,
rather than a narrow line-item budget method of budgeting, a
more general category of budgeting personnel, office equipment
and supplies, and maybe capital expenditures. Very broad
items, and, you know, how they handle it within that
particular office. You know, it doesn't have to be posted.
It doesn't have to be office supplies. It doesn't have to be
other items of -- of minor equipment purchases. But --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And maybe that's something we
could ask the Auditor's office to come up with some categories
that work a little bit easier, and I think that would also
save a lot of efficiency and a lot of time. It takes a lot of
time to code all this stuff down to all these lengthy codes
and figure out, well, is it a -- what kind of a purchase is
that? To me, it's unnecessary.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It would certainly do away
with a lot of $1.50 budget amendments throughout the course of
the year.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: That's pretty antiquated, I
think, the budgeting categories. I was thinking about this.
Relative to this subject, I think John Trolinger gave us a
copy of something about e-government, electronic government.
And I got -- that struck me, and I got to thinking about that.
When I fly -- it's either Southwest or Northwest Airlines.
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With one or two of the airlines now, when I get to the
airport, I, you know, touch the screen, --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: All of them.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: -- get my ticket and do
some other stuff, pick my chair and all that. The time will
come when -- it could happen now -- when a citizen comes to
the courthouse to transact business; he doesn't have to talk
to a person.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I think that the -- in
that area, the computer system is supposed to get us closer
there, of letting people do more and more of this online, so
we don't need to have them come to the courthouse. And, you
know, one of the ways to encourage people not to come to the
courthouse is if they have to wait a little bit when they get
here. You know, you don't want to make it unreasonable, but I
know that you -- you know, I'm not into the Tax Assessor's
office every day getting a license or paying something for a
vehicle, but rarely do you wait more than two or three
minutes, if that, in there. Well, I mean, I think a -- to me,
a 5- to 10-minute wait is not inappropriate to get a license
tag. Or same in Jannett's office. I mean, you know, you
don't want people waiting 30, 40 minutes for a service, but I
don't think in this day, it's -- you know, we need to have
counters open all day long. I mean, a short wait is not a
problem. And I think if -- if people don't want that, 'cause
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-- and I think one of the reasons we probably have that --
that open space is 'cause I think a lot of people do stuff
online. A lot of people send their license thing in through
the mail. The work needs to be done still, and you may not
have an actual personnel change, but you can at least get a
little bit more efficient use of the personnel.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I just want to say one more
thing. My goal, what I would really -- my wish, what I'd
really like to see come out of here, is the time that this
Commissioners Court approves a budget, and it's a real -- the
real thing, and we don't have department heads and other
elected officials coming back 15 days later amending the
budget. Now, I don't -- we've done -- we've done budgets 49
different ways, and I don't know the answer to it, other than
get the elected official and department head to build their
budget what -- you know, that's reasonable, and we approve it,
and say, "See you next year." Do not walk back in here until
next year. I don't know how you do that, but I -- that's my
goal, is to see that.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Some of that can be
accomplished like Mr. Holekamp mentioned earlier --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's what's he's talking
about.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- in terms of line items,
what they are, and we can establish better categories instead
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COMMISSIONER LETZ: All that takes time, and takes
DODGE TINLEY: We fleshed that one out? Let's move
on to 13; consider, discuss, and take appropriate action
regarding the restructuring of the Kerr County Juvenile
Detention Facility Center, including, but not limited to
personnel, salaries, and building configuration.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Judge, I'm going to ask that
that be taken off of the Commissioners Court agenda, and it
has already been suggested for placement by an addendum to the
Kerr County Juvenile Facility Board of Trustees agenda, and
that would be a more appropriate place for that discussion to
take place.
DODGE TINLEY: Very well. Anybody else on the Court
have anything to offer on that? Let's quickly take up our
department reports, then, under section -- under Item 14.
Animal Control, I've been advised that they're working a
special case in connection with abuse to an animal, I believe
I heard, and will not have the opportunity to be with us
today. If I'm not mistaken, I think we fairly frequently get
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reports from them out there at the facility. Let's move to
the Extension Office. I note that Mr. Walston is with us.
MR. WALSTON: Good morning.
JUDGE TINLEY: Good morning, sir.
MR. WALSTON: Good to see you gentlemen this
morning. I appreciate the opportunity to come visit with you
and give you an update as to what we've been getting
accomplished over the last couple of months out in the County
Extension Office. To start with, our Ag/Natural Resource
subjects, and on February 7th, we hosted a fruit tree
management workshop, which is an annual event, out at Ingram
and Hunt area, and Dr. Larry Stein -- we had about 40
homeowners, gardeners, producers come out, and Dr. Stein
worked -- worked us through a cool season management program,
pruning, selection on varieties as far as planting, and some
things like that. And it's always a well-attended program,
and the producers always really enjoy it.
March the 28th, Dr. Michael Masser -- we hosted a
pond management program at Stablewood Springs, and had a
really good program on identifying various aquatic weed types,
how to control those weed types, as well as stocking ponds
with the various aquatic species of fish types -- species, and
we had, I believe, about 40 producers at that one as well. It
was really well received, and the producers enjoyed it and got
a lot out of it. He also covered pond management as far as
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fertilization and numerous other subjects. Of course, our
private applicator certification, we just had that, I believe,
this last week, and we're still certifying private
applicators, and also recertifying those that have got their
license and continuing to need to get those CEU's, and so we
try to offer those as much as possible and at every event.
Our Hill Country Master Gardeners have just
finalized their last -- their fifth class. They're actively
working on hosting the 2007 State Master Gardener meeting.
We'll be hosting about 600 Master Gardeners in April of 2007.
We're trying to get -- our host hotel is -- will be at the Inn
of the Hills. It's a three-day program. They'll come in on
Thursday, tour the Hill Country on Friday, and Saturday have a
full day of meetings and educational seminars.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: How many did you say? How
many people?
MR. WALSTON: There will be about 600.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: How do you tour 600 people?
MR. WALSTON: With a lot of buses.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Really? Who pays for this?
MR. WALSTON: It'll have to come through sponsors,
and -- and they'll be paying for it themselves. It'll come in
as part of the registration fee.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay.
MR. WALSTON: And, so, it was quite an undertaking a
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year ago when we started this. And they were excited about it
and wanted to do it, and so they said, of course, you know,
600 is -- is -- they can pretty well get 600 anywhere, so when
we're talking about coming to the Hill Country, we may be
pushing over 700, 750. So --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Are they going to have a trade
show and things of that nature as well? Or exhibitors, or
just --
MR. WALSTON: They'll have some exhibitors. We'll
have exhibitors that -- sponsors that will -- and we're
working on all the -- everything's going to be set up there at
the Inn of the Hills, and we're going to have the booths and
things there inside. So --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Good.
MR. WALSTON: Trying to find a place to house 600
was -- you know, and transportation is our big deal. But
they're going really well, they're really active, and
everything is -- they're helping out on the phone banks and at
the office, and things are moving along real smoothly. Moving
into our 4-H and youth areas, of course, the past three
months, I've been pretty well tied up since the middle of
January with going to stock shows at Forth Worth, San Antone,
Houston, San Angelo, and Austin, along with our district show,
and this year we had 88 Kerr County 4-H members competed in
the five major shows. They generated $14,700 in premium from
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the sale of their livestock. Also, we -- this year, we hauled
some wool and mohair and livestock judging teams. The wool
team won champion wool team at San Antonio, as well as San
Angelo, and then was reserve wool judging team at Houston.
So, the kids were pretty excited about going into Houston and
trying to win the triple crown. So, unfortunately, they were
a little short, but they're excited and they're going. We
just got back Saturday from going to Ozona, so the judging
teams are active and going. We also are moving into --
JUDGE TINLEY: Let me ask you, if I might,
approximately how many entries -- judging team entries were
there at Houston?
MR, WALSTON: Houston is -- this was their first
five teams. And in San Antonio, I believe they had 16 teams,
and in San Angelo, six to eight teams, I think. So, it's --
it's one of those things that there's -- it's not a real large
program -- contest, but those teams that are there are there
year-in, year-out, and it gets pretty competitive with our
neighbors in Kendall and Kimball and Sutton. And, so, it's --
you know, we're a pretty close-knit bunch, but we don't mind
competing against each other. So, moving into our educational
presentations and our method demonstrations, what we've known
for a long time is what we call our share-the-fun method
demonstrations, and which we'll be having our county roundup
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April the 30th, I believe, is that Sunday, and I want to
invite y'all to come out. All our kids will be giving their
presentations on that Sunday afternoon, and --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: The 30th?
MR. WALSTON: If that's a Sunday. It'll be that
Sunday. I believe it's the 30th.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes.
MR. WALSTON: Okay. That Sunday afternoon, we'll
be -- we'll be having it, I believe, starting at 2 o'clock.
And we've got 31 Kerr County 9-H'ers that will be competing at
our district roundup, and that includes method demonstrations,
share-the-fun public speaking opportunities for these kids,
and it will be individuals as well as teams. So, we're
excited about that. That will -- our district contest will be
May the 6th. And, so -- and another thing I want to be sure
and mention; Laurinda has just gotten back from Washington,
D.C., and we've talked to y'all about our Salvation Army
program that we've worked with them. That is operated off of
a grant; that's a Building Community Inclusion grant. That is
to include handicapped as well as any other youth in -- in the
4-H program. She traveled to Washington, D.C. and represented
Kerr County as well as Texas 4-H on that S.C.I. grant, and I
thought she did an excellent job. And with that program,
she's starting to get some recognition from that, and she's
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also going to be going to Texas A & M in the next week or so
to be recognized, and she was recognized at the district level
last week on the work she's doing for those kids. So, I think
our program's off and running really smoothly.
Another thing I'd like to mention, our 9-H clubs
donated -- raised $2,000 for the M.L. Chartier scholarship
fund, and in hopes of helping that scholarship fund get
started. So, everything's moving -- moving real smoothly.
And we'll be, like I say, gearing up with 4-H as far as our
judging teams and things. We've also got numerous other field
days and programs coming on here in April and May as far as
our Hill Country Living 101, which is for new land owners that
are coming in the county. It's a two-day program to where
they're able to come in and learn about what it's like living
in the hill country and what programs are out there for them
to look at. So --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do you tell them about the
burn ban?
MR. WALSTON: Well --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Kind of like that?
MR. WALSTON: Yeah. And that's -- that's some of
the things that -- you know, sometimes we don't promote to
certain people, but sometimes we do.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You're way too nice.
JUDGE TINLEY: Anybody on the Court have any
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questions for Mr. Walston?
COMMISSIONER HALDWIN: Thank you, sir.
JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, sir. Appreciate you being
~ here.
MR. WALSTON: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Good report,
JUDGE TINLEY: Environmental Health.
MR. ARREOLA: Good morning.
JUDGE TINLEY: Good morning, sir.
MR. ARREOLA: I want to try this real quick and just
have some charts to give you, be self-explanatory.
(Discussion off the record.)
MR. ARREOLA: The first one there is just an overall
performance of the O.S.S.F. department. It just tells what
our goal is for the year, and how we're doing in the middle of
the year. Six months passed, and we're right at the mark
where we think we should be. Applications and revenue are up
from last year, and going just on target on that. The
complaints are under control; they're being investigated on
time, and we have been receiving less than last year, so
that's a positive. We also been developing a 1Lttle bit of
computer programs to make it more efficient and make it
faster, and it is working.
The second chart you have in there is, we are
responding -- our response time to the professionals in the
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industry, how we -- how we're responding, and to give them
approvals for installations. State law requires 30 days for
us to respond, and you can see there, 95.5 percent, it's 1 to
15 days. It's normally three days, but we just mark it as
less than 15 days. So, it's -- we're doing pretty good in
that area too. The other chart is a requirement by the state
law also. We are supposed to track all the aerobic treatment
units. We are doing that, and we are having people out of
compliance getting back into compliance. Total units in the
county, it's 1,353. That's aerobic units only. And of those,
only 81 are without a contract, so that it's a -- by
percentage, there's about 6 percent of the total is without
it. And then the breakdown of why they are out -- without a
contract is also there, if you have any questions on that.
That's basically how O.S,S.F. is doing.
The next chart is for solid waste. The numbers you
have in front of you, it's the same period of time from last
year to this year. It's fiscal year, so it's October 1st to
last day of March. We've been receiving a little knit more
I
i cases this year than last year. The response time has been a
lot slower because of the personnel problem, but we're still
working on it as hard as we can. The next is just the -- the
monthly report. And that's basically what I have, and if you
have any questions?
JUDGE TINLEY: Any questions for Mr. Arreola?
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COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Enforcement. How many have
been turned over to the County Attorney for enforcement? How
many cases?
MR. ARREOLA: Number of cases, I don't have exactly
a number year-to-date. Last month, we did -- I can tell you
real quick. Four -- no, let me see where that is. I don't
have the number here with me. I can get you that, but we've
been doing probably about four or five that we turned in.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Last year?
MR. ARREOLA: No, last month.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Last month.
MR. ARREOLA: Yes. Most of them -- all of them got
i resolved. And that includes violations of aerobic units also,
so those are not too difficult to deal with. But what we've
turned in as an enforcement, we're now at zero that is pending
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to be resolved.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you.
i JUDGE TINLEY: Any other questions for Mr. Arreola?
~ Thank you, sir. Appreciate you being here.
MR. ARREOLA: Thank you.
JUDGE TINLEY: What's the Court's pleasure on
winding up the Court's business quickly on the payment of the
bills and then going to --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Go ahead.
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JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, okay. Let's move on, then, to
Section 4 of the agenda, if we might, payment of the bills.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do we have an Auditor?
JUDGE TINLEY: We got a Sheriff going to summon the
Auditor. Do we have any questions on the bills?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No. A comment here, though.
I really like this new -- the new program. One -- first thing
about it that I like a lot, I don't see any -- not one bill
from the Commissioners Court. So --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Next month.
JUDGE TINLEY: Well --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I'm just saying it
looks good right now. But I know the County Judge is a pretty
heavy spender, $40 for the month.
JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, I jumped out there and put a
pretty good size dent in my budget. Anybody else have any
questions about the bills? Comments?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: i move we pay the bills.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded to pay the
bills. Any questions or comments? All in favor of the
motion, signify by raising your right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
{No response.)
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JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Budget
amendments. Budget Amendment Request Number 1.
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir. We have a bill to pay a
Court-appointed attorney out of the 216th District Court, and
we are short $72.47. This will be an ongoing thing, I have a
feeling. We want to go ahead and move it out of the Civil
Court-Appointed Attorney line item up to Court-Appointed
Attorney.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So moved.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for approval
of Budget Amendment Request Number 1. Any question or
comment?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Question. I just want to be
clear here. We're six months into the budget, and we budgeted
$90,000 for Court-appointed attorneys in 216th District --
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- and they're out of money?
MS. WILLIAMS: (Nodded.)
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay.
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you.
MS. WILLIAMS: You're welcome.
JUDGE TINLEY: Any other questions or comments? All
in favor of the motion, signify by raising your right hand.
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(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. The motion
does carry. Budget Amendment Request Number 2.
MS. WILLIAMS: Basically, this is the same as Budget
Amendment Number 1, only this is in the 198th District Court.
We have a couple of bills, but these are on Court-appointed
services. These are for a couple of bills to pay an
investigator on a Court-appointed case. We want to move
$1,]52.68 out of Civil Court-Appainted Attorneys line item and
move it up to the Court-Appointed Services in 198th District
Court.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Question, Ms. Williams.
MS. WILLIAMS: Sir?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: In your opinion, have we
underbudgeted in both of those categories, or are the expenses
extraordinarily high this year?
MS. WILLIAMS: I think the expense are just a little
high this year. These are things that we can't really
anticipate.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So moved.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded to approve
Budget Amendment Request Number 2. Any questions or comments?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let me make it clear here.
We're six months into the budget, and this line's broke.
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MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you.
MS. WILLIAMS: You're welcome.
JUDGE TINLEY: Any other questions or comments? All
in favor of the motion, signify by raising your right hand,
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
(No response.)
JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. Budget
Amendment Request Number 3.
MS. WILLIAMS: Okay, This involves the Detention
Maintenance budget in general fund. We have a couple of bills
that we're holding that we need to pay, and there are not
adequate funds in either one of these line items, the first
one being the Maintenance and Custodial Supplies. We have a
bill for $425 that needs to be paid, and in the Detention
Repairs line item, we have a bill for 1,695.50. We need
$1,010.64 to be able to pay that. Again, as -- like when I
was here last court meeting, there is nowhere in the general
i fund that I can see to take the money from, so I'm leaving it
I up to the discretion of the Court to guide me.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Fund 10-515, is that --
that's under Glenn?
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay.
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COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Have we used the other
moneys that -- unexpended moneys in the Marketing line item?
Have those been used up?
MS. WILLIAMS: No, sir, We do have some moneys Left
in that Marketing line item that we could probably reallocate
over here to take care of these bills.
COMMISSIONER SALDWIN: How much?
MS. WILLIAMS: I would say probably around $4,000,
because I do have -- the next budget amendment will address
that. I have some bills that we need to pay out of the
Detention Facility budget that I wanted to reallocate moneys
out of Marketing to different areas.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. So, you don't really
want us to make a precipitous move here.
MS. WILLIAMS: No, that would be fine. We're only
looking at needing $1,900. What I need -- what I need to move
out of this next budget amendment is, like, 3,300-plus, so
we're still going to have a little bit of cushion there.
JUDGE TINLEY: You're going to have 3,893 left after
that next budget amendment.
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir. So, I -- if we want to
take it out of that Marketing line item in Fund 76, that would
be fine with me.
COMMISSIONER SALDWIN: I do.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That would be my preference.
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COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. So moved, with the money
to come out of the Marketing line item.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for approval
of Budget Amendment Request Number 3, with funds to come from
76-572-980, Marketing, Detention Center. Any question or
discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising
your right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
(NO response.)
JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Budget
Amendment Request Number 4.
MS. WILLIAMS: Okay. On this budget amendment
request, we have a couple of line items that we really need to
put money into, and when I did the budget amendments, I was
anticipating a couple of months down the road. We have -- at
present, we have food expenses of 383.02. We need to get
those paid as soon as possible. We have resident medical --
the budget amendment says 2,030.73, but we have gotten
additional bills in to the tune of over $2,000, so we're
looking at about $4,200 in resident medical that we need to
pay pretty quick. Some of these I have set up to request hand
checks, as late bills, so that we can get them in the works
get them out. The others I think we can easily process at the
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next court meeting. I don't think there'll be a problem with
the vendors. On the Resident Medical line item, I was asking
for $5,000. I still want to leave it at that, because I think
that's enough to cover what we've got pending. We can look at
what we get in later. Lease Copier, there are two copiers out
there that are under contract, and I think we just probably
underbudgeted for those. I'm anticipating -- the $3,300 that
I'm requesting, I'm anticipating to carry through the end of
September. That could all change; I don't know. Either way,
I think with the contract, if we cancel one, we're going to
have to buy it out, unless we can work with Canon, get them to
just pick one up and call it square. These other line items,
Ms. Harris and I went over these at that time, and we feel
pretty comfortable that we can move these moneys out of those ~
line items without damaging them too much.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let me ask a question. Let's
go back to the food thing again.
MS. WILLIAMS: Okay.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You have a current expense of
$383?
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And you're moving into that
]ine over 10,000. Now, why is that?
MS. WILLIAMS: I was anticipating the bill from
Sysco, I believe, for March and April's expenses. Sysco and
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Oak Farms, they're running right at $5,000 a month.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, you think -- do you think
that if the place completely shut down tomorrow, --
MS. WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- do you think that this
would cover all the grocery bills?
MS. WILLIAMS: It may. It may not. I have no idea
what's sitting out there. I really don't know.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: But you happen to know about
a few things?
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes -- yeah. And, like I said, the
amount that I put in there is just a projected amount, based
on what we figured they've been spending on average per month
for the last month or so.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That was going to be my
question, how did you project that amount. 'Cause I think the
budget was 30,000, and we've long since expended that.
MS. WILLIAMS: Oh, yes. But the early part of the
fiscal year, October-November-December, we had a lot of kids;
the expenses were higher. The last month or so, like
January-February has not been quite as high, and it's -- I
took those and kind of averaged them and figured we're going
to probably stay along that even line, I hope.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move approval.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second.
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MS. WILLIAMS: I have -- excuse me. I have copies
of the invoices that I would like to get the Court to approve
as late bills.
JUDGE TINLEY: But we're not handling it with this
budget amendment.
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir, I -- I do need to have it
handled with this budget amendment so we can go ahead and get
the checks out.
JUDGE TINLEY: What you're saying is you need hand
checks as part of this budget amendment?
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
JUDGE TINLEY: To H.E.H. Credit Receivables for
$363.57, Gold Star Food Service for $19.45, Ackman Pharmacy
for $1,377.99, and for Walmart Community to -- for 191.76?
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
JUDGE TINLEY: Who made that motion?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I did. It includes --
JUDGE TINLEY: You included that as part of the
motion?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes, it does, including the hand
checks.
JUDGE TINLEY: Any further question or discussion on
the motion to approve Budget Amendment Request Number 4 with
the hand checks added? All in favor of the motion, signify by
raising your right hand.
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(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
(No response.)
JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Do we have
any other budget amendments?
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir, I have one more that I had
to work up. Here you go. This is mine. Okay, this budget
amendment, I spoke with the Tax Assessor about the midd]e or
so of last week. When she prepared her request for the
'05-'06 budget, she requested the full amount of money that
she had the previous year for her software maintenance. For
some reason, she didn't get that full amount; she only got
$8,772. I'm not sure why there was a difference, but I am
kind of guessing that maybe we were anticipating that we would
be on the new software earlier than what we are. With delays
and whatnot, I'm not sure what happened. Bottom line is, we
have a bill for $2,189 that we need to pay to Software Group,
and she's only got $332 left in her budget. And I spoke with
her; she's looked through her budget. She can't find it. I
really couldn't find $1,857 in any other of her line items
either. And if we take it out now, we're just going to have
to come back later on and do something different later. So,
I'm wondering if the Court has any direction for me to look
at?
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I want to ask a question.
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Ss this for software maintenance on the system that's being --
MS. WILLIAMS: The current --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- replaced?
MS. WILLIAMS: The current system. They are having
to run -- and especially for this bill, this is on the
automated tax collection system. They're having to run the
two systems concurrently side-by-side. It was something that
Paula said they required her to do so that they could kind of
compare and make sure that everything on the new system is
jibing with the old system. And she anticipates probably
running that through the end of this budget year. Hopefully
not that long, but we're not sure. So, this budget amendment
request is strictly to take care of the bill that we have that
covers the period of April 1st through June 30th.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON; This software is software
that the County owns? Does anybody know?
JUDGE TINLEY: I think it's software that the County
presently owns, but as soon as this new system is online, will
become obsolete and no longer needed. But that's part of an
annualized software maintenance amount?
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir, and they bill it quarterly,
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Help me -- help me just a
little bit. We budgeted 19,000?
MS. WILLIAMS: The previous year.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 14,000.
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MS. WILLIAMS: The backup that I gave you.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What did we budget for '06?
MS. WILLIAMS: $8,772. The backup that's attached
to the budget amendment is strictly what the Tax Assessor gave
me. It was copies of her worksheets where she had requested
the full amount, with her explanation about the line item
remaining unchanged. But when the budget was approved,
evidently it had been cut down to the 8,772.
JUDGE TINLEY: If that 2,189 is a quarterly charge,
looks like the 87 was right on the mark.
MS. WILLIAMS: But that is only for automated tax
collection, client support. She also has vehicles -- let's
see. There's one other one that she has that we pay every
quarter.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Maybe that's where the mistake
occurred, then.
MS. WILLIAMS: It could very well be.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is there any money in
contingency for Commissioners Court left?
MS. WILLIAMS: I believe there's $3,000. Don't hold
he to it, but I believe we have $3,000 in that line item.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Why don't we take it out of -- I
make a motion we approve the budget amendment and take the
funds from Nondepartmental Contingency.

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COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Second.
JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded as
indicated. Any question or discussion?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I
just want to say that we're six months in this budget, and
we're -- this is unbelievable. Isn't this unbelievable?
Y'all find this funny? This is absolutely incredible. What
is the answer to this thing? I have another Number 5 here.
Where'd it come from?
MS. WILLIAMS: It's the court reporter's copy.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, it's a different Number
5, though. Different information.
JUDGE TINLEY: May have been last week's.
MS. WILLIAMS: What's the date underneath it?
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Three --
MS. WILLIAMS: No, under the 5.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 3/13.
MS. WILLIAMS: Okay, that was two sessions ago.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Well, I appreciate you
keep pumping the information to me so I don't get lost. I
really appreciate it.
MS. WILLIAMS: You're welcome.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay.
JUDGE TINLEY: Any other questions or comments? All
in favor of the motion, signify by raising your right hand.
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(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
(No response.)
JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Do we have
any late bills?
MS. WILLIAMS: No, sir, that's it.
JUDGE TINLEY: Other than the ones we've taken care
I of.
MS. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
JUDGE TINLEY: I have before me monthly reports from
the --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thanks, Mindy.
JUDGE TINLEY: -- District Clerk --
MS. WILLIAMS: You're welcome.
JUDGE TINLEY: -- and the County Clerk, general fund
report. Do I hear a motion that these reports be approved as
submitted?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: So moved.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second.
JUDGE TINLEX: Motion made and seconded that the
indicated reports be approved as submitted. Any question or
discussion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising
your right hand.
(The motion carried by unanimous vote.)
JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign.
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(NO response.)
JODGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Any of the
Commissioners have any reports as their committee and liaison
assignments that they wish to render now?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I do. Let's talk about the
meeting, I gave you a copy of the Kerrville City Council's
budget schedule, and what was due April 3rd was the so-called
base budgets, working documents, current-year estimates. And
those were provided to the City Manager on the 3rd of April.
We met in a workshop on the 4th of April -- the Library Board,
"we" meaning the Library Board -- and we reviewed those
documents in some detail, line by line. This is essentially a
forecast of what costs are going to be for this fiscal year.
It doesn't include escalation for pay raises and things like
that. I did learn some things about the library budget that I
want to share with you, and I wouldn't mind having some --
some feedback or direction from you about how --
directionally, on preparing the library budget.
I think the library budget is going to be about
$940,000, plus pay increases -- no, about 823,000 -- I got it
wrong again. It's going to be about $940,000 plus pay
increases, which would mean, I'm guessing, that the budget
proposed by the Library Director is going to be about
$970,000. If -- if we decided, for example, to pay half of
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that budget, that would be about $130,000 more than we
approved for payment this year. I analyzed the budget, and
it's not unlike other government functions; 80 percent of the
costs is people -- pay, benefits, taxes, health insurance.
And about 12 percent is literally -- literary materials, books
and tapes and things like that. And the balance of it, pens
and pencils and computers, paper and all that, is 8 percent.
So, if you were concerned about controlling the costs to your
library, attacking that "All Other" category of only 8 percent
is not going to yield very much.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Mm-hmm.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: You're not going to have
much impact trying to control pencils and paper. If you're in
the library business, you need to be buying new books, so,
probably attacking the $110,000 a year or so budgeted for
those materials is counterproductive. That leaves people.
We've got about somewhere around 13, 13 and a half equivalent
full-time employees there, so that's what we're looking at.
We're looking at --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Out of those 13, how many are
degreed librarians? Do you know that?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I don't know.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's an interesting number
to have.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I know they're very --
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appear to be very particular about who can work dealing with
the users. We've got a whole lot of -- of volunteers; I'm
going to say 30, maybe 90. We had more than that in the past.
They don't let them deal with the users.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: "Users" being the public?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah. In fact, my neighbor
is a retired degreed librarian, and she's a volunteer, and she
doesn't fill one of the roles of giving materials to people,
answering questions. They're background people.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is -- do you anticipate the
Advisory Board delving into this personnel issue?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: No, I don't sense much
motivation on the part of the Library Board to control costs.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Would that be a Commissioners
Court function, by any chance?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I'm looking for a little
direction here, Commissioners. I -- there's strong support, I
think, on the -- certainly, on the Friends of the Library, and
probably on the Library Board, for expanding.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Budget or library, or both?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Both.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Building, staff, budget.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: How does -- how does that
big figure, Commissioner, comport with what they will tell us,
and probably have already told you, is the average number of
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dollars per resident of the county that they'd like to see
spent on library services? The per diem expenditure -- or not
per diem.
JUDGE TINLEY: Per capita.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Per capita.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Well, at a minimum, $13.50
per capita is the state minimum. You have to spend that much
money to be eligible for -- to participate in their programs.
I think that only generates about six, seven -- or 13.50 times
95,000, whatever that is, somewhere around 600,000 or 700,000.
And we're probably looking at 970,000.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I know that there's frequently
mentioned to us the number of library cards that are
outstanding, and we've looked at -- and one or two things I'd
like to know is, one, are these cards or people -- patrons
that are actively using the library, or cards that have been
issued in the last 50 years? And what's -- you know, I'd like
to get a handle on the number of people that are actually
using the library.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I think I can probably
answer that.
JUDGE TINLEY: 610,000.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: How much?
JUDGE TINLEY: 610.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That would be 13.50 times
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what?
JUDGE TINLEY: 45,000.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, they're asking -- well, go
back to this question. They're -- the budget is requesting
funding almost 30 percent above what the state recommends. Is
that what you --
JUDGE TINLEY: State minimum, yeah.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: State minimum.
JUDGE TINLEY: At the minimum level of 13.50 per
capita, it would come out just a little over 600,000.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, we're -- 900,000 is about
30 percent more -- 50 percent more.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: 50 percent.
JUDGE TINLEY: 50.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Gate count, that's the
total number of people that walk through the door. And 2006
is projected to be 175,000.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is there any -- is there any
idea as to how many different -- I'm trying to figure out the
usage. That counts one person going five times in one day
as -- the gate count doesn't really give you a distribution.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I don't know what the
registrations are, but I think included in that may be
somebody that registered 40 years ago.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Did you do the gate count
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II times --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Have they looked at -- and they
don't charge? There's no charge for a library card?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: No. They -- if they charge
anything for the library services, they lose their eligibility
for state program participation.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can we require -- can we get new
library cards? Can we say, "Okay, we want to update our
records"? We want to get every -- you know, just a one-time
thing. That would at least find out how many are really using
it county-wide, and get a name and address from everybody.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Right.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: That might be a way at least to
get a handle on the usage side of it a little bit better than
what we have right now. I mean --
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: In case you're interested,
there's some interesting learnings. The library is much, much
more than a place to go learn something from a book or other
materials. They laugh and say on the weekends, the library is
the Chamber of Commerce. People come in there and get
information about Kerr County, maps and directions. I got in
trouble last time I said this, but I'll say it again. It's
also an internet cafe. Snowbirds, travelers, and local people
go in there to check their e-mail and do other things on the
internet that are not related to literacy. It's a place where
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you can go get your taxes done. I'm not saying there's
anything wrong with all these things. It's just -- the only
question is, do you -- should -- are those the kind of things
that taxpayer funds should be used for?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And all those are free.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Oh, yeah.
JODGE TINLEY: But -- but could we charge a fee for
those services and not jeopardize the state funding?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I'm afraid to answer that.
I've raised that question about some products. Some said no,
you can't do that.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Be interesting to know. Or
maybe -- maybe we should ask the state licensing -- or the
state agency may be a better source of that information.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: What do we do that we can
charge for?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's the bottom line. Because
especially if we're using things like, you know, e-mail, or
using the computers and stuff, I mean, I think it's great, and
I don't mind spending public dollars to provide a spot to do
it, but I also think the users should pay a -- pay for that.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That gets us right back to
the point Commissioner Baldwin made earlier, when we were
talking about the budget matter. Things that we are required
to provide and things that we have opted to provide over the
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years. I think you can make the same analysis for the
library.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I think that's a good
starting point, 'cause I think -- I mean, I personally am very
much in favor of -- we want to provide a library service.
But, as we've said -- I've said the past couple of years, it's
getting to a point that it's real hard to do that at the level
that the library wants. I mean, a million dollars, or half of
a million dollars a year is something that is getting harder
and harder to fund. And I hear from my constituents that a
large number of them use another library that doesn't get any
Kerr County funding right now.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Mm-hmm.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And a large -- which is a very
good library in Comfort. And, you know, it's getting Kendall
County funding, but they also --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I have numerous neighbors
that use the library at Schreiner University.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. And I brought that up
last year, the thing that -- you know, is there a way we can
do some kind of a joint endeavor with Schreiner University?
The same issues that I had on the table last year when we went
through this debate have not been resolved and really looked
at seriously, in my mind. And, you know, it's just something
that we -- you know, we --
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COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Are these not questions,
however, that we need to ask? They need to be asked, but
should we not ask them at the time we have a -- hopefully have
a joint meeting with the City and discuss it? Because they
have the same problem. They have -- they have 50 percent of
~ this operational budget, so the same concerns should be theirs
as we're registering here today.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I'm not -- that's -- we
need to talk with our brothers on the City Council, that's for
sure. The complexity is, I don't know if it is or not. The
library is going to give me, and I'm going to give you, budget
recommendations by June 30th, as required by the interlocal
i agreement. And we're going to meet -- according to the City,
we're going to meet on August 19th. So, that said, we've got
June, July, and half of August that the library budget will be
i sitting on our desks before we are scheduled to talk to the
City Council about it.
COMMISSIONER LET2: I mean, I think what Bill said,
and what you said, I think the timing's going to be -- by the
time we meet with the City, it's going to be a done deal. At
our initial meeting --
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: That's what I'm worried
i about.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: But I think that the -- I mean,
we have gotten into this adversarial relationship,
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unfortunately, over the library with the City, and that's not
my intent at all. And I think if we can get the communication
back with the Library Advisory Board, it's not cutting the
library budget; it's really -- it's a way to expand it and
make it better. But it's got to be -- that has to be done
through other sources of revenue somewhere, whether it be
user-pay for the, you know, little bit of the computer time,
or -- or other sources that we can start charging. It's not
that we're trying to cut back our funding, necessarily. We're
trying to figure out how we can continue to fund it at a high
level.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I've commented to the Board
that -- I think I said it would be a mistake for us to assume
that the Commissioners Court is going to rubber-stamp a
budget. And a couple of times, I've said I think it would be
a good idea to tell the Court what a $13.50 budget would look
like, what the library would look like at $13.50. I would --
if I were the Library Director, I would want to do that, just
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for the purpose of selling the bigger budget to you. Say,
"You want a bare-bone budget? Here's what the library is
going to look like, so you better approve my needed budget."
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: $13.50 per person? Is that
-- but that's per capita. i
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Not actual use.
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COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: 13.50 times 45,000.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: But not all those 45,000 use
the thing. That's --
II COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Well, that's just a state
~ criteria.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think that the -- you know,
I
there's going to be a lot -- we can get a bigger and better
library if the Library Advisory Board -- the Library Board,
you know, if they can figure out ways to help us bring in more
i revenue so we can make it a bigger and better library. I
i mean, I just -- I think the days of public funds driving this,
~ you know, budget are -- you know, we've got to relook at it.
And I'm all in favor of the library, and I'm all in favor of
~ funding it, but I can't fund it at a higher and higher level
~ when a lot of these services are not -- or can be charged for
by the users.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I've qot three questions,
and I'm hoping I'll get some direction from you. I got three
questions I've said I'll ask the Board. One is what products
or services do we provide that we can charge for? And two is,
what products and services do we provide that are not
traditional to libraries? Which is partially the first
question, I think. And what about joint ventures? Is there
any opportunities for synergy in terms of working with other
local libraries?
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COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: One other area that I'm
surprised that you haven't brought up is the user fee issue.
Can we pinpoint the actual users, and the citizens that live
outside the incorporated city of Kerrville pay a $25 annua]
fee to use the library? That would be me.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's done in other
I counties.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And also other counties.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Huh?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Other counties as well.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. And, I mean, we're
back to the user fee thing that this Court seems to embrace on
i most occasions. I just think that's an option. An option I
I like, --
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- actually. And then there
wouldn't be any question. Our people pay a flat fee, and then
we'll see you next year.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can -- on the minimum fee that
we have to our standards, can we change -- or can the county
residents pay a fee and not the city residents, or county
residents cannot pay a fee? Or do you know?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I know one of our hill
country counties, close-by county, that a few months ago --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Comal.
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COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: -- the county wasn't
helping the city enough, and they said, "We're going to charge
a non-city resident, the other people in the county that come
in here." I think that was challenged. Commissioner Baldwin,
do you remember if that was challenged? Or --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, I don't.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: That was Comal.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It was Comal, and I think
Bexar does the same thing.
JODGE TINLEY: Comal County was in a very similar
situation to what we're in, and the request was made by the
City for the traditional participation that had occurred in
previous years, and I think they offered a nominal amount, and
that wasn't adequate. And they said, "Okay, our option is you
charge our people $25 for a library card, and that'll be our
contribution," And I'm not aware of any challenge. If there
was, I'm certainly not aware of it.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: One thing I sense is that
there's a good bit of thinking around the city, the library,
and maybe in the county, that a -- a library district is a
taxing entity that's going to be approved by Kerr County
voters, and that white horse will charge in here and bail us
out of this expensive operation. You all are more experienced
in these things than I am, but I -- I don't sense a lot -- a
lot of voters will want to vote for more taxes.
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COMMISSIONER LETZ: I would be -- I don't think it
would be very close, and I would be surprised if it passed,
personally. What I hear from my constituents, I know a lot of
my constituents use the library, but there's a lot that don't.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, a lot of people look
upon it -- and I've discussed this before, and I, frankly,
thought that it's an idea that bears discussion.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: But a lot of people look
upon it as another layer of tax over and above what we're
already paying. And for me to support it, I'd want to know
that we remove our line item in favor of the library district.
I don't know if that'll would fly or not.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I don't either.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I would vote for a district
if you assured me that you're going to drop it out of the
county budget.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: And when you told me you
were, I wouldn't believe you. (Laughter.)
JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner, let me ask you this.
You mentioned -- I appreciate you issuing those caveats to the
Library Board people. When you asked for the 13.50 per capita
budget, what kind of response did you get?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I didn't -- it wasn't met
with great enthusiasm.
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JUDGE TINLEY: Did you get the indication that you
would see one of those, or that it was just going to be --
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I can't tell you.
JUDGE TINLEY: I would renew that request --
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Okay.
JUDGE TINLEY: -- also.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Have you visited one-on-one with
the City Council liaison about some of these issues?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: No.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: It may be a good idea to follow
what Bill says, because, as I recall, we have one appointee
and they have one appointee. Then we appoint two at-large,
they appoint two at-large, and then the Friends
representative. But it may be a good way to get some support.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Who is the City Council
representative, Commissioner?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: David Wampler. And in
attendance a couple times have been Mayor Smith and the Public
Works Director. I can't recall his name right now.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Charlie Hastings.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Maintenance -- they got a
lot of maintenance issues there, so for some reason --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Who is the current Advisory
Board Chairman?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: John David Lipscomb.
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DODGE TINLEY: Lipscomb.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mr. Lipscomb?
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Mm-hmm. He's a very
effective chairman.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Appreciate your update. I mean,
this is -- I think we're further into the budget -- or into
the budget earlier than ever before, at least in a broad
sense, which is good.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Now, just one other comment,
though, Commissioner. Not only the library, but we have -- we
have the same sticky wicket with respect to EMS that we have
to deal with, and there's a high expectation for some airport
funds which we have not yet dealt with. The sooner we meet
with representatives of the City, the better it's going to be.
That's my point.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I thought we brought that
up, and the City was pretty reluctant to meet with us until
August.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, that was then and this
is now.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, I have no -- I think it
would be a very good idea just to put those -- possibly those
three items on a joint -- you know, either a joint agenda, or
just kind of discussion, at least to get the issues on the
table, and funding in generalities, because these are all
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big-ticket items. Now, I think the airport's going to be
trimmed quite a bit before it gets to the county budget, but I
think the other two are -- the library and EMS -- you know,
just philosophical discussion. I think the airport too,
really more on the philosophical side as to how we're going to
proceed in the future; not necessarily numbers, but what the
funding level's going to be. I think that's an important
discussion to have.
COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: If you want to go through
this detailed budget, I'll leave it -- I'm going to leave it
with Ms. Mitchell. I just didn't want to use up that much
paper to have it reproduced.
JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, sir. Anybody else have
any reports from any of their respective assignments? Any
other reports from elected officials? It appears that that
concludes the agenda for the Commissioners Court, so the
Commissioners Court will stand adjourned.
(Commissioners Court adjourned at 12:19p.m.)
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STATE OF TEXAS
COUNTY OF KERR
The above and foregoing is a true and complete
transcription of my stenotype notes taken in my
capacity as County Clerk of the Commissioners Court
of Kerr County, Texas, at the time and place
heretofore set forth.
DATED at Kerrville, Texas, this 17th day of
April, 2006.
JANNETT PIEPER, Kerr County Clerk
Kathy nik, Deputy County Clerk
Certified Shorthand Reporter
9-io-oti
ORDER NO.29625
PROCLAMATION FOR NATIONAL DAY OF PRAYER
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Williams seconded by Commissioner Baldwin. The Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to:
Approve the Proclamation for National Day of Prayer.
„w. ORDER NO. 29626
CONTRACT BETWEEN KERB COUNTY AND MOUNTAIN HOME
VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT FOR LONG-TERM LEASE OF 2.1
ACRES, OWNED BY KERB COUNTY, LOCATED ON STATE
HIGHWAY 27 IN MOUNTAIN HOME
Came to be heard this the 11th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Nicholson, seconded by Commissioner Baldwin. The Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to:
Approve the Contract between Kerr County and the Mountain Home
Volunteer Fire Department for the long-term lease of 2.1 acres of land,
,,._ owned by Kerr County, located on State Highway 27 in the Mountain Home
Community, and authorize the County Judge to sign same.
ORDER NO. 29627
APPROVE PROPOSED BY-LAWS OF THE ADVISORY BOARD OF
BUTT-HOLDSWORTH MEMORIAL LIBRARY
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Nicholson seconded by Commissioner Baldwin. The Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to:
Approve the By-Laws of the Advisory Board of the Butt-Holdsworth
Memorial Library Board as presented, to include the revision that Judge
Tinley referred to in the second paragraph, where it says, "by written
Contract between the two entities," to have it read, "by Interlocal Agreement
between the two entities," and authorize County Judge to sign same.
ORDER NO. 29628
REVISION OF PLAT FOR LOT 60 OF WOOD TRAILS RANCH, VOL 4,
PAGE 98, PCT. 4, AND SET PUBLIC HEARING FOR SAME
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Nicholson, seconded by Commissioner Baldwin. The Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to:
Set a Public Hearing on the Revision of Plat for Lot 60 of Wood Trails
Ranch, Vol. 4, Page 98, Pct. 4, for May 22, 2006 at 10:00 a.m.
.... ORDER NO. 29629
AWARD ANNUAL BIDS FOR ROAD BASE, COLD MIX,
AGGREGATE, EMULSION OIL, CORRUGATED METAL PIPE AND
EQUIPMENT BY THE HOUR
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Baldwin. The Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to:
Awards bids as follows:
Wilson Culverts, for corrugated metal pipe
_.. Ergon for emulsion oils
Martin Marietta for cold mix and black base
Vulcan Materials for trap rock or paving aggregate
Mr. Schwartz for equipment by the hour, who is low bid, and we
recommend as first contractor, but to retain that option for the
others in case there's certain equipment that we need that's
bigger sizes and all.
Lucky 3 for base material, our Type A, our limestone rock
ORDER NO. 29630
ABANDON, VACATE AND DISCONTINUE APPROXIMATELY 89.83
FT. OF DRUMMOND DRIVE AND SET PUBLIC HEARING FOR SAME
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Baldwin, seconded by Commissioner Nicholson. The Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to:
Set a Public Hearing for May 22, 2006 at 10:13 a.m. for considering
abandoning, vacating, discontinuing approximately 89.83 feet of Drummond
Drive.
,,,. ORDER NO. 29631
RESOLUTION IN SUPPORT OF SPECIAL PROSECUTOR'S
APPLICATION FOR RENEWAL OF VAWA GRANT FUNDS FROM
OFFICE OF GOVERNOR, CRIMINAL JUSTICE DIVISION FOR
FISCAL YEAR 2006-2007
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Baldwin. The Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to:
Approve revised Resolution in support of Special Prosecutor's application
for renewal of VAWA grant funds from the Office of the Governor,
,, Criminal Justice Division for fiscal year 2006-2007, to include language
required by the Criminal Justice Division.
~, ORDER NO. 29632
AUTHORIZE REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS/QUALIFICATIONS
PROCESS FOR CONSULTANTS AND REGISTERED ENGINEERS TO
PROVIDE BASIC AND SPECIAL ENGINEERING SERVICES FOR
CENTER POINT WASTEWATER FACILITIES PROJECT
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Williams, seconded by Commissioner Letz. The Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to:
Authorize the Request for Proposals/Qualifications process for Consultants
and Registered Engineers to provide basic and special engineering services
~.,. for the Center Point Wastewater Facilities Project, in accordance with the
materials furnished.
ORDER NO. 29633
CLAIMS AND ACCOUNTS
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, came to be considered by
the Court various Commissioners Precincts, which said Claims and
Accounts are:
Accounts		Expense
10-General	$	96,037.18
14-Fire Protection	$	29,908.87
15-Road & Bridge	$	16,716.82
19-Public Library	$	25,000.00
26-JP Technology	$	2,825.00
50-Indigent Health Care	$	40,578.57
63-Lake Ingram Est Rd Dist	$	1,000.00
71-Schreiner Road Trust	$	5,120.00
76-Juvenile Detention Facility	$	838.22
TOTAL $ 218,024.44
Upon motion made by Commissioner Nicholson, seconded by
Commissioner Williams, the Court unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0
to pay the claims and accounts.
ORDER NO. 29634
BUDGET AMENDMENT
216TH DISTRICT COURT
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Williams, seconded by Commissioner Baldwin, the Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to transfer the following expense
codes:
Expense Code Description
10-435-402 Court Appointed Attorney +
10-435-403 Civil Court Appointed Atty -
Amendment
Increase/QDecrease
$72.47
($72.47)
ORDER NO.29635
BUDGET AMENDMENT
198th DISTRICT COURT
Came to be heard this the 27th day of March, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Williams, seconded by Commissioner Nicholson, the Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to transfer the following expense
codes:
Expense Code Description
10-436-401 Caurt Appointed Services
10-436-403 Civil Court Appointed Atty
Amendment
Increase/QDecrease
+ $1,152.68
- ($1,152.68)
ORDER NO.29636
BUDGET AMENDMENT
DETENTION MAINTENANCE
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioners Nicholson, the Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to transfer the following expense
codes:
Expense Code Description
10-515-350 Maint. & Custodial Sup
10-515-451 Detention Repairs
76-572-480 Marketing
Amendment
Increase/()Decrease
+ $425.00*
- ($1,435 54)
*Amount needed for invoices held in Auditor's office pending payment as of
4/24/06.
ORDER NO. 29637
BUDGET AMENDMENT
LATE BILL
JUVENILE DETENTION FACILITY
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Williams, the Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to transfer the following expense
codes and issue a hand check in the amount of $363.57 to FiEB Credit
Receivables for February 2006 Food Charges, issue a hand check in the
amount of $19.45 to Gold Star Food Services for February 2006 Food
Charges, issue a hand check in the amount of $1,377.99 to Ackman
Pharmacy for February and March 2006 Juvenile Medical Expenses, and
issue a hand check in the amount of $191.76 to Wal-Mart Community for
March 2006 charges, all for the Juvenile Detention Facility.
Expense Code Description
Amendment
Increase/()Decrease
76-572-332	Food +	$10,234.00
76-572-309	Postage -	($1,200.00)
76-572-331	Vehicle Transportation -	($2,200.00)
76-572-351	Kitchen Supplies -	($500 00)
76-572-426	Transport Travel -	($3,000.00)
76-572-480	Marketing -	($3,334.00)
76-572-333	Resident Medical +	$5.000.00
76-572-461	Copier Lease +	$3,300.00
76-572-109	Contract Services -	($8,300.00)
*Additional resident medical billings received +$565.25 and +$1,580.87
ORDER NO. 29638
BUDGET AMENDMENT
TAX ASSESSOR COLLECTOR
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioners Nicholson, the Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 to transfer the following expense
codes:
Expense Code Description
Amendment
Increase/QDecrease
10-499-563 Software Maintenance + $1,857.00
10-409-571 Non-Departmental Conting. - ($1,857.00)
ORDER NO. 29639
MONTHLY REPORTS
Came to be heard this the 10th day of April, 2006, with a motion made by
Commissioner Nicholson, seconded by Commissioner Letz, the Court
unanimously approved by vote of 4-0-0 the following monthly reports:
District Clerk
County Clerk -General