1 2 3 4 5 6 KERRVILLE CITY COUNCIL 7 and 8 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT 9 Joint Workshop 10 Friday, February 15, 2008 11 8:00 a.m. 12 KPUB Meeting Room 13 2250 Memorial Boulevard 14 Kerrville, Texas 15 16 17 18 Kerrville City Council: 19 EUGENE C. SMITH, Mayor TODD A. BOCK, Mayor Pro Tem 20 MACK HAMILTON, Councilperson, Place 2 CHUCK COLEMAN, Councilperson, Place 4 21 PAUL HOFMANN, City Manager 22 Kerr County Commissioners Court 23 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 BRUCE OEHLER, Commissioner Pct. 4 2 1 I N D E X February 15, 2008 2 PAGE 3 1.1 Presentation and discussion with City Council and City staff with respect to operation and/or 4 funding of joint City/County projects, including, but not limited to: EMS, fire department, library, 5 recycling center, animal control, and airport 3 6 1.2 Discussion and consideration of other potential cooperative efforts, including, but not limited to: 7 health benefits program, road repair/rehabilitation/ seal coating, emergency services dispatch, airport 8 governance, broadband services, ETJ annexation issues, economic development/concept presentation, and 9 discussion on W.A.R.N. (Wide Area Rapid Notification) system 19 10 --- Adjourned 71 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 3 1 On Friday, February 15, 2008, at 8:00 a.m., a joint 2 workshop of the Kerrville City Council and the Kerr County 3 Commissioners Court was held in the KPUB Meeting Room, 2250 4 Memorial Boulevard, Kerrville, Texas, and the following 5 proceedings were had: 6 P R O C E E D I N G S 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you for being here. Let me 8 call to order this joint workshop meeting of the Kerr County 9 Commissioners Court and the Kerrville City Council scheduled 10 and posted for this time and date and place, Friday, 11 February 15, 2008, at 8 a.m., here at the Kerrville Public 12 Utility Board meeting room. Mr. Mayor, do you want to take 13 over for the Council? 14 MAYOR SMITH: As Mayor, I wish to open this meeting 15 for the -- and call to order the Kerrville City Council for a 16 special joint meeting with Kerr County Commissioners Court. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. The first item on the 18 agenda is a presentation and discussion with the City Council 19 and City staff -- this is ours; of course, the reverse would 20 be true of the City's items -- with respect to operation 21 and/or funding of joint City and County projects, including, 22 but not limited to: EMS, Fire Department, Library, Recycling 23 Center, Animal Control, and Airport. Of course, each one of 24 these is a separate function and operation, so I think in the 25 past we've done them one at a time rather than one big mix. 2-15-08 jwk 4 1 So, why don't we go ahead and start with EMS, since that's 2 the first one on the list? 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I hope we have one. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Good plan. Right, Buster? 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Hope we keep it. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Hope we keep it. 7 MR. HOFMANN: Judge Tinley? 8 MR. COLEMAN: Are you present today? 9 MR. HOFMANN: We don't have a specific -- specific 10 presentation planned. We're here to answer any questions you 11 might have. If you would like a brief overview of the 12 operation, we're happy to offer it. We're about -- we're 13 about four months into the fiscal year. The -- the County 14 and the City jointly contribute to the operation of the EMS 15 operation based upon a -- a formula that we have presented 16 to -- to this group a couple of times before, a formula that 17 takes into account system revenues. You remember, last year 18 we had a discussion about the -- the rates we charge for EMS 19 services, and after some discussion, again in this forum, 20 those -- those rates were increased for the fiscal '08 21 budget. And, again, we're not -- we're not prepared to 22 present specifics, but the operation's going well, and I know 23 revenues are coming in at least at budget. We have a lot of 24 customers for the EMS system. And if you would like for us 25 to answer any questions, we're certainly happy to. If we 2-15-08 jwk 5 1 can't answer them today, we'll come back. And I apologize; 2 if there was an expectation we were going to have a 3 presentation today, I wasn't aware. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: I don't know that there was an 5 expectation of a presentation. It's just that these are one 6 of our major joint operations that -- that we jointly 7 participate in and provide funding for. I think we've had 8 one change since last year. I think the change which carved 9 out the northwest corner of -- part of the Y.O. Ranchlands 10 occurred not this immediate past fiscal year, but the year 11 prior to that, or maybe even before that. This past year, I 12 think there was a modification of the primary coverage area 13 of EMS down in the Comfort area with the Falling Water 14 Subdivision. Isn't that right, Jon? 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's everything off Highway 87 16 north of Comfort. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It was easier to define it that 19 way, even though it was driven by Falling Water. It was 20 pretty much all Kerr County property accessed off Highway 87 21 has Kendall County as primary responder, and Kerr County -- 22 or Kerrville EMS is second. There's still coverage; they're 23 still responsible for it, but it's not as primary. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: And that just occurred this past 25 fiscal year? 2-15-08 jwk 6 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Correct. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And we pay for that -- we pay 4 $3,500, I think, to Kendall County, something like that, for 5 that. But, Judge, what I was kind of raising my hand about, 6 and based on what Paul said, it seems to me that -- I mean, 7 if there isn't a formal presentation, which I didn't expect 8 one really, a way to kind of jump into it in today's meeting, 9 we really almost need to -- due to a meeting that Mack and I 10 had, because that's kind of the nuts and bolts of this 11 meeting as to where we're going from here, last meeting Mack 12 and I were asked, I think, to do something. I'm not sure we 13 did what we were told to do, but we did something -- or Mack 14 primarily did something. And they -- they did an analysis, 15 and I'm sure they have some sort of a presentation of cost 16 allocation impact in the county and the city, looking at tax 17 dollars and where we're going with joint operations and 18 combining them and all. I met one time with Mack and Josh 19 Selleck. I didn't agree totally with the way their numbers 20 went, but I don't -- you know, it's a minor point, in my 21 mind. 22 I think the interesting point is that they have 23 come up with an overall feeling that -- and I don't disagree 24 with it, that city residents pay a higher percentage of some 25 offices -- of more services than non-city residents do. And 2-15-08 jwk 7 1 I don't -- you know, I don't -- I hope we don't go into too 2 much of it. I received the numbers at 4:30 last night; I 3 really just glanced through them before I went to bed last 4 night. I know the rest of the Court has not seen any of 5 this. I don't know if Council's seen it or not, any of it, 6 and I hope we don't spend a whole lot of time on it, because 7 I think it's not fair for us to get into a discussion on 8 numbers without our Auditor and our County staff looking 9 through it very thoroughly. I think -- but I don't disagree 10 with the direction, and also I support the recommendations. 11 I think -- and that's, I think, the key that Mack and I -- 12 you know, we do agree on, that we need to look at some of 13 these things and where that goes. 14 And I think that the -- and I think if we can just 15 agree to look at some of these items, I think we'll be way, 16 way ahead. And I think we have been roadblocked looking at 17 specific issues in prior years. I think we need to look at 18 more of the big picture and who should be -- and this may 19 mean transferring some operations from one entity to the 20 other, relook at how we fund some of these operations and 21 things of that nature. I think that's a very good thing to 22 do. I'll let -- you know, if no one has any objection, it 23 makes a lot more sense for the County to kind of go into 24 that, which is a big topic area that I know Mack and Josh 25 spent a lot of time on, then go into that second item on the 2-15-08 jwk 8 1 agenda today, which is kind of more a couple new items. 2 Because I really -- you know, without a formal presentation, 3 I mean, we -- we'll go through the same discussion on every 4 item that we go through every year, and I think we need to 5 get past that. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Do you have anything to add to that? 7 MAYOR SMITH: I'd like to mention one thing. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 9 MAYOR SMITH: I think, on EMS and fire department, 10 Chief -- I'm sure everybody knows -- in case they don't know, 11 Chief Holloway has retired, and I think we all -- the people 12 in Kerrville and Kerr County owe the chief a big thanks for 13 how he developed the EMS and the fire department. So, 14 Mark -- I understand Mark Beavers is -- is acting Fire Chief. 15 I don't know if he's over EMS both, too. 16 MR. HOFMANN: Yes, he is. 17 MAYOR SMITH: He is. So, Mark Beavers -- everybody 18 knows Mark, I'm sure. Stand up, Mark. So, he's acting Fire 19 Chief and EMS chief. He has some very large shoes to fill. 20 MR. BEAVERS: Large shoes. He's taller than me, 21 too, so -- (Laughter.) 22 MAYOR SMITH: Probably a better golfer, too. 23 MR. BEAVERS: Yeah. 24 MAYOR SMITH: But that's a temporary assignment, 25 because we're interviewing people to -- before the City 2-15-08 jwk 9 1 Manager makes his decision on a permanent replacement. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I don't know if he's -- but 3 I just -- you know, I do hope that we don't spend a lot of 4 time on the numbers, 'cause I don't think they're that 5 critical. 6 MR. HAMILTON: We'll hand out -- Josh, if you would 7 just hand it out to everybody. Let me try to explain what 8 we've done. And in the spirit of what Jonathan is 9 suggesting, I won't take you through the charts. You can 10 read them for yourself. If you take the services that you 11 might say the City does part of, the County does part of, in 12 some way they share and try to allocate the costs back, what 13 we've done is allocate the costs back, not to a government 14 entity, which is what the accounting system has been doing 15 for years. We've allocated the costs back to the individual 16 citizens of the city of Kerrville, or the individual citizens 17 who live outside the city. And when you do that, you get 18 very different numbers from what occurs when you look at the 19 government entity itself. And the reason for the difference 20 is that people outside the city pay county taxes, period. 21 End of subject. 22 People inside the city pay the same county taxes, 23 but in addition, they pay city taxes. So, any agreement 24 between the City and the County that says we will share 25 equally in the cost of something -- I'm using equal because 2-15-08 jwk 10 1 the math is easier that way -- ends up, in effect, having 2 city residents pay for the same service three times what the 3 county residents pay, and these numbers take you through that 4 in detail. We believe the sources used are very solid. They 5 are published county budget data, published city budget data, 6 U.S. census numbers, and KCAD's tax certified rolls. Those 7 are the four sources. And if you start with those, you then 8 have to say, Let's look at the numbers, pull the revenues 9 out, and ask ourselves, what's the net cost to the taxpayer 10 by service? That's what we've done, and the charts will give 11 you that by services listed. We originally had had fewer 12 services; when we met with Jonathan, he suggested adding 13 some. We have done that. 14 But, I -- I think once you go through that, the 15 main conclusion that you come to is, we need to figure out a 16 way to relook at this and ask ourselves, what is fair and 17 equitable? And I would submit that in some cases, what we're 18 currently doing is not anywhere close to fair and equitable. 19 But I'll -- I'll let you have the numbers there. I agree 20 with Jonathan, absolutely, that the -- trying to move beyond 21 the numbers without first accepting some sort of analysis -- 22 maybe not exactly this one -- doesn't make a lot of sense, 23 because we're going to find ourselves debating about, gosh, 24 we don't agree on the numbers. So, the first step in all of 25 this discussion is, let us agree or get closer to agreement 2-15-08 jwk 11 1 on the numbers. And I -- I think what Jonathan has 2 suggested, let the County look at the numbers. And you'll 3 notice, that's the first recommendation back here in the end 4 of this. I've got the last chart -- Chart 9 has two 5 recommendations, and they're very simple. The first 6 recommendation, the recommendation on the County side to 7 review and analyze the data to confirm the conclusions that 8 have been presented. We're giving you all the numbers. 9 We'll be glad to support you if you have questions and try to 10 take you through what we've done in any way possible. 11 Once we've done that, I'm sure we're going to come 12 to some disagreement on conclusions. That's bound to be the 13 case. But once we've done that, it seems appropriate to try 14 to establish a joint City and County committee to look at 15 this and come up with some modifications that move us towards 16 fixing the problem, and that's what we're trying to 17 accomplish. So, this -- this is -- I think in the City's 18 feeling, this is just a first step, and that's all we're 19 trying to accomplish, but it does get us started. So -- and 20 you'll see an aggregate; I used the number 3-to-1 and equal 21 split. When you run the services down the line, we're 22 showing a number of about 3-to-1 overall, and that's the way 23 it is. Some services, we're saying, hey, that's 1-to-1, 24 because we pay the same. County Jail, for example, is 25 1-to-1, but other services are 3-to-1. And the numbers are 2-15-08 jwk 12 1 distorted, I will agree. The fire numbers, which shows up in 2 here as being something like 20-to-1, I'll set that aside. I 3 realize that's a difference there. 4 I don't know that -- so I think I'm -- what I'm 5 saying is, I'm basically agreeing with Jonathan; the first 6 step is on the County side to spend some time analyzing the 7 numbers. And we can agree to disagree; if you don't like our 8 numbers, I mean, that's okay too, but I think we should be 9 able to get there. Our data sources are all published, 10 public knowledge, and it's a matter, then, of just turning a 11 crank. And once we do that, the next step is, how do we 12 begin to solve the problem? And the reason for -- for 13 looking at it this way is just the point Jonathan made. If 14 you look at an individual service by service, you may get 15 some acceptable answer, but there's no certainty you'd get an 16 acceptable answer. And, so, what we're proposing is take a 17 look at it instead from the top down, rather than from the 18 bottom up. That's -- that's -- 19 MAYOR SMITH: You know, the City was kind of guilty 20 of this, because we used to keep records of, say, the 21 library. They'd say, "This many city people use it and this 22 many county people," and they were overlooking the fact that 23 every city person was a county person, so it looked -- tilted 24 towards the city uses it many times more than the county. 25 But when you put city as county -- so, I've -- I've insisted 2-15-08 jwk 13 1 they say the people that live in the city and people that 2 live outside the city, rather than calling them city and 3 county, because it was an inaccurate statement. I'm not 4 saying -- you know, I'm just using that as an illustration. 5 And the County was keeping their records the same way. They 6 were using -- they weren't considering city people as county 7 people, which they are. And I -- I'm sure everybody in this 8 room realizes city people are a member of Kerr -- members of 9 Kerr County also, or citizens of Kerr County. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think another reason, kind 11 of, I think it's a good time to look at this, I don't know of 12 any real contentious issues now -- between the two right now, 13 but a lot of the agreements that we operate under right now 14 were originally started in the early '80's -- for the most 15 part, during the '80's. And during that time, there was a 16 real difference between county government and city government 17 as to what -- the staffing, what we did, lots of different 18 areas. Since that time, city government certainly has grown, 19 but county government's probably grown a whole lot faster, 20 and we basically have the same type or equivalent department 21 heads or county elected officials to match everything the 22 City has. We have H.R. now; we have auditors. And, I mean, 23 it's pretty much -- they're very parallel staffed 24 governments. 25 And I think there's a -- I think that's -- it's an 2-15-08 jwk 14 1 important thing to be looking at long-term of where we're 2 going from here, because originally, the County wasn't 3 equipped to do some of these things and didn't have the 4 staff. But the county has changed a whole lot, because the 5 county has been growing -- well, at a huge -- very fast rate. 6 And prior to that, it really was, I mean, growing, but it was 7 not growing that fast. And subdivisions and all that have 8 really driven the county to really, probably, grow 9 government-wise a lot quicker than the city's grown in the 10 last 20 years, and I think that's a real -- that's an issue 11 when you go back to, how did we get to where we are today? 12 And I think it's a good time just to look at -- step back and 13 reevaluate how we do some of these operations. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: You had mentioned that this may be a 15 time to -- to consider certain functions being totally 16 assumed by one entity or the other, and others being assumed 17 by the other entity. In your discussions with Councilman 18 Hamilton, have there -- have there been any of those 19 discussions underway? 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We've -- we've talked about, I 21 think, that opportunity, the opportunity of changing funding 22 mechanisms, operations of -- I hate to use the -- to say it, 23 but working together more. I mean, it's kind of all of the 24 above. It depends on what you look at. It looks -- I think, 25 from -- we didn't talk a whole lot about it in this 2-15-08 jwk 15 1 particular -- actually, we did as well -- Streets Department, 2 the streets. Our -- your city streets, our Road and Bridge, 3 very comparable budgets, what they do. And there might be a 4 lot more opportunity for those two departments to work 5 together, and they historically haven't worked together. 6 Some things like -- you know, I'll use one of the ones that's 7 not, is Animal Control. That's one that Mack -- and I don't 8 disagree -- I think, feels that the -- you know, it's one 9 that the County probably can handle -- we do it now, but 10 maybe we should pay for the whole thing. So, there's lots -- 11 lots of things that are on the table. 12 And another thing that I think needs to be on the 13 table is sales tax. Who gets -- who, right now -- and I 14 don't want to get into who's paying the sales tax, but the 15 vast -- or, you know, almost 2-to-1, 3-to-1 ratio, the City 16 gets the sales tax, and then it's paid out on city projects. 17 Well, you know, if -- so you -- that has to be put in the 18 mix, too. And I don't really know how you do that real 19 easily, because you start getting into state laws and all 20 these other issues as to how that's done. Originally, the 4B 21 sales tax wasn't -- I think it's 4B; is that the one? Yeah, 22 I see -- and it was not included, and now it is included, and 23 that was at my request. And we discussed that those are 24 dollars that would -- or a large part be paid by somebody out 25 of, you know, a governmental -- probably the City; if they 2-15-08 jwk 16 1 weren't coming out of that special fund, they'd come out of 2 the general fund, because those are needed projects. 3 So, I think that you have to look at -- everything 4 has to be on the table from being just a -- how you look at 5 funding sources, who operates entities, working jointly maybe 6 on different things, or same. I think all that should be on 7 the table, because I think if you can -- if you can get past, 8 you know, some agreement at that level, then you can start 9 addressing more specific issues. And, you know, one is fire. 10 I mean, I think the City's long felt that they -- we don't 11 pay enough on the fire side, and the County -- our feeling is 12 we do pay enough. You know, it's something I think you have 13 to look at the overall picture first, and then you start 14 looking at individual departments. 15 MAYOR SMITH: One thing that used to hit me, when 16 you're analyzing something that you're doing, somebody always 17 says, "Well, we've always done it that way." I think we need 18 to ignore the historical way of doing things and analyze it 19 fresh. But if you're going to go in, "Well, we always did it 20 that way," you're really not going to get anywhere. So, I 21 think we need to start, kind of like day one, and figure out 22 what is equitable. And -- and I'm sure the City does not 23 want to have one-upsmanship on the County, and I figure the 24 Judge feels the same way. We have to figure out what is 25 equitable. 2-15-08 jwk 17 1 JUDGE TINLEY: What's fair and equitable. 2 MAYOR SMITH: We all represent the citizens of 3 Kerrville and Kerr County, so we have to ignore historical -- 4 and I'm sure the two guys that are looking at this are pretty 5 good at doing their own evaluation. There's two hard-nosed 6 guys that are doing it, and I'm sure they will analyze it in 7 very great detail. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: May not agree, but we analyze. 9 MAYOR SMITH: Yeah. Well, that's fine. 10 Disagreement is not bad. I don't -- disagreement allows 11 the -- the route to proper conclusions. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think, you know, to me, if we 13 can come up with some -- if everyone is somewhat in agreement 14 that this is a worthwhile exercise, you know, timeline is the 15 next step, and then I think we can probably move on. I mean, 16 I think, you know, Mack said no one at the County other than 17 myself has looked at these numbers, and while I'm a decent 18 number cruncher, I certainly want to put it over to our 19 professional staff that does the number crunching for the 20 County and see if they concur with the numbers. And then 21 after that, I think, you know, whether we do it now or do it 22 at our individual meetings, appoint a group larger than Mack 23 and myself. 24 MR. HAMILTON: Yeah. Whatever we decide will be 25 wrong. (Laughter.) 2-15-08 jwk 18 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And -- 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Which you knew that going in, didn't 3 you? 4 MR. HAMILTON: Well, of course we did. Of course 5 we did. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And, you know, figure out where 7 we should go, and at least meet and look at that one issue. 8 And maybe it will be a very short-tenured committee, or maybe 9 very long-term. 10 MR. HAMILTON: I think we've -- I agree with 11 Jonathan; I think we've got lots of opportunity here. This 12 is -- if we back away from the specifics, we can improve what 13 we're doing for the citizens. I believe that. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, let's talk about the remainder 15 of this agenda item. With what we've got in the mix and in 16 play right now, we're kind of hung on a hook, so to speak. 17 But does any member of the Council or the Court have anything 18 they want to pitch out on the table with regard to these 19 various functions that we currently have joint operation and 20 funding responsibilities for? 21 MR. COLEMAN: I think -- I just want to reiterate, 22 I thank Mack, along with Jonathan -- I think especially 23 Mack -- for coming up with this perspective. I think it's 24 really good. It's helping all of us see for the first time 25 kind of through the -- through the woods and trees, and have 2-15-08 jwk 19 1 a broader perspective. I think Jonathan's exactly right; I 2 think it's a starting point that we -- we look at all of 3 these shared services globally. That's the only thing that 4 makes sense. And to the extent that we can do that, I think 5 everybody will do that, so I support both -- both those guys. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, certainly, the end result that 7 we're all hoping to achieve is to -- we both basically serve 8 the same -- at least I serve the -- all of your constituents, 9 as well as others, and if the end result is we can more 10 efficiently deliver services, hopefully at a lower net cost, 11 that's where we need to go, because that's -- that's the 12 bottom line goal, as far as I'm concerned. 13 MAYOR SMITH: Well, I agree with Jonathan. I don't 14 want to sit here two hours saying the same thing we've said 15 at every one of our meetings. I think we need -- we have a 16 two-member committee that's working on it. Maybe we need 17 more people, but I think just the presentations without any 18 solutions, that's what we've been doing. I think we need a 19 committee that looks for solutions, and I think we have two 20 good guys working on it right now. Maybe if they need help 21 or something like that, I'm sure that -- that there's 22 resources that would be available to them. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Let's go ahead and move to 24 Item 2, then. Discussion and consideration of other 25 potential cooperative efforts, including, but not necessarily 2-15-08 jwk 20 1 limited to, health benefits program, road repair, 2 rehabilitation, and sealcoating, emergency services dispatch, 3 airport governance, broadband services, ETJ annexation, 4 economic development, and -- and the Wide Area Rapid 5 Notification system. We probably got the airport issue off 6 the table for now, because we're all waiting on the -- the 7 study. 8 MAYOR SMITH: Waiting, waiting. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: The study by TexDOT that we're 10 somewhat frustrated that we've not yet seen, and are waiting 11 on. The ETJ, have we got anything active on that at this 12 particular point in time? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I put on it there for kind of 14 two reasons. The -- I think the county -- there are areas -- 15 I don't know how the whole Court feels about it -- areas 16 around Kerrville that I think need to be seriously looked at 17 at being annexed. They're not big areas. One of the areas 18 is -- and the only reason it's on the agenda, it's been a 19 little bit of a thorn in my side for a good amount of time 20 this year, is Roy Street. You know, it's one of those 21 streets -- it's a lower income area right in the middle of 22 Kerrville. Roy Street is the road where you come out of the 23 old Tivy High School at the stoplight on the north side, 24 straight across. One would think that's city. No, that's 25 county. And it's -- I think the first hundred yards or so is 2-15-08 jwk 21 1 in the city, then it turns into the county. It's small lots, 2 high density. It has septic problems; it has well problems. 3 It has lots of problems that we can't solve, and the City 4 can, and may be able to, you know, possibly get some grants 5 or something. 6 But some of those areas like that, Kerrville South 7 area where we've done the wastewater sewer project, some of 8 those areas, I'd just like to get on the table the City 9 looking at annexing some of these -- I mean, some of these 10 areas like that. It doesn't make sense, in my mind, for the 11 City to go out and annex Comanche Trace, annex some of these 12 things -- financially, I understand, it makes a lot of sense 13 to do it, but there's some of these areas that are not as, I 14 guess, financially attractive for the City to annex that I 15 wish they -- I think they need -- need to be done. It's just 16 -- I think Roy Street's probably the most clear example, in 17 my mind, 'cause it's surrounded by the city on four sides -- 18 well, three sides; can't get four sides, but it's a little -- 19 goes out towards the interstate, and with the Holdsworth 20 project and that area being developed, it's going to be 21 almost completely surrounded. And there's a few other areas 22 like that that I really think need to be on -- you know, I'd 23 like to get some discussions going on that and see if that's 24 even a possibility. And maybe there's some grants that the 25 County can do to help upgrade projects there, and then get it 2-15-08 jwk 22 1 into the city. I mean, working together, possibly. 2 ETJ issue -- and this kind of goes to subdivisions. 3 I'm not so sure the system that we negotiated is working. In 4 fact, I don't think it's working. We have had two developers 5 come to the County kind of after working through our new 6 system that we created where the City handles the ETJ issues, 7 both of them irate. I've had to -- I've had -- been -- I 8 won't say four-letter words been used at me on both of them, 9 but close to it. Very angry developers that have just felt 10 they've been given the runaround. They did what they were 11 told to do by the City, and the County's saying, you know, 12 "We're not going to do that; that's not what the rules -- not 13 what the agreement was." So, I think that needs to be 14 relooked at. One thing that I didn't really think of during 15 the -- and I was part of the original negotiations, the -- I 16 never really thought about the Environmental Health 17 Department's role in this. We haven't helped developers a 18 bit. If they're in the ETJ, they still have to go through 19 the county Environmental Health Department. 20 So, right -- you know, and the whole purpose of 21 that law was to have, so to speak, one-stop shopping. It 22 doesn't work. All the plats still have to come to the 23 county -- into the county system, and so now we have a system 24 of -- a city system having to work with the county system, 25 and they're not used to -- I mean, it's -- it's problems. 2-15-08 jwk 23 1 They have a whole -- our Environmental Health Department has 2 a whole set of subdivision rules and laws that they have to 3 follow statewide that may have nothing to do with city 4 subdivision rules or city ordinances. They, by law, have to 5 look at and approve every plat. The information that has to 6 be on that plat is different than subdivision rules say, 7 necessarily, and it's causing a -- a problem there. I know 8 our County Attorney spends a lot of time on this stuff 9 working with them. And, in fact, Commissioner Oehler's 10 liaison with that department. So, I think it's a -- I don't 11 think we've done a real good job fixing that, and I intend to 12 put it on the next Commissioners Court agenda to give notice 13 of canceling our agreement and going back to the drawing 14 board. There's got to be a better way. We have not helped 15 the developers, and we haven't helped my life, and I think we 16 have not accomplished the goal of -- of doing that, and I 17 just want to put that back on the table. I think we just 18 need to relook at that. 19 MAYOR SMITH: This item has several different 20 disciplines here. And, like the road repair, we have a very 21 capable Aggie over here that takes care of the roads for the 22 County, and we have a good Aggie that takes care of the roads 23 for the City, and it seems like those people should get 24 together and -- and decide what needs to be done in that 25 particular discipline. Now, we have gotten together on one 2-15-08 jwk 24 1 item that's listed here, economic development. There was an 2 economic development committee that was created that worked 3 jointly, and they did a fine job. I think we need to do the 4 same thing on all the disciplines here, like health benefits. 5 We have people that handle that, and you have it, and I think 6 we both use consultants, or either -- the same consultant, 7 but we ought to be able -- there's debates whether adding 8 more people will help you financially or not, so we need to 9 analyze that, and I think we ought to assign it to the proper 10 City person and the proper County person to come in and see, 11 with the aid of the consultant. I hate to say consultants. 12 MR. HOFMANN: Mayor, if I might, you already have, 13 and that is well under way. 14 MAYOR SMITH: Yeah. Well, I'm just stating -- 15 MR. HOFMANN: If you'd like a report on it, that 16 would be fine. 17 MAYOR SMITH: And, you know, on broadband services, 18 I guess that's under the Sheriff or -- or whoever it's under. 19 But, anyway, it seems like every one of these disciplines, we 20 should assign them to the proper people and have them meet 21 and come back with a recommendation as soon as possible. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: The -- the health benefits aspect, 23 as Mr. Hofmann just said, there was a meeting, what, two or 24 three weeks ago, probably, Paul? 25 MR. HOFMANN: Yes, sir. 2-15-08 jwk 25 1 JUDGE TINLEY: And it involved your H.R. and 2 insurance people. It involved our people. Our consultant 3 was not present; he was not available. But those -- those 4 discussions are already under way, so the folks that need to 5 be looking at those facts and figures are already doing that, 6 so that's rolling. The -- of course, the economic 7 development, as you mentioned, we've been pretty hard at that 8 for about a year and a half, and just both jointly approved a 9 resolution adopting the plan that was finally rolled out last 10 month, and we've now called for the establishment of a 11 committee to work on the incentives aspects, and that's under 12 way. The -- to my knowledge, there have been some 13 discussions between the good Aggies, as it were, about this 14 -- this road business. I've certainly been nudging that to 15 go along and keep those discussions going so that we might 16 see if there's some way that we can create some efficiencies 17 by -- we've got a -- we've got considerably better capability 18 with the equipment that we have, that we might be of 19 considerable benefit to you folks in some of your street 20 rehabilitation programs, and that's what I've encouraged 21 those discussions to look at. And I don't know where they 22 are, but I know they've been talking. I've been told they've 23 been talking. 24 MAYOR SMITH: Well, the point I was trying to make, 25 we all have staffs that have expertise -- expertise in each 2-15-08 jwk 26 1 of these fields. Instead of five guys from the County and 2 five guys from the City trying to resolve these issues, I 3 think we need to rely on our staffs to make recommendations 4 for a decision by this group. I don't think this group can 5 work the problem. We have people and staffs that will work 6 the problem, but we can sit here all day long on both 1 and 7 2, or Item 3 and 4, and never come to any satisfactory 8 conclusion until our experts present something that would be 9 mutually beneficial to both parties. That's the only point. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: That's why we've got them on board, 11 Mr. Mayor. 12 MAYOR SMITH: Yeah, that's right. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: To care of those functions. 14 MAYOR SMITH: Right. 15 MR. HOFMANN: Just to quickly follow up on the 16 question you just asked, on what the Mayor just said, the 17 question you just asked was, you weren't sure where they 18 were. There -- and just for everyone's benefit, we're not 19 far. There's been enough discussion, I think, based upon the 20 work that Mr. Hamilton has led, to look at the numbers, I 21 think, where we can be reasonably sure that there's a lot of 22 room for opportunity here, especially, but perhaps not only, 23 on the -- on the street maintenance and street reconstruction 24 side. And to follow up on what the Mayor was just saying, I 25 think all we need some consensus direction that -- that makes 2-15-08 jwk 27 1 sense, and -- and let the appropriate people put the details 2 together, and we'd be happy to do that and report back as to 3 what that might look like. 4 MAYOR SMITH: Mr. Mosty made a comment on our 5 economic report, and he said we come out with studies, but 6 nobody ever follows through. Now, when we get 7 recommendations, I'm going to be out of here, so I'm quitting 8 my job. That's not a very nice thing for me to do, but I 9 have -- want to do some things myself. But when we decide 10 what needs to be done, we need to carry through and implement 11 it instead of just talking about it every year. 12 MR. HAMILTON: Which I suppose is what we need to 13 do, is be handling this meeting and saying, okay, here's an 14 item that was brought up; who's going to be assigned to do 15 something about it? And I heard Jonathan mention Roy Street 16 as an example, and are we going to do anything about it? 17 MR. BOCK: Mack, say again? 18 MR. HAMILTON: Are we going to do anything about 19 it? I heard Jonathan mention Roy Street as an example. Is 20 anybody going to do anything about it? 21 MR. HOFMANN: Well, if -- 22 MR. HAMILTON: Anybody going to take an action item 23 to do something? 24 MR. HOFMANN: If -- 25 MAYOR SMITH: Well, that's all ETJ. 2-15-08 jwk 28 1 MR. HAMILTON: But I noticed a silence. I think 2 I've made my point, gentlemen. Okay? 3 MR. HOFMANN: If your question -- if your 4 question -- 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That is a complete City 6 issue. County has nothing to do with annexing Roy Street in 7 the city, and so that's something the City needs to take care 8 of. We have no jurisdiction. We're taking care of it now as 9 far as the roads go and O.S.S.F. 10 MR. HOFMANN: Right. 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: So, you know -- 12 MR. HAMILTON: It requires City cooperation; it's 13 not a complete City issue. It's county property now, as 14 Jonathan correctly pointed out. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: City's the only one that can 16 annex it, though. 17 MR. HAMILTON: That's correct. And the County then 18 would want to come to the City and start working with the 19 City to try to accomplish that, if -- if that's the County's 20 objective. 21 MR. HASTINGS: Absolutely. From my point of view, 22 if you guys can give us the list that are of the greatest 23 concern, we'll develop -- you know, there is that overall 24 caution that there's a reason Roy Street's not in the city to 25 start with. I mean, we run into that reason throughout. 2-15-08 jwk 29 1 MR. HOFMANN: Go back to the -- the question that 2 Mr. Hamilton asked, and I think Commissioner Oehler is -- is 3 exactly on point. If there's a concern here, about 15 4 minutes ago is the first time I heard it. And annexing that 5 property is ultimately a City Council decision, and if the 6 City Council would like your staff to evaluate and analyze 7 what it would take to annex that area, or any other area, 8 it'll come down to basically a math question. There's a lot 9 of things to consider -- legal, financial, policy -- when you 10 talk about annexing an area, especially a developed area. 11 And your -- I'm addressing my comments directly here to the 12 -- to the Council. If you would like your staff to come back 13 and analyze that and make some recommendations about that, 14 we're more than happy to do that. That's -- that's simple. 15 I didn't know of the specific concern. Now that that concern 16 has been raised, we're happy to look at it. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think -- being kind of both. 18 I think what Mack's saying, and I agree with it, is, you 19 know, if annexation of certain areas like Roy Street is an 20 important issue to the County, which it is to me, and if the 21 Council agrees it needs to be looked at, someone needs to be 22 appointed to look at it. 23 MR. HAMILTON: Absolutely. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And that's -- you know, and 25 there -- and not just -- I don't want to limit it to Roy 2-15-08 jwk 30 1 Street. I'm sure there are -- Roy Street's important to me 2 'cause it's in my precinct. I'm sure Commissioner Williams 3 and Commissioner Baldwin, Commissioner Oehler also have areas 4 that they think should probably be put into the city limits. 5 But I think there -- you know, if this -- if -- and there's 6 no reason for the City to piecemeal it, this street and that 7 street. I mean, do it all at once. Let's figure out where 8 the areas are and look at the annexation plan. And this -- 9 and the annexation plan for the city, which I know is 10 certainly public, does impact subdivisions and ETJ issues, 11 because it's kind of the next step, and I think those have to 12 be considered. So, I kind of look at all of that, and that's 13 why I wrote it on here, ETJ annexation/subdivision. That's 14 all one issue, in my mind. 15 MR. HOFMANN: I might add some clarity here. The 16 phrase "annexation plan" has a certain meaning in state law. 17 And if I overstep, Mike will bring me back, but -- and I'm -- 18 I just want to make sure we're all on the same page and we're 19 careful about the use of that phrase, "annexation plan." And 20 the truth is, the City of Kerrville doesn't have an 21 annexation plan, as described by state law. In fact, what 22 we've published is that we don't have an annexation plan. 23 Not to go into too much detail, what that specifically speaks 24 to is annexation of developed areas. And today, as we sit 25 here -- and this could change, given the appropriate policy 2-15-08 jwk 31 1 direction from the City Council -- we don't have a plan for 2 the annexing of developed areas. Now, we have had 3 conversations with our Planning and Zoning Commission, and 4 there's been discussion with the Comprehensive Plan Update 5 Committee that as they work through larger planning issues 6 and as they work through population projection issues, which 7 is what the City Council asked them to do, the question of 8 service delivery to and how you pay for that, and annexation 9 of property on the city's perimeter that is generally 10 undeveloped, that is being looked at, and we've asked the 11 Plan Update Committee to help us through this, big policy 12 questions about all that. 13 And -- but no, there is no plan to annex developed 14 areas that are currently being served by the -- by the 15 County. And, again, I've never been asked to evaluate that. 16 I am happy to evaluate that. That -- what that essentially 17 comes down to is an analysis of the shifting of burden, a 18 burden from one spot to another, and an analysis of the -- 19 the potential for extending city services, municipal services 20 to an area that doesn't get it now, and there's going -- 21 quite obviously, there's going to be a cost associated with 22 that. Now, people ask me all the time, "Well, how come the 23 city of Kerrville doesn't annex part of Kerrville South or 24 all of Kerrville South?" Well, it's a real simple answer, 25 and it has to do with cost associated with it. Now, I will 2-15-08 jwk 32 1 say, since there's a discussion about how the County and the 2 City relates to all this, just to make sure this is on the 3 table, I've been part of discussions before -- not here, City 4 of Kerrville and Kerr County, but in other places -- where 5 those discussions include a commitment from the County to 6 help pay for it. Because what that is about is shifting a -- 7 what is currently a county burden to a city burden. And it 8 might -- if we're going to appoint a committee of 9 representatives from both bodies to look at that, it might be 10 wise to say, well, let's look at how that cost burden's going 11 to be shared into the future. Just -- just a thought. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I agree; I believe I said 13 that. And Kerrville South -- the reason I brought up 14 specifically the area where we've added wastewater to 15 Kerrville South, because the County is in the process of 16 spending, through grants, about $1.5 million. Most of that 17 has been spent now in Kerrville South, providing -- 18 MR. HOFMANN: Right. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- wastewater, as the City's 20 fully aware. And that's part of that -- in my mind, part of 21 that bringing it up to a point when it makes it a lot more 22 palatable for the City to take over those services. 23 MR. COLEMAN: Now, another consideration with 24 Kerrville South in the ETJ is the U.G.R.A. grant. I know 25 that we would need to include them in any kind of plan. And, 2-15-08 jwk 33 1 Paul, as a Councilman, to answer your first question, I 2 personally support us looking at it on a tiered basis, maybe. 3 And it's almost like a big ball of string; you start pulling 4 it, it's a big -- it's a big thing, because of Kerrville 5 South. If we could look at the ones that are more contained 6 within the body of the city, and just anomalies, that makes a 7 lot of sense. And then next year, maybe look at Kerrville 8 South. 9 MR. HOFMANN: And not just U.G.R.A. As people in 10 the room are aware, there are other service providers out 11 there on the -- on the edge of the city. In fact, there are 12 places inside the city that have utility services provided by 13 other service providers, all of which tend to complicate the 14 question. But, you know, it's something we ought to look at. 15 MR. BOCK: To resolve it immediately is to have the 16 County create a list of these areas, such as the Roy Street, 17 and -- and compile them, and provide them to the City, and 18 we'll definitely -- definitely take a look at it. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Mm-hmm. 20 MR. HAMILTON: Yeah. So now -- now we're turning 21 this discussion into something fruitful, gentlemen. Now 22 we're getting -- okay, here's an action item. Why don't we 23 continue in that vein? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: With what the Mayor said, we've got 25 these staff people available to do these various functions, 2-15-08 jwk 34 1 so in order to move forward on these items, it -- the sense 2 I'm getting is that we need to assign, as it were, the -- the 3 evaluation and review of these various potential joint 4 cooperative efforts to the various staff people that we have 5 that -- that handle them. Health benefits would be our 6 respective H.R. and audit or financial people and 7 consultants. The -- of course, the road repair and 8 rehabilitation would be your Director of Public Works and our 9 Road and Bridge Administrator. And emergency services 10 dispatch, that, of course, will be the fire and EMS, and -- 11 and the law enforcement people that are involved in utilizing 12 those functions, and know best how they operate and need to 13 operate. Broadband, of course, the I.T. Managers in each of 14 the entities. The -- in looking at the -- the W.A.R.N. 15 system, we had a presentation on that recently. I'm not sure 16 how well it was received, but that appears to be something 17 also that's fire and EMS and law enforcement also. That -- 18 but those are the folks that I see that -- on a go-forward 19 basis, that would have to take a look at these things. And 20 staff will brainstorm and then come up with a report to both 21 of the entities, and see where we go. And then how they fit 22 in these numbers, that's, of course, another issue. But 23 as -- as Councilman Hamilton said, now we're getting 24 somewhere. Now we're getting it. 25 MR. COLEMAN: Judge, I agree with you 100 percent. 2-15-08 jwk 35 1 I would also add -- and I may be redundant; you may have 2 covered it -- that we do the same thing with the ETJ 3 development problem, and try to assign a group to work that 4 out before we -- try to modify the existing agreement, if 5 it's salvageable, than to start totally fresh. 6 MR. BOCK: That goes back to a concern I have. Was 7 that state law driven? If we cancel -- if we cancel an 8 agreement, does that put us in any sort of -- 9 MR. HAYES: We're required under state law to have 10 that agreement. 11 MAYOR SMITH: By agreement, we have to have the 12 agreement, as I understand it. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But if you can't have an 14 agreement, it goes to arbitration, and then we'll be given an 15 agreement. So -- so, I mean, yeah, it has -- we have to do 16 something. We can't just walk away from it. It's not cancel 17 and walk away. It's, "Hey, we have a real problem here, and 18 we need to relook at it." Either way is fine with me. I 19 mean, it's the same thing. It's either -- to me, it's a -- 20 you know, this is going to be canceled if we don't solve a 21 new way to do it, but either way, as long as it's -- we're 22 talking about it. But to go back to -- I hate to agree with 23 Councilman Hamilton too often here, but I -- (Laughter.) 24 MAYOR SMITH: Not your reputation, that's for sure. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I -- you know, I really would 2-15-08 jwk 36 1 like to see us come out with the specific people that are 2 accountable to these -- as the Judge said, yes, we need these 3 staff people, but unless the staff is told by the policy 4 makers that, "You need to do this," I'm not sure we're going 5 to really be moving too far. And, you know, it's like the 6 annexation; I wrote down here, yeah, okay, I'll get with our 7 Road and Bridge Department; we'll come up with a list from my 8 precinct of things that we think need to be annexed by the 9 City. You know, that's something that can be done. The ETJ 10 issues, I mean, obviously, that's going to involve Len, our 11 Road and Bridge Department -- or subdivision administrator, 12 Len Odom, and I've kind of taken the point on that, working 13 with that. But other people, like Rex and Mike Hayes, 14 clearly Paul or -- or someone, you know, on his direction 15 needs to be involved with that too. So, I think we need to 16 focus on reducing to paper who's going to be responsible for 17 each of these items. Otherwise, we'll come back next year 18 and be in about the same place we are right now. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Jon, I think my reason for 20 mentioning these various offices in our respective entities 21 was to throw that out there, and looking for a consensus from 22 both the Court and the Council that, yeah, those folks as 23 designated need to -- need to perform their function in that 24 area. That was my purpose in naming that, so that we might 25 get an amen, as it were. 2-15-08 jwk 37 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, the action would be -- is 2 really for the two bodies to come back with and agree with a 3 formal list of, okay, these people are charged with looking 4 at this and coming back with a report in both city and 5 county. 6 MR. HAMILTON: Building on what Jonathan's saying, 7 and I'm agreeing with him, is that the next meeting is going 8 to be structured with -- I'll take this in order. First, the 9 two H.R. people are going to give us a presentation. Next, 10 the two streets and roads people are going to give us a 11 presentation. Next -- and right down the line like that. 12 Because I -- I think without -- so that they feel somewhat 13 responsible. I mean, you'll notice that this time, what 14 happened from last time, good old Scott Gross, who didn't 15 have the courage to show up today, volunteered me, and 16 Jonathan stupidly raised his hand, which he got a report, 17 right? Something happened. So, building on that, if we'll 18 do the same thing next time, we'll have people standing up 19 and saying, "We've talked, and we've agreed we can't work 20 together." Or, "We've talked, and here's what we see as the 21 right thing to do." We'll have some meaningful dialogue. 22 Does that make sense to everybody? 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Perfectly. 24 MAYOR SMITH: At least you can agree to disagree on 25 certain matters. 2-15-08 jwk 38 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Sure. 2 MR. HAMILTON: I said that could be the case. Just 3 say, "We can't work together." 4 MAYOR SMITH: Agree to disagree. 5 MR. HAMILTON: That's not desirable, but it may 6 happen. It's not to be encouraged. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: But if it's not staffed, you won't 8 know. 9 MR. HAMILTON: Well, that's right. So -- so we've 10 now got the agenda for next time outlined. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 12 MR. HAMILTON: It sounds to me like. I'm not -- 13 MAYOR SMITH: See, I have to mention one little 14 area. You have Roy Street. My little problem is -- is that 15 at the end of where Veterans Highway hits 173, there's a 16 little section of land in there that's in the county. The 17 people on Earl Hollimon (sic) call me all the time and say, 18 "Somebody shot a deer 10 feet beyond my fence, and my kids 19 were out there, and he's -- he's shooting -- firing a rifle 20 at deer right there." And somebody said, "Well, you know, we 21 can't sleep at night because they sell firecrackers there. 22 Why don't you tell them to get out of there?" Well, I say, 23 "Call Bill." 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And they do. (Laughter.) 25 MAYOR SMITH: I probably get more complaints about 2-15-08 jwk 39 1 that little section of land than anywhere else, but it wasn't 2 inside the city until they took over the -- the park. Now 3 it's wholly inside the city. It's a little island in there 4 that somebody needs to -- to administer and, you know, to 5 say, "You can't hunt on county property." You can't do that 6 because, you know, it's under the -- under the hunting laws 7 of the county. So, it's something that has to -- I think it 8 needs to be part of the city. Well, it's going to be an 9 uneconomical thing for the City to take over that property. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'll give you the fireworks 11 concession, Mayor. 12 MAYOR SMITH: Okay. Okay. Well, that's an 13 illustration of something that needs to be worked out, as to 14 what -- but if it -- it will -- with the services the City is 15 obligated to provide some of these areas will be an economic 16 hardship to the City, but that's what the City is supposed to 17 do. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think there's another 19 illustration. Going back to what you said, Councilman, with 20 respect to "agree to disagree," or perhaps having a 21 subcommittee work on something, and then the two governing 22 bodies never really knowing what the info was and what the 23 consensus of agreement or disagreement was, and that has to 24 do with emergency services dispatch. That's been talked 25 about. Sheriff's talked about it. I believe the Chief of 2-15-08 jwk 40 1 Police has talked about it. I couldn't tell you what their 2 findings were. I don't know what their findings were, 3 whether they were good, bad, or indifferent. All I know is 4 that they hit a wall, and that was the end of it. So, I 5 think your point's valid, and if it does hit a wall, at least 6 we ought to know what the reasons were. 7 MR. HAMILTON: Sure. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: As to whether they make 9 sense or don't make sense. 10 MR. HAMILTON: Maybe we can adjust the wall. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Could be, or tear it down. 12 MR. HAMILTON: Yeah, that's what's I'm implying, 13 sure. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Judge, I just want to pass 15 out something. I don't mean to jump here, but we had one 16 other area on there. I don't want to get into any major 17 discussion about it unless you and the Mayor want to, but 18 this has to do with the Wide Area Rapid -- Rapid Notification 19 system, and it's just a handout. And if there's any -- maybe 20 just a cursory explanation, I'd ask Mr. Amerine to do that. 21 So, I put this on the agenda; unbeknownst to me, within hours 22 or a day or so, we had a whole rash of brush fires all over 23 the county. It just kind of emphasizes the need for us to at 24 least know more about Wide Area Rapid Notification system and 25 what's it's all about and what the costs are, what the 2-15-08 jwk 41 1 benefits are and so forth. So, that's kind of the basis of 2 this. This is -- for the those who don't know what it's all 3 about, it is the updated version of what used to be called 4 Reverse 911, where you can, you know, identify an area that 5 has a problem, whether it's fire or whether it's flood or any 6 other kind of catastrophe, and through the use of the 7 internet and the trunk service -- trunk services of the local 8 telephone company, you can notify all of the residents within 9 a particular given area that you've identified of the danger 10 that they face and send out some kind of message. With your 11 permission, Judge, I'd like Mr. Amerine just to say a word or 12 two about it, and further -- further in terms of what this is 13 all about before we pass on. It, too, needs to be studied in 14 terms of what the cost and what the benefits are. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Bill, did you know you were going to 16 get pulled into this? 17 MR. AMERINE: I did. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Well, that's good. 19 MR. AMERINE: I'll give a -- do I need to stand? 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, it'd probably be helpful, if 21 you wouldn't mind. 22 MR. AMERINE: At the request of Commissioner 23 Williams and a rather pesty -- pesky little vendor who kept 24 calling me every week to try to get on the agenda to have 25 City and County officials review their product -- and this 2-15-08 jwk 42 1 Wide Area Notification System is just one of many products 2 that are out there from a jurisdiction-to-citizen 3 notification type approach. In any case, after they -- they 4 pestered me for weeks and weeks -- as a matter of fact, over 5 a year, we finally were able to get some representatives from 6 the City and the County together to review this product. 7 And, like I said, it's one of many. Essentially, what it is, 8 is it's an internet-based service that allows jurisdictions, 9 whether it be City, County Health, City Health, whatever, to 10 notify a select group of citizens about an impending issue, 11 whether it be public health issue, public safety issue. 12 I think the wildfire last week is a good example of 13 that. I got a call from Pat Tinley, Jr., who was assisting 14 to help -- trying to get some assistance to help notify 15 certain citizens that the fire was headed their way. And 16 right now, neither the County nor the City have any efficient 17 way of identifying who those citizens are and quickly 18 notifying them, other than going out there with a bullhorn 19 and saying, "Pack your bags, get the heck out." These 20 systems are not cheap. The one that we looked at with 21 Commissioner Williams and County and City representatives has 22 a license fee in the first year of about $30,000. It goes 23 down to half that the second year, and there's a per-call 24 cost. All of the provisioning of the services is done 25 somewhere else. The only limiting factor is how many access 2-15-08 jwk 43 1 lines we have in our local telephone companies. One of the 2 concerns that's always raised with one of these systems is, 3 when we have an emergency like this wildfire, we notify, 4 let's say, 1,000 citizens to move. We tie up every phone 5 line in the county and we impede normal communications with 6 the fire departments and response agencies. Well, these 7 systems, by law, only can capture, if you will, about 60 8 percent of the available access lines, so that they can't 9 completely strangle the public telephone network. 10 I think -- and, you know, I'm really here as a 11 technical expert, I guess, on this. I think this is 12 something that the City and the County should seriously look 13 at. This is one of those things you don't think about 14 needing until you need it, and then it's too late. It's a 15 simple thing to do. We'd be involved at 911 by providing the 16 geographic information layer, if you will, that provides 17 physical addresses. The vendor would then take information 18 from the individual phone companies and create a visual layer 19 that allows the user of this tool to select a polygon, a 20 circle, an area to prerecord a message to go out to citizens, 21 and then hit an enter key on their -- any internet access 22 computer, laptop, anything, and it would automatically start 23 sending out those messages and get those people notified. 24 All these systems are essentially the same, whether it be 25 W.A.R.N. or Reverse 911, Code Red. They're all essentially 2-15-08 jwk 44 1 the same. Just depending on how you want to approach it, 2 which one you want to go with. It seems like, to me, rather 3 than having the City do their own thing and the County do 4 their own thing, this is something that should be jointly 5 looked at and jointly licensed. It's much more efficient, a 6 lot more cost-effective to do it that way. I'll answer any 7 questions you have about it. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you, Bill. 9 Appreciate it. 10 MR. AMERINE: You bet. 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sounds like a good job for 12 you to proceed and review, and come with a recommendation to 13 both entities. 14 MR. AMERINE: I can do that. 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Actually, if I may on that, 16 myself, my chief, one of the representatives from the City -- 17 I believe it was Captain Wendling -- went to the presentation 18 that was done with Mr. Amerine. We all came away from there 19 that it needed to be done. It's something that I know the 20 County's needed for years, not just because of fires. You 21 know, they are one reason, but it does kind of give 22 notification -- now, fast as those fires were moving, it may 23 or may not have given us a lot of help, but floods are a 24 major part where you can warn people. You can't, you know, 25 do it with loudspeakers, even though that's exactly what we 2-15-08 jwk 45 1 have right now, if you have to. You know, manhunts in a 2 large area, it will give reason to notify. The presentation 3 they gave gives a certain dollar amount for the license fee 4 itself. That goes down each year, and then the calls are a 5 very small part of that. 6 And even in that presentation and discussion, that 7 was already broken out as to, you know, City can activate it 8 with what they need in the city. When they need to notify a 9 certain group, they pay for the individual call cost of it, 10 which is very nominal. You think it would get to be 11 expensive, but it's really not. For that notification, if we 12 need to get the County to notify a whole area on a river or 13 whatever, the County pays for that. I walked away from that 14 meeting in hopes that they would give the presentation to the 15 Commissioners Court and City, and I wasn't able to be there 16 when it was done. Commissioner Williams was at our first 17 one. And the position I'm at right now, for being over the 18 W.A.R.N. part of the emergency management annex, is it's now 19 a budget item, and it's an item that -- that we can put into 20 our budgets. It is a dollar figure in there that we can use 21 to put into each of our budgets respectively, and even 22 including Ingram, for the next year's budget rounds, which 23 we'll start preparing in the next couple of months. And, to 24 me, that's where we're at. It's something that has to be 25 done. 2-15-08 jwk 46 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just something I want to add. 2 I mean, this goes to -- it's one of those things that doesn't 3 make that much difference if we spend $30,000 a year -- 4 $30,000's a lot of money, but in our budget, that's a pretty 5 small-ticket item, and whether it's done 100 percent by the 6 County or jointly doesn't make that much difference to me. 7 But it's critical that there's one system that -- and the 8 best system available currently is the one that's chosen. 9 And it -- you know, there -- you know, the dollars are not 10 that big on this one, so it should be pretty much of a 11 no-brainer. So, we can start proceeding on this. I think 12 Commissioner Oehler's statement is correct, that Bill Amerine 13 needs to, you know, get with Rusty and the Police Chief or 14 whoever their designees are, and probably someone from 15 Ingram, and come up, look at what's out there, recommend what 16 they think is the best program. Just get it in the budget. 17 CHIEF YOUNG: My representatives came back very 18 impressed with the process. My only concern is that we need 19 to look globally; we don't need to look at just one. Right 20 now we're discussing one vendor, and I think we need to look 21 at multiple vendors to compare what they have to offer and 22 what their cost effectiveness is. Like Bill said, there's 23 several systems out there. Each of them have their own 24 nuances, but I think we need to -- if we're going to do this, 25 we do it jointly, split our cost. And since it falls within 2-15-08 jwk 47 1 our emergency management issue, I don't know if there's 2 grants out there available for that kind of stuff or not, but 3 it's just something we might want to look at with AACOG or 4 somebody else also. 5 MR. AMERINE: Grant money has been used in the past 6 by other counties and cities. 7 CHIEF YOUNG: So we may look at that. We're coming 8 up on -- you know, with AACOG and some of the CJAC grants, 9 that we may be able to do that. So -- 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I think this issue, as far as 11 what's on this agenda, is -- in my opinion, I think the Chief 12 would agree with me, this is an issue no -- none of us have a 13 difference of opinion on whether we need it or not. I think 14 every one of us agree we have to have it, and we need it. 15 Every one of us agree, you know, it's at the point of picking 16 the correct vendor that we decide on and then presenting the 17 budget to the City Council and the County Commissioners, and 18 let's just basically make this thing happen, period. 19 MAYOR SMITH: And $30,000 is peanuts compared to 20 the safety issue here. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's correct. 22 CHIEF YOUNG: And the fact that we have a small 23 university here, and what happened at N.I.U. yesterday -- 24 they have their own system, but, you know, it would improve 25 our position if we ever had something that was close to the 2-15-08 jwk 48 1 university that we could tie in and let them know what's 2 going on so we don't get caught short in that area. 3 MAYOR SMITH: Since fire was mentioned here, 4 Jonathan almost said something nice about the City; I'll say 5 something nice about the County. And I expressed this 6 opinion when we opened Fire Station Number 4, that the whole 7 area owes a thanks to the volunteer fire department -- the 8 county volunteer fire departments for -- for preventing these 9 fires from getting completely out of control. So, I don't 10 know who pulls the volunteer fire departments together, but 11 they cooperated very well. I think there was, oh, maybe 15 12 or more fire departments that worked together to do this, and 13 it could have easily -- the one going along I-10 could have 14 very easily blown into the city. So, as Mayor of the City of 15 Kerrville, I wish to express our thanks to the vol -- the 16 Kerr County volunteer fire departments. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, Mayor. Of course, there 18 were other departments that came in as mutual aid agreements, 19 and there may have been some that didn't have specific mutual 20 aid agreements, but they show up to help each other out. 21 It's a -- it's a tremendous fraternity those folks have, and 22 when the bell rings, they show up and they get the job done. 23 And we've got some extraordinarily good fire protection at a 24 pretty doggone nominal cost, and we're proud of it. 25 MR. BEAVERS: There was actually 22 departments 2-15-08 jwk 49 1 that assisted in that Midway fire, and generally, as the 2 Judge mentioned, it's mutual aid agreements that the 3 departments have among themselves. Of course, the Forest 4 Service was also involved, and they stated -- requested some 5 assistance for air drops, and -- 6 MAYOR SMITH: The City was obligated to the County 7 for one brush truck, but we opened our emergency office at 8 the police station, and we were ready and -- to send out 9 additional fire trucks if needed. So, we -- we were 10 prepared, and I think that's pretty important, the emergency 11 procedures that are available in Kerrville and Kerr County. 12 And I think we -- the manual's about that thick, and every 13 person is assigned, and we do -- we just don't put a book on 14 the shelf. It's practiced on occasions during the year. 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: There's one other issue I'd 16 like to mention, in that for fire, there's a few other people 17 that really need some very strong acknowledgment. Number one 18 was the Salvation Army showed up out at the -- out at the 19 Goat Creek fire, one of the first big ones, and they handed 20 out water, food, everything that any fireman or anybody else 21 could need. Didn't cost anything. The Red Cross, we 22 dispatched them to Midway fire. They did the same thing 23 there. We had a number of contractors here, and it's not 24 cheap to load up bulldozers on 18-wheelers and just offer 25 them anywhere, and before the end of the day, we had over 10 2-15-08 jwk 50 1 different bulldozers that were offered at different locations 2 to help us, just by some of our contractors offering. Not a 3 phone call made requesting, nothing; they just offered it. 4 H.E.B. -- we drove over there, because at first we 5 didn't have water. H.E.B. threw about -- between 75 and 100 6 cases of water in the back of one of our department's trucks 7 to haul out there, and hauled it out to the volunteer 8 firemen. People donated 500, 600 sandwiches for them. You 9 know, this community is unbelievable when this happens, 10 because you don't have to make too many phone calls, and word 11 gets out, people show up, and it's more, "Okay, now let's get 12 it directed and put out." But the whole community, 13 especially those contractors and our local businesses, were 14 fabulous. And the volunteer firemen, no doubt -- you know, I 15 was driving down the interstate; you couldn't see the hood of 16 my car. Because we had a truck that was trapped on the 17 interstate, and all you could see is flames on both sides of 18 the car. And I'm putting it in reverse, getting out of 19 there, and some volunteer firemen were going into it, putting 20 out the fire. Those people are unbelievable in the county. 21 MAYOR SMITH: Well, I didn't know about all these 22 details, but I -- I second your motion that they deserve a 23 great deal of thanks. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: One other area on fire, and -- 25 the change that was made, I think probably everyone ought to 2-15-08 jwk 51 1 know, 'cause we're working together and trying to improve 2 things. We really looked at the burn ban notification a lot. 3 Obviously, Commissioners Court is responsible for burn bans, 4 so we have a system that it's on again, off again, depending 5 on rains in different parts of the county, and through our -- 6 Jody, our court administrator, we've really changed that 7 notification process. Also, John Trolinger helped a lot on 8 who gets notified. And in that, I want to thank -- Mark 9 Beavers has, you know, kind of also gotten much more involved 10 in that, and he sends the County information on fire watches, 11 red flag warnings, things like that. We get e-mails about 12 that, which is to make sure we're aware what's coming 13 weather-wise so we can adjust accordingly, and I think 14 there's been a lot more communication. We usually just 15 notify directly, oh, two or three people by phone when we 16 change the burn ban. Now, other -- by e-mail, you know, that 17 list has gotten much longer, including Forest Service, NRCS. 18 City dispatch now is much more involved in that notification 19 process; they get called. Of course, Rusty's office is very 20 much involved with that. All the volunteer fire departments 21 are notified right away. So, we've really used technology to 22 improve that and try to keep the public and people that need 23 to know what the burn ban -- what we're doing, more informed. 24 If we can just get the Legislature to make the penalties a 25 little stiffer for people that violate it, maybe we can break 2-15-08 jwk 52 1 the burn ban. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Mr. Mayor, let me see if I sense 3 where we are. 4 MAYOR SMITH: Okay. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: These various functions, we will 6 need to prepare a -- a roster, as it were, of -- ask each one 7 of these functions and who the responsible parties are out of 8 both organizations to evaluate and study and staff those 9 issues, and to come back with a report and recommendations at 10 our next meeting, and then we'll proceed to take it from 11 there, as it were. 12 MAYOR SMITH: That's fine, but I don't think we 13 need to stop at the items that are on the list. If some 14 staff person thinks that there's some other areas of 15 cooperation, I think it should automatically be added. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: I've got no problem with that. 17 Seems reasonable to me. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I believe we've got some 19 things to talk about that we have kind of skipped over here, 20 and I think that what we really need to focus on, as well as 21 other issues that we need to cooperate on jointly, we need to 22 figure out how to solve the problems within those areas where 23 we have had the biggest discussions and the biggest amount of 24 controversy, and I believe those two areas are the library 25 and the -- probably EMS, and maybe fire. And so if we can 2-15-08 jwk 53 1 come to some kind of an agreement of who does what, maybe if 2 we could each take one or the other, or take two and somebody 3 take one, so we don't have these arguments every year about 4 how much funding is required to do these functions. It seems 5 like there's been an argument about the library for the last 6 -- however many years, probably at least 10 or 12, 15 maybe. 7 And it seems to me that we need to target those areas where 8 we have the most controversy so we can get a plan, solve it, 9 and move on. It is -- it is ridiculous to argue about these 10 things every year. 11 And right now, we're still -- having settled one of 12 them, I'm going to go ahead and bring it up, because that's 13 part of reason we're here, I think, and that is the library 14 and the excess funds that were left over out of last year's 15 budget. Which Commissioners Court has requested to be 16 reimbursed for that, but in all fairness, we also have the 17 same thing with the Animal Control. Kerr County does the 18 Animal Control, and it's basically the same way we do the 19 library, and so it's only fair in my mind that -- that if 20 there's an excess of funds that were left over and unexpended 21 from a previous budget, they should be credited or refunded, 22 and so it works the same way in Animal Control. We do all of 23 that. The City pays us -- last year was 60/40; this year's 24 budget is 50/50. And so it was pointed out to me, and I 25 totally agree, that we need to credit or pay back the excess 2-15-08 jwk 54 1 funds that were left over from that budget. It -- in my 2 mind, it's not fair that -- that we take funds from one 3 entity to another and do not credit those or pay back. It's 4 all the same taxpayers, but you have city taxpayers and you 5 have county taxpayers that pay for different services. 6 MAYOR SMITH: I want to address the library. There 7 was an agreement years ago, and it was an action taken by the 8 Commissioners Court to take the excess funds and credit it to 9 the next year. That was done in an action by the 10 Commissioners Court, and there's a gentleman in this room 11 that will verify it if you don't agree with it. But it went 12 on for years and years, people on the Commissioners Court 13 fussing about not refunding the money. "Where did the 14 $44,000 go?" Well, it's by action of the Court that it was 15 credited to the next year. And you went on at the little guy 16 from the -- that owned a motel out there somewhere -- I can't 17 think of his name -- 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Has that been done this year? 19 MAYOR SMITH: Yeah, you've done it. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No, has it been done in this 21 '07-'08 budget? 22 MAYOR SMITH: There was no recommendation from the 23 City to -- to credit it. And there's a little complication. 24 Y'all didn't pay your 50 percent of it, so there's a little 25 -- it's not that easy as it -- when it was 50/50 to make it. 2-15-08 jwk 55 1 But -- 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It's -- 3 MAYOR SMITH: -- if y'all want the money refunded, 4 and we can agree what your share of the money is, I'm sure 5 that the City Manager will refund your money, if you -- if 6 you care to -- 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's what we'd like. 8 MAYOR SMITH: Y'all did not pay 50/50, so it's not 9 as feasible -- 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: In '06-'07, we didn't pay 11 50/50 of what was requested to be funded? 12 MAYOR SMITH: No, I'm pretty sure that -- the 13 information I've seen, it wasn't 50/50. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's not the information I 15 have. This is -- I mean, this is another one of the 16 dealings, as an example of which -- 17 MAYOR SMITH: You made the request, and we're 18 working on -- the City Manager's working on replying to that. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I understand that. 20 MAYOR SMITH: We kept going over and over, and you 21 were one of the guilty persons, wanting to know what happened 22 to it. And I wish y'all would shut up on what happened years 23 ago. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'm talking about right now. 25 MAYOR SMITH: Yeah. Well, it's being worked on. 2-15-08 jwk 56 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Mr. Mayor, I'm not being 2 disrespectful to you; I am stating a fact. And I am not 3 doing anything outside what was rightfully to be done in 4 '06-'07. I could care less what happened before that. 5 MAYOR SMITH: Yeah, okay. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And that money was not 7 credited to Kerr County in '07-'08. We are already four 8 months into it. It has not been done. The money went from 9 that budget, which -- of which we paid the money, into your 10 general fund October 30 -- October 1st, -- 11 MAYOR SMITH: Well -- 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- '07. 13 MAYOR SMITH: Historically, it was credited the 14 previous year. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I don't care what historical 16 is; we're talking about today. 17 MAYOR SMITH: All of a sudden, this year you want 18 to set up a different procedure. It is -- it hasn't been 19 calculated right now. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Okay. Well, let's get it 21 calculated, get it straight. 22 MAYOR SMITH: When do you think you'll have a reply 23 to this? 24 MR. HOFMANN: Mr. Mayor, I'll reply in any way the 25 City Council would like for me to reply. Commissioner Oehler 2-15-08 jwk 57 1 is right; the County Commissioners -- and the Council knows 2 this -- did request a refund of excess funds. And I did 3 share with the City Council that -- that there's a court 4 order. That court order did not go into any detail about how 5 that refund should be calculated. I did visit with 6 Commissioner Oehler earlier this week on this topic, shared 7 with him some thoughts and a calculation that we prepared. I 8 did share that with the City Council. And, if I may, I think 9 the first question here, before you get into doing math, is 10 -- and this is ultimately a question for the elected 11 officials in the room, and specifically the City Council. 12 Now, the County Commissioners have spoken. They think they 13 are owed a refund. 14 So, the first question in my opinion is, is there 15 -- should there have been an expectation, based upon the 16 agreement we put together in developing that fiscal '07 17 budget, that if the library function doesn't spend 100 18 percent of its budget, then there ought to be a refund? Now, 19 if you'd like, I can talk about that for a bit. I'll say in 20 brief that in my opinion, no, there's no -- that was never 21 discussed. That's not part of the agreement, and I'm not 22 even sure I follow the logic that there's an expectation that 23 the library has to spend 100 percent of its budget, or if it 24 doesn't, there's a refund. But if I'm in the minority on 25 that, and it doesn't matter -- if the City Council's of the 2-15-08 jwk 58 1 opinion that, yeah, a refund is due, then the second question 2 is, well, how do you calculate that refund? And it's -- it's 3 -- and now I'll stop talking opinion and I'll start talking 4 facts. 5 The fact is, there is no 50 percent contribution. 6 And I only say that because of what was reported in the 7 newspaper. There is no 50 percent contribution for the last 8 couple of years now. Every July, Judge Tinley gets a letter 9 from me that makes suggestions as we go through the budget 10 process of what the City/County contribution should be on 11 these joint functions. And for the last several years now, 12 we've used a formula for determining that library 13 contribution that nets out non-tax-related revenues and nets 14 out capital outlay and capital expenses at the library. So, 15 right there, you're not talking about 50 percent. And the 16 share we ask the County to participate in does not include 17 any enhancements that we might be looking for in our budget 18 that next fiscal year; for example, salary increases. We 19 base that contribution on how we define a base budget. 20 This year's contribution -- I'm sorry, last year's 21 contribution came out to be $443,000. And Commissioner 22 Oehler's correct, that's what we requested, and that is what 23 the County paid for. What I shared with Commissioner Oehler 24 and I shared with the City Council is a formula that, if we 25 agree a refund is due, and if we agree that 50 percent of net 2-15-08 jwk 59 1 actual expenses is how that ought to be calculated, then we 2 did that math, and, okay, a refund of about $6,000 would be 3 appropriate. And if it's the City Council's direction to me 4 to prepare that refund, I'll do it. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, that's all fine and 6 good, but, you know, a deal's a deal. And when you're asked 7 to -- when you're requested to fund the operational costs of 8 the library at basically a 50/50 split, and the County paid 9 based on that amount of money, paid 12 months of that amount 10 of money to total out to that amount, and that money was not 11 expended, how is it not to be credited or refunded? You 12 don't change the rules and all of a sudden decide you want to 13 put administrative fees, you want to put other costs into it. 14 That was not requested in the beginning. 15 MR. HOFMANN: No, I -- 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: If you want to do that, do it 17 up front. Don't try to do it after the fact. 18 MR. HOFMANN: And I'm just going to suggest that we 19 left -- 20 MR. HAMILTON: Well, to definitely be clear, they 21 are coming this year, Commissioner. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think it's a wonderful -- 23 maybe we can just separate them. 24 MR. HAMILTON: You can be sure. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: What I would prefer to do is 2-15-08 jwk 60 1 us take something that you are totally -- that you're -- 2 maybe you're funding 50 percent, we're funding 50. You take 3 one, we'll take the other. We will stop all this 4 controversy, I promise. 5 MR. HOFMANN: Mr. Mayor, if I might suggest -- and 6 I do not mean to belabor this discussion, and I'll do 7 whatever I am asked to do, but I do feel a bit of an 8 obligation here to make sure we are staying on a factual 9 plane. I don't know how we could have been more clear when 10 we calculated this, and I can go back and resurrect that 11 documentation. It's certainly not your staff's intent to 12 change the rules as we go. As far as I can tell, this is how 13 it's been approached generally for about 40 years. There was 14 one discussion about a refund during that period, but I'll 15 suggest if what we're -- if what we're looking for here is an 16 approach that details those actual expenses against budgeted 17 expenses and tries to reconcile through the course of the 18 next fiscal year, then you're adding a complexity level that 19 I just want you to think about. And I don't think, at the 20 very premise, it is correct to say that the thinking ever was 21 that that 50 percent contribution -- that that contribution 22 equated to some obligation on the City's part for how much 23 money was spent. I think you can argue that there was some 24 service delivery expectation, but the fact that there were 25 vacancy savings in the library budget, and that that equates 2-15-08 jwk 61 1 to a -- a conclusion that there ought to be a refund, then 2 that's the change in the rules, not the other way around. 3 But I'm happy to live with it if that's the direction. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: On the contrary there, I 5 don't believe, Paul, there was ever any understanding on our 6 part that if the entire budget was not expended, for whatever 7 reason, staffing not being hired or whatever reasons there 8 may have been, there was never any understanding on our part 9 that any unexpended funds would revert back to the City's 10 general fund. That was never our understanding. 11 MR. HOFMANN: Well, that's just a simple function 12 of how that budget works. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's right, a simple 14 function of the money going into to City's general fund. 15 MR. HOFMANN: I apologize for that; that's how that 16 works. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It will be made right any way 18 you slice it or turn it, or whatever you want to do with it. 19 You can't alibi your way out of that fact, in my mind. 20 MR. COLEMAN: Let me interject my perspective real 21 quick. Bruce, I see what you're saying, I truly do. From 22 one perspective, all we'd have to do is jack up the budget 23 and -- and realize savings that you guys never realize, and I 24 can understand that being a problem. However, this is just 25 like a whole lot of our -- our shared services; this thing 2-15-08 jwk 62 1 has gotten complicated. I think the first -- because the 2 agreement's changed over the last two or three years relative 3 to the entire agreement, and I think the cost-sharing. I 4 think the first thing we've got to do -- I hate to do this, 5 but I think the first thing we've got to do maybe is have 6 Mike and Rex look at the agreements and see what the 7 agreements actually say. Then -- we need to come through 8 that first and know what -- what legally is required, and 9 then I think, once we've determined that -- and some of this 10 issue may become a moot point. We may say, "Well, yeah, we 11 need to refund this," or may not. We may say that, "Well, 12 no, guys, that's the way it was, and it is a budget 13 function." But, personally, I think that -- I think, I 14 really do, that we shouldn't realize -- if we had a situation 15 where we had salaries that weren't used during the year, I 16 don't think we ought to realize singly the savings on that. 17 It ought to be -- it ought to be a shared basis. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I agree with everything you're 19 saying, except I don't really want Mike and Rex getting 20 towards that kind of confrontation as to a policy decision. 21 MR. COLEMAN: Not confrontation, but consultation 22 to help us. 23 MR. HOFMANN: I can just tell you, the agreement 24 doesn't speak to it. I can save you some time there. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I -- 2-15-08 jwk 63 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: But there is precedent for 2 it. 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Real simple. It's what we do 4 with Animal Control. 5 MR. HOFMANN: We can go back and look at 40 years 6 worth of precedents. But, okay, if the City Council would 7 like for me to do that, we can do it. 8 MR. COLEMAN: Mine is one opinion of five. 9 MR. BOCK: Well, when we take that excess funds, 10 and excess funds run into our general fund, is that credited 11 toward the beginning balance in the library operations the 12 next year? 13 MR. HOFMANN: No, it is unappropriated balance in 14 the general fund, is what it is. 15 MR. COLEMAN: If it goes forward -- 16 MR. BOCK: No, but it doesn't go back directly the 17 next year for the function of the library? 18 MR. HOFMANN: It is subject to whatever the City 19 Council decides to do with it when you appropriate. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I rest my case. 21 MR. HOFMANN: Well -- 22 MR. COLEMAN: That doesn't seem fair. If it is 23 applied to the library going forward, you're right, that's 24 not an issue. 25 MR. BOCK: Right. Then I would -- I would agree 2-15-08 jwk 64 1 with that point. If we're going to apply those unexpended 2 funds back to a beginning balance of the library which is 3 used the following year is one thing, but to take that money, 4 and if we're putting it into our general fund for whatever 5 use we determine to use for that money, I can see then, as 6 the County does, then -- 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It's the same thing with 8 Animal Control. If we were going to intend to do that, we're 9 doing the same thing. That is, we're taking money that was 10 unexpended -- 11 MR. HAMILTON: There is a difference on Animal 12 Control. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Whatever we decide -- 14 MR. HAMILTON: You're asking the City, on Animal 15 Control, to pay twice for it. Let us get our facts correct, 16 Commissioner. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: City people live in the city 18 by choice. It was voted on to be turned into a corporate 19 city years ago, knowing that services were required. 20 MR. HAMILTON: And the City is paying its full 21 share directly in as -- as county tax rate, Commissioner, as 22 you well know. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, it's been that way. 24 MR. HAMILTON: As you well know, the City is paying 25 its full share and its county tax rate -- 2-15-08 jwk 65 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yes, sir. 2 MR. HAMILTON: -- for this service. 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: So is every other city in the 4 state of Texas. You're not special. 5 MR. HAMILTON: I only care about this city and this 6 county. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, that's the way the 8 world's set up in Texas. And we're fully willing to work 9 with you to do joint things to enhance both entities, but I 10 don't know how you would separate a tax -- you know, how you 11 would -- how we would go up on our taxes and exempt the city 12 residents from having those taxes. 13 MR. HAMILTON: The city residents pay the county 14 taxes right now. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sure do. 16 MR. HAMILTON: Thank you. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They always will. Every city 18 in the state's going to pay that from now on. It's not going 19 to change in Kerrville. 20 MR. HAMILTON: So you think the City should pay the 21 tax twice? 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They do, because that's the 23 way its set up. We didn't do it. Constitution did it. 24 MR. HAMILTON: No, that is incorrect. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They did it for the county. 2-15-08 jwk 66 1 The county -- every city in the county is part of the county, 2 and they are subject to county taxes. 3 MR. HAMILTON: That's correct. Trying to pass the 4 cross back to the city again is not state law. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: What is it? 6 MR. COLEMAN: Back to the library issue, how do we 7 solve that to go forward, Paul? I mean, have you gone 8 through your analysis? You just need to sit down with Bruce? 9 Or the appropriate -- 10 MR. HOFMANN: If it is our intent to get to a point 11 at the end of the fiscal '07 budget that we -- the City and 12 the County share 50 percent of the net expenses, backing out 13 non-tax revenue and backing out city expenses for capital 14 outlay, then by that math, which I have shared with the City 15 Council, we need to write the County a check for about 16 $6,000. And if it's Council's consensus that I do that, 17 we'll do that. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's based on your 19 calculations. 20 MR. HOFMANN: That's based on -- 21 MR. COLEMAN: You haven't had a chance to walk 22 Bruce through that? 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I have been through it. We 24 do not agree. 25 MR. COLEMAN: You disagree? 2-15-08 jwk 67 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We do not agree. 2 MR. HOFMANN: Then what I would -- and, 3 Mr. Coleman, I'm truly not trying to create an argument here. 4 What I would respectfully request is a -- a suggestion. I 5 think what we came up with is more than fair, and if that's 6 not adequate, then I would just request a proper approach 7 that -- 8 MR. COLEMAN: Bruce, will you come back with a -- 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sure. 10 MR. COLEMAN: -- with a scenario that you support 11 that we can all look at? 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Be glad to. 13 MAYOR SMITH: But you agree with the $6,000 that's 14 been calculated by the City? 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I do not agree with the 16 $6,000. 17 MAYOR SMITH: So, you need -- we can't take any 18 action on it. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No, I'm just bringing it up. 20 I want -- 21 MAYOR SMITH: We have a quorum here. I was 22 prepared to make a motion that we -- we solve the problem. 23 I'm not going to argue over $6,000. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, if it was just $6,000, 25 I wouldn't be arguing over it, probably, either. It wouldn't 2-15-08 jwk 68 1 be a big enough issue. But I think the issue's somewhere in 2 the neighborhood of -- the County's portion we contest is 3 $23,000. 4 MAYOR SMITH: $23,000? 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And it's not based on -- 6 because we're doing operational costs only. We don't own the 7 building. We don't maintain the building. We only share 8 cost -- share operational costs. 9 MAYOR SMITH: Have you made your calculations to 10 the City Manager? 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I have not. 12 MAYOR SMITH: You need to do that. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: If that was what was 14 calculated that was left over by the City from last budget 15 year, it was 46,000. 16 MAYOR SMITH: Well, we can't resolve it until the 17 -- the County and the City agree on what the number is. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I understand that. 19 MAYOR SMITH: As far as I'm concerned, you can have 20 your dadgum money. 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Thank you. We'd like to. 22 MAYOR SMITH: I wish that you would also pay -- 23 there were some years that you didn't come up with your 24 50 percent, that we got charity to -- 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No, there were years -- 2-15-08 jwk 69 1 MAYOR SMITH: Anyway, y'all have an obligation. 2 You have an obligation to come out with some problem, and it 3 will be placed on our agenda to approve it if you can agree 4 with it. If it's never agreed, then we can't take any action 5 on it. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I understand the process, 7 thank you. 8 MAYOR SMITH: Thank you. I appreciate it. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Bruce, did you have any more 10 issues? 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's all I have, Buster. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All right. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Get after it. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Anything else from the 15 Commissioners Court? 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I just think we need to go back 17 where we started and look at some of the issues, and it will 18 resolve that -- this issue and other issues if we just look 19 at how we move forward. 20 MR. COLEMAN: Well, from the global perspective, 21 based on these analyses, I think that's going to fix all 22 these individual issues, just as you said. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We'll get those behind us, 24 and I'm more than willing for us to separate some things and 25 do them on our own. The City has a totally -- 2-15-08 jwk 70 1 MR. COLEMAN: Or do more together. 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Or do more together. I mean, 3 it'll be together; it will just be doing things independently 4 of one another, so we don't have to argue about, well, 5 they're giving a 7 percent raise over here, and we can only 6 afford 3 and a half. And we -- we have these health care 7 benefits and they have these over year here. Let us take 8 care of each -- of individual things with our own staff so we 9 don't have those kinds of arguments. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Bill, anything else? 11 MAYOR SMITH: For the record, since you mentioned 12 7 percent, our City employees got 3.3 percent, I believe. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I was just using it as an 14 example. 15 MAYOR SMITH: Okay. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I was not trying to put a 17 specific number. I was using it as an example. 18 MR. HOFMANN: On the average. And, again, we -- we 19 did not ask the County to participate in any of the cost of 20 these salary increases. 21 MAYOR SMITH: Yeah, okay. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Any of the cost of what? 23 MR. HOFMANN: Any of the cost of any of the salary 24 increases. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Anything from the County 2-15-08 jwk 71 1 staff? 2 MR. HOFMANN: Anywhere. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Anything from County staff? 4 MR. HOFMANN: We took the same approach when we 5 calculated the fire and EMS contribution too. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Commissioner Baldwin, are you 7 saying we're done? 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'm fixing to say that. 9 MR. COLEMAN: Do you need the hammer? 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Hmm? 11 MR. COLEMAN: Do you need the hammer there? 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, I've got one. You 13 notice the Judge, when the firecrackers were lit, out the 14 door he went. Typical. 15 MAYOR SMITH: Well, are we -- are you the -- 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I am, and I'm fixing to 17 adjourn this meeting. 18 MAYOR SMITH: -- the number two guy? So, the 19 number one guy is gone, so you're the number one guy. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. 21 MAYOR SMITH: And I'm the number one guy on this. 22 I think we have concluded what was on the agenda. With your 23 approval, we will stand adjourned. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: We're adjourned. 25 (Joint City/County workshop adjourned at 9:37 a.m.) 2-15-08 jwk 72 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 20th day of February, 8 2008. 9 10 JANNETT PIEPER, Kerr County Clerk 11 BY: _________________________________ Kathy Banik, Deputy County Clerk 12 Certified Shorthand Reporter 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 2-15-08 jwk