1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT 9 Budget Workshop 10 Wednesday, August 17, 2005 11 9:00 a.m. 12 Commissioners' Courtroom 13 Kerr County Courthouse 14 Kerrville, Texas 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 PRESENT: PAT TINLEY, Kerr County Judge H. A. "BUSTER" BALDWIN, Commissioner Pct. 1 24 WILLIAM "BILL" WILLIAMS, Commissioner Pct. 2 JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Pct. 3 25 DAVE NICHOLSON, Commissioner Pct. 4 2 1 I N D E X August 17, 2005 2 PAGE --- Visitors' Comments 3 3 Review and discuss FY 2005-06 budgets for various 4 County departments including, but not limited to: 5 Road and Bridge 12 6 Information Technology 60 7 District Clerk 119 8 Tax Assessor/Collector 139 9 --- Adjourned 142 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 3 1 On Wednesday, August 17, 2005, at 9:00 a.m., a budget 2 workshop of the Kerr County Commissioners Court was held in 3 the Commissioners' Courtroom, Kerr County Courthouse, 4 Kerrville, Texas, and the following proceedings were had in 5 open court: 6 P R O C E E D I N G S 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Let me call to order the 8 Commissioners Court workshop -- budget workshop scheduled 9 for this date and time, Wednesday, August 17th, 2005, at 10 9 a.m. It's a bit past that time now. We've -- the agenda 11 is couched in a manner that we've listed some County 12 departments, but we -- I purposely couched it "various 13 County departments including, but not limited to" listed 14 departments, and Mr. David Dozier with K.I.S.D. Board of 15 Trustees is here and he has some solutions with respect to 16 our juvenile facility. So, we'll be glad to hear what you 17 have to offer on that, Mr. Dozier. 18 MR. DOZIER: Well, I think really all I 19 wanted to say, Judge, was that -- that we have some teachers 20 over there, and this year it's costing us about $150,000 to 21 have them over there, and so that's taxpayers' money. So 22 when y'all talk about $750,000, you have to add in $150,000, 23 and it's $900,000 of taxpayers' money. And Mr. Tomlinson 24 said last week that K.I.S.D. was just raking in money over 25 there, and that's an absolute falsehood. And -- and if -- 8-17-05 bwk 4 1 if our -- our budget is kind of fixed. It's not like 2 y'all's, and have to worry about getting people in there and 3 all that. But -- but we need about 45 people to break even. 4 So, when y'all come up with all these solutions, it seems to 5 me like y'all were leaning towards 36, and 75 percent of 36 6 is more like 20-something. 7 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Let me ask you, you 8 said it's costing you $150,000, but then you said you'd need 9 some number to break even? 10 MR. DOZIER: Our number is probably about 45. 11 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Okay. So if we got 12 the population up, you could get rid of your $150,000 cost? 13 MR. DOZIER: Yes. It's between -- 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 15 MR. DOZIER: We get back something like 5,000 16 or 6,000. Maybe 500. I'm not -- I don't know the exact 17 number, but it's -- but we get back a number around 5,000. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: State aid? 19 MR. DOZIER: Right. And, see, they do get a 20 multiplier, so if the A.D.A. is 2,500, well, we do get, 21 like, 5,000 or something like that. 22 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: If we didn't have a 23 local juvenile facility, that 150,000 would be erased? 24 Would you absorb those teachers back into your system? 25 MR. DOZIER: Well, yeah, we would absorb 8-17-05 bwk 5 1 them. We have them under contract for this year. 2 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Would the costs be 3 eliminated? 4 MR. DOZIER: Well, it -- 5 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Would your costs go 6 down 150,000 if -- 7 MR. DOZIER: At least 150. 8 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Okay. 9 MR. DOZIER: Right. But -- unless you can 10 get -- unless you can get 45 people in there. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: My question, David, what 12 does K.I.S.D. do with the kids -- I mean, if they're -- I 13 guess if we don't have a facility, they go out of county and 14 it's some other school district's responsibility to educate 15 them; is that correct? 16 MR. DOZIER: Yeah, like what y'all have been 17 talking about. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So if we -- 19 MR. DOZIER: I guess they go through Judge 20 Tinley, and Judge Tinley sends them somewhere. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. But if they go 22 to -- say they're in Gillespie County; then Gillespie ISD 23 has to figure out how to educate the kids. It's no longer a 24 Kerr County problem, and that money isn't passed back to the 25 county where they come from? I'm asking the question. 8-17-05 bwk 6 1 Tommy's shaking his head. 2 MR. TOMLINSON: I don't think so. I think 3 the A.D.A. goes to the -- to the county where the kid 4 resides. That's my impression. 5 MR. DOZIER: Oh, if they live in the juvenile 6 facility over there? Yeah, that's probably right. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, the money goes there. 8 But, I mean, we lose -- K.I.S.D. has no responsibility if 9 the kids are housed in another county. 10 MR. DOZIER: Right. 11 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: And the other -- 12 MR. TOMLINSON: But they still have the 13 teachers. 14 MR. DOZIER: For -- they're under contract 15 for a year. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: For a year. So -- but 17 after that, you -- 18 MR. DOZIER: And we can absorb them, and then 19 we can -- well, we could -- 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Reduce through attrition 21 or something? 22 MR. DOZIER: Yeah. We always have "X" 23 number; 20 -- 20, 30, something like that. 24 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: The other key 25 learning here is that K.I.S.D. taxpayers are paying to 8-17-05 bwk 7 1 educate children from other counties. 2 MR. DOZIER: Right now. 3 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah. And so we're 4 paying to house and feed children from other counties. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, that quid pro 6 quo extends all over this -- this juvenile spectrum. If we 7 send a kid out of county and their cost to house that kid is 8 greater than our per diem, the County is taking -- picking 9 up the difference just like we do. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But we get the state 11 revenue for the kids from other counties, so it's kind of -- 12 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah. 13 MR. DOZIER: Well, I guess what I really was 14 thinking of first, besides what Tommy said, was that 15 Commissioner Letz said that -- that if we were to send them 16 out of county, we would lose -- it would cost $200,000 or 17 something -- some number. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 19 MR. DOZIER: Well, that's not too far from 20 what K.I.S.D. is losing right this minute. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Does K.I.S.D. not put 22 some of their -- 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Expelled? 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- expelled kids -- kids 25 that go out there that aren't part of the facility? 8-17-05 bwk 8 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's that 2 summertime program. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I thought it was. 4 MR. DOZIER: I'm not sure what the expelled 5 kids -- I know Dr. Troxel has worked with y'all, and we have 6 some slots that -- that we keep available and we pay for. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 8 MR. DOZIER: But that's, like, four slots or 9 something like that. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: It's a -- it's a smaller 11 number. The advantage is that we've got the end -- end-game 12 result that these children that are trying to work their way 13 out of the system where they don't have to go to school at 14 all are looking at the end result, they'll be going to 15 school out there. 16 MR. DOZIER: Right. And it's a good 17 deterrent. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Saves them from being thrown 19 out. 20 MR. DOZIER: It's really good to take the kid 21 out there and say, "Look, how would you like to live here?" 22 And -- and if you -- you're not going to be expelled and you 23 can go down and live at McDonald's or wherever you go -- 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And they pay us a 25 whopping $22.18 a day or something like that. 8-17-05 bwk 9 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Something like that. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, David, what you're 3 basically saying is that from K.I.S.D.'s just dollar 4 standpoint alone, you're better off either having no 5 facility in Kerr County or having 45 kids? 6 MR. DOZIER: Yeah. For -- if we're not 7 talking about -- we're trying to take care of kids. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just pure dollars. It's 9 either nothing or 45. Otherwise, it's costing the 10 taxpayers. 11 MR. DOZIER: Yes. If it's 43, it's costing 12 some number. May be only $10,000. But -- but I think when 13 I was thinking of it, you said it would cost 200,000 or 14 something just to send those 10 out or whatever they are. 15 And -- and if you did, we wouldn't get money for those 10. 16 But we wouldn't -- but we would absorb those teachers into 17 the school somewhere. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: For one year. 19 MR. DOZIER: Yeah. And then we would -- we 20 would drift them out through attrition. And so I'm not 21 encouraging y'all to do anything, but I want you to know all 22 the facts. And -- and when Mr. -- when Tommy said what he 23 said, that was very irritating to me. And -- 24 MR. TOMLINSON: My point, sir, was that you 25 did get A.D.A. That's was all my point -- 8-17-05 bwk 10 1 MR. DOZIER: But you said we're raking in the 2 money over there. 3 MR. TOMLINSON: I think that's a false 4 statement, sir. I didn't -- I didn't imply that. 5 MR. DOZIER: Okay. 6 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: The reason I -- 7 MR. TOMLINSON: I don't want to be accused of 8 something like that. You understand me? 9 MR. DOZIER: I understand. 10 MR. TOMLINSON: Okay. And my point was, is 11 that we get the A.D.A. from the kids that come from other 12 counties. Okay. 13 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: The reason I was 14 asking the question about whether or not K.I.S.D. was 15 subsidizing out-of-county children, other counties' 16 children, and the point that we are, I made that point 17 because an editorialist said we ought to be happy to help 18 solve these other counties' problems by incurring these 19 costs to house their children, and I -- I reject that. I 20 don't think we -- we can barely afford to take care of our 21 own children, let alone incur costs to take care of somebody 22 else's children. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But I think -- and also, 24 I think an interesting point is there's been a lot of talk 25 about having a preadjudication facility in the county only. 8-17-05 bwk 11 1 From a K.I.S.D. standpoint, that's a bad option. A very bad 2 option. 3 MR. DOZIER: Well, unless you do -- I was 4 thinking the number might be 60, and take 75 percent of 5 that, and that's 45. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But if it's 7 preadjudication only, we're probably looking at about 20 8 maximum. 9 MR. DOZIER: Twenty, we lose -- we lose in 10 the neighborhood of half of 262,000, which is 135,000, 11 140,000. And this year alone, we're going to lose about -- 12 we don't have all of our numbers in, but it looks like it's 13 going to be in the neighborhood of 150,000, so I just wanted 14 y'all to -- to have all the facts together. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And this is just a 16 general -- you're president of the school board? 17 MR. DOZIER: Yes, sir. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is this just -- I know, 19 because of the way boards are -- is this your opinion, or is 20 this your statement or the school board's? 21 MR. DOZIER: This is my opinion. We talked 22 about it at the school board last night, and I think I've 23 got my facts clear. But it's my opinion. It's not -- 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The board didn't direct 25 you to come? 8-17-05 bwk 12 1 MR. DOZIER: We didn't have a resolution 2 saying come over here and tell y'all that or thinking like 3 that. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 5 MR. DOZIER: I've been thinking about it for 6 a week, so -- 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. I just wanted to 8 get that clear. I know boards -- 9 MR. DOZIER: No, that's correct. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 11 MR. DOZIER: Thank you, Commissioners. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Appreciate you 13 being here. 14 MR. DOZIER: Okay. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's move into the -- the 16 first budget to be reviewed, Road and Bridge. Mr. Odom? 17 MR. ODOM: Good morning. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Morning, sir. 19 MR. ODOM: Alive and well. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Road and Bridge. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Number 20. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Number 20. 23 MR. ODOM: Number one in your scorecard, 24 right? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Before we get started, 8-17-05 bwk 13 1 one thing that we talked to him about which relates to -- we 2 talked a lot about at our last meeting, mowing at the 3 airport. A recent -- I'm not saying I agree with it -- 4 recent opinion from the City Attorney's office is that the 5 City entered into a five-year contract there, which I'm not 6 quite sure how you do that, but they have done it, and they 7 have obligated the City and the County for funding that 8 contract for five years. And because of that, the City 9 Attorney's office feels that there is a potential -- if we 10 were to cancel the contract and do it ourselves, there is a 11 potential for a lawsuit, and the damages in such lawsuit 12 would be the profit that the individual currently doing it 13 would probably very easily -- or the way I read the opinion, 14 was he could quite easily get that profit. 15 I have a real problem with how they can 16 contract -- one, how they entered into a contract without 17 the County knowing anything about it, and two, how you 18 contract for and commit future budget years. They did say 19 there's an out if we don't fund it, and that may be an out. 20 But it appears at this time that that's a battle I'm not 21 willing to really fight for about a $10,000, $15,000 22 savings. I'm going to ask the Airport Board to really look 23 very seriously at all the original charges coming out of the 24 city management contract for the next year, and we'll look 25 at this same topic next year, but I want to take that off 8-17-05 bwk 14 1 the table for this year. I think we just have too much else 2 going. And with that legal opinion out there -- Rex has not 3 looked at the legal opinion, his input into it. But I don't 4 want to bring up another controversy at this point with the 5 City of Kerrville. 6 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I wonder if they 7 advertised that contract for bid. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes, they did. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, they did, 10 and -- 11 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I'd have bid on it. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think this contract 13 was let before the new Joint Airport Board was -- was formed 14 and populated, which changed the balance of -- of power down 15 there on that matter. And it also -- the contract, I think, 16 Commissioner, contains what they call a reserve clause, I 17 believe, that -- something to the effect that if either of 18 the governing bodies fail to appropriate funds, then -- then 19 the contract is canceled or whatever. However, the reserve 20 for the reserve clause is that it has to be that you don't 21 have the money to fund it, as opposed to not being willing 22 to fund it. There's a material difference here. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And especially if we were 24 going to take it on ourselves, obviously, we'd have money to 25 do part of it, even if we could save money. 8-17-05 bwk 15 1 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: So, we're stuck with 2 it. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It would look that 4 way. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It appears at the moment, 6 but I would like, during the -- in October, let the County 7 Attorney look at that contract. I have some questions 8 about, one, the contract that was entered into prior to -- I 9 mean, in a whole different legal scheme than what the -- the 10 way the airport's currently being operated, and during a 11 period when the City opinion is that they had authority 12 under -- being the managing partner prior to the current 13 system to enter into contracts on behalf of the County. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I suspect there will 15 be more discussions at the Airport Board. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But my -- the bottom line 17 is, from a Road and Bridge standpoint, you can -- you don't 18 need to worry about mowing that airport this year, because 19 that's not going to be happening. 20 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: But next time the 21 contract comes up, we'll bid on it. 22 MR. ODOM: I got it. In other words, I'm low 23 bid, right? We can handle that. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge, Line 1, 25 Engineer's Salary. Requested 73. Is that the same amount 8-17-05 bwk 16 1 that was in this present budget, or is there an increase? 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think it's the same -- 3 well, no. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: The present budget was 5 adjusted -- and the Auditor, I think, can tell us, because 6 we made some adjustments going into last budget year when we 7 put the engineer on contract services, and -- but we made 8 adjustments because of floodplain and -- and matters such as 9 that. And the -- the 73,370 is the current budget for what 10 was classified then as the assistant's salary, who became 11 the Road Administrator in charge of the entire thing. If -- 12 if I'm incorrect in any manner, you gentlemen let me know. 13 MR. TOMLINSON: That's right. We moved -- we 14 moved his administrative assistant into Line Item 103. 15 MR. ODOM: 103. 16 MR. TOMLINSON: And -- 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see that. 18 MR. TOMLINSON: And his goes into Line 102. 19 MR. ODOM: 102. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, that changed 21 the designation, because it's not the engineer. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's my next 23 question. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 25 MR. ODOM: Yeah. I have administrative 8-17-05 bwk 17 1 salary, is what we submitted as 102. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's the way it 3 should read. 4 MR. ODOM: That's the way we thought it -- 5 but I don't have any control. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, that was really 7 the reason for my question. 8 MR. ODOM: 102 was administrative salary. 9 That's what I submitted to the Judge by -- of course, what 10 you see is the old one, but we even marked through the 11 administrator up there. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, the answer to my 13 question, 73,370 is the same number in the present budget. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, with all the -- 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- moving. Okay, very 18 good. Thank you. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Just a clarification. 20 That includes -- that includes compensation for doing -- 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Floodplain. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- floodplain and -- 23 and land use? 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Mm-hmm. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 8-17-05 bwk 18 1 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Looking at 105, 2 there's a big change there. Is that connected with the 3 reorganization? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. I think the first 5 one's Len, the second one's Truby, the third one's Barbara. 6 MR. ODOM: Barbara. 7 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: So, there were two 8 people in 105 -- 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 10 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: -- previously, and 11 now they're -- 12 MR. ODOM: That's right. We're going to one. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: There were some adjustments to 14 the assistant last year also because of some -- some 15 additional duties that were put on the -- what is now the 16 Assistant Administrator's position. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, 56 goes up to 18 Line 2, right? 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. Essentially, that's 20 what happens. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And what is -- 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, no. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 34. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: 34 goes up to Line 2. And the 25 breakout, 2197, to Line 3. 8-17-05 bwk 19 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: That's the only change that 3 really needs to be made there, is where it says "Engineer," 4 just provide the administrator, and then everything else 5 kind of -- 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Falls into -- 7 JUDGE TINLEY: -- falls into place. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Tell me about fuel costs, 11 Mr. Odom. 12 MR. ODOM: I think I have $8,000 left, and 13 we're running around 7,000 every two weeks, so we think that 14 we will be right at -- I think when I made that adjustment 15 this year, that I was saying that I might be a little bit 16 short there in September, but we feel like that we will get 17 into the middle of September, and then the bill will 18 probably be at the last there, and so if there's any 19 savings, we'll see where we're at. But right now -- last 20 time I looked at our printout that we carry, that I had 21 8,000-something on -- on fuel, so we think we'll be close 22 with the next billing and all at the end of this month, and 23 we'll just see. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Judge, did you move to -- 25 MR. ODOM: I moved 25,000. 8-17-05 bwk 20 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, I'm asking what page 2 we're on. All of a sudden, we were -- I'm on Page 75, and 3 all of a sudden I don't see -- 4 MR. ODOM: Probably 611 is what he's talking 5 about, the second page -- well, I'm sorry. I'm not quite 6 sure. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. Page 77, I'm sorry. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 9 MR. ODOM: The 611 budget that he's talking 10 about. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 12 MR. ODOM: We think we will hold the same. I 13 don't see a lot of difference in fuel. What they're saying 14 is that I think that we're definitely going to see $70 -- I 15 don't put my life on it, but I believe sincerely that $70 is 16 there, and should there be something else, they say that -- 17 they're throwing out the number 100, and they do that a lot, 18 just flyers, what I've been reading. But we can possibly 19 get to $80, so I don't see it coming down. 20 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: What line? 21 MR. ODOM: '07, yes, I think we can look at 22 something. 23 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: What line is this? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Fuel Oils, 331 on Page 77. 25 MR. ODOM: So, I think the 100,000 that I 8-17-05 bwk 21 1 tried to adjust to -- what we adjusted this year on this 2 year's budget, the current one, and then I've adjusted a 3 little bit there on this new budget, and we'll just see. 4 But if we run -- you're going to see $3. I saw 3.09 on TV 5 the other day, and 30 days ago I was seeing projections of 6 $3 a gallon in California, and I saw 3.09, I think, last 7 night on -- on a deal. So ... 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Under the current 9 budget, Len, you only had -- you had nine -- I shouldn't say 10 "only" -- had $99,000 budgeted for fuel oil; is that 11 correct? 12 MR. TOMLINSON: That's right. 13 MR. ODOM: I believe so. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Started out with 70, and we 15 adjusted that upward. 16 MR. ODOM: Started out with 70. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Up to 99, but now you 18 want 102 for the ensuing year? 19 MR. ODOM: Well, I added 25 to this. We've 20 been running 66. And that shows you how much fuel has -- 21 has impacted us. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can we go back up to the 23 beginning of this, up to Crew Salaries? 24 MR. ODOM: Crew Salaries? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How many individuals are 8-17-05 bwk 22 1 in that line item? 2 MR. ODOM: I believe that there should be -- 3 taking three -- 22, I believe. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 22? 5 MR. ODOM: I think there's 25 all together. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And -- 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And a few years ago, 8 it was up around 30. 9 MR. ODOM: 30, 34. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 34. 11 MR. ODOM: Yeah. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Something like that. 13 So, through the years, he has really scaled that thing down. 14 MR. ODOM: I've come down. As a matter of 15 fact, what, a year or so ago, I gave up one position. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. Year before last. 17 MR. ODOM: Yes, sir. 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Len, you have done a 19 good job of holding down payroll costs, and yet I see that 20 we're a relatively expensive county overall compared to 21 other counties, and that we staff relatively heavy compared 22 to other counties. I don't have any question that you -- I 23 know how your people operate. They're efficient, 24 hardworking out there, do a good job. One question. Is 25 there any technology or machinery that -- any capital 8-17-05 bwk 23 1 expenditures that you can make that would tend to displace 2 personnel costs? 3 MR. ODOM: I have one in mind that I wanted 4 as we got to Capital Outlay. However, to answer that 5 honestly, I can't say that it would replace it, but I think 6 it could keep it from increasing. I'm -- there may be the 7 possibility, when I look at Maintenance, to -- if I don't 8 get the new equipment, I'm seeing this year that we're 9 beginning to hold the line. Even with the increases, that I 10 have less downtime. And that's a key there, is how much 11 maintenance I do. So, it sort of fluctuates with our growth 12 and all. I hate to give anything up, but I do have a 13 specific thing that I'm using in your area, Commissioner, on 14 Skyview up there. I had to go out to a contractor, and if 15 y'all will allow me to talk a little bit on it, this is 16 called a zipper, and it's a reclaimer, which is a smaller 17 machine that I can put on my loader, and it picks up base 18 failures without having -- it cuts down the time. I mean, 19 it just -- I can add cement on top of the ground, I can add 20 base on top of the ground where the wheel wells sink down in 21 there, like Ranchero, where we're trying to level up in 22 areas. And it just -- in 5 or 10 minutes after you get the 23 material down that you want, that area is -- 24 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Do you have one of 25 those now? Or it's something you -- 8-17-05 bwk 24 1 MR. ODOM: It's something that I want to 2 discuss with you, that I could pick up without costing us 3 anything this year, because what I'm doing now is 4 17,000 square feet. It's costing me $17,000 to have 5 somebody do this. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: You're utilizing this machine 7 via a contractor, and it's costing -- 8 MR. ODOM: That's correct. And I've got 9 miles -- I've got Tatsch Road that needs to be reclaimed out 10 there. I got Weatherby out there. That whole area in there 11 is just -- it's a unique area with very cold stratas, and 12 makes the concrete -- everything just decay very quick, and 13 so we look at that. If I just use the example I've got with 14 Mr. Cummings for 17,000, it pays for itself. Now, I was 15 talking to Tommy before we started, that there's an 16 opportunity to pick this up on H.G.A.C., to put off the 17 payments like I did the chip spreader until this year, and 18 that over a three-year period, the chip spreader will be 19 paid for. And that I just -- I wouldn't have to make a 20 payment until October of '06, and then after that, I can pay 21 for it out of what I see right now that I want in this new 22 budget; I'll have special project money and can make the 23 payment without increasing anything. And that once -- in 24 three years, that equipment's paid off that I just bought, 25 that we took that municipal loan on. That other one's paid 8-17-05 bwk 25 1 for without hurting the budget at all. It is a way that I 2 don't have to increase; I can do my maintenance more 3 efficiently. I can take things, and we don't have to -- you 4 know, it will cut down the time tremendously. But it -- I 5 can't say that I can release people, but -- 'cause I just 6 got three-man crews. I couldn't do it with two-man crews. 7 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: You'd either get 8 more miles out of it -- 9 MR. ODOM: That's right, sir. 10 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: -- or lower costs. 11 MR. ODOM: Lower costs to the taxpayers. 12 That's the way I see it. More efficient. 13 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: That's what I wanted 14 to hear. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: On Item 460 under 16 Equipment Rental -- 17 MR. ODOM: All right, sir. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- you've got, it 19 appears, a new piece of equipment. 20 MR. ODOM: A new piece of equipment. That is 21 the 910 loader. There was two of them I bought -- the Court 22 bought in 1991 or 1990, and I've had that one, and I have -- 23 I don't have anything except those old W-11 loaders, and 24 they're on their last leg. They're obsolete. So, what we 25 wanted to do was to lease a 914, which is equivalent of a 8-17-05 bwk 26 1 910, and move that 910 into the Spur 100 yard to load with. 2 Because that W-11, it just -- just doesn't have the power. 3 Parts are difficult, and that's throwing good money after 4 bad. We just felt like we would go like we have on the 5 other heavy equipment, other loaders, five-year lease, put 6 it in there. And you notice I did do that, but we didn't 7 increase our budget. I think my budget's $300 less off -- 8 item-to-item, taking out the $84,000 payment for the chip 9 spreader and that distributor. So -- 10 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: What items am I -- 11 I'm looking at 460 and what else? 12 MR. ODOM: Pardon me? 460 is the one that 13 Jonathan -- 14 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: And what other 15 item -- you were saying you lowered another item? 16 MR. ODOM: Well, the total budget was $300 17 less than -- 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Oh. 19 MR. ODOM: -- this year. But I had to add 20 in -- if you go back to the sheet -- I think you have 21 that -- the payment for the chip spreader is 84,040 that we 22 have a payment this year on. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is that under 460 24 already? 25 MR. ODOM: I think -- well, we have -- 570 is 8-17-05 bwk 27 1 a new item that the Auditor put down. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah, that's capital, 3 570. 4 MR. ODOM: But I think it's going to be a 5 separate -- 570 is that list of items that -- under Capital 6 Outlays, but there's a separate item that Mindy told us 7 that -- that we were going to be charged loan repayment or 8 something like that, and I don't know what that item is. 9 And that was 84,000. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: My question is, I don't 11 understand the -- if you're -- if the -- what's the 12 difference between 646 and 570? If you're putting the new 13 loader under Equipment Rental, then you also have a Capital 14 Outlay item -- it seems that the new loader should be under 15 Capital Outlay, not under rental. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, it's not a 17 purchase. 18 MR. ODOM: It's not a purchase; it's a lease. 19 Capital Outlay would be purchase. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I thought we did 21 capital lease. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We're doing a lease on 23 the chip spreader? 24 MR. ODOM: No, we purchased the chip 25 spreader. We took a municipal loan for -- three years? 8-17-05 bwk 28 1 MR. TOMLINSON: Three years. 2 MR. ODOM: Three years. And the 3 distributor -- and that's another item that I don't have 4 here, and they -- that's the reason I showed it up here 5 under 570, but it's -- to our knowledge, it is a separate 6 line item, whatever they're going to put it under. 7 MR. TOMLINSON: Well, I separated the 8 payments out of the Capital Outlay for recording purposes. 9 It's just easier for us, for GASB purposes, to have that -- 10 the debt payment separate from any cash expenditures for -- 11 for capital purchases. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So, capital leases 13 will always, from this point on, be 460, and capital 14 purchases 570? 15 MR. TOMLINSON: Yes. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 17 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: So, if we look at 18 those two together, we see 460 going down by 100,000 -- I 19 mean going up by 100,000, and we see 460 going down by 20 280,000. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The -- under 460, the 22 balance of that -- the requested was 92. The recommended's 23 176. 24 MR. TOMLINSON: That's the payment on the -- 25 the last two pieces of equipment, the chip spreader and the 8-17-05 bwk 29 1 distributor. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Wait a minute. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The chip spreader, you 4 said, is under 570. 5 MR. TOMLINSON: No. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We purchased that. 7 MR. TOMLINSON: The payments on the chip 8 spreader are in 460. $84,000. That's what Leonard's 9 talking about. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So we have the -- the 460 11 is the new loader and the lease payment on the chip 12 spreader. 13 MR. ODOM: The purchase of the chip spreader. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, Tommy just said 15 that that payment's in here. I mean, it's saying here, 16 "rental." That's my confusion, is we're calling it rental, 17 but you're telling me you're buying it. It doesn't seem 18 that's the right spot for it. 19 MR. TOMLINSON: Well, it should -- I mean, 20 it's a lease payment, is what it is, not really a rent -- 21 rental. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is it a lease-purchase? 23 MR. TOMLINSON: Yes. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So it's a lease, but we 25 end up owning it after three years of lease payments. And 8-17-05 bwk 30 1 what's in 570? 2 MR. ODOM: Well, I've got to go -- let me -- 3 570? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 108,000. 5 MR. ODOM: Capital Outlay. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Less than last year. 7 MR. ODOM: Capital Outlays is going to be a 8 9-cubic-yard hatch-cab, extended-cab, four-wheel drive, 9 steel track for skid loader, and two bat wings. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Hold on. We didn't get a 11 copy of that. I didn't get a copy of it, anyway. It's a 12 Capital Outlay -- 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I don't have it, 14 either. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What is the 16 recommended number for 570? 17 MR. ODOM: 108,200 is what I have for Capital 18 Outlay. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, that's what I 20 have, too. So, you would run -- or you're going to buy a 21 new dump truck, and what's -- 22 MR. ODOM: Dump track, half-ton extended cab, 23 four-wheel drive. Shop analyzer, steel track with a skid 24 loader, and two bat wings. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: For $108,000? 8-17-05 bwk 31 1 MR. ODOM: For 108,200. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That list is -- that's 3 what Kathy's copying right now, that list, and the price 4 breakdown. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I didn't know you 6 could buy anything for $108,000. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You're getting ready to 8 see the -- just like the way -- here's the breakdown. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I saw the light. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It may not be a light; 11 may be a haze. 12 MR. ODOM: There's no haze. It's always 13 open, commissioner. I'm as open as any book you've ever 14 read. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I tell you, I'll have 16 to -- Leonard and I met with one of the more difficult 17 constituents that I have. He charmed her. Unbelievable. 18 Unbelievable. I was quite impressed. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Wish I could have seen 20 it. 21 MR. ODOM: I'm capable of a lot. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: He made everyone else 23 look bad. There was four other people there, all wearing 24 hats. He arrives and tips his hat. It was all over from 25 then on. (Laughter.) 8-17-05 bwk 32 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Of course, it blinded 2 her, that glare off the head. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: She was impressed. 4 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: They learn that over 5 at Texas A & M. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Miss Salvatore thinks 7 that he hung the moon; we can do nothing -- no wrong out 8 there as long as Leonard's involved in the project. So, 9 thank you, Leonard. She is a difficult constituent 10 sometimes. 11 MR. ODOM: I hear that, yeah. Nice lady. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Patience is a virtue, isn't 13 it? 14 MR. ODOM: Yes, sir. There's nothing -- I 15 have $108,200, okay? That is capital outlays. That is 16 off -- what I'm showing off my sheet is 570. And that -- 17 that list, I did turn in there, so -- 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We got it. 19 MR. ODOM: And that is for the dump truck at 20 52,000, the -- another one-half-ton extended cab hopefully I 21 can buy for 25, and a shop analyzer for 4,200, 5,000, and 22 22,000 is 108. Now, last year, what I was talking about, 23 the same question Commissioner Nicholson asked me; can I use 24 another 100,000? I didn't use it, but my answer is yes, I 25 can. Because that's where we were coming back with the chip 8-17-05 bwk 33 1 spreader and the asphalt distributor, which matched together 2 to make a more efficient operation, and we were going to 3 amortize that over three to five years, and it ended up with 4 a three-year amortization. So, that's where the -- and I 5 didn't have to pay this budget year. It was first of 6 October, so that's where the extra 84,000 is. The question 7 was -- is where do I put it, and there was going to be a 8 line item that was separate. That's the reason I showed it, 9 to make sure that you saw it. But if you took that out -- 10 and my budget was $300 less than what I had this year, and 11 then you add in what I was asked that I needed, and that was 12 that 84,000. So, my dollars that -- to make the budget work 13 for my capital outlays. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 15 MR. ODOM: And I've reduced -- the capital 16 outlays are reduced this new budget year versus this year 17 what I've spent, 130-something. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: $278,000 worth. 19 MR. ODOM: Yeah. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, Leonard, you said 21 a couple of times that bottom line here, that you -- your 22 budget is reduced by $2,000. 23 MR. ODOM: No. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: 200,000. 25 MR. ODOM: $300. 8-17-05 bwk 34 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 300? 2 MR. ODOM: Uh-huh. That's what I calculated. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Your bottom line? 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: My math doesn't work 5 that way. But -- 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I see bottom line of 7 $200,000 less. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I do too. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I think what's being 10 referred to is the current budget, by virtue of some 11 amendments, has your current budget up to 2 million 4-plus. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Right. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: And your going-in budget was 14 2,161,850. Your proposed budget for the -- requested budget 15 for the coming year is 2,161,550. That's the $300 you're 16 talking about. 17 MR. ODOM: That's the 300 I'm talking about. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: You're 300 under what you went 19 in last year. 20 MR. ODOM: That's right. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Subtract that from 23 there. 24 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: 200 under actual. 25 MR. ODOM: Under actual. 8-17-05 bwk 35 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm, yeah. Two -- about 3 240. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But this -- well, two 5 things. My recollection of last year is that we had a 6 fairly heavy capital outlay last year, you know, so that's 7 why we're coming down. It was a higher-than-usual year last 8 year because we did some equipment, I think -- actually, I 9 believe we accelerated some equipment forward and bought 10 some things that were -- you know. So, I mean, I'm not -- 11 that number was real high, so I hate to go off last year for 12 the capital outlay items and saying we've reduced the 13 budget, because last year was an extraordinary year for 14 capital outlays -- 15 MR. ODOM: That's true. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- in your department. 17 So, I think that's -- you need to remember that. Going back 18 to your capital outlay list here, if you had to cut an 19 item -- and I can kind of look at one of them, to me, the -- 20 if we had to defer one for a year to lower this some, I 21 would pick the half-ton truck. What would you pick? 22 MR. ODOM: Well, if I had to go -- that's my 23 truck. I have 184,402 miles on it right now. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Long way to go still on 25 that truck. 8-17-05 bwk 36 1 MR. ODOM: Well, I hope you're right. And I 2 just discussed it with the shop, "What is the possibility of 3 upgrading some different things on it, U-joints and stuff 4 like that? Can I make another year?" And, so, I -- if I 5 had to, I would go that way. The only -- you know, I -- 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean -- 7 MR. ODOM: -- I think I got a quarter of a 8 million maybe out of it. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You likely would have -- 10 I would say to delete that, you really should probably put 11 $5,000 in repairs, because you're likely to go through a 12 transmission this year. 13 MR. ODOM: I'm going to guess 4,000 or 5,000. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But that would give you a 15 couple more years. That would defer this probably two 16 years. 17 MR. ODOM: Probably two years on the truck. 18 I don't know if I could even buy one for 25,000, to be 19 honest with you. I haven't seen it in the market. But with 20 this new stuff going on, maybe there's something that's 21 stripped down I could pick up, and that's what I thought. 22 But I don't even know if I could do it. If I couldn't do it 23 for that, I -- 24 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: What year model is 25 your current truck? 8-17-05 bwk 37 1 MR. ODOM: I think it's a 2001. I think I 2 picked it up in 2000. I ordered it sometime like that, and 3 I don't think I got it till January of '01. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And the other item, the 5 zipper is not in -- is in here or not? 6 MR. ODOM: No, sir, it is not in here. It is 7 something I wanted to discuss. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What does a zipper cost? 9 MR. ODOM: H.G.A.C. was 79,119. And what 10 they -- here's -- Jonathan, here is this. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's all right. I can 12 just -- 13 MR. ODOM: Okay. This -- it says that -- 14 that this could be picked up, and a five-year 15 lease-slash-purchase is approximately 18 to 19 thousand 16 dollars a year. And for 17,000 square feet, it's too -- you 17 know, that -- that is probably less than a half a mile of 18 roadway to start, and I'm spending that in just having a 19 contractor come in here and tell me how wonderful this 20 machine is, which I already know about. If I had the big 21 machine, it would be no problem. But he's wanting to do the 22 same thing with the same piece of equipment, and I can 23 control the job, and I can't get him on the job right now. 24 I mean, it's -- 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: New equipment or 8-17-05 bwk 38 1 used? 2 MR. ODOM: This is new equipment. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: If we approved that, 4 would you reduce contract fees, then? 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: He has. 6 MR. ODOM: Well, we were talking about the 7 truck. That's -- I would say yes, I would. I'd give up my 8 truck and drive it till it drops. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, will you give up 10 your truck? Will you give up some of the 85,000 in contract 11 fees if we put in this -- 12 MR. ODOM: Oh, in contract fees? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Long as it's not in 15 Precinct 1. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Or 2. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Dave, your turn. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Guess what? 19 MR. ODOM: Hang on a second. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: All going to be in 21 Precinct 3. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The second part of that 23 question is, what is included in this contract fees? What 24 projects? 25 MR. ODOM: Do you have this sheet here? 8-17-05 bwk 39 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I don't see it. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: I don't think so. 4 MR. ODOM: Here. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let me amend his 6 question. How much of the contract fees is in Precinct 3? 7 That may be where you want to start the cut. 8 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Well, if you buy the 9 zipper, don't the contract fees go down? 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. That's what he 11 just told us. So you don't -- you need less money if you 12 buy the zipper. 13 MR. ODOM: I said the productivity would go 14 up, gentlemen. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Productivity goes up? 16 MR. ODOM: Productivity goes up; means I can 17 do a little bit more. And that, in itself, is conducive to 18 less fuel, less wear and tear on equipment. That's what the 19 chip spreader's going to show, and this distributor over the 20 next two years. We're already beginning to see a little 21 bit, just the productivity is there. That means less wear 22 and tear. There's less wear and tear on your men in 23 104-degree weather, and being through. And I -- there's a 24 savings, but what that is right now, I don't -- 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We'll, we're waiting for 8-17-05 bwk 40 1 the backup on the contract fees on the Mountain Home yard. 2 You have a new 35,000. What's that for? 3 MR. ODOM: Sir, I don't think so. I think 4 that -- she's got it. Let me look and see. That should be 5 reduced 35,000. I tell you what's happened is that I marked 6 this, and I don't get it changed on the computer, so that's 7 not the same. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's down 35,000? 9 MR. ODOM: I have -- 588 is Upper Turtle 10 Creek. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Wait. Where are we? 12 JUDGE TINLEY: On Town Creek. 13 MR. ODOM: Town Creek Crossing -- which one 14 do you have? 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I have -- I don't have -- 16 I have Mountain Home Yard, 35,000 requested. 17 MR. ODOM: That is Town Creek Crossing. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's not Mountain 19 Home Yard? 20 MR. ODOM: No, sir. And we mark through it; 21 when we get it back, it still stays there. That is Town 22 Creek Crossing, and what I was trying to do there is, we're 23 looking at trying to get some engineering done this year to 24 see if I can't do some of that work. That's part of that 25 $110,000 for Hermann Sons -- 8-17-05 bwk 41 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right, okay. 2 MR. ODOM: -- that we agreed to do over -- 3 that's what I've been trying to do. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But, see, now it's moved 5 into my precinct instead of Dave's. Much more important. 6 MR. ODOM: But there is an obligation we took 7 on with the Highway Department, and that's part of it. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: That's the in-kind -- 9 MR. ODOM: That's the in-kind. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: -- that we got to meet? 11 MR. ODOM: That's -- and they're looking at 12 now with the crossing over there, Mr. Baldwin, at -- I 13 believe that's yours. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Town Creek? 15 MR. ODOM: Yes. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes. 17 MR. ODOM: And right at Morris Boulevard 18 right there, we're looking at that small, narrow crossing 19 now, right-of-way and some engineering. We looked at it in 20 2000, I think it was, and I had some preliminaries done 21 there, but now we're trying to finalize something and see if 22 we can get a no-rise out of it to widen that structure. Not 23 elevate it, just widen. And then we'll look at the next 24 budget year. You know, if I have enough to buy the box and 25 do some stuff, then we'll do it. And then we'll look down 8-17-05 bwk 42 1 toward the other -- toward the old Highway 41 down there; 2 we'll address that. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: With the upgrade of 4 the loops and new bridges and new roads and all that the 5 City and the State's doing, I think it's an absolute must 6 that you do that. 7 MR. ODOM: Well, I think you've got 8 3,500 acres sitting there; it's vacant. And then whatever 9 that project is that they've got going across to Harper 10 Road, I just see -- I envision that. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This is part of the 12 whole -- 13 MR. ODOM: K.I.S.D. That will explode -- 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 15 MR. ODOM: -- in there. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's the Holdsworth 17 issue. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. Okay, that 19 one. Let's go back to contract fees, now that we've got 20 this list. 21 MR. ODOM: 85,000 is what I have. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. Where's 23 Weatherby? 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I-10, on the western 25 end. 8-17-05 bwk 43 1 MR. ODOM: Off Lower Reservation. It 2 intersects -- it's up there and comes off the feeder road up 3 there at I-10, goes to the county line of Kimble County. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Where's Artlet? 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 1340. Right or wrong? 6 Leonard, are you with us? 7 MR. ODOM: No, I'm sorry, I was looking at 8 the -- I thought he was talking to you. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Artlett's up on 1340. 10 MR. ODOM: Artlet? It's off 1340, yes, sir. 11 That's 4 miles of dirt road. We won't take that on, but 12 we'll look at a mile or two right there, the -- maybe try 13 and scorify and seal. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Could we use -- on Artlet 15 and Weatherby, could we use some of the Schreiner Trust for 16 those projects? 17 MR. ODOM: Probably -- probably both of them, 18 but I -- if this -- the one on Weatherby, this is where that 19 machine will come into excellent -- 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I mean, I'm trying 21 to find money for your machine. 22 MR. ODOM: Right, I understand. Yes, I don't 23 see why not. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Tommy, do we have enough 25 funds in the Schreiner Trust to take those two projects and 8-17-05 bwk 44 1 put them out of the Schreiner Trust? 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That thing's pretty 3 close to being depleted, I know that. 4 MR. TOMLINSON: I didn't bring my -- I 5 brought my budget, but I didn't bring the current 6 financials. I can go get it real quick. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Why don't you? 'Cause if 8 we can just get, like, 20,000 out of the Schreiner Trust or 9 something, if there's that much in it. 10 MR. ODOM: There's more than 20 there. I 11 think we left the principal -- the principal was left at 12 100,000-plus. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 14 MR. ODOM: And then the interest has accrued 15 over that time. So, I just -- it's been several years, but 16 last time we used it was on Sheppard Rees up there. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Couple of years. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I just think it's one of 19 those funds -- I would much prefer to use that dedicated 20 fund for projects if we -- when they're eligible. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: In your precinct. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Are these both in your 23 precinct? 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, they're in his. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Schreiner Trust is 8-17-05 bwk 45 1 eligible for 1 and 4. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I know. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We get reminded every 4 time we ask for it. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I know. Can't have 6 it. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Sorry. 8 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I drive by Artlet 9 Road every day, but I've never been down it. Are there a 10 lot of residents down there? 11 MR. ODOM: No, sir. That's the reason it's 12 been put off at the last. Maybe five or six people. But 13 this is -- you know, we've already done the last -- what was 14 Clark, I just finished. If you look in proportion, there 15 was more people on Artlet, but the mileage was shorter, 16 1.6 miles versus 4 miles. So, it's one of those that I put 17 off for 15 years to -- 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Okay. 19 MR. ODOM: -- to get around, get everybody 20 else that had more traffic and more count -- you know, the 21 cost per vehicle or cost per residence is greater in Artlet 22 than it was the other stuff out there. That's how I looked 23 at it. 24 MR. TOMLINSON: There's 81,000. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Available? 8-17-05 bwk 46 1 MR. TOMLINSON: Yeah. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's over and above 3 the -- 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Principal. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: There's a trust 6 that's 100,000? This is available? 7 MR. TOMLINSON: Yeah, that's what's in our 8 account. 150,000 stays with the trustee. So that's moneys 9 that we have, yeah. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I recommend we take 11 50,000 out of that. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, you jumped from 13 20 to 50 there. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 'Cause there's 80. I 15 could have easily gone for 80 out of it, but I think it's 16 better to leave a little bit more for next year. But if we 17 take -- if you take 50 out, you can lower contract fees to 18 35,000. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And that just got him 20 a zipper, didn't it? 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And then we can go with a 22 zipper. 23 MR. ODOM: Are you asking me to give you 24 absolution? That's tight. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But you can do it. 8-17-05 bwk 47 1 MR. ODOM: Huh? 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But you can do it. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: When can you -- you had 4 mentioned acquiring this zipper with the -- with the 5 obligation to make the first lease -- lease-purchase 6 payment -- 7 MR. ODOM: It would not be until October of 8 '06. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Which will be the next budget 10 year. 11 MR. ODOM: The next budget year. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: When would you take possession 13 and have the use of that zipper? 14 MR. ODOM: They said if they received a P.O. 15 now, that I would avoid -- 1st of October, there would be a 16 price increase; that they could take -- have the P.O. now, 17 that I would lock in that H.G.A.C. price at 79,116, 18 something like that. And that I -- they would -- they would 19 give us a municipal loan like we did on the chip spreader 20 and that distributor, and we could stretch it out and the 21 first payment would be October of '06. So, I don't need any 22 money this budget year. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: When do you take 24 possession of the machine? 25 MR. ODOM: 1 October, anytime after that, or 8-17-05 bwk 48 1 whatever the availability is. I couldn't take it till the 2 1st of October anyway. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: What kind of price increase 4 are they quoting effective 1 October? 5 MR. ODOM: I think that they said 6 to 6 10 percent. They weren't quite sure on the -- on the price 7 of steel and all. 8 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I like that 9 alternative. I think the zipper would improve productivity, 10 and we -- three or four years from now, we'll be glad we had 11 it. 12 MR. ODOM: I believe we would. And that's 13 the way I looked at it, that it wouldn't affect my capital 14 outlays; I could still get the things I need. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I mean -- 16 MR. ODOM: Or contract fees. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, shifting the 18 funds -- the money down out of the Schreiner Trust for those 19 two projects, or 50,000 of it. 50,000 goes to the Schreiner 20 Trust. 21 MR. ODOM: That's right. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's money that's 23 dedicated; that doesn't affect the tax rate. 24 MR. ODOM: I see I'm still at the same -- 25 same deal. Okay, that covers me. 8-17-05 bwk 49 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So it gives us -- it will 2 appear like your budget's even reduced further. 3 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Why don't we pencil 4 that in? 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's fine with me. 6 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: 50,000 out of 7 capital trust, and buy this equipment. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, Tommy, you ask the 9 trustee for permission to do that, do you not? 10 MR. TOMLINSON: We don't have to have 11 permission to use this money. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. Okay. 13 MR. TOMLINSON: If we -- if there's moneys 14 in -- with the trustee beyond -- that exceeds the 150,000 -- 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. 16 MR. TOMLINSON: -- we have to get permission 17 from them to get that money. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It just -- I think -- to 19 add a comment, I think this is the type -- both Weatherby 20 and Artlet are the purpose of the Schreiner Trust. It's 21 exactly what that trust was intended for. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Except it should be 23 used more in Precinct 1 than 4. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You got Sheppard Rees. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's my only point. 8-17-05 bwk 50 1 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: But you had eight 2 years to get it. (Laughter.) 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. So, contract 4 fees is 35,000, then 50,000 will go out of Schreiner Trust. 5 MR. ODOM: That's fine. I can make it work. 6 Now, may I ask, is that a direction of the Court? Do I need 7 to come back on this zipper for an agenda item? 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. 10 MR. ODOM: For authorization to go out or 11 issue a -- a P.O. for that? I can buy it off the H.G.A.C., 12 so there's not a formal bid. 13 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Can we get that on 14 Monday's meeting? 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 16 MS. MITCHELL: Mm-hmm. 17 MR. ODOM: My deadline's passed. I'll -- 18 okay. 19 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Kathy doesn't have 20 deadlines; she can do whatever she wants to do. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Now, the first -- the 22 first installment on the zipper doesn't come until the next 23 budget year? 24 MR. ODOM: Till next budget year. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: '06-'07 budget year. 8-17-05 bwk 51 1 MR. ODOM: Yes, sir. And then by then, we'll 2 have some of these special projects done and over with, and 3 then there's no increase. I see that as working without 4 hurting my budget and staying within the line. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That'll work. 8 MR. ODOM: And I'll verify that, but that's 9 what I was told personally by the manager of the department 10 -- corporation. They came down and demonstrated it. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It could either -- I 12 mean, you can get on this agenda. It could also probably be 13 on the next one, but go ahead and get it on this one so you 14 can make -- 15 MR. ODOM: What about capital outlays? Is it 16 possible -- do I have to put that on the agenda, or is this 17 meeting here to verify that I can go out to start to locate 18 this? 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Not -- we can start 20 locating it, but just don't buy it till we approve the 21 budget. 22 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I just want to make 23 sure we meet that October 1 deadline. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 25 MR. ODOM: Yes, before the price increases, 8-17-05 bwk 52 1 goes up. And I've got to check to make sure -- sometimes 2 they go up on 1 September. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, but still, until we 4 approve the budget, the capital outlay is not available to 5 use. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: But this doesn't 7 affect capital outlay in this budget year, anyhow. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: He's talking about the 9 other items. The zipper, I don't have a problem with coming 10 in special and doing that, 'cause that's not going to affect 11 the budget. 12 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: That would give him 13 the authority to issue the P.O. 14 MR. ODOM: P.O. for that. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Is the one-half-ton 16 extended cab in or out? 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Out. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Got to make do with 19 the old one, then. 20 MR. ODOM: Okay. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And then add 5,000 to 22 repairs. Or -- 23 MR. ODOM: 5,000 to repairs. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think that's pretty 25 reasonable. That transmission is going to need an overhaul 8-17-05 bwk 53 1 this year. 2 MR. ODOM: How would I -- to add that into 3 Equipment Repairs, another 5,000 there? 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Mm-hmm. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. And if you don't 6 need it, I mean, great, but I just think you need to -- it's 7 a pretty good likelihood you're going to need some front-end 8 work on that truck. 9 MR. ODOM: Yeah. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: To keep going. 11 MR. ODOM: Okay. Equipment Repair -- yeah. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: That goes to 100. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: And -- 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Goes to 100? What goes 16 to 100? 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Equipment and Repairs, from 95 18 to 100. 19 MR. ODOM: Goes to 100,000. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: And looks like -- 21 MR. ODOM: I'm reducing Capital Outlays by 22 25, so that's -- 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 83,2? 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Which one? Which 25 line? 8-17-05 bwk 54 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 570. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: 570. 3 MR. TOMLINSON: Got it. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Oh, okay, I 5 understand. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: And, of course, Contract Fees, 7 553, goes down to 35. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: What else for Road and Bridge? 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just a general -- or a 11 question. I notice that floodplain is all zeroed out. Is 12 all -- that floodplain was just moved into your 13 administration budget? 14 MR. ODOM: I'm sorry, what's the question? 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Floodplain 16 administration. There's nothing on any of those pages; it 17 was all zero. All of that money was moved into the 18 administration portion of your budget? The unit system? 19 Where did the floodplain money go? 20 MR. ODOM: I didn't know I had any floodplain 21 money. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I mean, you -- 23 there are some expenses going to floodplain. 24 MR. ODOM: Well, we absorbed that into it. A 25 lot of this is my time -- 8-17-05 bwk 55 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 2 MR. ODOM: -- to do this, or Truby on the 3 computer and all, so it's printouts. We've just looked 4 at -- to try to absorb it, to see what other costs would be, 5 but a lot of it's just time or questions and that, trying 6 to -- 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, it was just absorbed 8 into unit administration? 9 MR. ODOM: Yeah. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 15-611-011 is no 11 longer -- 12 MR. TOMLINSON: Nothing there. 13 MR. ODOM: See, I think we have 25 in 14 Engineer, so if I needed anything -- I think we had 5,000 15 this year, and I moved that down to 2,500 as far as the 16 engineer outside. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Question. 18 MR. ODOM: Yes, sir? 19 JUDGE TINLEY: What is the $9 expenditure 20 this year for this contract -- 21 MR. ODOM: You asked me that, and I think 22 that was postage for something we had to send out. That 23 sounds like more of a postage thing. I just forgot to -- 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Or maybe a copy of a plat that 25 you had to get. 8-17-05 bwk 56 1 MR. ODOM: Could have been something. But I 2 take it, more than anything, it was probably a certification 3 -- a letter that we had to send out, and she probably 4 charged it off to that. But as far as -- as far as an 5 engineer or something, I -- I wish could I get them for $9 6 and some-odd cents. But that's all I know, Judge, is 7 probably, you know, something registered or something I sent 8 out. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think the -- you know, 10 I don't have a real problem with reducing contract engineer 11 to 2,500, but I think that's an unrealistic number. I think 12 there's going to be -- once we get our Subdivision Rules 13 finally redone, I think there's going to be more places for 14 it. And I think there's -- but we can address that as a 15 budget amendment down the road. I just think that that's 16 something that is needed, and there's some areas that I 17 think we're really on a little bit thin ice under our 18 current rules and not having an engineer, I mean, just the 19 way it's currently worded. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, wasn't the 21 majority of that your bridge? I mean, wasn't that -- 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, it was in there to 23 make up for the fact that we don't have an engineer on staff 24 any more. And when someone needs to look at, like, drainage 25 studies and things of that -- I'm a little uncomfortable 8-17-05 bwk 57 1 having a non-engineer recommending to the Court. I mean, 2 we're taking the -- we're just basically right now taking 3 the word of the developers, their engineers. If we ever 4 question that, we're going to have to have an engineer to 5 question it. Leonard, I mean -- 6 MR. ODOM: I mean, I'm not certified. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- is not a certified 8 engineer. 9 MR. ODOM: Not getting paid to run behind an 10 engineer to check him up. But if we do change the rules up, 11 though, Commissioner, that engineer -- these developers will 12 start using engineers to do their own inspections, to sign 13 off on it. Then you don't -- I don't need a P.E. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But if we ever are to 15 challenge it, if we ever have a question, only an engineer 16 -- I mean, I think we're on thin ice if we have a 17 non-engineer questioning an engineer's work. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's why we put the 19 money in there to begin with. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. And we haven't 21 even ever used it, you know. It's just one of the things -- 22 you may not need it, and that's why 2,500, I don't have a 23 real problem with that, but I think that's getting low. 24 If -- for example, if we get -- if you disagree with what an 25 engineer tells you, and there's -- you know, that's quite 8-17-05 bwk 58 1 likely that could happen. 2 MR. ODOM: Sure it is. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We're going to have to 4 get an engineer to look at it and give us a third opinion, 5 and that's what the money was for. But it's just -- I'm 6 just pointing it out, that we're getting low in that area. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: But I think most of us 8 are in agreement that when their engineer signs off on it, 9 that it's a -- 10 MR. ODOM: He's put his seal on the line. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- a real deal. 12 MR. ODOM: Yes, sir. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And there's Contingency 14 there. There's money in Contingency. 15 MR. ODOM: Well, Contract Fees is a 16 catch-all. That's where I've had it before, that if I 17 really needed that, then Professional Services, I would go 18 there. Or the engineering. Of course, that had to do more 19 with surveying than it did anything. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Had to do with 21 hydrology, too. Stormwater takeoff and runoff and all that 22 kind of stuff, calculations to go with that. If we had to 23 challenge somebody's stormwater plan, for example, 'cause we 24 thought it was inadequate, we're hard-pressed to challenge 25 it if we don't have an engineer doing that challenge. 8-17-05 bwk 59 1 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Well, a year ago, we 2 saw two different engineers put their seal on a thing, and 3 one of them said it's in the floodplain; the other one said 4 it's not. So, if -- if that were to come push to shove, and 5 just what Jonathan says; we can't pick and choose between 6 those two. We've got to have another. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's right. 8 MR. ODOM: And I have talked to some other 9 engineers, would they be willing to do that; Herm, Doug. 10 I've talked to Lee Lines. He's qualified to do that for 11 Vordenbaum. So there's different people out there that do 12 that. We need to do it, but, of course, at this point I 13 don't know what other rules -- you know, what you're -- how 14 the changes are going to be. But there are people out there 15 saying that they would be willing to do that. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Sure. 17 MR. ODOM: The question would be, what would 18 we pay them to do -- you know, I haven't got that far with 19 it. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 21 MR. ODOM: Of course, I'm not qualified to 22 sit up here and argue. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Plug it in the 24 middle. It was at 5 and recommended to 25. Why don't we 25 increase to it 35? 8-17-05 bwk 60 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't have a problem 2 with leaving it at 25, because there is a Contingency fund, 3 and there's Contract Fees, two other areas that we can draw 4 from if we get into a dispute. 5 MR. ODOM: Right. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I just wanted to 7 bring it up that that's what the purpose of that line item 8 is. And I think, you know, even though we didn't use it 9 this year, I think it's a line item that we need to keep 10 money in. 11 MR. ODOM: But floodplain's pretty cut -- 12 either it's going to be in or out. It's -- there's a 13 question there, but it's all approximation, so to get into 14 their designs in a no-rise, I don't have my P.E. to -- to do 15 that. But -- 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Anything else on Road 17 and Bridge? Thank you, Mr. Odom. 18 MR. ODOM: Thank you. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Appreciate you being here. 20 MR. ODOM: Thank y'all. I appreciate it. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's move, if we could, to 22 Information Technology. That'll bring us to fairly early 23 in -- 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Four. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, indeed. Four. How are 8-17-05 bwk 61 1 you, Mr. Trolinger? 2 MR. TROLINGER: Good morning. It's a rough 3 past few days, but I'm here. Could have rested up a little 4 bit, but I'll do my best this morning. 5 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Well, that's a big 6 increase in budget. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But that's -- well, 8 that's because of salary. Mr. Trolinger requested a salary 9 increase, which isn't on the table today. 10 MR. TROLINGER: I did not. That is for a 11 second full-time position. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Oh, I'm sorry. 13 MR. TROLINGER: Yes, sir. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That is on the table 15 today. 16 MR. TROLINGER: Yes, sir. The line item -- 17 earlier this year, we had moved part-time salary to a 18 contractor. You followed my recommendation, and it looks 19 like we're going to come in a few thousand dollars below the 20 budgeted part-time salary that was moved to contracting 21 services, so now contracting services will have a -- 22 probably a couple thousand dollars at the end of this year, 23 not expended. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So that program is 25 working? 8-17-05 bwk 62 1 MR. TROLINGER: It's working. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Not -- lay the money 3 aside. Is the program working? 4 MR. TROLINGER: It's been working very well, 5 yes, sir. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Good deal. And they 7 respond within the one-hour or two-hour deal that we had 8 agreed on? 9 MR. TROLINGER: Drop of a hat. If I need 10 them, they're here. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Great news. 12 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: What's the name of 13 that outfit? 14 MR. TROLINGER: Gazelle PC. And they're 15 growing. They've gotten the contract from Dell Computers to 16 be the local service provider for the Dell service 17 contracts, so they are -- 18 JUDGE TINLEY: We had a number of those units 19 in our inventory, didn't we? 20 MR. TROLINGER: We do. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Tell me about this -- this 22 request for an additional person. What does your normal day 23 consist of, time-wise? Duty-wise? 24 MR. TROLINGER: Monday, I had been up since 25 Sunday at 5 p.m., and I turned in at about 9 p.m. Monday 8-17-05 bwk 63 1 night. That's 30 hours in front of the computer. And then 2 this morning, I went to bed about 2 a.m. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What's your average 4 workday hours? I know you've been keeping a record of it. 5 MR. TROLINGER: Per day? Per week? 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah. 7 MR. TROLINGER: I've got, per week, 78 hours 8 for the past two months, average. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: On average, 78 hours 10 -- 78 hours a week? 11 MR. TROLINGER: Per week. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What would this -- how 13 would you divide responsibilities between you and the second 14 person? 15 MR. TROLINGER: Basically, we need someone 16 that can respond to the individual PCs on the desktops, do 17 the basic software installs, do a little bit of training for 18 the users, spend some time when a new computer is installed. 19 And that's what the second person would do mainly, PC 20 desktop maintenance. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Would it be a better use 22 of dollars to have a full-time person or higher-paid 23 part-time person? With a higher pay, I mean someone with 24 more skills. 25 MR. TROLINGER: The full-time is what I 8-17-05 bwk 64 1 prefer, because with a part-time, you may have three days a 2 week -- Monday, Wednesday, Friday -- that the part-time 3 wants to come in and work. Well, if, on Tuesday, the virus 4 outbreak occurs, I've got to have somebody available on 5 Tuesday, and I don't see it working out. That's why I 6 recommended earlier this year that we move from the 7 part-time to the contracting services, so I'd have somebody 8 available on-call to back me up. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You couldn't set up -- I 10 mean, this may not solve it, but you could set you up 11 part-time where they're working four hours every day. 12 MR. TROLINGER: Possibly. That's possible. 13 The couple of individuals that I've spoken with, I haven't 14 discussed part-time work hours; they're both interested in 15 full-time. So -- but -- but for the responsiveness that I 16 need, the full-time help that -- the purpose is -- is that 17 that person can respond between 8:00 and 5:00 every day of 18 the week, and make the run out to the user, fix their 19 computer if it's broken, fix the printer, that type of 20 thing. Be available during normal business hours. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: If you had another 22 full-time employee, would you still have a need for the 23 contract services? 24 MR. TROLINGER: Somewhat. And that's why 25 I've reduced contract services next year, Line Number 553, 8-17-05 bwk 65 1 to $2,250. And that will mainly consist of a consultant. 2 Say I need a network engineer to put a stamp on something 3 before I sign off and send a network diagram to D.P.S. or 4 the state. It's going to be more along that lines. Or 5 for -- where some wire needs to be run where I need a 6 professional to do the installation. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Where's the -- the -- in 8 what budget is the whole mainframe and the -- what we've 9 talked about, about a possible upgrade of that whole system? 10 Is that in Nondepartmental? 11 MR. TROLINGER: Nondepartmental historically 12 is where that's always been budgeted from. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can you go over kind of 14 what your thoughts are on that and how that relates to your 15 additional person? 16 MR. TROLINGER: I've got a report -- an 17 efficiency report that I submitted to y'all. It's in a 18 green folder. It says, "Information Technology Plan for 19 2006-2007 Budget Year," and I'm going to refer to that. The 20 -- the cost of county information technology, I looked back 21 over five years at the budgets and took every piece -- every 22 purchase that I could find, and averaged out over five years 23 the cost of desktop computers. The system -- the mainframe 24 that runs, that makes the user, the court system, the -- the 25 tax, the financial all operate, is about 500 -- about 8-17-05 bwk 66 1 $500,000 per year. About half a million dollars a year. If 2 you look at the -- all the individual budget amendments that 3 you get, all the individual line items, the supplies, and 4 that goes all the way to, you know, how much does it cost to 5 run the -- the computers? Over the next five years, I see 6 it being about the same, just a slight decrease a few 7 thousand dollars, but basically that's the -- that's the 8 cost that the County spends each year to put these computers 9 on the desk and to operate the mainframe, the -- the large 10 server. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What -- what part of that 12 is related to the mainframe? 13 MR. TROLINGER: Where it says "Servers," I 14 believe I broke that up as a separate line item. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 55,000? 16 MR. TROLINGER: Correct. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Or that's to replace the 18 server? 19 MR. TROLINGER: That's to replace it. That's 20 contingency. But, basically, that one server, that one 21 large box that we have right now, everybody relies on. If 22 it's offline, then the county government comes to a halt. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: How old is that 24 server? 25 MR. TROLINGER: It is five years old. 8-17-05 bwk 67 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What's the useful 2 life of a server? 3 MR. TROLINGER: Five years. The -- the 4 present status is that the -- I've done the updates to it 5 that were possible to bring it up to the point where The 6 Software Group, our vendor, will continue their maintenance 7 and be able to add the few pieces that we added this year, 8 but if it fails -- if the server breaks right now, it's 9 unsupported by the manufacturer, by IBM, because it has not 10 been upgraded over the five years. The basic operating 11 system had not been upgraded. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Are we talking about 13 hardware or software or both? 14 MR. TROLINGER: It's combined. It's really 15 -- the operating system is -- is considered software, but it 16 goes hand-in-hand with the -- with the server. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: John, can you go back to 18 -- and I'm looking at the -- this page. 19 MR. TROLINGER: Yes. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Which is kind of where 21 you get to the 500,000. We're going back under that -- come 22 up where it says 2000-2005 Legacy System. 23 MR. TROLINGER: Yes. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Those are per-year costs, 25 or is that a five-year cost? Is that a -- I mean, where I'm 8-17-05 bwk 68 1 looking at 346,660 for desktop computers, is that what we 2 spent over a five-year period or each year? 3 MR. TROLINGER: Per year. This is per year, 4 and I -- I took five years worth of data to come up with 5 this. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I guess I'm -- you know, 7 if I take -- I look at that and I say, okay, desktop 8 computer system, $5,000 apiece. That's 70 computers a year. 9 How does that number -- I just -- I mean, have we been 10 buying 70 computers a year, or even anywhere close to that 11 number, or is there something else in there? 12 MR. TROLINGER: The -- the total cost of the 13 desktop computers is in there. In other words, the costs 14 from electricity to -- somebody goes down and buys a mouse, 15 all the way up to the monitor fails and they've got to 16 replace the monitor. And that includes the -- the 17 additional software. That's Microsoft Office; that's all 18 the other -- 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All the licenses? 20 MR. TROLINGER: -- things that need to be 21 purchased to go along with that. Every single thing. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How many desktop 23 computers do we have in the county? 24 MR. TROLINGER: That I directly, every day 25 can get a phone call, responsible for, is about 170. There 8-17-05 bwk 69 1 are other computers that add that up to about 220 computers 2 that I'm not directly responsible for. In other words, 3 Adult Probation. They -- they pretty much have their own 4 maintenance contracts and their own repair in-house, or 5 their own contracts. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Would they -- you said 7 Adult Probation? 8 MR. TROLINGER: Adult Probation. But I do 9 spend some time over there, because they do use the county 10 system. They use the server for everything they do. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Anybody know how much 12 they spend for outside contract services? 13 MR. TROLINGER: I do not. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Tommy? 15 MR. TOMLINSON: No, I don't know. That might 16 be in here, but I think -- I'll look and see. 17 MR. TROLINGER: I do know when they made a 18 large initial outlay on computers, that they purchased a -- 19 a very good service plan with Dell, the Platinum service 20 plan, so that may be -- 21 MR. TOMLINSON: All of their desktops are 22 Dell. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Pardon? 24 MR. TOMLINSON: All their desktops are Dell. 25 MR. TROLINGER: Yes, they are. 8-17-05 bwk 70 1 MR. TOMLINSON: So, they -- I think they 2 purchased a warranty on those, and service contracts on 3 those. So, the costs would be in the -- the cost of -- of 4 the service would be in the cost of the PC. So -- 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right, okay. 6 MR. TOMLINSON: -- it would be difficult for 7 me to tell you if they -- if they have any outside service 8 other than what they've already purchased. They do -- they 9 -- you know, they do pay their own maintenance to Software 10 Group, and that's -- it's probably about -- they budget 11 35,000 a year for maintenance for computer services. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The -- if my math is 13 anywhere close to being correct, that means we're spending 14 about $2,000 a year per computer. And then over -- and that 15 includes the purchase of the computer, which is to say a 16 five-year life, so every, you know, five years, spending 17 $10,000 per computer. I guess where I'm going is, do we 18 need as many computers as we have? It seems that that's a 19 lot higher number per year than I would have thought. 20 MR. TROLINGER: It's difficult for me to get 21 my arms around that whole picture. In each individual 22 department, you know, do they need one more computer? Do 23 they have one computer too many? And I haven't been able to 24 go into the departments; I've just looked at what was there 25 right now. 8-17-05 bwk 71 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think -- I mean, I 2 think it's a real -- to me, it's a real useful number, 3 'cause that means all these computers cost a lot on an 4 ongoing basis. 5 MR. TROLINGER: They do. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's not as much a 7 one-time expenditure, and then they operate for five years 8 and you buy them again. That means we're spending a lot 9 every -- for every computer every year. 10 MR. TROLINGER: And the State of Texas is 11 about three years that they -- that they cycle through to 12 another computer. The T.A.B.C. office, he's going to get a 13 computer every three years. Any of the state offices, about 14 every three. We extend that to about five years in the 15 county, so -- as far as I've seen. 16 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Commissioner, that 17 $2,000 a year, that doesn't include personnel costs. 18 That's -- 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's just -- 20 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: -- equipment, 21 software. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- equipment, software. 23 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: That's a lot. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But you figure, you 25 know -- I don't know. What's the average computer costing? 8-17-05 bwk 72 1 $3,000? $4,000? 2 MR. TROLINGER: The average new Dell computer 3 can be upwards, with software, of $1,700. The low end of 4 that figure, where they don't purchase as much software, 5 about $900. I've found another -- I've found another 6 vendor, C.D.W., where I can purchase a computer that's 7 basically built from the same components that Dell's built 8 from, and not pay for the additional warranty and the things 9 that Dell throws on there, for about $450 to $500 for the 10 computer itself, so I've found another vendor to reduce that 11 cost. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What you're saying, if I 13 understand this right, is that, going on the high side, say 14 the computer costs $2,000 with the other things that go with 15 it. Of what we're spending on computers, only 20 percent of 16 that goes to the cost of the computer, 'cause over five 17 years, with a five-year life, $2,000 one year goes for that. 18 Then we have another $8,000 going in for other costs related 19 to computer, which is a lot. 20 MR. TROLINGER: Well, if you look at a 21 printer, a laser jet printer can be -- for a desktop 22 computer, Linda's probably got $200 printers on the desk, so 23 we're looking at $200 printers for each one of the 24 computers. Some of the computers will have very expensive, 25 large printers attached to them, a lot of peripherals. 8-17-05 bwk 73 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Help me out here. 2 The 346,660 is an aggregate cost of everything associated 3 with one computer on one desk, right? Including licenses, 4 all the good things. Is that correct? 5 MR. TROLINGER: Yes. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Now, is that 7 predicated on 170 computers or 220 computers? 8 MR. TROLINGER: 220. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That brings the cost 10 down to $1,575 a computer. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: A year. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, still -- you're 14 still talking about 20 percent. I was rounding up. You're 15 still talking about 20 percent of the cost of -- of having 16 this computer is the computer. We pay another 80 percent 17 for the other stuff that goes with it that we don't really 18 ever think about. We just buy the computer and -- 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- worry about that. 21 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I think the 22 Commissioner's question is a good one. Do we have more 23 computers than we need? I don't need my computer here; I 24 use mine at home. It might be a little inconvenient for me, 25 but not -- are there any other -- are there another couple 8-17-05 bwk 74 1 dozen people that would be willing to give up a computer? I 2 don't know. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's just -- it's a -- 4 that's something that each department needs to kind of look 5 at with John, I think, to come up with whether the answer -- 6 I don't think we can answer that question today. But I 7 think in the next year, as part of the ongoing -- really 8 looking at how we're using technology, that's a real 9 important question. And if there's ways to -- you know, 10 it's one of those things that there is a great example of 11 relatively small expenditures add up to a whole bunch of 12 money. Is there a way we can share printers in some of the 13 offices? I don't want to -- you know, Linda's already been 14 picked on -- not picked on, but talked about. Is there a 15 way that they can share -- a few people can share a printer 16 more than they are? Maybe they already are, but anything 17 like that. Because of the volume we're talking about, it 18 really does start saving the County a lot of money. 19 MR. TROLINGER: And Linda's an example of 20 efficiency. Her county operation, she's got a printer at 21 each station for the local printing of receipts and other 22 items, and then she's got a work group printer -- large 23 printer, so when there's a large volume, a report or 24 something along that line, she sends it over -- they send it 25 over to a larger printer, and that way it reduces the 8-17-05 bwk 75 1 up-and-down at the counter. And, actually, I'd like to see 2 the County Clerk, Jannett, move that way also with a printer 3 at each station. It's much more efficient than getting up 4 and running back to the big printer or to the receipt 5 printer. Makes things move faster. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: In your handout, 7 you've got capital -- anticipated capital expenditures to 8 desktops at -- for the next five years, it's just 29,640. 9 That would be 29,640 for each of the five years? 10 MR. TROLINGER: Correct. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. What's in your 12 Capital Outlay, Line 570 in your budget, of 55,280? What's 13 that all about? 14 MR. TROLINGER: Okay. Because, historically, 15 Information Technology budget had been just for the office, 16 just for the individual, it did not encompass all the 17 computer purchases, all that. The capital outlay has been 18 spent for network equipment, for antivirus software and the 19 associate components of that. Last year, it was budgeted 20 $16,000, which I have made purchases of about $13,000 as of 21 today, probably -- probably just below that. Next year, 22 to -- in order to maintain the network, the infrastructure, 23 I see about 5,280 needed for new purchases. That's 24 additional equipment to -- to keep the backbone, the 25 network, the servers that run the e-mail on the web site 8-17-05 bwk 76 1 online. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We had a meeting -- I 3 think you engineered a meeting with some of us, if not all 4 of us, with a representative of The Software Group; is that 5 correct? 6 MR. TROLINGER: Yes, sir. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Can you explain how 8 that fits into all this? 9 MR. TROLINGER: The big picture is that all 10 these computers run on one server, one big computer, and we 11 pay about $106,000 per year in software maintenance -- 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. 13 MR. TROLINGER: -- for this server and for 14 those desktops to operate. And I've consolidated that 15 number. I'm giving you these, breaking these out. But the 16 -- the existing system that we have now, the technology's 15 17 years since we purchased it initially, and about 25 years 18 since the technology was developed. I see right now that, 19 just to maintain the system as it is, that the server needs 20 to be replaced. It's at the end of its life, and if it 21 breaks, we'll have to replace it anyhow. And if we retain 22 that existing system, that we should then purchase 23 additional software licenses or packages for departments 24 that do not use -- do not take advantage of The Software 25 Group right now. 8-17-05 bwk 77 1 But, ideally, we would take -- and instead of 2 continuing on with that Legacy system for another five 3 years, we are at a point here, we have the opportunity to 4 get in on the ground floor, so to speak, with Software Group 5 with their new package, which is called Odyssey for the 6 Courts, the courts system, and that's the majority of the 7 cost. And that's right at $750,000, is the cost to replace 8 and install the Odyssey package. And that affects the jail, 9 the operation of the Sheriff's Office, the -- and all the 10 courts, including the clerk's office. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'm listening. 12 MR. TROLINGER: The -- the cost next year, if 13 -- if we decide to wait and purchase the Odyssey package 14 next year, will be about twice as much. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Why is that? 16 MR. TROLINGER: And that's because right now, 17 they're -- the first five counties -- the first handful of 18 counties -- I'm not sure if it's five -- in Texas are just 19 now coming online with the system, and Software Group would 20 like to offer us the -- to take advantage of Kerr County, 21 because of its size, and use us as a testbed on the 22 development portion for some of the packages; in particular, 23 the computer-aided dispatch. So, right now they're offering 24 to install that at no cost to -- to encourage us to -- to go 25 with the package this year. 8-17-05 bwk 78 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I see good and bad with 2 this -- with the proposal. One is -- the good is that we 3 save money. The bad is, we're the guinea pig, and it may 4 not work very well. 5 MR. TROLINGER: Well, most of the burden of 6 the -- of the test phase of the -- of the roll-out is just 7 particular to Texas. This already exists in Georgia, 8 Florida, Minnesota. The entire state of Minnesota 9 operates -- 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Doesn't make me any more 11 comfortable. 12 MR. TROLINGER: What they're doing is, they 13 have to bring this into Texas, and they have to adopt our 14 laws and D.P.S. -- the way that D.P.S. does things, the way 15 that our -- that our state, all the computers interface 16 together. So, basically, the headache for me every night is 17 that Software Group would send a new patch or update, and 18 I'd have to make sure that that was up and running in the 19 morning. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Do you see any 21 interruption of services to the Sheriff or others as a 22 result of that? 23 MR. TROLINGER: No. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Tommy, is this one of 25 those things that we can borrow the money to pay for it and 8-17-05 bwk 79 1 pay that like we do other things? Yes? 2 MR. TOMLINSON: Yes. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Does this include the 4 video conferencing? 5 MR. TROLINGER: It does not include video 6 teleconference. I wanted -- I was going after a grant, 7 Indigent Defense Grant -- 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 9 MR. TROLINGER: -- for the video 10 teleconferencing. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: But the software or 12 hardware that's included in the Odyssey program has nothing 13 to do with the teleconferencing? 14 MR. TROLINGER: It's complex. A lot of 15 things tie together here and fit together in a puzzle. The 16 part where the high-speed internet connection, the broadband 17 that we paid for, I put those numbers in -- rolled those 18 numbers in here, and the video teleconferencing runs off of 19 that, so -- 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: But we're not talking 21 about a camera being included in this program at all? 22 MR. TROLINGER: Correct. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You know what I'm 24 talking about? A camera here and a camera in Menard. 25 MR. TROLINGER: Correct. Does not. 8-17-05 bwk 80 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: John, have you or has 3 Tommy looked at the various technology funds that we have 4 that are dedicated for certain purposes and to see if any of 5 those funds can be used for the new system? 6 MR. TOMLINSON: There -- the technology fund, 7 the only one that exists is for the Justice of the Peace. 8 And that -- those amounts are -- are immaterial, I mean, in 9 relation to -- to the big picture. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Talking about regards 11 management, I mean, it seems like we have a lot of dedicated 12 funds that we can pull things for, and I can see that a new 13 system is going to benefit anyone that uses the computer for 14 any purpose in the county, and, to me, like -- you know, I 15 know Linda kind of runs the records management portion. And 16 we're not talking, I know, big bucks in these funds, but if 17 we can come up with another 20,000, that's 20,000 that's 18 dedicated that we can use. I think we shuffle -- 19 MR. TROLINGER: The big picture over the next 20 five years, what I'd like to develop is, I'd like to bring 21 all these purchases, all these individual purchases that you 22 see that costs a half a million dollars a year, as much as 23 possible into the Information Technology budget wherever 24 possible, and then this gives the Commissioners an idea of 25 how much is really being spent and what's really going on. 8-17-05 bwk 81 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I was thinking of that, 2 and I was getting ready to ask Tommy if he could do that. 3 Then I started thinking the down side to that maybe is that 4 we get them out of the individual department budgets where 5 they're being -- or are in there now, and I think it would 6 be -- from a budget standpoint, I kind of like it the way it 7 is, but I think it needs to be able to be consolidated as 8 well so we can look at it as a whole. But I'm not sure if 9 it's good or bad to all of a sudden take the computer 10 purposes -- or purchases for the District Clerk out of her 11 budget and put it in another budget and just say her budget 12 goes down and yours goes up. I don't know what that gains. 13 MR. TOMLINSON: Just depends on your 14 philosophy. Do you want to, you know, look at the big 15 picture, or do you want to look at -- at how much it costs 16 to run each office? And, so, it's just -- just a matter 17 of -- 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What is your 19 preference? 20 MR. TOMLINSON: I don't really have a 21 preference. I mean -- 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Tommy, that's too 23 easy. What is your preference? 24 MR. TOMLINSON: Well, I mean, it would 25 simplify things for us to have it in one, but on the other 8-17-05 bwk 82 1 hand, I think there's some value to knowing what the total 2 cost of operating an office is. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Let me ask -- 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: But we could always -- 6 one more, Judge, I'm sorry. But we could always ask the 7 question, break out the District Clerk's numbers, and you 8 can do that, couldn't you? 9 MR. TROLINGER: Well, with the new financial 10 package, it will, that we -- 11 MR. TOMLINSON: That's what I was going to 12 get to, where along with this -- the court package, we're -- 13 I'm looking at a new financial package along with it, and 14 that -- that particular software is designed to be more 15 flexible than what we have. So, there's -- there would 16 be -- I foresee ways to -- to massage the data any way you 17 want to. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 19 MR. TOMLINSON: So I think there's -- there 20 is benefit in that, in new -- you know, in a new accounting 21 package for that reason. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Do we not have the accounts -- 23 the numbering system that you currently have in place, we've 24 got those paralleled in each department where software is 25 620 or whatever number? 8-17-05 bwk 83 1 MR. TOMLINSON: Yes, sir. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: And you could key your system 3 even now to provide -- pull up all of your budgets for that 4 particular item, could you not? 5 MR. TOMLINSON: I can do a report that keys 6 off of the last three digits of the account number, and 7 that's really all you need. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: And that would print -- give 9 us a -- an informational printout of all of the software 10 expenditures from all of the departments. 11 MR. TOMLINSON: Right. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Listed by department. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 14 MR. TROLINGER: I looked at that starting in 15 Budget Year 2000, and -- actually, my wife went through 16 every single page of the budget and broke out and tried to 17 determine how those line items were -- where the spending 18 was, and it was very difficult. It looked like there's -- 19 sometimes there's software in a particular line item, and 20 it's in a different line item for the jail or for the 21 Sheriff. 22 MR. TOMLINSON: There -- over the years, 23 there's been issues with -- with account numbers, and I 24 foresee a time when -- when every county has the same chart 25 of accounts. There are -- they're already -- the 8-17-05 bwk 84 1 Legislature already issued a directive to a committee to go 2 out and study that, and that's been in the mill for -- for a 3 couple years. So, we -- our charter accounts right now are 4 designed around recommendations out of the Comptroller's 5 office. And most -- most accounting numbers in most 6 counties are very similar. And I -- I look for that to 7 happen within probably the next two years. So, there's 8 already a manual printed by the Comptroller's office that 9 breaks down or consolidates, actually expenditures by 10 function, and they did that because of GASB. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, I was going to 12 ask if that was because of GASB. 13 MR. TOMLINSON: And so -- and so I foresee a 14 numbering system coming down the pipe that will lend itself 15 to reporting for the State. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Sounds like one world 17 government to me. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. Have we got any more 19 questions? 20 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I do. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 22 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I think I understand 23 your proposal. Not all the details of it, but I -- it's my 24 sense that you're probably leading us in the right 25 direction. And my assessment of it is that our choices are 8-17-05 bwk 85 1 to continue to spend a lot of money on the system that's 2 essentially obsolete or becoming obsolete, or spend more 3 money and get a -- a leading-edge kind of a system. My 4 question I've got is, the impact on productivity. I've seen 5 in the past where -- where computers significantly increase 6 productivity. 35 years ago, one of the hottest jobs around 7 was keypunch operator. Well, there aren't any more of them; 8 technology eliminated that job. Computer-aided drafting 9 replaced millions of people. Systems can do it better and 10 faster and all kind of things. But I also don't -- I also 11 wonder if we've got the will or the discipline to allow 12 technology to increase productivity and reduce the number of 13 people it takes to get our work done. What do you -- what 14 do you see that this spending more money on -- on 15 leading-edge systems, what impact do you see on 16 productivity? 17 MR. TROLINGER: I attempted to do a 18 return-on-investment analysis. I started small. I looked 19 at the e-mail efficiency, and that's why I included that in 20 my efficiency report. I tried to analyze, how much does it 21 cost if we've got one e-mail system versus the other? 22 Versus -- and include the people that did not have e-mail in 23 that return-on-investment number that I've given you the 24 bottom line. And it's very difficult for me to analyze even 25 something as small as the e-mail and come up with a solid 8-17-05 bwk 86 1 number. And I wanted to give you that example of e-mail 2 efficiency. Well, to do the same thing for the courts 3 package and for the financial and for the Tax Office, I 4 just -- it's completely beyond my capability. So, I went to 5 the vendors, and as recently as yesterday at -- after 5:00, 6 I was still on the phone with one of the -- one of the 7 software vendors that we're not using right now, and asked 8 them, "Well, what do you see -- how many people did Potter 9 County reduce at their county operation?" And the vendors 10 really -- they don't have that information either. And I 11 said, "Well, just off the top of your head, what do you 12 think?" Well, maybe two or -- but these aren't solid 13 numbers. I can't -- I can't present you -- I'm told they 14 won't hand me a piece of paper that says, "Here's the 15 report," so even the vendors that want to sell a product to 16 us won't give numbers on people. But the return on 17 investment for the -- for the taxpayer that doesn't have 18 access to their data right now, that has to come into the 19 courthouse versus logging in through the internet, the 20 amount of traffic of having a time card system versus a 21 paper time system, an electronic time card system, just -- 22 it's invaluable, the amount of foot traffic, the amount of 23 driving back and forth. I've just looked at the big 24 picture, and that's where all this comes together. Just 25 reduces -- you know, it just reduces the time that people 8-17-05 bwk 87 1 spend every day doing mundane tasks that just don't need to 2 be done. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, with that thought 4 in mind of reducing the traffic in the courthouse, then we 5 can go over here and reduce the security issue problem, huh? 6 MR. TOMLINSON: There you go. 7 MR. TROLINGER: Well, that's the courts. I 8 don't know how many people -- that's the court system, 9 running through the courtroom. When I talk about traffic, 10 mainly I'm talking about the counter operation, where the 11 public comes in and has to see somebody at the counter, and 12 the foot traffic of the people driving back and forth, you 13 know, when payday hits. We've got -- probably the majority 14 of the -- of County employees are going -- making a trip to 15 the bank, and I think Barbara's going to improve that some 16 with direct deposit. But -- 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: John, acquisition of 18 this new software package would enable the County Clerk, for 19 example, to offer up through internet query documents that 20 someone might come in to the counter and ask for and pay a 21 fee to receive; is that correct? 22 MR. TROLINGER: Yes, it is. Right now, she's 23 made an attempt desperately -- Jannett's made an attempt to 24 bring in, even for her land records, a third-party company 25 to do just that, to put the electronic records out there on 8-17-05 bwk 88 1 the internet and to, for a fee, sell those records on -- 2 from a web site. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Is this something 4 that would also apply to the District Clerk? 5 MR. TROLINGER: Yes. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: How do we collect a 7 fee? 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, the -- the 9 client puts in a credit card. That's how you do it, right? 10 MR. TROLINGER: Yes, lots of options. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Debit card. 12 MR. TROLINGER: For the online payments. 13 But, basically, it comes down to choosing a payment -- a 14 provider that will take the transactions, and then -- same 15 as Brad does over in Collections. He uses that now. He's 16 got a provider. 17 MS. UECKER: Be a little bit more difficult 18 for the courts because of the expunged cases and the sealed 19 documents. My plan would be to have the -- to start out 20 with, to have the indexes online so they would -- you know, 21 they -- 'cause the biggest part of the traffic is, I want to 22 come in and I want to see if there's a case. There may or 23 may not be. Online, they could see if there's a case. If 24 there is, then they would know from that, you know, what the 25 fee is, where you go to get it. You can call me and, you 8-17-05 bwk 89 1 know, we'll mail it to you, maybe with a credit card or 2 whatever. But as far as putting the records online, I still 3 have some real concerns about that because of all the sealed 4 and expunged cases that are expunged after they go online. 5 So it's kind of -- going to be kind of hard to pull those 6 off. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Any applications for 8 the Tax Assessor? 9 MS. RECTOR: Pardon me? 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Would it be 11 beneficial to you? 12 MS. RECTOR: Yes, as far as the tax rolls 13 being online for the taxpayers to view. The main question 14 would be whether they're understanding what they're looking 15 at, and that's where the phone calls, I don't think, would 16 decrease much. Probably the over-the-counter traffic, as 17 far as information part of it, that would benefit us. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Could people pay 19 their taxes online? 20 MS. RECTOR: Not at this -- well, if we were 21 set up to do that. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's what I'm 23 asking. 24 MS. RECTOR: That's another -- 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: With this new system, 8-17-05 bwk 90 1 it would allow -- is that a possibility? 2 MS. RECTOR: That's a possibility. 3 MR. TROLINGER: Yes. In Guadalupe County, 4 they do exactly that. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. That's where 6 we get into productivity or reduced -- what Dave talks 7 about. And it also reduces traffic in the courthouse. It 8 becomes efficient. 9 MR. TROLINGER: What I see -- 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I don't know. The 11 Auditor has a problem with it, though, maybe. 12 MR. TOMLINSON: No, I was just going to add 13 something, too, to my desire to have a financial package. 14 And it's something this County's never done, and -- and -- 15 but it -- what it would do, it would allow the online -- 16 online requisition from different offices, and it would lend 17 itself to a purchasing officer if, you know, the County ever 18 decided to do that. And so I think there would -- there 19 would be some control -- more control over -- over 20 expenditures for everyday items. And from -- from an 21 internal control standpoint, you know, I think that -- 22 that a purchase order system with -- with a purchasing agent 23 is -- is something that, you know, this County needs to do 24 sometime. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I agree. 8-17-05 bwk 91 1 MR. TROLINGER: Going back to Paula's, I 2 wanted to make sure I made this point, Tommy. On the -- on 3 the Tax Assessor/Collector side, the -- the things that 4 Paula does now under a great workload, especially when tax 5 time comes up -- I understand that there's just a huge 6 workload that cycles up, that ramps up. Well, I don't think 7 she's able to -- because -- because of the way that cycle 8 works, I don't think she's able to provide you all -- or 9 give you information as quickly as she could online to have 10 the numbers typed in, to have the -- you know, to be able to 11 do the things that Paula really should be concentrating on. 12 Instead, she's actually going and she's sitting down and 13 serving customers and helping, you know, take some of that 14 load off. And I think by -- by getting her a modern system, 15 a modern system that integrates all the pieces that she's, 16 some of them, doing by hand now, that it just -- it just 17 makes her life so much better and helps her provide you with 18 the information on a more timely basis. And that's my -- I 19 think that's my assessment. 20 MS. RECTOR: Yeah. One of the pluses in this 21 is the bookkeeping part of it. I am still manually keeping 22 books, because the system that we have does not integrate 23 with QuickBooks. The new system would integrate with 24 QuickBooks. It would make my life so much easier. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Would that be part of 8-17-05 bwk 92 1 the package, John? 2 MR. TROLINGER: Yes, sir. 3 MS. RECTOR: Mm-hmm, that's part of the 4 package. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Help me understand 6 this purchase. You've got two different scenarios here on 7 purchase. You've got a scenario that costs for a payback of 8 250,640, and another one of 152,640. Is that annualized 9 cost under each of those scenarios? 10 MR. TROLINGER: It is. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So, on a five-year 12 purchase, we would be committing to an outlay for all of 13 this software and its use, as well as the server and 14 whatever desktop computers are necessary to upgrade and so 15 forth, and our -- our obligation would be 250,000 and some 16 dollars? 17 MR. TROLINGER: Correct. And, additionally, 18 over five years. Each year for five years. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Each year, five 20 years. 21 MR. TROLINGER: And it also includes training 22 every single user. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. 24 MR. TROLINGER: Which, right now, the 25 majority of the users have never been trained on the system. 8-17-05 bwk 93 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Let me -- let me -- we've got 2 some more things to do here. Our reporter needs a break, so 3 why don't we take a break for about 15 minutes. We'll come 4 back, and we've got some more work to do. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge, could we come 6 back to this actual issue? 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Sure. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Again, I want to hear 9 how it's going to benefit the Sheriff and his office as 10 well. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: No, we're just kind of 12 stopping in mid-stream where we are. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Good deal. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: We'll be in recess for about 15 15 minutes. 16 (Recess taken from 10:53 a.m. to 11:15 a.m.) 17 - - - - - - - - - - 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Let's come back to 19 order, if we might. We were in recess, and we were dealing 20 with the Information Technology Department budget. I 21 believe Commissioner Baldwin said he wanted to be sure we 22 were back on the same page where we left off. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: That's where we are. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I wanted to hear from 8-17-05 bwk 94 1 the Sheriff, of how the Odyssey package would affect his 2 department, and how -- and if it enhances anything or not. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It would be a major 4 impact on our department. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: A major-plus impact. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Major-plus impact, all 7 for the good. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The real small things, 10 it's just what Commissioner Nicholson was saying, 11 productivity. Number one, the Odyssey package has the 12 capability of -- all the stuff we send to and fax every day 13 to the medias, about six or eight different ones that we're 14 required to; arrest list, offense reports, anything that 15 happened the night before. It allows all that stuff to be 16 sent automatically through e-mail at 8 o'clock or whatever 17 time we set every morning, and we don't have to pull it. We 18 don't have to make copies; we don't have to stand there at 19 the fax machine. And yesterday, for an example -- and I'm 20 sure Gerard got tired of the fax running yesterday, for 21 example. It was 25 pages that had to be faxed to every 22 media around. So, that is -- that's just a small part of 23 it, but that is a major -- 'cause our C.I.D. secretary has 24 to do all that faxing every day. 25 It allows -- especially, like, Gillespie 8-17-05 bwk 95 1 County is on it now. Denton County is a fabulous example. 2 They were the original actual test site for Software Group 3 to use it all. I can go online right now in Denton County 4 from any computer, as long as I've got internet access; I 5 can see all the public information, every jail arrest, every 6 docket sheet, every inmate photograph, everything. The 7 sharing of information between the departments is -- is, you 8 know, ten times better. So, it gives all that information. 9 It would solve us a lot of public information requests. The 10 organizational and the ability to do forms and design the 11 forms that we need it to do, just like -- one thing Tommy 12 and I have talked about for years, and we may be able to get 13 to it with Legacy; I'm just not sure, but our department has 14 never, ever had a complete, full, itemized, running 15 inventory of every piece of equipment that the County owns 16 that's in that department, and being able to separate it out 17 to -- this is to this car, this is to this car, this is to 18 these offices. It hasn't happened ever, and probably won't. 19 It's very hard to do in this, but the Odyssey 20 program allows you the flexibility to draw up those programs 21 and do that. With Fredericksburg on it, I can log on with 22 their passwords they give us -- and this is where law 23 enforcement across the state is trying to do more 24 interoperability stuff, is that their Sheriff can give 25 certain ones of us passwords; I can give them passwords. 8-17-05 bwk 96 1 You can actually get into the entire system, depending on 2 what password availability you had or chat clearance you 3 had, and see everything that entire department's doing. 4 I've talked to the Chief of Police here about it, that I 5 think the City should seriously look at doing that, and in 6 going with it or something, or at least going to it, to 7 where we solve beaucoups of problems on them having to call 8 all the time and get information from the jail or -- or 9 trying to do a stand-alone computer and get licenses, so 10 that they have just a couple people that could pull up stuff 11 where they could pull it up individually when they need it. 12 A good example is a couple weeks ago, when we 13 had the drowning in Ingram, the person that drowned was an 14 alien -- illegal alien, okay? He had only been arrested in 15 the county one time, which was four years ago, for no 16 driver's license. That's the only record the state ever had 17 on him, so his name was not in the State's database. His 18 fingerprints were not in the state database for that or the 19 national database for that, okay, because he was only 20 arrested on a Class C charge four years ago here. That was 21 local. There's only a couple people in my office that know 22 how to search our database on description, and so we had to 23 wait till we got one of those people in. We searched it, 24 and within 10 minutes of doing that, we identified this guy 25 that we wouldn't have ever been able to identify before. 8-17-05 bwk 97 1 The Odyssey package enhances all that, makes 2 it ten times better and ten times easier, and quicker to be 3 able to -- an officer on the street, if it were -- has the 4 capability of going into a laptop computer and doing it 5 right there from his car. And where this comes into play, 6 say you have a robbery. All you have is a red car; first 7 letter of the license plate was "F," and it had a white male 8 in it, maybe 6 foot tall, maybe 30 to 50 years old. You can 9 plug that information in it, and it will search your entire 10 database and narrow it down to only what fits that 11 description. And if you can do that in the field, you can 12 talk about so much quicker in solving and affecting law 13 enforcement. So, I can't -- and what I've seen in talking 14 with him and seeing the program upstairs and seeing -- and 15 visiting with Software Group, it would be the best thing in 16 the world. 17 Now, the training ground, we would be -- we 18 would have -- and where the real cost saving is is in the 19 computer-aided dispatch. We don't have computer-aided 20 dispatch now, okay? We have a call screen that the 21 dispatcher just puts in the call, but it's not a 22 computer-aided dispatch; it doesn't help you along. This 23 system, it's a good system. They've already got it. But 24 what their test site is, is, "We want you to use it. We 25 give it to you for nothing. You use it; you tell us, from 8-17-05 bwk 98 1 the people that are actually using it, what improvements we 2 need to make in it, what it's not doing that you really 3 need." That's the testing part of the deal, is getting it 4 worked out. It puts a map of the entire county with every 5 street on it. It can locate every house. You can have 6 every patrol car pinpointed to where they are with the extra 7 stuff. I mean, it's just -- the capabilities of the modern 8 technology, as we all know, are unbelievable, and the 9 capabilities of what we currently have used up. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Rusty, on that one point, 11 just -- you know, not that -- not a big point, particularly, 12 in my mind, but, okay, you have a map of the city. Where 13 does that come from? 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Comes from 9-1-1, and it 15 would all be into that system. 16 MR. TROLINGER: It originates from Central 17 Appraisal District, who I'm also integrating in with the 18 County. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, your -- my confidence 20 in the system is going down real rapidly as you're talking 21 about that, 'cause their maps are not accurate at all. That 22 was what I'm saying, is -- I mean, it's good stuff, but -- 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The street index is -- 24 we go back over and the City goes back over and we do a lot 25 of those, and those help too, but their maps, the ones we 8-17-05 bwk 99 1 have, okay, are really not bad. Now, you get out there in 2 your subdivision off 87, yeah, a lot of that's still 3 coming -- you know, a lot of it's behind, you might say. 4 But they are not -- for our use, they are not bad maps at 5 all, and they do get us to the -- to the area that we need 6 to get to. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: How often are they 8 upgraded, Rusty? How often are they upgraded, the maps? 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: We upgrade our maps at 10 the Sheriff's Office about every year, and every time y'all 11 change a road name or do something like that, between Road 12 and Bridge and us, we try and integrate that in. What we 13 did is, we went to a total different self-made-up Microsoft 14 program that they have to get out of the County computer, 15 pull up that screen, and try and get into it and find it 16 out. This type system, it's -- 17 MS. UECKER: If I'm not mistaken, that 18 Odyssey will also allow you to do aerial photo maps, which 19 would be accurate. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, the problem is, the 22 Appraisal District uses the photo, perhaps, and it's 23 probably accurate for 99 percent of the needs. The 24 inaccuracy comes when you get out in the rural areas. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, it's the source 8-17-05 bwk 100 1 data, not the system. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: We don't have any maps 3 in the system now; they're all just in a -- back in 4 Dispatch, and we have to try and go by those and street 5 indexes. 6 MR. TROLINGER: Right now, there is a one-way 7 flow from Central Appraisal through 9-1-1 to the Sheriff's 8 Office, and there's no feedback on -- if the dispatcher 9 knows what the real address is versus the old one, or the 10 notes on it, that doesn't go back and forth. And this 11 brings that together so that if -- given permission, the 12 Sheriff's Office can say, "Okay, here's the real information 13 on that field," and then Central Appraisal will then be able 14 to see that also, 9-1-1 will be able to see it. It 15 integrates everybody. 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And patrol-wise, 17 everyone's using video cameras in the cars. Everybody's 18 trying to go to digital cameras, which is needed. What this 19 system also does, where now we have to have evidence areas, 20 storage areas for all those video tapes -- and I've got 21 thousands of them out there, 'cause you need to keep them. 22 What it does is, the officer, from in his car, on a digital 23 video system will be able to get within range, which is 24 anywhere around, okay, push one button, download that entire 25 video from that case that he's been working out in the field 8-17-05 bwk 101 1 directly into the actual case file in the computer system. 2 It's not a separate file; it goes in with that case; you 3 know, autopsy reports, mug shots, photographs, hand 4 photographs. Everything is in that one case file. If the 5 D.A. wants a copy of that case file, we can -- with the 6 Odyssey -- you can't do it now -- you can e-mail that entire 7 case file with every attachment, including the videos, to 8 that D.A. or anywhere else you need to, even mail it. 9 MS. UECKER: We could even do -- the Judge 10 could even pull it up in the courtroom. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Oh, you can pull it -- 12 it's an unbelievable system. You know, I've always liked 13 Software Group. The problem with Software Group, one was 14 always the expense, but two was training issues. But this 15 system is ten times more user-friendly, 'cause it's all 16 based off Microsoft Word and the common way. You don't have 17 the old Uniplex and the different codes that kills everybody 18 trying to learn how to use it. This is more the -- the 19 common folks being able to use it, being able to make it 20 work. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Sheriff, you indicated that 22 Gillespie County has this -- 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: -- in place? 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. They've got parts 8-17-05 bwk 102 1 of it in place, and they're adding more into it each -- 2 MR. TROLINGER: The district -- excuse me. 3 The County Clerk's complete, and now it's being rolled out 4 to the courts. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: So you don't have any reports 6 from your law enforcement counterparts in Gillespie County 7 yet as to their -- 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The only report I have 9 was when they first started getting some of it up and going, 10 and I was with Milton Jung, the Sheriff over there, and we 11 -- we were talking about it, and it was mainly built on the 12 ease of it, 'cause they had parts of it in and there was -- 13 they were starting to use -- they said it was an 14 unbelievable advantage, 'cause, you know, he's got something 15 his officers can actually use. And that was his opinion of 16 it, because it's easy to use. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: John used the phrase 18 "test site." I want to see if we can qualify his comment 19 about it being -- it's not -- it is -- this is not an alpha 20 site where we're developing something, right? 21 MR. TROLINGER: Correct. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: This is where we're 23 shaking out some idiosyncrasies that apply to Texas law. Is 24 that essentially it? 25 MR. TROLINGER: Correct. And the Sheriff 8-17-05 bwk 103 1 actually said -- told Software, when I first sat down in 2 February or March with them, and said he wants -- you know, 3 Denton County's getting all the stuff, and we want it too. 4 And this is what it does. It's not -- it's not alpha. 5 It's -- 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I have watched Denton 7 County for the last umpteen years be their test site, and 8 they get all the stuff just about free. And visiting with 9 them and everything else -- and I harass Software Group 10 every time I see them, because we do just as much -- not 11 quite as big, but we've got such a complex-type deal, is why 12 can't Kerr County do that same thing? Why can't we be, you 13 know, one of the test sites and get it at a -- at a much 14 reduced cost or free cost to let -- and let us work through 15 the bugs? 'Cause we do the whole thing. And -- 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can we do EMS billing 17 through -- I'm just teasing here, to be honest. 18 MS. PIEPER: Gentlemen, by being the guinea 19 pig on this, as well, if we have something in the system 20 that we want tweaked or changed, then we're more than likely 21 to get that as well. If -- like, if I have a -- a case that 22 I want flagged and I don't have that capability, then we can 23 call Software, and they can give us that capability to where 24 we can flag a case. Now, some other county may not want 25 that capability, and they may get it, but they won't use it. 8-17-05 bwk 104 1 But it also -- it kind of gives more -- us more access to be 2 able to do what we -- we can have them program it to the way 3 we want it and the way we'll use it better. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think -- speaking for 5 me, y'all have sold me on the -- the use of it. The desire 6 for us to have it. The productivity enhancements down the 7 road, it looks like. Cost -- 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, the only other -- 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- I'm talking -- I don't 10 know how. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well talk to him, but 12 one thing I want to mention on cost is, right now we have to 13 have licenses for so many terminals in so many areas, okay, 14 which the County has so many; it costs so much. Our problem 15 is where we run into -- and you don't have this with the -- 16 with the new system. Where we really have a problem is at 17 shift change, or my dispatchers log off; they're changing 18 shifts. Once they log off, then they go to log back on, and 19 we can't even get on our own system because all the licenses 20 are used up. And then I have to call Tommy and say we 21 need -- 22 MS. UECKER: And we can't get on 'cause y'all 23 are using it. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: See? It goes somewhere. 25 But the problem is, regardless of who's at fault, the 8-17-05 bwk 105 1 licenses are being used right then. There's too many people 2 on the system. And I have to call John and tell him, knock 3 somebody off. And they go in and make them mad 'cause they 4 knocked them off, or sometimes we get knocked off because 5 people can't -- but, like, the dispatch, that's -- that's a 6 very serious problem when we can't get onto our computer 7 system and let the guy in the field know, "We've been to 8 this house five times before. He's been arrested for 9 assault on a police officer; he's been arrested for this. 10 Use caution when you go to the house." And we can't pull it 11 up and let them know that, and it is serious. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: This will correct 13 that? 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: This system will correct 15 that. 16 MR. TROLINGER: One day I had to shut 17 everybody off the system so that dispatch could get on. 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I've got a couple of 19 questions about mopping up what we learned in the last hour 20 or so. I want to talk about online transactions, and how -- 21 what can be done online, and how does it get paid for? 22 First question is, can we pay fines online? 23 MS. UECKER: Yes. 24 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: When I'm in the 25 J.P.'s office, I notice that a lot of the clerk's time is 8-17-05 bwk 106 1 spent dealing with law breakers and fines and things like 2 that. Is there some way, using either a local bank or a 3 facility like Pay-Pal, that we can pull all this together 4 and collect our money efficiently and easily? 5 MR. TROLINGER: Yes. That's the -- that's 6 the choice -- who -- whomever does the credit card 7 transaction for us, whoever that provider is, is -- is going 8 to be selected based on if they provide Linda and Jannett 9 with exactly what services they want. I don't know the 10 details. 11 MS. UECKER: Well, my suggestion was, you 12 know, that maybe the Auditor or the Treasurer would talk to 13 Security and see about working a -- you know, getting a 14 contract price for everybody that takes money. See, 15 Jannett's got her own system right now. I'm looking at 16 having a separate one. It's very expensive for the user 17 fees. But if we can get some type of a contract with our 18 depository bank -- 19 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah. 20 MS. UECKER: -- I would think that they 21 would -- 22 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: That can be done. 23 MS. UECKER: And that would work exactly with 24 Odyssey. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That should be 8-17-05 bwk 107 1 doable. 2 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: In the small 3 business I owned, I had that facility through one of the 4 local banks. Could you -- can you buy a -- pay for your 5 license tags, your license renewal online? 6 MS. RECTOR: Well, that goes through Texas 7 Department of Transportation. That would not go through 8 this system. I'm currently working on doing that for Kerr 9 County. It's not in -- 10 MS. UECKER: Your tax issue could, though. 11 MS. RECTOR: Taxes, we could. But the 12 problem being, either with the TexDOT equipment or the Orion 13 equipment, would be somebody has to be in front of the 14 computer the next day to download everything that was paid 15 the previous day or during the night, so you're still not 16 eliminating a body that processes that. It's just that it's 17 going to make it quicker for the taxpayer. The money will 18 go direct deposit to the bank, and then we'll get a report 19 from the bank on a daily basis as to what our deposits were. 20 MS. UECKER: And we'd all have to download, 21 you know, whatever inquiries and orders or whatever took 22 place. 23 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: So, all these kinds 24 of transactions can be done; it's just a matter of working 25 out the process. 8-17-05 bwk 108 1 MS. UECKER: Right. 2 MS. RECTOR: Yeah. 3 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Okay. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We talked a good bit 5 about -- have talked a good bit about productivity and/or 6 reducing labor costs in various departments. There are some 7 departments where that's absolutely impossible to do, 8 because they're already winnowed down and it's computerized, 9 but I think what we sometimes fail to take into 10 consideration is the fact that, first of all, this is a 11 growing county. We're at 45,000; we're going to be at 12 50,000 before you know it. As a result of that, there are 13 increased demands on services in the courthouse on every one 14 of these elected officials, tremendous increases in demand. 15 And I'm -- what I'm hearing, I think, is -- and I want John 16 to confirm it. What I think I'm hearing is that, with this 17 type of package, which is -- takes us out into the future 18 now, we can absorb that increased demand on our services 19 hopefully without any increases in our personnel cost 20 itself. Am I hearing that correctly? 21 MR. TROLINGER: I agree, yes. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 23 MR. TROLINGER: And I did look at Guadalupe 24 County. They're about twice our size, I believe, roughly, 25 and saw how he were operating and whatnot. I saw that they 8-17-05 bwk 109 1 were -- that there doing everything online. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's good enough 3 for me. Let's talk about the cost. Tommy? He's got two 4 scenarios here. 250 each year for five years or 152,6 for a 5 10-year payout. How do you come down on that? What do you 6 see as the recommended approach? 7 MR. TOMLINSON: I would go the shorter term. 8 But we just gave that to you just to show you the difference 9 between, you know, one maturity or the other. Personally, 10 I -- I mean, I -- I think this is largely done that -- that 11 we might do a tax anticipation note for this purchase. And 12 the benefit to that is that it qualifies the debt as -- as a 13 deduction in -- or to increase our rollback. If -- if we 14 go -- if we go to a finance company like -- well, a bank, 15 for instance, it qualifies for that, but that debt is not -- 16 is not a qualified debt. So, as large as it is, I -- there 17 might be some advantage to think about a tax note. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Can you work up that 19 scenario for us so we can take a look at it? 20 MR. TOMLINSON: Well, the -- the numbers will 21 be essentially the same. If they -- if the tax note is sold 22 on the open market for -- for a five-year term, it will 23 probably be -- the rate will probably be less. I used a 4 24 and a half percent rate for the numbers that you have, and 25 it could be 50 basis points lower. 8-17-05 bwk 110 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: How much? 2 MR. TOMLINSON: 50 basis points lower if we 3 go to a tax note. I would have to talk to our -- to Bob 4 Henderson about -- about that. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: John, looking at your 7 same chart above, in the first -- Lines 1 through 6 -- 8 MR. TROLINGER: Yes. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- new system, 598,000 10 per year. Does that include the 250,000? 11 MR. TROLINGER: I'm sorry, what line number 12 was that? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Line 6. Line 6, new 14 system. It says 598,698. 15 MR. TROLINGER: Let me make sure we're on the 16 same page. I've got a couple versions of this. Okay. That 17 -- that is the -- that is the total per-year cost that 18 we're -- that we paid over the past five years for desktop 19 computers, software licenses, everything county-wide. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But that's under the new 21 -- that's the Legacy. That's the 2000-2005. Historically, 22 it's 570, but you have a 2005-2010, 598. 23 MR. TROLINGER: And that's what I'm 24 projecting first year -- I'm sorry, per year for the next 25 five years. That number's going to come down significantly. 8-17-05 bwk 111 1 One thing that happened this year, the Sheriff seized -- 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All that stuff. 3 MR. TROLINGER: -- several computers. We've 4 received some computers from the Crimestoppers, and there's 5 a couple other sources where I wanted to, you know, get more 6 contributions in. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, the 250 is not 8 included in that. 9 MR. TROLINGER: That's correct. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What if we were to not 12 buy the Odyssey system, but do a -- another bandaid on the 13 Legacy system? What would that cost? 14 MR. TROLINGER: And that's the Legacy column, 15 and that's the -- 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's the 81,000 a year? 17 MR. TROLINGER: Yes, sir. And that's the 18 same -- it's spread out over the next five years. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's 81 on top of 20 598? 21 MR. TROLINGER: Yes. And that gets -- and 22 that gets everyone trained, basically. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, the new system costs 24 $170,000 additional a year for the next five years? 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's correct, over 8-17-05 bwk 112 1 and above the cost on Lines 1 through 6, I guess. 2 MR. TROLINGER: For the five-year 3 lease-purchase, recommended capital outlay is $250,000, 640 4 per year for five years. Those are the numbers that Tommy 5 and I worked up. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: My other question is, 7 we're getting a good deal from Software Group because of -- 8 or pilot -- whatever you want to call it. The Software 9 Group has a -- a history of hitting you pretty hard with, I 10 guess, their annual licenses and/or annual fees, and -- 11 MR. TROLINGER: The maintenance costs, 12 software maintenance, yes. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What kind of guarantee 14 are they willing to give us on their -- on the escalation 15 that we've seen on the maintenance cost side? 16 MR. TROLINGER: No increase for three years, 17 was the verbal that I received, in software maintenance. 18 So, the software maintenance that we pay today would not 19 change over the next three years. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And that number is not in 21 here? Or is it? 22 MR. TROLINGER: It is. It's part of the 23 total of the desktops and the servers and the training and 24 networking. 25 MS. UECKER: Does that include all the 8-17-05 bwk 113 1 computers? 2 MR. TROLINGER: It does. 3 MS. UECKER: It does? 4 MR. TROLINGER: I'm sorry, does what 5 include -- 6 MS. UECKER: The computers, the hardware. 7 MR. TROLINGER: The servers. Yes, it -- the 8 equipment's included. 9 MS. UECKER: The monitors, the keyboards, 10 the -- 11 MR. TROLINGER: Which part are you asking 12 about? 13 MS. UECKER: Odyssey. 14 MR. TROLINGER: Oh. It does for some -- 15 there's some equipment in there that's required, some 16 upgrades. 17 MS. UECKER: Not all? 18 MR. TROLINGER: Not everything. The base -- 19 what we spend right now on computers, networking and all 20 that, I've got that figured in separately. 21 MS. UECKER: Okay. As, like, a credit or 22 something? 23 MR. TROLINGER: Basically. 24 MS. UECKER: Okay. 25 MS. RECTOR: John, does that figure include 8-17-05 bwk 114 1 the Orion package also? 2 MR. TROLINGER: It does. 3 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: We just heard that 4 if we go with the latest technology compared to continuing 5 to make the old system work, the net cost is 170,000 a year 6 for five years? 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's correct. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: $850,000. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Actually, it's about 197, the 10 way I compute it, because of the difference between the 11 annual for the Legacy of 570 and the new one of 598. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: You add that on top of the 14 difference between 250 and 81, you come up with about 15 $197,200. 16 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Do you agree with 17 that, John? 18 MR. TROLINGER: I do. I didn't look at it 19 that way; I'm not certain about the -- the exact numbers. I 20 looked at it as either Legacy or new, or, you know, hang on 21 to what we've got by our fingernails. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. We can accept 23 that 198,000, whatever. That gets us -- 24 JUDGE TINLEY: I'm just talking about pure 25 dollar outlay; I'm not talking about relative benefits 8-17-05 bwk 115 1 otherwise. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No, you're just over 3 and above where we are today. 4 MR. TROLINGER: Correct. And I wanted to add 5 that I've got -- the 198th District Attorney's on board with 6 this, the Ingram City Marshal, and to some extent, like the 7 Sheriff said, the City of Kerrville. And -- and Ingram City 8 Marshal told me this morning they're willing to participate 9 financially, to throw some money in the hat. Rowan wasn't 10 certain how much, but he said they did want to participate 11 in paying the cost. And 198th District Attorney said they 12 would pay their way -- their fair share of the system. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What did City of 14 Kerrville tell you? 15 MR. TROLINGER: Basically, we're still -- 16 because their budget has already been set and they've got a 17 new police chief, it looked like they weren't ready to 18 commit. But they -- they have stated verbally -- the Police 19 Chief has stated verbally that he wants to participate in 20 the system, and this coming year, see if we can integrate -- 21 my goal would be to first integrate the PSAP, the 9-1-1 22 system better, which is underway now. And also for the 23 bookings and arrests, I want to get City of Kerrville on our 24 system so that they're not filling out separate paperwork 25 using separate computers, but instead integrate them into 8-17-05 bwk 116 1 the Odyssey package. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm not -- you said 3 something that just -- that caught my ear just then. Are 4 you telling me that part -- if we do this, part of that will 5 improve the PSAP? 6 MR. TROLINGER: Yes. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Which is city dispatch 8 equipment. 9 MR. TROLINGER: The computer-aided dispatch 10 portion that the Sheriff spoke of, that's part of the -- 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: His dispatch? Not the 12 City of Kerrville dispatch, which is 9-1-1's dispatch? 13 MR. TROLINGER: City of Kerrville has the 14 PSAP and provides all the information to the County. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 16 MR. TROLINGER: The PSAP is a separate 9-1-1 17 Commission issue. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 19 MR. TROLINGER: The vendor for that is aware 20 of our intention -- or possibility of using the new system, 21 and it will integrate in what the efforts of 9-1-1 22 Commission, will integrate the PSAP and -- 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I guess my bottom line 24 is -- either one of you can answer -- this is going to go 25 towards helping the city's dispatch? 8-17-05 bwk 117 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The main thing that will 2 do in conjunction with 9-1-1, the other thing they're doing, 3 okay, it will give city dispatch direct access real quick, 4 real easy, to any information regarding inmates, courts, 5 anything like that they may want as far as sending their 6 officer out. They're not going to have the maps. They're 7 not locked into this system, but the biggest deal is, 9-1-1 8 and their upgrades is trying to set the Sheriff's Office up 9 as a complete secondary 9-1-1 office. Because if something 10 happens to the City's dispatch office, it goes down, okay, 11 everybody's out on 9-1-1. We don't have the capability 12 right now of taking over for them, you know, on an instant 13 notice or anything. We don't have a server out there for 14 that. We don't have any of that. In their upgrades, what 15 they're looking at -- and I think you'll probably see it in 16 this year's budget, that they're doing -- they're going to 17 set up the Sheriff's Office dispatch as a complete another 18 9-1-1 deal to where if that one goes down, we are their 19 backup 9-1-1 dispatch office. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Going back to the 21 equipment only, I mean, 9-1-1 funds currently $36,000 a 22 year, and they're getting ready, I think we're all aware, in 23 the next couple of years to do a major system upgrade of 24 technology in dispatch. 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 8-17-05 bwk 118 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Does this system -- if we 2 do this, that helps that whole process? 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It does help that 4 process. The biggest thing is, it would totally be able to 5 be integrated into that, to where, say, in the future, us 6 and the City do come to a deal and work a totally joint 7 dispatch center, okay? If we could get the City to end up 8 going to this same type of system, Odyssey -- 'cause they 9 just went to a law enforcement system that I wouldn't give 10 you a nickel for, and if their office would -- 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Did you get that, Gerard? 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: He knows it. But if 13 they were to go city-wide to this system -- 'cause that's 14 what it's designed for, is cities and counties -- it can all 15 work together. And if they were to do it all together, 16 you'd have the best dispatch in the state, because it would 17 all be under one deal. It -- and it's setting the 18 groundwork for doing that. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's what I -- thank 20 you. 21 (Low-voice discussion off the record.) 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. I've heard 23 all I need on this. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I have too. I'm in. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, Mr. Trolinger. 8-17-05 bwk 119 1 MR. TROLINGER: You're welcome. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You're in? I'm not. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: The District Clerk and the Tax 4 Assessor each have six minutes. (Laughter.) Y'all can 5 split up the 12 any way you want to. 6 MS. UECKER: I'll take it. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Will y'all take the 8 whole 12? 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Linda's quick. 10 MS. UECKER: I'm easy. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: She doesn't exist. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Nine. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Number 9. There she 14 is. 15 MS. UECKER: I just want to start off by 16 going down to my Microfilm Records. I would like for you to 17 increase that to 8,000, and I'll tell you why. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Microfilm. What 19 number -- oh, yeah, 412. 20 MS. UECKER: 412. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Increase it? 22 MS. UECKER: To 8,000. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Eight. 24 MS. UECKER: I want to get rid of every damn 25 reader-printer in my office. I don't want to pay 8-17-05 bwk 120 1 maintenance on them any more. Now, records preservation is 2 a big issue, because we do have to preserve these documents 3 forever. I know -- and any vendor will tell you that 4 microfilm is still the only way to do that. So, I still 5 want to be able to microfilm, but I want to be able to do 6 that for archival purposes only. Right now, I have a copy 7 of the film that we use, which has been very useful. It's 8 been an up -- it's been better than what we've had before. 9 But at this point, because of technology and -- and all the 10 computers that we have, I have found someone that can very 11 inexpensively convert all of the microfilm and still 12 maintain the original in case we have a fire or whatever, 13 all of the microfilm, the older ones, everything back to 14 1856, put them on C.D.'s so that -- and they'll be 15 searchable by name, by part of a name, by offense, by 16 anything. 17 So that when someone comes in and says, you 18 know, "I want to look up a divorce record from 1950," rather 19 than pulling Cartridge, you know, 27, they'll pull C.D. 27, 20 put it in a computer, either one of the staff or the public 21 computer, which I'm going to get another one donated from 22 the O.C.A. to put on the counter. They can put it -- look 23 it up, print it to one of the printers, and that's it. 24 There's no microfilm; there's no reader-printers to have to 25 keep up with, and it just makes a lot of sense for the 8-17-05 bwk 121 1 money. Now, this will happen probably over a two-year 2 period. I don't think that I can get it all done this year. 3 I'll do as much of it as I can. And still, you know, the 4 other project that I'm working on is the -- but that's 5 another line item and we'll talk about that later, but it's 6 all of the old historic documents, preserving those so that 7 they don't deteriorate any further. But that's what I need 8 the 8,000 for. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Ms. Pieper? 10 MS. PIEPER: Yes? 11 JUDGE TINLEY: You have a need for those 12 microfiche readers, don't you? 13 MS. PIEPER: Yes. I'm down to one, the one 14 we just purchased. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Pardon? 16 MS. PIEPER: Yes, I'm down to one, the one we 17 just purchased a couple of months ago. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Do yours work? 19 MS. UECKER: Depends on how you hold your 20 mouth. (Laughter.) Right now, there's four. The only one 21 that's really -- that we can count on is the one that I 22 bought 20 years ago. It's an old 605-Z, Minolta. But the 23 MARS controller, which tells you what -- you know, you can 24 enter a key pad -- it has a key pad that you can take it 25 directly to a case. It doesn't work any more, because they 8-17-05 bwk 122 1 don't make the parts any more. They don't even make that 2 machine any more. So, you have to scan it, but it still 3 makes the best copies. Now, I have two that don't work at 4 all. 5 MS. PIEPER: I don't want them. 6 MS. UECKER: And I have one good one that, 7 you know, does -- does work good. So, you know, that -- 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: One and a half. 9 MS. UECKER: Yeah, probably got one and a 10 half. But I'm also paying maintenance on that, and I don't 11 want to have to do that any more, either. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Does your maintenance 13 contract go down slightly if you -- we increase -- 14 MS. UECKER: Yeah. And it depends on -- see, 15 I'm -- until I get them all on C.D.'s, I'll still have to 16 use a reader-printer for certain -- 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 18 MS. UECKER: -- you know, for the film that's 19 not on a C.D. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 21 MS. UECKER: The other things, of course, is 22 the computer software. We've already talked about Odyssey 23 software. 24 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Let's look at Line 25 104, Deputy Clerks salary. 8-17-05 bwk 123 1 MS. UECKER: Okay. 2 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: We had a current 3 budget of 196, estimated actual 153, requested 180. What 4 are those variations? 5 MS. UECKER: The 180 was cost-of-living 6 increases and, I think, a two-step merit increase for one 7 person. 8 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: How are we down 9 43,000 from budget -- budget versus estimated actual? 10 MS. UECKER: Because of the other person that 11 I gave up, and -- and a part-time person. 12 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: How many deputy 13 clerks does this budget include? 14 MS. UECKER: Seven. 15 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: And we have seven 16 now? 17 MS. UECKER: Mm-hmm. 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Thank you. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Looks good to me. 20 MS. UECKER: The other thing is, on software, 21 depending on what the Court does with Odyssey, if we don't 22 buy Odyssey, then I would request about $1,000 to create -- 23 to hire someone to create a web site to do what Odyssey will 24 do. So, if we don't buy Odyssey, I would like that plugged 25 into my budget. 8-17-05 bwk 124 1 JUDGE TINLEY: $1,000? 2 MS. UECKER: That's -- 3 MR. TROLINGER: Just to edit a couple of web 4 pages. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: You're telling me that for 6 $1,000, we can do what Odyssey is going to do? 7 MS. UECKER: No, to create a web page. 8 MR. TROLINGER: What Linda wants is her nice 9 picture right there on the web site right in the middle -- 10 MS. UECKER: Not necessarily. 11 MR. TROLINGER: -- and then the bio on either 12 side. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Does it get a title 14 that says "Our Beloved" across the top? 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: State champion. 16 MS. UECKER: State champion. 17 MR. TROLINGER: Basically, to update her 18 existing web site. 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: One thing that I left 20 out a while ago that even goes along with this scanning and 21 documents -- you know, Linda would probably be able to use 22 part of it. As y'all know, trying to get a scanner in to 23 scan documents in a case right now, you have to have that 24 dedicated, and all this -- 25 MS. UECKER: Which we've got. 8-17-05 bwk 125 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: -- stuff, okay, and we 2 don't have any -- Buster can tell you what my file room 3 looks like; he was in there yesterday. With the Odyssey, 4 any scanner purchased at Office Max, you can use at any 5 computer terminal, and you can scan those documents all into 6 a -- into a regular case file that's already there. The 7 price we got to try and take care of our file cabinets a 8 couple years ago when Linda and I were working on it trying 9 to get everything was $1 million just to do the Sheriff's 10 Office documents that need to be put into the system. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Question -- I'm sorry 12 Judge. You had your hand up? 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Baldwin was there 14 yesterday? 15 MS. UECKER: Are we still talking -- 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'm on a work-release 17 program. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: I was going to say, were they 19 working out there? 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: They let me out this 21 morning so could I come to Commissioners Court. I do 22 represent a quarter of the people of this county. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's why I brought my 24 gun today; I'm pulling guard duty on him. (Laughter.) 25 MS. UECKER: There's a couple things I need 8-17-05 bwk 126 1 before I move off of computer. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Just a second, Linda. 3 If we go to the Odyssey, does your software maintenance, the 4 fifteen thousand five, go away? 5 MS. UECKER: I don't think so. 6 MR. TROLINGER: No, the software maintenance 7 remains. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's for the 9 existing system? 10 MS. UECKER: Well, plus the fact that they've 11 agreed not to raise what we're currently paying for three 12 years. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 14 MS. UECKER: The other thing that I might 15 want to talk about a little bit is the passport business is 16 just incredible. I mean, we've been doing 15 and 20 17 passports a day. We get 30 bucks a passport. Even having 18 to reduce the staff, it almost takes, you know, one person 19 just constantly working on passports, and we're doing okay 20 with that. Plus civil case filings are up from 1,300 to 21 about 1,425. Criminal, a third again as much in the same 22 period of time. The other piece of information that might 23 increase our workload -- well, it will increase our 24 workload, and I think I've got it -- and we'll talk about it 25 again Monday in the Commissioners Court item agenda, is 8-17-05 bwk 127 1 Senate Bill 1704 will require that the -- that the District 2 Clerk keep grant -- let's see -- hear grant postponements, 3 and keep record of that. Now, I understand that The 4 Software Group is changing their software a little bit to 5 accommodate us with that, but we will have to keep some type 6 of a running tab of who all is postponed, because if they've 7 been -- had a postponement within the last year, they can't 8 be postponed again. And their postponement has to be to a 9 date that's not more than six months away. So, I mean, 10 that's going to increase our workload a little bit. 11 I think that's all on that, except that I do 12 want to make one comment on salaries for employees. When I 13 hire someone, one of the -- the first thing I tell them is, 14 anything you do, any of your actions, I don't want to scare 15 you, but if you make a big mistake, it reflects personally 16 on me, and could even cause me, in the most serious 17 incident, to lose my house or property that may not be a 18 homestead. That's the effect that it has. And when I hire 19 someone, they have to be intelligent enough to interpret 20 lengthy court judgments that are composed by attorneys. We 21 have to issue the right process; for instance, a writ of 22 execution, garnishment, sequestration, but all of those 23 judgments -- some of them are that long -- have to be 24 carefully studied. They have to be savvy enough to survive 25 intense technical computer training. They have to be 8-17-05 bwk 128 1 tactful enough to deal with very difficult people. And 2 they're difficult people because they found themselves in 3 the court system, so we're the only outlet they have, 'cause 4 they're darned sure not going to tell the Judge what to do. 5 They have to be confident enough to absorb strong 6 personalities of attorneys and judges. Sorry, Judge, but 7 they do. They have to be honest enough to be bonded and 8 insured to handle very large sums of money and sensitive 9 information, and they have to be adaptable enough that every 10 two years, fees change, laws change. Forget what you 11 learned two years ago; we're going to do it all over. 12 Having said that -- and I think Jannett will 13 agree with me, and Paula will too -- these people that come 14 in entry level at the same pay scale that the light bulb 15 changer and the trash picker-upper enters at, and can't 16 speak English, there's something wrong with this picture. 17 My suggestion would be -- I know that there is, I think, a 18 Step 14 that's not even being used. I don't want to take 19 anything away from those people, but my suggestion would be 20 to move all of the 12-1 office staff up to 13-1's, all the 21 13-1's to 14-1's. And to make an even more distinct 22 comparison, there is actually a position in the courthouse 23 -- I won't say who it is, because it's a good person -- 24 whose job description is a legal secretary, but the 25 description is exactly -- exactly that of what my staff is, 8-17-05 bwk 129 1 entry level, and that's a 17-1. Now, I know the Nash study 2 did this, I'm sure. I don't -- I don't know that for sure, 3 but I think that's something -- you don't have to comment on 4 it -- I would really, seriously like for you to consider 5 when you start talking about employee salaries. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You're saying, Linda, 7 that there's an employee that -- that's a legal secretary; 8 they're at a 17-1? 9 MS. UECKER: Job description's the same as -- 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And the job 11 description for your people are exactly the same, and a new 12 hire for you would be a 12-1? 13 MS. UECKER: Well, in my office right now, 14 it's a 13-1, because the Nash study said because of the type 15 of judgments, as big as they are, and the type of cases, 16 that -- but before that, it was a 12-1. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 18 MS. UECKER: I mean, the same applies to 19 Jannett's folks. 20 MS. PIEPER: My folks are a 12-1. 21 MS. UECKER: So, this would apply to her as 22 well as Paula. I haven't talked to them about it. They 23 didn't even know I was going to say this. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, right. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And we have 8-17-05 bwk 130 1 custodians that start at 14-1? Is that what you said? 2 MS. UECKER: No, 12-1's. Which is fine; 3 which that needed to have happened. Because I think 4 Mr. Nicholson was the one, last budget year or two years 5 ago, that said no one should start at less than a 12-1, and 6 I agree. But that makes them the same as someone who's -- 7 who has to be -- has to have all of these qualities, and be 8 semi-intelligent enough to comply with these. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You make a good 10 point. 11 MS. UECKER: Thank you. 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Very good point. 13 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Well, that job 14 description you gave and the qualities they have, we could 15 replace this Commissioners Court with your employees and -- 16 MS. UECKER: That's right. 17 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: -- improve the 18 average capability. (Laughter.) 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That was a lame duck 20 statement. 21 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Heard that quacking, did you? 23 MS. UECKER: Let's go over to Law Library. 24 I'm not sure that the books -- I see that the actual was 25 43,714, and, you know, I'll try to live with the 37,5, but 8-17-05 bwk 131 1 we might need to raise that a little bit. I'm pointing out 2 that that's still a lot less than what we were spending 3 before I took over as Law Librarian. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Are we still buying 5 books and pocket parts? 6 MS. UECKER: Very few. Very few. 7 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But, like, this year she 8 does buy, because it got changed over, the -- all the new 9 law books that every patrolman has to have, the Penal Code. 10 MS. UECKER: Yeah, paying off all those now. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: All of that gets paid 12 for out of that, so we get over 50 of those, so each officer 13 has one. 14 MS. UECKER: See, I'm also paying out of 15 this -- and we decided to do this last year to save money 16 from the other budgets, because we can't use this money for 17 anything else. Everybody's law books, their bill comes to 18 me. County Attorney, the Sheriff, whoever needs a law book, 19 bring the bill to me. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is that still a good 21 thing? 22 MS. UECKER: It's a good thing. I mean, 23 we're up a little bit. I mean, you know, probably 5,000, 24 6,000 we need to add so I can keep doing that. But that's 25 still a lot less than what we've been doing. Let's see, 8-17-05 bwk 132 1 Jury. There's going to be a big change in juries -- jury 2 fees. We need to raise that from 20,000 to 50,000. And 3 here's -- 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 50,000? 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Need to raise it to 6 what? 7 MS. UECKER: 20,000 to 50,000. 8 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Why? 9 MS. UECKER: The same Senate bill, and I've 10 got that -- I've got all of these explanations of all of 11 these on the agenda for Monday, and we'll go into them in 12 detail more. But it's going to require that the first day 13 of service for a juror is not less than $6, we're going to 14 ask for $15 because of the fact that County Court at Law 15 jurors and -- like, yesterday I had a jury that finished in 16 one day. Under the new bill, if we set it at $6, they would 17 only have gotten the same as for the person that came in and 18 said, "I'm here and I'm going home." So, I talked to both 19 the District Judges. They would like that one set at $15. 20 The big one is, any day after that, any -- yeah, it goes up 21 to $40 a day, not less than. And, you know, we can set it 22 at higher than that, but the minimum is $40 a day. So that 23 is where -- and doing some intense mathematics and changing 24 it a bunch of times, I figured that 50,000 is probably where 25 we need to set that. However, there's another new fee added 8-17-05 bwk 133 1 to criminal cases -- convictions that we collect and send to 2 the state -- State Comptroller for a jury reimbursement fee. 3 You know, God forbid we just keep the money and pay the 4 jurors; we have to send it to the State. But every quarter, 5 someone -- and I would assume that to be the Treasurer or 6 the Auditor; I don't know, or me -- will have to apply for a 7 reimbursement from the State Comptroller for $34 of every 8 $40 that we spend. Now, that's going to be tough the first 9 year, because before all of those funds get to the 10 Comptroller, we're going to be asking for money that's not 11 there, and in that case, Senate Bill 1704 says that they 12 will proportion it, you know, based on what county asks for 13 what percentage. They'll prorate it. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: As I understand it -- 15 MS. UECKER: In other words, you may not get 16 your $34. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: As I understand it, the 18 fees goes in place September 1, but the reimbursement -- 19 MS. UECKER: January 1, right. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And the $40 doesn't start 21 till January 1, so that -- and also, this goes on all 22 traffic cases, every conviction. 23 MS. UECKER: Everything. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Municipal. So, it's -- 25 MS. UECKER: So, you know -- 8-17-05 bwk 134 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- it should -- their 2 theory is that there's far more fees generated than they're 3 going use up. 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's why they're 5 taking the money and sending it back, 'cause they're going 6 to pay the mandate and keep the extra money for themselves. 7 MS. UECKER: Overall, I don't think it's 8 going to be that much of a big increase for us, but I don't 9 know until I see how this first year plays out. The other 10 increase is the Operating Supplies, to 6,000, because 11 although I have a lot of jury cards right now, the law also 12 changed to make some mandatory changes to the jury cards, so 13 I'll have to have those reprinted. And I'm working on 14 getting some proofs done on those right now. 15 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: What you're saying 16 is that the net effect of this new law that says you have to 17 pay 40, you might get 34 back and all that, the net effect 18 is going to be an additional 32,000 a year cost to us this 19 first year? 20 MS. UECKER: Not the net effect, no, but we 21 have to put it in here to pay it. Now, when we get the 22 check back from the Comptroller for the reimbursement, I 23 don't -- I don't know where -- it will probably go back into 24 the General Fund. 25 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I see. 8-17-05 bwk 135 1 MS. UECKER: To be appropriated here next 2 year. 3 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Our total budget's 4 not going up 32,000, but this -- 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We hope. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's a cash flow 7 situation. 8 MS. UECKER: Exactly. Let's see, what else? 9 JUDGE TINLEY: You've already used all of 10 Paula's time. 11 MS. UECKER: I know. 12 MR. TOMLINSON: What did you say? 13 MS. UECKER: 6,000. Which, actually, 14 Operating Supplies, that's mainly all we use, except I think 15 the jurors' coffee comes out of that. And -- 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Price of coffee went up. 17 MS. UECKER: -- price of coffee went up along 18 with gas. The other thing that I would like to ask for 19 again -- and I hope to have this project completed before I 20 leave -- there -- 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Are you leaving? 22 MS. UECKER: No. But, you know, someday I'm 23 going to have to. Remember, I can retire now and come back 24 to work for the County. I'm eligible to do that. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You going to be on 8-17-05 bwk 136 1 the Road and Bridge crew, or where would you like to be? 2 MS. UECKER: No, I want to run for 3 Commissioner of Precinct -- wherever I live. (Laughter.) 4 Just kidding. The Records Preservation, that is the 5 County's -- there's actually three records preservation 6 funds within the county. There's one that covers everybody 7 that Jannett and I collect money, and it goes into this 8 fund. There's one that she collects that goes into just for 9 her. There's one that has just started for district clerks, 10 that mine doesn't have that much money it yet. That will, 11 however, increase by $5 a case for district clerks this 12 year, and I think also for the County Clerk. $2.50 of that 13 goes into this -- this fund, and $2.50 goes into mine, the 14 increase. So, every year I've asked for -- I think it was 15 5,000 for a while -- for 3,000 out of that -- the County's 16 general one to continue to try to preserve all of these 17 pre-1800, early 1900 documents that I have. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So, you're going from 20 three to what? 21 MS. UECKER: 3,000. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: 3,000? 23 MS. UECKER: From five to three. And the 24 only other one I have is the -- see, like, my -- my Records 25 Preservation right now just shows $1,400, and you can't do a 8-17-05 bwk 137 1 whole lot with that, except maybe put it in on Odyssey, 2 'cause it would qualify. I don't know how much that would 3 help. The Alternative Dispute Resolution, that's also on 4 the agenda for Monday, but to -- and I think the Judge 5 penciled in 12,5, which may or may not be pretty accurate as 6 to what the fund will have in it. That fee also will -- 7 goes from $10 to $15 per case, so that fund will increase. 8 And I will defer, then, until Monday on the other bills -- 9 oh, wait, wait, wait. Let's go back to Jury. I talked to 10 John, and he got a figure for me for a video projector for 11 the courtroom. He said we can get one for $875. The -- 12 here's a little something on it. 13 There is a program -- a free program that the 14 Supreme Court has come out with to increase jury efficiency 15 and reporting. The number of people that report right now, 16 we're at less than half because of the over-65 or 17 disinterest, apathy. We're going to be putting those in the 18 courtrooms on the counters. And there is a video -- an 19 excellent video, and I've got a C.D. of it upstairs if any 20 of you want to see it, that would play the first 15 minutes 21 as jurors are filing in, and it's been proven in some areas 22 to actually greatly reduce the number of excuses that are 23 requested. And it instills a greater sense of 24 responsibility, what a juror should do, and has actually 25 increased attendance, and it's an excellent video. Supreme 8-17-05 bwk 138 1 Court Justice Wallace Jefferson is on it, and some of the 2 other Supreme Court Justices, trial court judges, D.A.'s. 3 Even, I think, a clerk or two is on there. But it's an 4 excellent video, and we would like -- and I've talked to 5 Judge Ables and Judge Prohl about it. It's free; the only 6 thing we have to do is buy the projector. Now, the 7 projector would not be just for that purpose, because we 8 have needed one. We just haven't had one, so the trial 9 attorneys have had to bring in their own or buy one to hook 10 up to their computer and to play videos. You know, like a 11 DWI video or whatever could be played using this equipment 12 during the trial of a case, so the $875 would not just be to 13 play this video. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: That's included in the 6,000, 15 though? 16 MS. UECKER: Yes. Yes. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's included in the 18 6,000? 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 21 MS. UECKER: What else? That's all. Is that 22 why I'm hungry? Okay. Paula, you got two minutes. 23 MS. RECTOR: What's the pleasure of the 24 Court? Do you y'all want to go to lunch? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. How long will it 8-17-05 bwk 139 1 take you? 2 MS. RECTOR: Not very long. First of all, I 3 want to say I appreciate Linda's comment about the 4 employees. I hope you all will take that into consideration 5 when you start discussing salaries. And I don't have as 6 many new projects as Linda does, but I do have one that I'm 7 working on right now, and that is to go online with the 8 Secretary of State's office for voter registration, meaning 9 they would maintain the equipment, they would supply the 10 software. So, the cost for the software maintenance and 11 scanning would go away to the tune of about $5,400 out of my 12 Software Maintenance line item. We'll be meeting with the 13 Secretary of State's office next week to discuss the 14 possibility of us switching over to their system. We 15 haven't done it before now because they didn't have scanning 16 capabilities, and we currently scan all of our voter 17 registration records, so I hope I can get that accomplished 18 this budget year. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How many employees do you 20 have in your department, Paula? 21 MS. RECTOR: I have 12. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 12 total? 23 MS. RECTOR: I have 11 in the main office 24 here and one in my Ingram office. 25 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: And you're proposing 8-17-05 bwk 140 1 12? 2 MS. RECTOR: Pardon me? 3 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Your proposal is 12? 4 MS. RECTOR: Yes. Yes, I have not asked for 5 any additional staff. I think everything else except for 6 the Postage and Office Supply line items are increasing 7 because of this year's mass mail-out of voter registration 8 cards which takes place every other year, so you'll see a 9 rise and fall every other year in those two items. 10 MS. UECKER: I have a question while Paula's 11 here and Jannett is here. I recently learned that -- and it 12 will affect all of our budgets -- that our Pitney Bowes 13 machines will not be -- and I did not include that in my 14 budget, and I don't if -- 15 MS. RECTOR: Next year -- they're telling us 16 this year they will all have to be replaced next year 17 because they will not maintain the machines if something 18 breaks. 19 MS. UECKER: The meters, yeah. 20 MS. RECTOR: Yeah. 21 MS. UECKER: So I didn't add it. I figured 22 I'd add it next year. 23 MS. RECTOR: That's what I'm going to do for 24 next year, is put in for a new postage machine. 25 MS. UECKER: Which we'll all have to do. 8-17-05 bwk 141 1 MS. PIEPER: I've already done mine. 2 MS. UECKER: You've already done yours? 3 Okay. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Any other questions? Thank 5 you, ma'am. 6 MS. RECTOR: Is that it? There's a couple of 7 comments. This year, we hit the 55,000 vehicle registration 8 mark in Kerr County, meaning that we will be collecting an 9 additional dollar off of registration. All the counties, 10 when they hit $55,000, can charge an additional dollar on 11 the vehicle registration, which stays at the county level. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Good. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do you automatically 14 do that? Or -- 15 MS. RECTOR: It'll be programmed into our 16 collections from TexDOT. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. 18 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: We get the whole 19 dollar? 20 MS. RECTOR: Mm-hmm. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Once you reach that plateau, 22 you collect it on every one of them, or just those in excess 23 of 55? 24 MS. RECTOR: Yes -- no, on every one of them. 25 Another thing is, I'm currently revising my contract with 8-17-05 bwk 142 1 the Appraisal District for the 10 percent rendition penalty, 2 late-filing renditions. They do not have means of 3 collecting that penalty, and in the past there was no 4 legislation that allowed any recourse if it wasn't paid by 5 the taxpayers, so I did not pursue that collection. It was 6 just too much of a headache. With the new legislative 7 session, it is becoming part of the tax bill, and penalty 8 and interest and attorney fees can be attached, and we can 9 actually file suit on that delinquent rendition penalty if 10 it's not paid, so we're revamping the contract, which will 11 mean some additional funds coming into Kerr County off those 12 rendition penalties. Another thing on the down side, with 13 this new legislative session, they've created another -- 14 another little monster for me in the form of an escrow for 15 D.V.A. and other military-related people that I have to 16 escrow their tax money. They can come in and pay me -- 17 prepay their taxes throughout the year, and I must hold it 18 in a separate account and keep track of it on a monthly 19 basis. So, just another little bookkeeping situation. And 20 that's all I have. Any questions? 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Any questions for the Tax 22 Assessor? Thank you, ma'am. We appreciate it. We're 23 scheduled to have a workshop on emergency services districts 24 at 1:30, so we'll stand in recess till 1:30. 25 (Budget workshop recessed at 12:17 p.m.) - - - - - - - - - - 8-17-05 bwk 143 1 STATE OF TEXAS | 2 COUNTY OF KERR | 3 The above and foregoing is a true and complete 4 transcription of my stenotype notes taken in my capacity as 5 County Clerk of the Commissioners Court of Kerr County, 6 Texas, at the time and place heretofore set forth. 7 DATED at Kerrville, Texas, this 7th day of November, 8 2005. 9 10 11 JANNETT PIEPER, Kerr County Clerk 12 BY: _________________________________ Kathy Banik, Deputy County Clerk 13 Certified Shorthand Reporter 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 8-17-05 bwk