1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT 9 Special Session 10 Friday, July 28, 2006 11 9:00 a.m. 12 Commissioners' Courtroom 13 Kerr County Courthouse 14 Kerrville, Texas 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 PRESENT: PAT TINLEY, Kerr County Judge 23 H. A. "BUSTER" BALDWIN, Commissioner Pct. 1 WILLIAM "BILL" WILLIAMS, Commissioner Pct. 2 24 DAVE NICHOLSON, Commissioner Pct. 4 25 ABSENT: JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Pct. 3 2 1 I N D E X July 28, 2006 2 PAGE 3 1.1 Receive and open Requests for Qualifications for professional services to provide planning 4 and engineering services for the Center Point Wastewater Project, refer to Commissioners 5 Williams and Letz for review, scoring and recommendation 3 6 1.2 Consider, discuss and take appropriate action 7 on COBRA expense for one month for a single employee 5 8 --- Adjourned 9 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 3 1 On Friday, July 28, 2006, at 9:00 a.m., a special 2 meeting of the Kerr County Commissioners Court was held in the 3 Commissioners' Courtroom, Kerr County Courthouse, Kerrville, 4 Texas, and the following proceedings were had in open court: 5 P R O C E E D I N G S 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Let me call to order the meeting -- 7 special meeting of the Kerr County Commissioners Court 8 scheduled for this date and time, Friday, July 28th, 2006, at 9 9 a.m. It is that time now. Let's move to the first item on 10 the agenda, if we might. Receive and open Request for 11 Qualifications for professional services to provide planning 12 and engineering services for the Center Point Wastewater 13 Project; refer the same to Commissioners Williams and Letz for 14 review, scoring, and recommendation. Commissioner Williams. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We have three items that 16 arrived prior to the deadline. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, I'll open those. The first one 18 we have is from Tetra Tech, Incorporated. Wow. There are a 19 number of -- 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think they're -- 21 JUDGE TINLEY: -- portfolios, and I'm not sure -- 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: The dollar amount is -- 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Ain't there. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, is predetermined, the 25 dollar amount. So it's just all the various qualifications 7-28-06 4 1 and so forth. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. The submission of Tetra Tech 3 appears to be in order. The next one is from Klein 4 Engineering, Incorporated. This one also appears to be in 5 order. And you have a third one? 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yes, sir. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Third one is contained in two 8 envelopes. It is from Vordenbaum Engineering out of 9 Fredericksburg. Second envelope is just more of what's 10 contained in the first? Yes, it is. That proposal also 11 appears to be in order. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. Judge, I would move 13 -- I would move acceptance of the qualifications for proposal 14 for professional services, and refer those to Commissioners 15 Letz and Williams for review, scoring, and recommendation to 16 the Court. That's a motion. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a motion and a second for -- 19 to approve the receipt of Request for Qualifications for the 20 professional services as indicated on the agenda item, and 21 referral of same to Commissioners Williams and Letz for 22 review, scoring, and recommendation. Is there any -- any 23 discussion, comment on the motion? All in favor of that 24 motion, signify by raising your right hand. 25 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 7-28-06 5 1 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 2 (No response.) 3 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion carried. Let's move to 4 Item 2. Consider, discuss, and take appropriate action on 5 COBRA expense for one month for a single employee. 6 Mr. Emerson? 7 MR. EMERSON: I will tell you what little I know. 8 July 19th, I was contacted by Michelle from our insurance 9 administrator's office. There is a county employee who, for 10 HIPAA purposes, I'd just as soon not mention or go into 11 specifics, but the bottom line is that she was out of work 12 from the end of December '05 until April of '06. Apparently, 13 there's an inherent conflict between our Mutual of Omaha 14 policy and our personnel policy on FMLA and the insurance and 15 when it applies, with the bottom line result being that this 16 employee did not have any insurance coverage for the month of 17 April, was not advised that COBRA was available and should be 18 picked up, and there's a gap. The recommended path of least 19 resistance to try to solve this is for the County to pick up 20 one month's premium of COBRA expense for this employee, 21 thereby avoiding $2,400-plus in medical bills. From the 22 information I've been able to gather, I don't think it's been 23 the employee's fault that things kind of went down. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What's the employee handbook 25 say? 7-28-06 6 1 MR. EMERSON: Employee handbook says that FMLA 2 covers and the insurance will be paid while employee's out on 3 FMLA. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Paid by the County? 5 MR. EMERSON: Paid by the County. The Mutual of 6 Omaha policy says that their insurance does not cover -- does 7 not apply after 90 days of, quote, active employment, which 8 means that we have a conflict, because somebody could be out 9 on FMLA. Under our policy, we're supposed to pay. FMLA's 10 good for 120 days, but the Mutual of Omaha policy runs out at 11 90 days, based on their wording. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Rex, is there something we 13 need to correct in the policy handbook? 14 MR. EMERSON: Yes. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 16 MR. EMERSON: We either need to correct the policy 17 handbook and/or correct -- amend our contract with Mutual of 18 Omaha -- 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well,they need to mesh. 20 MR. EMERSON: -- to reflect the same language. They 21 need to -- that's correct, they need to mesh. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Who has the responsibility to 23 let an employee know about the COBRA program? 24 MR. EMERSON: Whoever's handling the personnel/human 25 resources. 7-28-06 7 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. It's not the 2 employee's responsibility? 3 MR. EMERSON: It's the employer's responsibility. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. That's all I have. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: The bottom line here is that the -- 6 the policy manual of Kerr County as it presently exists, which 7 we distribute to our employees, tells those employees that if 8 they're in an FMLA status, Kerr County will pay -- will be 9 responsible for their insurance coverage. 10 MR. EMERSON: Correct. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: We're on the hook, the way I see it. 12 Easily. 13 MR. EMERSON: Correct. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We are, definitely. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What is the dollar amount? 16 MR. EMERSON: $515.10. 17 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I probably don't need to 18 know the answer to this, but since we don't charge the 19 employee anything for health insurance, why is there any 20 premium to pay? 21 MR. EMERSON: It's COBRA coverage, because of the 22 way the policy's written. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: In excess of 90 days. 24 MR. EMERSON: Yeah, that's the problem. 25 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Okay. 7-28-06 8 1 MR. EMERSON: There's a letter in the packet, Judge, 2 that if the Court approves it, it's dated June 19th from 3 Mutual of Omaha, that has a one-time amendment to the 4 administrative services agreement to allow them to go back and 5 retroactively address the COBRA issue. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What budget line will this 7 come from? 8 MR. EMERSON: I don't know, Commissioner. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, there's a department 10 that this employee worked for, right? 11 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Yeah. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Would it be charged back to 13 that department, reasonably? Auditor seems to think so. 14 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: I would think so. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. Move approval. 16 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Second. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for approval 18 of the agenda item. Any question or discussion? 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. Would you please 20 put the dollar amount in the motion? 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: $515 and -- 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 10 cents. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- and 10 cents. 24 COMMISSIONER NICHOLSON: Second. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a motion and second. Motion, 7-28-06 9 1 as amended, to include the dollar amount of $515.10. Any 2 further question or discussion? All in favor of the motion, 3 signify by raising your right hand. 4 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 5 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 6 (No response.) 7 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Is there any 8 more business to be covered under the agenda of the special 9 Commissioners Court meeting which was called to order moments 10 ago? If not, I will adjourn that meeting. 11 (Commissioners Court adjourned at 9:11 a.m.) 12 - - - - - - - - - - 13 STATE OF TEXAS | 14 COUNTY OF KERR | 15 The above and foregoing is a true and complete 16 transcription of my stenotype notes taken in my 17 capacity as County Clerk of the Commissioners Court 18 of Kerr County, Texas, at the time and place 19 heretofore set forth. 20 DATED at Kerrville, Texas, this 31st day of 21 July, 2006. 22 23 JANNETT PIEPER, Kerr County Clerk 24 BY: _________________________________ Kathy Banik, Deputy County Clerk 25 Certified Shorthand Reporter 7-28-06