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KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT
Workshop
Monday, February 25, 2008
1:30 p.m.
Commissioners' Courtroom
Kerr County Courthouse
Kerrville, Texas
Design Planning for HCYEC
PRESENT: PAT TINLEY, Kerr County Judge
H.A."BUSTER" BALDWIN, Commissioner Pct. 1
WILLIAM "BILL" WILLIAMS, Commissioner Pct. 2
JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Pct. 3
BRUCE OEHLER, Commissioner Pct. 4
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2
I N D E X
February 25, 2008
1. Participate in workshop with architect Peter W.
Lewis to discuss design planning for the Hill
Country Youth Exhibit Center
--- Adjourned
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On Monday, February 25, 2008, at 1:30 p.m., a workshop
meeting of the Kerr County Commissioners Court was held in
the Commissioners' Courtroom, Kerr County Courthouse,
Kerrville, Texas, and the following proceedings were had in
open court:
P R O C E E D I N G S
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, let me call to order this
Commissioners Court workshop posted for this date and time,
Monday, February 28, 2008, at 1:30 p.m. It is that time now.
The workshop was called for the purpose of participating in a
workshop with architect Peter W. Lewis to discuss design
planning for the Hill Country Youth Exhibit Center. I don't
see any brass bands or great visual arts displays or Power
Point presentations. Are you not prepared today or what?
MR. LEWIS: I am not prepared today.
JUDGE TINLEY: All right.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: How's your pencil? Sharp?
MR. LEWIS: It is sharp. It is sharp.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: What I told Peter about five
minutes ago, before we met today --
MR. LEWIS: Three minutes ago.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Three minutes ago. Since
primarily Bruce and I have been the ones talking to him, it
would probably be a good exercise to start with to let Peter
tell us all what he thinks Bruce and I told him to do, and
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then y'all can -- then Bruce --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And we'll decide whether or
not that's what we told him.
MR. LEWIS: I took notes and you didn't.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, but I got them.
JUDGE TINLEY: Then we can decide whether that's
what we think you should have told him.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's right. We probably --
probably the first step is to make sure we're --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's why there's more than
two of us on this Commissioners Court.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Government at work right
there.
MR. LEWIS: Well, to that end, thank you for --
thank you for asking us to be a part of this process. And I
appreciate being here in front of you today just to talk
about it and get some guidance from you, and then we can go
off and begin to do our work. I have met -- I met with
Jonathan a couple times. And -- no, I don't want to be a
smart aleck; I'll just -- and I -- and then I did meet with
Commissioner Oehler and Jonathan on December 3rd. We walked
around. We walked around the property several times, walked
all of the buildings, walked around on the grounds as well,
and talked about what the County's vision might be for the
use of that facility and the -- talked about the use of a --
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creating a new events center out there to be used by
were pretty thorough, and I'll just tell them in order.
The long-range master plan will envision, sometime
into the future, what that property might look like, given
using what is there now to its best advantage and removing
what doesn't work now, or relocating certain things on there.
The first priority, or the first item that I had as we walked
through was to demo the hog barn and add a new pavilion,
probably generally in that area, about a 150-foot by 300-foot
barn. And then possibly something in the range of a 150-foot
by 300-foot event center, which would have common area
restrooms, something like a prep kitchen, maybe some offices,
meeting rooms as well, and a large -- large open event area
that could be multipurpose, and also could be divided,
perhaps, into multiple spaces to make it usable for a variety
of groups of different sizes. Relocate the existing wash
area, renovate the pole barn to be dedicated for use, among
others, by Maintenance, 4-H. It would have some restrooms
out there. And we talked specifically about how some of
those spaces might be divided up even more, but I don't know
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that we're -- we really have a clear vision of that yet.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: We probably have jumped ahead
and we've already designated a lot of that, but it doesn't
MR. LEWIS: Relocate the rodeo arena, and to the --
what the -- and the pole barn, my notes further say that
about two-thirds of it would work for 4-H, and about a third
of it would go to county storage or county use of some kind.
There's a desire to have more structured parking, meaning
maybe more paved parking, as well as overflow parking, and as
we either relocate buildings or add buildings, we'll find
that we'll be displacing parking. We talked also about,
maybe as we do this master plan, to, oh, create some clear
traffic patterns through the site, you know. We have the --
again, as we create new parking areas, we want those to be
safe and easy to use, and so how people get -- get on and off
the site might change a little bit. Obviously, we'll use
Highway 27 to its best advantage. We'll -- just sort of as
an aside to that, knowing how challenging it is sometimes to
work with TexDOT, that we would do everything we could in the
master plan to think about using the existing curb cuts that
you have on the highway.
And then we talked about some other things. We've
got some things out there that -- there's an existing
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barbecue pit out there, and I asked if that was -- that kind
There's an existing testing well out there
that we would abandon. And anything -- any utilities, any
infrastructure that's in place that is either aged or
unserviceable or not used to be analyzed, assessed, and --
and abandoned or	relocated	or upgraded	as appropriate.	And
then we talked a	little bit	about the -	- just kind of	the
image of this. It is -- it is a county exhibit center. It
appears there's an opportunity for maybe overlap of uses at
times. I know that as a board member of Arts and Crafts
Fair, during that weekend in May, we take over that whole
area and we use the parking, and this next year, we'll use
the events -- the indoor events center. And so it appears
that recognizing that and taking those facilities that are
there now, as well as any -- any plan to kind of leverage the
collaboration for all of that acreage out there, and use it
to its highest and best advantage.
We talked specifically about some of the buildings,
some of the things in terms of events lighting and
waterproofing. So, some of the -- some of what we would do
would be to assess -- in our proposal was to assess the
existing buildings, and if we're going to propose to reuse a
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building or to add on to it or whatever, we would want to
make sure that, structurally, it's sound, and, you know, we
need to add insulation or the things we night might need to
do to make that fit well into the plan. So, obviously, it
would be easy to do new buildings and build them where they
meet all your needs. It's a little more challenging to take
existing facilities and upgrade them, but if that seems to be
the appropriate use of these, that's what we want to do.
That's the long and short of it. I had -- the notes we had
from back when we were doing the original walk-through pretty
well track that, before we submitted our proposal.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Did you tell him all that
stuff, Commissioner?
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, between the two of us,
we did.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Wow.
MR. LEWIS: Not bad. Two sets of notes to
corroborate that.
JUDGE TINLEY: You made the notes, right?
MR. LEWIS: I made the notes.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Let's kind of go back to the
beginning. Hog barn area. Initially, demo what's there now.
MR. LEWIS: Mm-hmm.
JUDGE TINLEY: And what's the thought about
replacing, if any?
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MR. LEWIS: Well, that -- that's --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, that's --
MR. LEWIS: That's something y'all -- yeah.
JUDGE TINLEY: Are we talking about pretty
plain-Jane ag uses? Are we talking about maybe an
enlargement of the -- of the existing exhibit space on an
add-on basis? Or are we talking about multi-use, where, if
push comes to shove, you can use it for ag purposes, such as
new, you know, hog pens, but portable to the extent you could
clean that out and have a much expanded exhibit center?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think where we were is that
the -- both, to answer your question. We need another ag
barn. We need a barn to replace the hog barn and put sheep
or something like that. We need a barn, and then we probably
need a separate building, and the barn could be attached to
the arena or it could be detached. Kind of depends how
Peter -- but there also, somewhere in the mix, we need
something akin to the current exhibit hall, but it's not ag.
A building --
JUDGE TINLEY: That's the 150-by-300 that you're
talking about, the new --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah, that's the barn.
JUDGE TINLEY: -- stand-alone building. I
understand that.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's the barn, but then
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there's also a building that would be a replacement for the
exhibit hall where animals may go in on an auction, but
that's about it.
MR. LEWIS: Yeah. The thought there was to -- to
segregate human and non-human events.
JUDGE TINLEY: But what I'm trying to do is -- is
envision some sort of a transition, and we're probably
looking at a multi-phased --
MR. LEWIS: Mm-hmm.
JUDGE TINLEY: -- multi-phase project here to get
to the end of the road, the big -- major portion of which
will be the new stand-alone, 150-by-300, approximately.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. Our timing has to be
right on doing the hog barn thing, and what I think, and I
believe Jonathan agrees with, is that back part has got to
go.
JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I've got no disagreement with
that, Commissioner.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: But then what goes back in we
want to use.
JUDGE TINLEY: That's where I'm coming from. If --
the existing hog barn I don't think can be rehabbed with any
degree of economical --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Absolutely not. It needs to
be --
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JUDGE TINLEY: -- practicality.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- expanded and concrete
floor, where all your pens are portable.
JUDGE TINLEY: That's right.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You can utilize that.
JUDGE TINLEY: But if push comes to shove, --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah.
JUDGE TINLEY: -- while you're awaiting this new,
bigger facility over here, if you need an expanded exhibit
hall area, --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Right.
JUDGE TINLEY: -- as it were. And, of course, you
could put in appropriate openings between the two, where they
could all be used at once. And -- and, true, it would be
ag-suitable, but it would also be -- we have a lot of
functions out there now that -- that seem to work just fine
for it, and it just gives us the opportunity to have bigger
functions.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Right, I agree.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think it's kind of -- the
phasing of it is -- before you can -- you've got to build a
barn for animals before you can tear the hog barn down.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: You got to get -- the barn has
to go, and then, depending on the timing and money and lots
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of other things, and where a people building would go kind of
depends on how you mix it with the exhibit hall and all that
stuff.
JUDGE TINLEY: You don't see the ability to, say,
starting in, say, early February, clear out the hog barn,
come in with a replacement facility, and have that in place
I for the next stock show season?
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's exactly what I
I envision.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's always been my
I vision.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That we would take care of
the ag -- ag requirements, get them a new facility, get them
out of where they are, take care of that. I've always
thought that that could be adjacent to the east of the
existing arena, tie all that together for agricultural
purposes, and move that arena and get the stock show moved,
and then start on a people facility on the other side.
That's always been my vision.
MR. LEWIS: And a big -- and a large ag facility is
going to be pretty simple to construct. I mean, it's going
to be simple with large, clear spans. Going to pour a slab,
you know, provide -- the complicated things are going to be a
few restrooms and things like that that you night need, just
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to support the people doing that, and maintenance -- storage
inside or maintenance rooms inside. But that -- that would
be -- that's something that could go up in -- you know, I
hesitate to commit here, but, you know, six to eight months
construction period, something like that.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, it's a very quick deal.
For the newer, bigger facility, we're talking about a little
bit more of a people facility; it's going to be a little bit
longer term process to build.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Sure, more things going
into it.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: A bit more going into it.
JUDGE TINLEY: But during the interim period, you
could use the new ag-intended facility for --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Ag.
JUDGE TINLEY: -- functions, just like we use the
exhibit hall right now.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, and one of the things
that probably needs to be talked about is -- and I think it
needs to be for his purpose, and our purpose too, is do we
tear down the existing exhibit hall, that's heated and
air-conditioned somewhat, completely and start all over? Or
try to do something with that? And I don't -- I'm beginning
to think it -- I know about building a little bit, and it's
much easier to go back new than it is to try to fix up one
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that's already not functioning very well.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'd rather see us put a big
"X" on that building.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Build you a -- you know,
you'd still have a slab there, and you'd still have some
things you could use, but it needs to be a facility that's
well insulated, that's economical to run, and maybe a little
bit larger than what it is, and get rid of some of those
posts and things in there, have it more of a -- little bit
bigger. Bigger clear span, if we can get it.
MR. LEWIS: My thought is, we've walked through
there, and you asked that question to deliberate about it, is
that maybe this new event center is adjunct to that and we
figure out a way to salvage and reuse what is there now. But
for, you know, common uses, maybe that's where restrooms go.
I think the slab appears to be -- I think we want to take
borings on it eventually. The recommendation would be to
assess the foundation, but it appears to be in good
condition.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It's very --
MR. LEWIS: Very little cracking. And so if we
could envision a use for that, an overlapping use, or adding
on to that, but tear down the superstructure and -- and take
advantage of that, but -- and put a new cap over it, add
foundation to it. Or maybe, like I said, it's a connector to
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the indoor arena and an event center that's on the other
side. And then -- or back where the hog barn is now, use
that area in the back. And that's what the master planning
is about, to sort of assess it there and just look -- look at
how these pieces -- how 150 feet by 300 feet fit, and then
how it logically relates to the other things that it's next
to. This isn't rocket science. We've got a few moving parts
out there; they just happen to be very big parts. You know,
you got the 40,000 and 50,000 square foot parts for these
arenas, and so it's not going to be real complicated. I
think we can explore a lot of ways that new construction can
complement what's there.
And then the other thing I was talking about is
refurbishing some of what's there where you have roof leaks
or where you need more insulation; you got birds eating up
all the insulation that's there now. And -- but some of
that's just easy. That's maintenance. That's just -- that's
a slam-dunk. And I'll -- as a -- again, on behalf of the
Arts and Crafts Fair and tenants of the County -- as a tenant
of the County, we would -- we would -- we have seen a need
out in that end of the county -- or in the county for an
events center, and could envision how that could complement
the grounds that we have on the River Star Arts and Events
Park. And wherever the building is placed, we'll be able to
use that outdoor area that's kind of park-like right now;
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it's got restrooms there already, outdoor restrooms. So,
we'd look at all those kinds of things.
We'd look at -- I would suggest that we would look
at the county site without River Star and kind of figure out
what can happen there, and then look at also at how we can
take advantage of all of that, the additional 7 acres, 'cause
it's your -- it's your property; we just happen to have been
fortunate enough to have a long-term lease on it. But my
vision for the whole grounds would be something that follows
along the lines of what we've done, and the structures -- you
know, they're -- they're open, big metal structures, big
spans. I don't see -- I see anything architectural would be
embellishments, ornament to -- to tell us where the entries
are to the various buildings, where the public entries are
and things. But, on balance, these are large agricultural
buildings. And, you know, I'm rambling. Don't say that --
well, you did.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: How do we get there?
MR. LEWIS: Well, I think how we get there is that
-- what I need to do -- the first thing would be to sit and
codify all the requirements. And we've -- I mean, I don't
think -- again, I don't think it's a real long list. But --
but we would say, okay, we want a new ag barn. Okay, what
are -- what are the dimensions of that? How many people do
we think we want to accommodate in that, and what are the
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support facilities for it? We have a pretty good sense of
what might -- might happen with the maintenance and 4-H barn,
but go ahead and put that down on paper and say here are the
uses, and here are what we think the number of people, the
space allocations; do that for all these different uses. And
then get our -- you know, quantify the rodeo arena, what your
expectations are, if we're relocating something of like size,
or does it	need	to	be bigger?	Smaller? And -	- and	some of
that would	be --	I	would take	-- I'd start by	taking	the
notes I've got and fleshing them out, and trying to be smart
about taking my best guess, and then coming back and sitting
down, and probably with Commissioner Oehler and Commissioner
Letz, and let them help develop that.
And then the next thing to do would be to begin to
-- and in complementing that, at the same time, we would also
maybe get -- get some engineering help to take a look -- just
a visual look at the buildings right now and assess the
foundation from a visual perspective, get some idea of -- of
all of the utilities on there. We do have site surveys, but
we'd want to maybe ask the -- I think the Voelkels have done
most	of	the surveying work out there, but	maybe ask -	- make
sure	we	understand where all the easements	are and --	and
underground utilities, and then what surprises we might find,
if there are some that aren't documented.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. Well, one thing -- one
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thing that would be hard to do is to put a building on the --
the west side of the existing building, 'cause that's where
the sewer line is.
MR. LEWIS: Yeah. Without re --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sewer line runs right down
that parking lot that's on the west side of the existing hog
I barn.
JUDGE TINLEY: How far out?
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It runs right down the
middle.
MR. LEWIS: Middle of that paved area.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Edge of the pavement, between
it and the barbecue pit, somewhere in that area.
MR. LEWIS: And I think that's a logical place to
have traffic circulate. And we've kind of -- I've looked at
this some, just in passing, not hard and fast. But I think
we -- that can be accommodated. And, I mean, if push comes
to shove, if you say the best use of that is to put a
building there and relocate the sewer, that's just part of
the program.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Peter, you may have
mentioned it and I missed it; I'm not sure, but did you talk
about a new concession stand and improving that in
conjunction with the ag side?
MR. LEWIS: Well, I did -- I didn't mention that,
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but that is a -- that's an important subset of this. So --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, it needs -- that is
another real need, that area that's now the concession stand.
MR. LEWIS: Mm-hmm.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: In my opinion, it's not
located where you would want to --
MR. LEWIS: Well, we might --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It's just not -- it's not
good space.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's not adequate, not
located properly.
MR. LEWIS: And if it's possible, and we have this
people events center and the ag events center, if we could
share -- you know, somehow or other share a lot of the
infrastructure for a concession, you got a lot of plumbing,
and you might -- if we bring gas to it for some reason or
other, maybe if you have the opportunity to -- one fronts on
one, one fronts on the other. I'm -- I'm not trying to
design this thing ahead of time, but where we can gain
efficiencies by -- by sharing uses. And, you know, 'cause
you want to be able to use them 24/7 if there's a demand for
it. So --
JUDGE TINLEY: Well, the extent you can back up and
mirror your restrooms, kitchen, --
MR. LEWIS: Right.
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JUDGE TINLEY: -- that sort of stuff, you're going
to save a lot on your plumbing and electrical costs.
MR. LEWIS: If you had a clear -- you know, if
there were very distinct entries and common area where you
came in and you said, "Okay, I'm participating in events over
here; I know I go here," but all of the restrooms for that
are -- are in this common area. If that makes sense,
that's -- you know, we would pursue that. I told -- I told
the Commissioners when we were out walking around, we'll look
at a couple different scenarios that place buildings. The
next step would be to go ahead and start looking at planning
and take these blocks of space, think about the relationships
that -- that exist between public restrooms and -- and this
space and this space. Or -- or the overlap where the ability
to open up -- as you were suggesting, Judge, the ability to
open up one to the other and -- and have a much larger
extended area, and so instead of having two 45,000 square
foot buildings, you might end up having 90,000 square feet
under a roof, connected.
Connectors might be -- those connectors also might
be something where they're all-weather connectors, or they're
a vehicle -- you know, vehicles can come through them to load
~, both ways, one way or the other. I think there are lots of
pretty simple things to look at that would give you some
I options to say, "Yeah, this works for us; these are the right
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sizes." And then we do understand that it would be phased,
so part of what we would do would be to help assess how that
would be phased logically, in context of use, and so that you
don't abandon a use and not have a place for that, or you
don't -- yeah, you don't abandon a building and not have a
place for the use to go. So, kind of -- kind of just some
clean-up, general things. It occurs to me that if we find a
place for relocating the rodeo arena, it would be a pretty
easy thing to do almost any time in the process, and it's --
it's going to have the least construction to ratio of
anything. It's going to --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, it's going --
',I MR. LEWIS: -- going to be a quick, quick thing;
six, eight weeks or something, I don't know.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: That -- doing that as soon as
we could opens up visually being able to see how things are
going to work. You really see how much space you're freeing
up.
MR. LEWIS: That's a lot of space, between the
7 acres that River Star has and what the -- your --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Sewer line.
MR. LEWIS: And the sewer line, yeah. Well, there
is -- I mean, yeah, there is a lot of space there.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, the thing is --
MR. LEWIS: It could be park, but it could be
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building, too.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: The reason that it's going to
be back, it's not going to have all the bucking chutes and
all the stuff the old one has.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You talking about the
outdoor arena? Yeah.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They don't need that. If
they need to have a rodeo, they can go inside and have one.
If they're going to have a 4-H, you know, event with roping
and pole bending and barrel racing and goat roping and all
that kind of stuff, they can do that in an outdoor -- limited
outdoor facility that doesn't have to have near the things --
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Just won't have bucking
chutes. It will have a roping box, though.
'~, COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Have a roping box. But that
still doesn't take up any room compared to what they're
taking up now.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It doesn't get used; all it
is is a maintenance nightmare.
COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah.
', MR. LEWIS: One of the things I want to be sure
that I hear from y'all is what your constituents and what the
-- the user groups have told you that they -- they think is
important, and have it filtered out to us, but -- so that we
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-- we hear everything that is expected of us one way or the
other. You know, I'm getting a good perspective on that
today, but if -- what nobody wants to have happen is have
some voice out there that becomes very vocal because it
wasn't considered in, you know, how we did this planning.
And so we've had some conversations about that, but I -- and
I look to y'all to guide me in how we deal with that kind
of --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Ernie Kaiser needs an
elevator to go up and down to his nature bay.
MR. LEWIS: In that office --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I told him we'll get a loader
and dump him in the window.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's the answer.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: But I think on the -- from the
stock show standpoint, they get by with the space we have
now, so we need to have more space. Not a whole lot more.
MR. LEWIS: Mm-hmm.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: And it needs to be a little bit
more flexible. Because the meat goats, for example, have
tripled, quadrupled in numbers, where some other things have
dropped, so we need to be able to have space that can go from
one type of animal to another type of animal without having
to -- there are pens out there in the hog barn right now that
are fixed. They need to be a lot more portable.
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COMMISSIONER OEHLER: All portable.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: All portable. And -- but I
think on the, you know, square footage standpoint, you need
to have a -- an area where you have the auction now,
preferably an ag building, and then you need to have the area
where all the pens are, and where the back part of the hog
barn -- you know, that square footage plus some, and maybe
20 percent plus.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think you just run it on
out even with the existing big indoor building that has the
pens on the back. I think you just run that building on out,
and it will require moving a sewer line a little bit.
~~'i MR. LEWIS: In this area -- wash area?
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, the sewer line comes
out the back right where that concrete wash rack is now, and
concrete between the buildings.
MR. LEWIS: Mm-hmm, right.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And it turns and goes behind
the existing barn, ties into the main line.
MR. LEWIS: Again, if we need to relocate -- like I
said, I mean, if relocating either a private or a public
utility line is the best thing for the long-range plans, then
that's not that big a deal in the context of this proposal,
or project.
25 ~ COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Have y'all identified what
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improvements need to be made to the big arena now?
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Big arena, probably, I think
that over time, we're going to need to start replacing the
tin, and the insulation is gone. It's nasty and it's
cracking and falling down. It's just --
MR. LEWIS: Lots of bird nests.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Birds. It's just got to be
cleaned, and put up basically new insulation, new tin, and
just basic -- you know, that's something we can probably do
somewhat in-house on a systematic -- do so much this year and
so much next year. And that way, as something comes around,
you do the same process, and not have to do it all at one
time. It's fairly expensive. But if we want to do it all at
one time and we got the money, we can do it. I do think that
needs to be done.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: New air movers?
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. Those never worked.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Electrical in good shape,
or needs repair?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Probably not bad.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Electrical's okay in the
indoor arena, now. But, you know, as we build some of this
new stuff, replace some of the stuff, we're going to need
some better sound systems, better lighting in most all those
areas, 'cause all that stuff is obsolete.
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MR. LEWIS: One of the things that's part of our
walk-through and look. You say electrical's good. They
~' might be able to go and indicate where certain upgrades are
needed, or capacity of existing service, and -- and that will
be part of our assessment. So that we -- we -- instead of
feeling like stuff is good, we want to know for a fact, and
we have somebody that can --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I believe, you know, if we're
going to do this, we need to make it look good and be good.
But just like the electrical service stuff, a lot of that
stuff could be placed in -- in an equipment room, rather than
having it sticking out there on poles that, you know, are
going to -- that are deteriorating, and it's just another --
basically another safety hazard.
JUDGE TINLEY: Liability issue, yeah. If you got
-- we got some electrical in the indoor arena that's
potentially a liability issue.
MR. LEWIS: And so those are some of the things
that our engineers could come and assess -- visually assess,
as well as do some -- look at some of the individual service
entries, and -- and some of our recommendations would be
consolidation	of service,	upgrades. We	-- everything	new
that we do and	everything	that we touch,	we want to be	with
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current codes. I mean, you are building for the next 25 to
50 years, and so as we take each step forward, we'll bring
everything up to today's standards. That probably won't
change a whole lot in the next 25 years.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think one of the things
that's happened, and it continues to happen, it's more -- is
the fact that 4-H, you know, they have the priority use of
that thing, and they -- they book that facility a lot for
things, like the little area that we have now that we call
the event center whatever you want to call it; it's a dining
hall or show arena or whatever.
MR. LEWIS: It's all those things.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It's all those things. It's
a BB gun range and it's -- you know, it serves many purposes.
MR. LEWIS: Mm-hmm.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: But I think one of the goals
is that we -- we have that available for them and we give
them good space to use. But if -- when we get this other
bigger, newer space, that those -- that gives us the ability
to lease this stuff out to multiple -- multiple types of
shows and functions and exhibits, and you name it; we'll have
them.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You're right.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We won't have that conflict
of having 4-H tie up the whole facility for a week when it
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doesn't need to be tied up. You know, or sometimes they use
it for a backup --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- plan. And, you know, we
want them to -- we want them to be taken care of, number one,
but we also need to take care of other things that come to
Kerrville that benefit Kerrville.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I agree with you.
MR. LEWIS: And I -- there's been a lot of
conversation over the last couple years about the need for a
large indoor event center, and I think there's a tremendous
pent-up demand that will really be realized once the facility
is available. And I think it will also be a catalyst for
other things happening along -- in east Kerr County along 27,
you know, and things like motels and restaurants will start
to spring up. 'Cause as -- as you create a space a lot of
people use, they're going to want amenities to go with that.
So, I think it's a great economic driver, and you'll -- I
believe you'll realize that immediately when you have the new
facilities. Right now, people -- so many -- you know, the
facilities are well used, but if they are much better,
they're going to get much better use and a broader range of
uses.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right, exactly.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can I -- I think this is
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somewhat on topic. Jeannie, can you look up -- I know there
I
was some legislation not too long ago that enabled counties
to put sales tax areas together that are smaller than the
whole county, like doing an ag barn, and -- and can you look
at as to how that's done and if that's reasonable?
MS. HARGIS: Sales tax district.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Sales tax district. And if we
don't want to expand it, because, I mean, that area is not in
the city. It can -- it does have quite a bit of -- well,
2 percent it can go up -- whatever it is, it can go up on
sales tax.
MS. HARGIS: First come, first served, you know, on
sales tax. Whoever applies for it first --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Whoever applies for it first.
And the City can't apply for it, 'cause it's not in their
city limits, so --
MS. HARGIS: Right.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think it -- something was
brought up, some new legislation that gave counties the
ability to do things differently, and I think it would be
both the Arts and Crafts Foundation and the fair, and this is
a pretty good source of revenue to help fund some of this.
And I think it would -- it can be a special, you know,
designation of proceeds.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Sure.
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JUDGE TINLEY: The River Star is not in the city?
MR. LEWIS: No, we're about 200 feet or so from the
city limits.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: What are your annual sales?
What are your sales at the show?
MR. LEWIS: Off the top of my head, I don't know
the figures, but it's -- it is the largest single economic
event in Kerr County. And that may be eclipsed somewhat by
the Hill Country Shooting Sports Center, as that --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's difficult to pull that
number together, 'cause each of those vendors -- 50 different
vendors, they don't reveal their total sales to you.
MR. LEWIS: And so -- yeah.
JUDGE TINLEY: Well, they have to, though, because
the percentage that -- y'all take a percentage of sales,
don't you?
MR. LEWIS: Well, we take concessions and we -- we
do a flat booth fee, and then we do our gate, and that's it.
JUDGE TINLEY: Oh, it's no longer a percentage of
sales? It's a flat fee basis?
(Mr. Lewis nodded.)
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You only got the percentage
off of -- off of food before you changed the process, right?
MR. LEWIS: Mm-hmm.
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COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Got it off there.
MR. LEWIS: It's too hard to -- it is difficult to
track anybody who's been in open air markets or art events or
things like that. It's very hard to --
MS. HARGIS: They don't report it all. If it's
cash, they don't report it.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right.
JUDGE TINLEY: Years ago, it used to be on a
percentage of sales.
MR. LEWIS: Mm-hmm. Back when we were maybe in
simpler, kinder, gentler times.
JUDGE TINLEY: I see.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Anyway, if we're going to --
MR. LEWIS: But, yeah, it's an incredible multiple
three-day economic event, and so just think if we could have
four or five or six of those a year. You have a facility
that could do it.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You bet.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We know of one event coming
up in 2009.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What's that?
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: In July, 2,500 people are
going to be in town for nine days.
JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, the spelunkers.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah.
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COMMISSIONER LETZ: Speleology. International
Convention of Speleology.
MR. LEWIS: Really? Are they going to do some
spelunking out in the county?
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah.
MR. LEWIS: There's a bunch of that.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: They called me the other day
wanting to know if our new building will be ready for them.
I said I don't think so.
MR. LEWIS: Speleology.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I hope so, but we're going to
have to get high and behind on raising money and starting the
process.
', COMMISSIONER LETZ: We -- you know --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: But I really believe that --
you know, that we need to expand that animal part where the
hog deal is now, maybe even connect it to the existing
building, with the indoor arena, all that under one roof.
Pour concrete in it to where you can have multiple things in
there, 'cause when the stock show's over, you don't have any
reason to have pens set up in that thing the rest of the
year.
JUDGE TINLEY: You're right.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: You can do all kind of shows;
garden shows --
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COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, all kinds of things you
could have if you had concrete and didn't have a bunch of hog
pens sitting in it.
MR. LEWIS: I think some things that you do -- I
mean, think about how the festivals -- how you could expand
on the festivals that happen. You could do automobile shows,
gun shows, I mean, all kind of indoor shows that maybe you do
a little bit of now, but if you have a newer, nicer facility,
it's going to be a bigger draw.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, just look what you
could do with the Arts and Crafts Fair that comes in that
time of year if that was a pavilion-type situation.
MR. LEWIS: Right.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That maybe it was closed down
that west side.
MR. LEWIS: Right.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And the rest of it basically
open air, but it still probably would have -- you know, tie
it to the front building.
MR. LEWIS: We found, because of the -- the real
intense rains last year, that we weren't sure we were going
to have a fair, and then we did. But we moved a bunch of our
artists into the indoor area, and they loved it, and that
place -- that part of it's booked this year. And, so,
that's, again, why we keep coming back -- if we can expand
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that, I think one thing is it'll increase our revenue,
because we can charge more for that. Additionally, if we
have a rain-out -- if we ever had a rain-out completely, it
would devastate the Arts and Crafts Fair, because we rely on
that event for a big chunk of our annual operating revenue.
We're doing other events, but having that -- having that
flexibility, I mean, people -- you know, if it rains, people
are still going to come, but not in the numbers that we need
them to. If we had two or three years like this past year,
we'd be hurting. So, an indoor center where you can move a
bunch of your artists in there and still have the outdoor
grounds for a lot of different things, just --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You'd be much better off if
they were under cover.
MR. LEWIS: They like it.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Exhibitors want to be under
cover.
MR. LEWIS: They do. And there's some -- and we
have -- you know, and we've seen -- we've done a lot of
research and visited a lot of different events around the
state, and there's a decline in interest in outdoor events
like this. When we were kids, I mean, that was just the
thing to do; it was so neat. And -- and these --
generationally, it's not as appealing much any more, and so
everything we can do -- people do want to be indoors. They
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do like comfort, and particularly during July and August. If
you had a nice, very comfortable, all -- all-season indoor
events facility, well, I think it would just be gangbusters.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We could also maybe -- maybe
charge the fair a little premium.
MR. LEWIS: No, you don't --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That doesn't work that way?
MR. LEWIS: You don't want to do that.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: But, you know, what you
talked about --
MR. LEWIS: I'm stepping down now. (Laughter.)
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You talked about the
increased -- the additional interest of some of your vendors
because of the opportunity to move under the roof --
MR. LEWIS: Right.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- would give you the
opportunity to recover those guys that have moved out to the
Y.O., and bring them back under your --
MR. LEWIS: It would. In fact, we've seen some
movement back. There's -- other circumstances prevail, of
course, but we're seeing some movement back, and part of it
was the ability to offer an indoor --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Sure.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You think about having
another building that you could actually put -- you could --
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I don't know how many exhibitors you could put into, say, a
40,000 square foot space.
MR. LEWIS: A bunch.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: A lot.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You could -- and it could --
you would have room to build.
MR. LEWIS: You could put -- you could put almost
all of our exhibitors in there -- well, say, 75 percent of
them in there, let's put it that way. And we've got all
these little outdoor booths, but, you know, the big tents are
-- our pavilion is 40 by 100, and the big tents are generally
in that range, and so --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Then if we -- then the next
thing will be to get the next big building be more of a
full-time people building. Then you would have even -- you
could expand it even more. You could even be having some
other kind of show going on.
MR. LEWIS: Mm-hmm.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Until it grew to the point --
MR. LEWIS: And if you are -- if the building has
spaces that can be configured differently with moving walls
and things like that, it gives you a lot more flexibility.
There are -- oh, for instance, our former Executive Director,
Bob Miller, puts on a fly fishing show, and they'd like to do
classrooms, and they want to do the -- a show like that out
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on the fairgrounds and use Flat Rock Lake if needed, put
different things. But if you had an indoor facility, a
classroom space, that type of event where they -- you know
lecturers come, or experts come, that just makes all those
other spaces more valuable.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What we're talking about is
a potential of ultimately, perhaps, filling a need -- a
longstanding need in the community. We don't have a facility
that can seat 1,000 people in a dinner, and you're talking
about a building that can do that.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: The building that we're
talking about can seat close to 2,500.
MR. LEWIS: Well, that Tivy High School could
graduate from.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Exactly right.
MR. LEWIS: Yeah. So, there's nothing that -- that
would accommodate a full graduation with all the families at
an indoor event.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Just so there's so much, and
the whole thing is multi-use. You know, multi-use, not
limited use.
MR. LEWIS: Simple buildings. I mean, they can be
very simple buildings, and have a very nice campus at the end
of the day, whenever the end of that day is. And we may be
around to see it; we may not. But if we have a vision for
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what it can be now, at least set the standard for it.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I assume that the
improvements -- the ag improvements you're talking about,
which were -- basically would be on the east side of the
existing arena, right?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Probably. But, I mean --
MR. LEWIS: We're going to explore. I think we'll
look at both. And, again, it's pretty easy to put blocks
down and -- and the internal parts and how they connect, and
look at it here, look at it back here, over here --
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I guess I was leading up to
the question that the -- the parking area, which was the old
polo field, would continue to be our major parking area?
That's where I was going with that.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Probably still will be.
MR. LEWIS: Saying most likely. Doesn't seem to
make sense to put a building further and further away from
the center of activities, as well as the 7 acres of park on
the other side, if you can -- and it does seem to make sense
to use that for cars. We talk about more structured parking,
more paving, and -- and then -- and then in the overall
master plan, just some things to dress up the front along the
highway and make it a place that's just a little softer and a
little more appealing as you drive by.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: New signage out front?
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MR. LEWIS: New signage out front, some
landscape -- some landscaped things. I don't know what that
is, but, you know, some things with landscaping, entry --
entry gates. Maybe, again, making it very clear how you
enter in a vehicle, and then once you're on the property and
you've parked, how you enter the buildings. Those are things
that -- that's kind of where the planning and the
architecture part comes in. But just -- those are things to
just enhance the overall function of this place.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, next step you need is to
MR. LEWIS: Yeah. We want to do -- what we want to
what the sizes ought to be for those, and then, you know,
whatever kind of comments and things about that. And then
we can tell you -- you know, we know if you got restrooms, we
know how many restrooms you're going to need to do for this
many people; that's the kind of stuff that we'll plug in.
But I want to be sure that we're real clear about the uses
and the spaces that will be required, and then we can develop
footprints to do that and look at them. Like I say, pretty
simply look at them all over the site, and just -- in places
that are logical and make sense. So, that would be the first
deal, and then we can get our -- I mean, as soon as we have
-- have some sense of what might happen, and then I can get
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together our engineering team and bring them up, and -- and
walk through, look at the utilities, look at the electricity
-- electrical and mechanical, plumbing and inside the
building, do kind of an assessment, and then talk to the
operations folks, talk to maintenance people, get their
perspective too. It's always good to get input from the
folks who have to deal with it every day and deal with all
the -- all the repairs, or --
COMMISSIONER LETZ: We can probably get that to you
by the end of the week, I'd say. I know we're meeting
Thursday again. We could each -- you know, everyone write it
down and get it to Bruce.
MR. LEWIS: Okay.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Part of the plan is to move
the outdoor arena this year, right?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yes.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's part of what our
bond issue's all about, right?
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It doesn't have anything --
we can get this thing built so cheap, it won't even be funny.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay, that's good.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: The bond issue, the little
under 500,000 that's in there is really set aside more as
going for grants, that we're putting up that amount. And I
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think anything that we do in the process, we keep track of,
like moving the arena. And we've already, you know, done,
you know, a couple hundred thousand, whatever it is, towards
getting us to the point that we can do it, and then going out
for -- you know, 'cause the more we show that we're putting
up, the easier it's going to be to raise some money.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: The sooner Peter gets a
concept plan ready, the sooner we can go see folks like
U.S.D.A., see what's available there.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: We can be fairly -- I mean,
think?
MR. LEWIS: Well, this first part of it, I think we
the program done. What we got to do is get our base maps
together as well so we can do some planning. I think I've --
in my original proposal, I had kind of -- I think I gave you
a schedule, and I -- if we adjust for time, I'd say -- I was
going to say that, you know, if you go out for matching
grants, the more that you do things like classroom spaces in
this public building, or educational grants that -- and as
well as that complement the programs -- education programs
you do, I think there's a lot of money out there from various
sources that makes sense. Well, I have to say, if I
documented a schedule early on, I don't -- I didn't keep a
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I' good record of it, but I will put together a schedule.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: Probably -- you're looking at
probably two months --
MR. LEWIS: Mm-hmm, I think so.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- to get mostly through this?
Okay.
MR. LEWIS: And then what -- you know, we'll have
-- we'll have two-dimensional drawings of the layout, but
then we'll also produce a little something that's a --
something -- you know, bird's eye perspective that -- just
eye wash, but it gives a sense of, in three dimensions, what
' this thing might look like if you're coming into Kerrville
Airport -- Schreiner Field.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You know, I think -- we know
that we need to expand the size of the livestock area a
little bit, and then work on deciding whether -- if we're
still going to use that -- what we call the convention hall,
you know, or whatever the heck you want to call it, exhibit
hall, if we're going to continue to use that for smaller
functions, you know, say up to 600 people for a sit-down
dinner type situation, do we want to expand that a little
bit, or do we want to leave it the same, or do we want to --
you know, what are we going to do with that area? Because
we're going to build, hopefully, another area that's going to
have a lot of that in it. Do we need two of those, or do we
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just need one?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think one, but I think what
we probably need to do, we need to just put down -- from what
I'm hearing Peter say, we need to put down what we want it to
have, and then we can -- you and I can hash some things out
Thursday.
MR. LEWIS: Say we want a meeting room for 1,000
people. You don't need to tell me the dimensions of it.
I'll come back and -- say you want 1,000 seated or 1,000
dancing or what -- you know, whatever. Tell me that kind of
thing, and then I'll come back and propose a size for that,
and then a size for maybe a kitchen to support that. But
tell me you want a kitchen and you want it to be a catering
kitchen, or you want it to be a full-blown institutional --
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We want it to be a
preparation area with sinks, but no stoves.
MR. LEWIS: Okay.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Catering type.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Most of those events are
catered, and I don't think we want to have somebody cleaning
up a kitchen after somebody comes in there and does a
full-blown meal.
MR. LEWIS: Well, you get into a lot of expense
doing things like that as well.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We don't need commercial
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ovens and -- and six-burner Viking stoves, and zero walk-in
coolers and all. I mean, we -- it needs to be limited on
that, from my point of view.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You're talking about a
catering kitchen.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, I'm talking about a
preparation area where they bring in their food and have
counters to set things out on, so they can go from there to
the servers.
JUDGE TINLEY: But you are going to need
refrigeration.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Oh, yeah, we'll need
refrigeration. We have a little bit of that already, but
refrigeration -- big freezer and a big cooler.
COMMISSIONER LETZ: If everyone on the Court would
get their list of what they think it should be, and Bruce and
myself -- he and I can meet on Thursday and get it to Peter
by the end of the week.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sure, if that works for
y'all.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah.
JUDGE TINLEY: Are we done here?
COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think so.
JUDGE TINLEY: Okay.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Very good.
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JUDGE TINLEY: Let's fold this one up.
MR. LEWIS: Thank you, I appreciate it. It's an
exciting project; I appreciate being involved in it.
COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Take care, Peter.
(Commissioners Court workshop adjourned at 2:20 p.m.)
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 3rd day of March, 2008.
JANNETT PIEPER, Kerr County Clerk
B Y : __ _ ~~~~ _______ ___
Kathy anik, Deputy County Clerk
Certified Shorthand Reporter
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