1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT 9 Special Session 10 Monday, July 28, 2008 11 9:00 a.m. 12 Commissioners' Courtroom 13 Kerr County Courthouse 14 Kerrville, Texas 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 PRESENT: PAT TINLEY, Kerr County Judge H. A. "BUSTER" BALDWIN, Commissioner Pct. 1 24 WILLIAM "BILL" WILLIAMS, Commissioner Pct. 2 JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Pct. 3 25 BRUCE OEHLER, Commissioner Pct. 4 2 1 I N D E X July 28, 2008 2 PAGE --- Commissioners' Comments 5 3 1.1 Report from Roy Walston regarding the Extension 4 Office 6 5 1.2 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to approve position change (step & grade) and title 6 to replace existing position 11 7 1.3 Presentation from Marc Hamlin regarding the development of a county controlled and owned 8 software system for courts and beyond 15 9 1.4 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action on requested Kerr County funding commitment to 10 TAC for participation in and/or support of the development of a county controlled and owned 11 software system for courts and beyond 42 12 1.6 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action regarding the Guadalupe River Parade 44 13 1.7 Presentation from Adan Munoz, Executive 14 Director, Texas Commission on Jail Standards 46 15 1.8 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action regarding collection of delinquent court fines 16 and fees from County Court at Law, County Court, and District Court and other related issues 67 17 1.13 Presentation to court of draft of City of 18 Kerrville and Kerr County Economic Development Incentive Policy 70 19 1.5 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to 20 release Letter of Credit #7080351 for the roads in Estates of Johnson Creek 96 21 1.9 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to 22 approve Maintenance Department to go out for bids on walls and doors for maintenance shop 23 at Hill Country Youth Exhibit Center 96 24 1.10 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to approve reimbursement to Kerr County Fair 25 Association for 1/2 of an interior wall at the Hill Country Youth Exhibit Center 99 3 1 I N D E X (Continued) July 28, 2008 2 PAGE 3 1.11 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action on imposition of optional local fees in addition 4 to registration fee as provided by Chapter 502 of the Texas Transportation Code 101 5 1.12 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action 6 regarding restoration/replacement of courthouse windows 106 7 1.18 Consider/discuss request to develop a large 8 tract in Bee Caves Creek into three 100+ acre tracts 115 9 1.16 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to 10 approve purchase agreement with Tyler Technologies for import and balancing of Kerr County Certified 11 Roll; authorize County Judge to sign contract 123 12 1.14 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to recover costs of repair to Kerr County roads from 13 damage inflicted by mining vehicles/equipment, aggregate haulers and construction equipment 125 14 1.15 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to 15 set public hearing for the 2009-10 Texas CDBG program cycle for 5 p.m. on Tuesday, August 5, 16 2008, at the Kerr County Courthouse 128 17 1.19 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to approve contract with Office of Rural Community 18 Affairs (ORCA) in the amount of $500,000 for Phase IV, Kerrville South Wastewater Project; 19 authorize County Judge to sign same 129 20 1.17 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to discuss the FY 08-09 budget process 132 21 4.1 Pay Bills 134 22 4.4 Approve and Accept Monthly Reports 141 23 5.1 Reports from Commissioners/Liaison Committee Assignments 141 24 5.2 Reports from Elected Officials/Department Heads 147 25 --- Adjourned 148 4 1 On Monday, July 28, 2008, at 9:00 a.m., a special 2 meeting of the Kerr County Commissioners Court was held in 3 the Commissioners' Courtroom, Kerr County Courthouse, 4 Kerrville, Texas, and the following proceedings were had in 5 open court: 6 P R O C E E D I N G S 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. 8 Let me call to order this regularly scheduled meeting of the 9 Kerr County Commissioners Court scheduled and posted for this 10 time and date, Monday, July 28th, 2008, at 9 a.m. It is that 11 time now. If you would, please rise and join me in a moment 12 of prayer, followed by the pledge of allegiance. 13 (Prayer and pledge of allegiance.) 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. At this time, if there's 15 any member of the public or the audience that wishes to be 16 heard on any matter that is not a listed agenda item, we'd 17 ask that you tell us what's on your mind at this point. If 18 you wish to be heard on an agenda item, we'd ask that you 19 fill out a participation form. They're located at the back 20 of the room. That helps me to keep up with the fact that I 21 have someone that wishes to be heard on that particular 22 agenda item. It's not essential. If we get do an agenda 23 item that you wish to be heard on, and you've not filled out 24 a participation form and gotten it up here to me, just get my 25 attention in some fashion and I'll see that you have the 7-28-08 5 1 opportunity to be heard. But right now, if there's any 2 member of the public or the audience that wishes to be heard 3 on any matter that is not a listed agenda item, please feel 4 free to come forward at this time. Seeing no one coming 5 forward, Commissioner Baldwin, do you have anything for us 6 this morning? 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Sir, I do have one thing. I 8 want to remind everyone that the second week in August is the 9 -- the Cowboy Camp Meeting, I think the 7th -- 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: First week. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: First week in August -- 12 that's exactly what I said, Bruce. You didn't pay attention. 13 And there's all kinds of neat and fun things going on out 14 there, of course, the barbecue being number one. But to show 15 you that God's grace is at the Cowboy Camp Meeting, one of 16 our speakers this year is a lawyer. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Oh, really? 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It's an interesting -- 19 interesting concept, and I don't know about it quite yet. 20 But, anyway, that -- just a reminder of that. I'm not 21 knocking lawyers, Judge, of course. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, you never have. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, I never have. Kind and 24 gentle. But that's all I want to talk about right now. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Commissioner Williams? 7-28-08 6 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Nothing, Judge. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Letz? 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Thankful for the rain, and just 4 as a little bit of an update, I had a nice conversation with 5 the Texas Farm Bureau. It was shortly after our last 6 meeting. We discussed cattle guards at some length, and I 7 think the County and the Texas Farm Bureau are on the same 8 page when it comes to cattle guards. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What page is that, 10 Commissioner? 11 JUDGE TINLEY: The right page. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The right page, that's right. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Oehler? 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Camp Meeting is the 3rd 15 through the 10th, and it's always the first full week of 16 August; starts on the first Sunday and runs through the 17 second, and been going on for 70-something years, 75 18 probably, something in that neighborhood. And if you get a 19 chance, well, come out. Anyway, that's it. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Appreciate everyone 21 being here today. Let's get on with our agenda. The first 22 item on the agenda is a report from Roy Walston with the 23 Agricultural Extension Service concerning activities at the 24 Extension Office. Mr. Walston? 25 MR. WALSTON: Thank you, Judge. Appreciate y'all 7-28-08 7 1 taking the opportunity to -- and letting us come forward with 2 you. I'm going to be brief. I've got a group of 4-H members 3 that participated in our Texas 4-H Congress, and I'm going to 4 let them visit with you on what they did in Austin, Texas, at 5 4-H Congress. I've got Lance Bauer. Lance is -- along with 6 rest of them; he'll introduce the others. Lance is our 7 current district first vice president, and served on State 8 Council this past year. So, Lance? 9 MR. BAUER: Thank you. With me today are Tyler 10 Behrens from Center Point, Ashley McDonald from West Kerr 11 County, Ingram, and Nick Randall from Kerrville club, and I'm 12 from West Kerr County. 4-H Congress is a mock congress 13 experience that takes place every other year in Austin, when 14 the actual congress is not going on. We divide up into the 15 House and Senate, and within the House and Senate we actually 16 have committees, and we also have lobbyist groups and a press 17 corps that puts out a newspaper every day. We discuss many 18 different bills, and these bills are bills that have been 19 written by the participants, something that is affecting 20 them. And we get a big bill book and go through the bill 21 book, and there's lot of different activities. The governor 22 has a reception, and lobbyists have a reception, and it's -- 23 it's pretty -- it's as close to the real deal as you can get. 24 And also, we are one of five groups, I believe, that actually 25 get to use the floor of the Capitol for our event. 7-28-08 8 1 MR. RANDALL: One of -- I'm Nick Randall. I was 2 part of the House committee. And one of the major bills that 3 we talked about was homeschool UIL participation that's 4 brought about major, major problems with a lot of the kids 5 who felt that they were -- they should be allowed all the 6 rights that public school kids have, just like we do. So, 7 that was something that everybody talked about in there a 8 lot. 9 MS. McDONALD: I'm Ashley McDonald, and I was also 10 in the House of Representatives. One of the things is, once 11 the bill passes through the Senate and the House, and the 12 governor writes it -- or signs it into law, it actually goes 13 to Governor Perry and he reviews it. If he thinks it's 14 actually something that would benefit our state, then he 15 reviews it and sends it back for actual legislation. 16 MR. BEHRENS: I'm Tyler Behrens. I've got some 17 stuff for y'all to look at, if y'all want. I was in the 18 Senate along with Lance, and it was just -- it was a lot of 19 fun. We did a lot of, basically, the same bills. Some of 20 the House bills are different, for some reason. And so it 21 was a big experience to actually be in the Senate sitting in 22 those chairs and everything, and just go through the real 23 process. So, here's some -- this is the invitation to the 24 Governor's Ball. Those are the bills we went through, and 25 here's the newspapers. 7-28-08 9 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Okay, thank you. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. 3 MR. BEHRENS: Oh, and this is -- everyone that was 4 there got one of these books -- binders, I guess. It's a -- 5 we have the whole -- we have the whole list of the bills 6 right here. It was just a bunch of stuff there. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I want to tell you young 8 people, it's a pleasure to see you in front of us this 9 morning, and it's also really a pleasure to see you involved 10 in citizenship and political science and learning about what 11 state government's all about and what our future -- our 12 future is bright with people like you. Thank you for doing 13 what you do. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Hear, hear. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: I'm going to say again what I've 16 said numerous times before. These are the youngsters I don't 17 see in my juvenile court, the ones that are participating in 18 these programs through the 4-H and the Extension Service and 19 the FFA and those. They're kept real busy doing positive 20 things with other positive young people, and they don't have 21 time to get into mischief and show up in my court, and so 22 there's a big payoff in that. There really, really is. And 23 the bottom line is, it saves the taxpayers a whole lot of 24 money. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Lance, can you explain why you 7-28-08 10 1 were -- your expulsion from the Senate? (Laughter.) 2 MR. BAUER: That was -- that was one of our State 3 Council -- we -- the Senate was getting kind of monotone, 4 'cause everybody was just -- it was the same arguments over 5 and over and over about everything. And so the speaker -- 6 or, I mean, the -- the lieutenant governor and I decided that 7 we'd like to spice things up a little bit. Since we kind of 8 planned and put Congress on, we decided to just add a little 9 excitement to the Senate, and that was how we decided to do 10 it. (Laughter.) 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It worked. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything else, Mr. Walston? 13 MS. BOYD: I just want to say real quick, Lance is 14 going off State Council this year, and Katie Muehlstein is on 15 her way to begin her term with State Council. And we are 16 very proud that we have, for the third year in a row, had a 17 representative on State 4-H Council. And we also have -- in 18 the top three offices, we have consistently had the president 19 or first vice president and second vice president, and 20 District 4-H Council for District 10. So, Nick Randall is 21 second vice president this year, and Katie Muehlstein is 22 second vice president, and we're very proud of them. They've 23 worked very hard to achieve those goals, and State Council is 24 a really awesome experience. They get to really do a lot of 25 cool things all over the state all year long. So, we're 7-28-08 11 1 proud of them. Lance is heading to Texas A & M, so I'm not 2 going to cry right now, but anyway... 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything else for us, Roy? 4 MR. WALSTON: That's got it. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. I appreciate it. We'll 6 go to Item 2 quickly; consider, discuss, take appropriate 7 action to approve position change in step and grade and title 8 to replace existing position. Is this something that would 9 be more appropriately considered in a budget workshop 10 context? 11 MR. WALSTON: This is going to be -- 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Is that where we're going? 13 MR. WALSTON: No, this is for the current budget 14 year, to be done prior to. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 16 MR. WALSTON: I mean, -- 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 18 MR. WALSTON: -- we're basically filling the 19 vacancy of a position that we've -- we've lost effective the 20 22nd of August, and just basically filling in with a current 21 position. We have two secretarial positions. One's an 22 office manager; one's a secretary. We're promoting the 23 secretary to office manager, and that's the -- that's the 24 change in step and grade, is the promotion from secretary to 25 office manager. And we'll replace the secretarial position 7-28-08 12 1 with a new hire. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: So, there's no budgetary impact this 3 year? 4 MR. WALSTON: No, not this year. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You can do that without -- 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Sure. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Sure, that's internal to you if 8 there's not budgetary impact. 9 MR. WALSTON: Well, as far as the step and grade, 10 we just need to -- from what I understood, we needed y'all's 11 approval to promote for the promotion for this step and 12 grade. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The step and grade are the same 14 as -- the office manager position isn't changing. You're 15 just filling that position. And the -- 16 MR. WALSTON: Well, there will be -- that office 17 manager -- the office manager step and grade will not be the 18 same as the current one that's there. It'll be below the one 19 that's currently there. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Below? 21 JUDGE TINLEY: You're bringing them in at entry 22 level as office manager, at that grade? 23 MR. WALSTON: No. It will be -- well -- 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What are you -- 25 MR. WALSTON: I'm not sure what the entry level for 7-28-08 13 1 an office manager is, but it'll be -- I mean, Eva and I 2 visited about it, and whatever she set up is what -- 3 JUDGE TINLEY: All this is to be effective 4 August 22? 5 MR. WALSTON: Mm-hmm. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Why don't I suggest that you get 7 with Eva, and she can take a look. If it needs to come to us 8 here, we can take a look at it at our next meeting. That 9 should be adequate time, shouldn't it? 10 MR. WALSTON: Yeah. She said that we needed to 11 present it to y'all, and I thought she was going to be here 12 to -- to explain that. But as far as -- 13 JUDGE TINLEY: What's your current office manager's 14 step and grade? Do you recall? 15 MR. WALSTON: The current one? 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 17 MR. WALSTON: I believe is 14 -- maybe 6. 14-6. 18 I'm not sure about the current one. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Okay. So, it's a 14? 20 MR. WALSTON: I believe it's 14-6. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: You're promoting a secretary into 22 the office manager position? 23 MR. WALSTON: Mm-hmm. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Proposing what step and grade, 14 25 what? 7-28-08 14 1 MR. WALSTON: To 14-6. It would be going to 14-6. 2 Like I say, I'm not sure about the current one that's there 3 now. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: See -- 5 MR. WALSTON: I know it won't be going above the 6 current one. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I know. I understand why. 8 MR. WALSTON: It's not going above the current one 9 that we've got now. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Why don't you go with the 11 Judge's recommendation and bring it back next time. We have 12 to look at the dollars a little bit. I see a problem with 13 the dollar consideration. 14 MR. WALSTON: Okay. Yeah, I know it won't be going 15 over what we've -- what we've currently -- of course, we'll 16 be -- 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Won't be any budgetary impact, but 18 you're bringing someone into a new grade at above entry level 19 step, -- 20 MR. WALSTON: Yes. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: -- is the problem. 22 MR. WALSTON: Well, if it's -- like I say, I don't 23 know what the entry level is for office manager, so I don't 24 know. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: And there may be -- I don't know. 7-28-08 15 1 Ms. Hyde may -- there may be some modifications to job 2 description or something that she wants to bring to us. 3 MR. WALSTON: Okay. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's work it that way, okay? 5 MR. WALSTON: Okay, thank you. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you very much. 7 MR. WALSTON: If y'all were through with those 8 handouts, if I could get that back for Tyler? 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Item 3 is a timed item for 10 9:15. Amazingly, we're on schedule. Presentation from 11 Mr. Marc Hamlin regarding the development of a county 12 controlled and owned software system for courts and beyond. 13 Mr. Hamlin is here with us today, and we appreciate you being 14 here. 15 MR. HAMLIN: Judge, Commissioners, thank you for 16 allowing me to come into your wonderful county and visit with 17 you today about a very important project. I need to get some 18 preliminaries out of the way. Buster Baldwin and I have 19 served on the -- the state board, and he has served in many 20 capacities, and he has helped me tremendously over the past 21 years. I was president for two years, and during that time 22 he -- he helped me out tremendously. So, Commissioner, I 23 appreciate all the involvement that you have with TAC and 24 your County Judges and Commissioners Association. I also 25 want to tell you that I knew that Ms. Pieper and Ms. Uecker 7-28-08 16 1 had a lot of power. We just recently had a conference here, 2 and y'all were as dry as what we are in Brazos County right 3 now, and they assured me that there would be rain. I drive 4 back in yesterday and everything is green. So, I'm not for 5 sure of exactly how much power they really do have, Judge, 6 but it seems like that the rain has been bountiful here, and 7 we need as much as we can get in Brazos County, if y'all 8 could send it that way. Welcome -- where did Lance go? We 9 lost him. I was going to say welcome to Aggie land, and 10 hopefully he would come by and see me at the office. That 11 seems like an impressive group. 12 Gentlemen, the Texas Association of Counties is 13 contemplating a project with the County Information Resource 14 Agency, CIRA. This is a visionary project. This is a 15 project that is a necessity for county government. We have 16 tried to make as many presentations all over the state of 17 Texas that we possibly can, and this project is one that -- 18 if I can, I kind of liken to it Bill Gates sitting in his 19 garage and building the first computer, trying to see what 20 was going to happen in the future, and having all the 21 naysayers saying that it wouldn't work. County commissioners 22 across the state of Texas, along with elected officials and 23 department heads, have to rely on vendors and what I call a 24 "dog and pony show" to come in and tell you what is the best 25 programs, software that can be utilized by all the 7-28-08 17 1 departments in county government. 2 As you well know, county government is a -- is a 3 being of its own. We need a specialty program that not only 4 is adaptable to county government, but is adaptable to 5 different counties for different needs. Take Brazos County, 6 for instance. In your county, Kerr County, Ms. Pieper 7 handles all of the misdemeanor cases and Ms. Uecker handles 8 all the felony cases, and that's the case it was in Brazos 9 County up until 1996. We had a District Court come in and 10 take jurisdiction over misdemeanor matters, and could hear 11 those matters. Well, guess who decided -- the Attorney 12 General decided that the District Clerk was the clerk of the 13 court since 1996, so that is a different -- and, you know, 14 254 counties; we have Houston with the largest population of 15 over 4 million. We have Loving County -- I'm not sure of the 16 population of Loving County now, but I do know that there are 17 different needs. 18 One of the things that government needs to be able 19 to do is to be able to adapt. It needs to be able to adapt 20 and communicate with one another, interdepartmental, and then 21 it needs to be able to communicate with other counties as 22 well. We have not been able to find that correct solution 23 for all of county government. That's the purpose of CIRA. 24 It is a visionary project. It is a project that I feel like 25 is a necessity. Texas Association of Counties and CIRA is 7-28-08 18 1 not out to make any money on this. We're trying to figure 2 out exactly how much it -- it will cost TAC before it's over 3 with. We are trying to -- this is not eliminating vendors. 4 If anyone ever tells you that it's eliminating vendors, 5 absolutely not. Once we get the program written, the vendors 6 are going to be a necessity. They can come in and go -- we 7 can go out for RFP's, but it will be a county program that is 8 developed by county commissioners, county judges, tax 9 assessor/collectors, clerks, sheriffs, so on and so forth. 10 It will be used by elected on officials and it will be paid 11 for by elected officials. 12 Now, I know that -- that I've given you as quick as 13 I possibly can a synopsis of what the vision is. I know that 14 y'all have been very active in the past in many different 15 areas, and I want you to know that because a lot of times we 16 don't understand whatever a vendor -- a software vendor is 17 proposing, just don't feel like you're alone, 'cause a lot of 18 times -- 254 counties -- this is the resounding message that 19 I heard over and over and over, is that Commissioners Court 20 feels like that they're exposed to this in meetings and 21 workshops, and they try to make the best decision that they 22 possibly can, but the problem is -- is that your elected 23 officials is going to be using these programs, your appointed 24 officials, your department heads. They're the ones that need 25 to have the input to know exactly what will work and what 7-28-08 19 1 won't work in your county. 2 Now, what are we asking for? We're asking for your 3 involvement through a resolution. And we're asking for -- 4 and this is what CIRA project decided -- the board decided to 5 come up with as far as initial cost. It's one-tenth of 1 6 percent of your county budget. I don't know what that number 7 here is in Kerr County. All I know is that in Brazos County, 8 our contribution was $65,604.45. Commissioners Court in 9 Brazos County knows that we've got to do something. Two 10 years ago, they allocated $300,000 to do something. Last 11 year they again contributed $300,000 and put it into a -- a 12 project fund. This year they're contemplating doing the 13 exact same thing. Folks, again, I am not running down any 14 vendors whatsoever. I am trying to -- to work on a theory 15 that -- that everyone realizes that we have a need and we 16 have got to get on board with one another to realize the best 17 allies that we have is each other so that we can utilize the 18 system to its fullest extent. Our -- our citizens deserve 19 it, and we know that we need it. It's just hard to go about 20 it, especially whenever you're -- you're putting money up for 21 something, but you're not exactly sure what's going to 22 happen. We don't know for sure, but we know that we've got 23 to do something. Having said that, Judge, Commissioners, 24 please ask me any questions that you may have. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I have one, Judge. 7-28-08 20 1 Mr. Hamlin, I understand what you're saying with respect to 2 the development of the scope of work, and as far as our 3 contribution is concerned, it would appear that we -- we 4 would be -- our contribution would be somewhere around 5 $15,000, based on this projection that you've shown us. My 6 real question has to do with the future, when you indicate 7 that the cost after developing the scope of work -- you 8 indicate the cost to develop the software is somewhere 9 between 12 and a higher number of millions of dollars. My 10 question is, where does that money come from? 11 MR. HAMLIN: That would also be part of the project 12 costs, that we will be coming back to commissioners courts 13 and saying, "We not only have a theory now. We have a 14 realization. We have a project that can work. This is what 15 it's going to cost." Gentlemen, you know, you look at that 16 number, and it scares all of us to death, but whenever you 17 look at 254 counties, you look at a minor contribution by 18 each county. And I say "minor"; one-tenth of 1 percent is 19 what we're talking about. Over -- and right now we have 20 collected 355,000 -- over 355,000 on 33 counties, 33 out of 21 254. Once we get the project and -- and get the idea from -- 22 and get it completed from here to realization, then we will 23 have a good grasp on what it's going to cost county 24 government. The good part about it is, to answer your 25 question, that it's going to be a question in the future of 7-28-08 21 1 asking county government, "Do you want to go forward?" 2 Brazos County allocated -- the last time that we 3 bought a software project, it cost us a little over 4 $7 million. $7 million for a population of 160,000 people. 5 $7 million. I keep going back to that $7 million, because 6 when we bought it, the technology was seven years old. 7 Folks, we're 15 years down the road now, and we are in a 8 bind, as other county governments are, in trying to develop a 9 system that your Sheriff can sit down and utilize from 10 everywhere, from his booking all through -- all the way 11 through his bonds and the administration. Your clerks can 12 use it as well, and be able to have their imaging if they 13 want to image their documents, have it available. Again, I 14 want to emphasize the importance that Texas Association of 15 Counties and CIRA is not in this for a profit. This is a 16 theory that I believe is going to raise county governments' 17 level of professionalism to a tremendous degree. We are 18 having so many citizens across the state of Texas that feel 19 like that it is all over -- all over the board. In my 20 office, we have every document from the beginning of Brazos 21 County's time that has been imaged and available online. 22 Does everybody in state of Texas and every county and every 23 district clerk have that available? Absolutely not. We're 24 looking for standardization. 25 One of the big -- big important things that I feel 7-28-08 22 1 like as clerk that standardization is going to play a big 2 role in, is clerks are going to be able to report along with 3 other elected officials and department heads; we will have a 4 funnel -- a conduit into Austin on the -- on the requirements 5 that we have upon us that we have to make these different 6 reports every month. Why aren't they standardized? Why is 7 it that we don't have a computer program that all of us use 8 that we all can understand and that we can all utilize 9 between one another? Sorry, Commissioner. I went too far 10 with your answer, but that's my -- 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The question I have is that we 13 purchased Odyssey through The Software Group, and it was 14 supposed to do exactly what you're saying. And it's done, I 15 don't know, 75, 80 percent of that. It's got some problems, 16 and we know it's got problems and they know it's got 17 problems. Why can't, basically -- and I know TAC isn't 18 government, but it's kind of like government. Why do you all 19 think you all can do something that private industry cannot 20 do? 21 MR. HAMLIN: The quickest and easiest answer, it 22 goes back to the profit issue. This project would be 23 nonproprietary. It would be able to be manipulated and used 24 in any different county in any different way that a county 25 wants to use it. That's the key. 7-28-08 23 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But then how is -- you said 2 you're not trying to cut out the vendors. Well, then, how is 3 -- are the vendors going to use software written by TAC? 4 MR. HAMLIN: Well, there again, these are going to 5 be your Windows-based programs that the -- that the vendors 6 will be able to bid on, that are going to be standardized, so 7 it's not going to be a project that we can do it all on our 8 own, because we're not in the vendor business. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, you're -- you're building 10 an Odyssey, what you're trying to do, or equivalent to 11 Odyssey. 12 MR. HAMLIN: We're trying to build -- no, sir. 13 We're trying to build a -- a computer system by -- and the 14 whole board is -- with elected officials, appointed officials 15 from throughout the state that will be utilizing the program, 16 we are trying to build a system that is standardized, that is 17 nonproprietary, that can be configured in any different way. 18 And all of the things that I just said to you is absolutely 19 an oxymoron to most vendors, because they want you to be 20 dependent upon them to make those changes to -- to cost you 21 on upgrades, to cost you on whatever it is that they want to 22 come back as a vendor and tell you that it's going to cost. 23 This project is separate and alone from any ideology that any 24 vendor -- because it's in -- it's in direct conflict with the 25 vendor. We are -- we are trying to have it where it is so 7-28-08 24 1 standardized and it is user-friendly. And is this a project 2 that's going to work, that we're going to have in 2009? No. 3 This is going to take time. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: If I'm understanding you correctly, 5 that you're not in the vendor business. You're going to 6 develop -- and correct me if I'm not seeing this thing 7 conceptually correctly. 8 MR. HAMLIN: Yes, sir, Judge. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: You're going to develop a -- a 10 software concept, and then based upon that, private industry 11 will develop the actual software and market that software 12 through their existing marketing system? Is that what I'm 13 seeing? 14 MR. HAMLIN: Can you go with me to the next 15 counties that I need to visit with and say exactly what you 16 just said? Because that's exactly right. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 18 MR. HAMLIN: You said it just as well as -- 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, unfortunately, I can't go with 20 you to the next counties, but I just wanted to see if I can 21 understand it. 22 MR. HAMLIN: Yes, sir. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: There -- there's going to have to be 24 some sort of profit motive in it for those guys to step 25 forward and -- and with their geeks and so forth, to develop 7-28-08 25 1 that -- to develop that software, and then to market it. Is 2 there going to be some sort of proprietary function that 3 remains with Texas Association of Counties that, by virtue of 4 that, it keeps the -- keeps the cost controlled so that we're 5 not totally at the mercy of these vendors, as we have been? 6 MR. HAMLIN: As we have been, exactly. That whole 7 concept that you just outlined, Judge, is exactly the goal of 8 the CIRA board. And -- and, again, this is the resounding 9 message that continued to take place over the past two years 10 whenever I was president. It's amazing to me how many 11 commissioners courts felt obligated -- and that's a light 12 version of what you really want to say in some of the cases. 13 It's -- it's absolutely amazing the amount of money and time 14 that they have thrown and continue to throw at software 15 projects. This is a whole different concept. It takes out 16 the fact of proprietary; it takes out the fact of -- of being 17 able to have a system that you're going to have upgrades that 18 are going to continually cost somewhere down the line. 19 You know, one of the things, Commissioners, that 20 y'all haven't brought up yet, that a lot of the commissioners 21 that I've talked to, and judges, is they say, "Well, what do 22 we get out of it? If we're one of the first counties that 23 say, you know, this is a visionary project, we need it, what 24 do we get out of it? What about those other 220 counties out 25 there that decided that they do not want to?" Well, as you 7-28-08 26 1 well know, the larger counties, they have their own -- what 2 do we call it, Harris Country, or Country of Harris. Harris 3 County has their own system, and they utilize that, and 4 they're not interested. The larger counties aren't 5 interested, because they have enough money to get it done 6 in-house. And their project, so you'll know, is almost 7 exactly what CIRA is trying to do. They only do it for 8 themselves. That's exactly what has happened over the state 9 of Texas, is that these smaller counties don't have the 10 budgets to allow them to spend the kind of money that is a 11 necessity to develop a project, so what we've had to do is 12 we've had to look at it and say, "Is there a need out there 13 for a professional standardized system?" Not just for Kerr 14 County, not just for Brazos County, but that can be developed 15 by elected officials and developed by appointed officials, 16 used by those same people that are developing it, and paid 17 for by the same people. 18 Judge, it absolutely makes all the common sense in 19 the world. It's a long-term commitment as far as being able 20 to get it developed, but I can't say enough to you how 21 important it is, not just to Kerr County, not just to Kerr 22 County government. I want to answer my own question, 23 whenever I said, "What do you get out of it?" I will say to 24 you, if you're one of the initial counties that come on 25 board, I will say to you that that would be a question. Once 7-28-08 27 1 we did come to the realization that this is a project that is 2 worthy of -- of going forward with, that we see the vision, 3 all of us see that this is something that we're going to go 4 forward with, we have the initial counties that have stepped 5 up to the plate and made it in their budgets to -- to send 6 money to the project. Once we do that, I think that it would 7 be you, Judge or Commissioners, depending on who's here at 8 the time, to ask the hard question. We've got it. We're 9 going forward with it. We -- but we want to know, out of 10 these other counties that are coming on board, is it going to 11 be a reduced rate if we -- if we go forward with it in the 12 future? Absolutely. There's something that's got to be 13 done. 14 My judge and commissioners are going to be asking 15 me the exact same thing. They -- they want to know, "Marc, 16 is there going to be something that we're going to get out of 17 it if these other people are not willing to step up early? 18 What is it that we're going to get out of it in the future?" 19 I want to go back to Bill Gates and him having that first 20 computer in the garage. This is such an important project to 21 county government. As long as that -- these vendors can 22 continue to do the things that they have done -- and, again, 23 I'm not picking on any one vendor, 'cause there are some good 24 vendors out there. But as long as they continue to have 25 these upgrades and continue to come back to counties and we 7-28-08 28 1 all stay separate, they're the ones that benefit, not us. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: John, you had a question? 3 MR. TROLINGER: Hi, I'm John Trolinger; I'm the 4 I.T. Manager for Kerr County. 5 MR. HAMLIN: Nice to meet you, sir. 6 MR. TROLINGER: Thanks for being here. I have one 7 interesting point to make, and one question. First of all, 8 you've got to get the counties to buy into this, so that's my 9 point. And you've got 33 so far that are willing, at the 10 one-tenth of 1 percent level. Do you see -- and then my 11 question is, do you see this project being like a motor 12 vehicle or a voter registration project, that eventually is 13 mandated or provided by the State, that all the counties must 14 adopt and -- and use at some level? Will it be a top-down 15 project at some point, maybe five years from now, where the 16 State says, the Office of Court Administration, "In order to 17 file your reports with us, you must have this system"? 18 MR. HAMLIN: To answer your question, I don't know. 19 What do we -- what do we know that our Legislature is going 20 to do for us? You know, they're about to meet in '09 again. 21 And, you know, that's a very good point that actually we 22 haven't addressed as a committee. I'm not for sure that -- 23 that we, as county government, would take so kindly to the 24 state government mandating that we do something that we have 25 had to go out on our own and spend our own local dollars to 7-28-08 29 1 accomplish. I think that that would be a -- a huge topic for 2 discussion. But -- but it's one of the best questions I've 3 had since -- since I've been doing this. I too sat as the 4 chair of the Information Technology Committee in Brazos 5 County, and it is overwhelming to me, whenever we -- even 6 within our own county, and even our elected officials that we 7 got together, just how much individual departments were going 8 to the Commissioners Court and asking for upgrades during the 9 last four years. We've got -- I feel like that we've got to 10 do something. We need to provide to the -- to all of our 11 constituents the best way that they can utilize county 12 government, and you, as county officials, have to have the 13 best computer system at your fingertips. Do we have that? I 14 just don't think that we have. I think that we have people 15 that are continually providing us services that a lot of 16 times, some of those services are not actually needed, but 17 we're having to pay for them. Go ahead, sir. Sorry. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Question? 19 MR. TROLINGER: Thank you. 20 MR. EMERSON: My name is Rex Emerson; I'm the 21 County Attorney. And last year at the Elected Prosecutors' 22 conference, Tarrant County made a presentation that they were 23 already working on a software system similar to what you're 24 talking about, and any county that was willing to participate 25 could basically acquire the system for free. How, if at all, 7-28-08 30 1 does your system tie in with what they're doing? Or -- 2 MR. HAMLIN: It does not. And I'm going to tell 3 you -- answer your question with going back to the 4 nonproprietary -- the non -- the standardization that is a 5 necessity. I have visited with -- with Judge Whitley on 6 numerous occasions, and he -- he assures me that this is the 7 answer. And I will tell you that this committee has looked 8 in-depth at every program out there available to county 9 government, and not one -- not one -- not one project has the 10 vision that this project has. It's -- it's -- we were hoping 11 that that was the answer. Regardless, if tomorrow, ABC 12 Company comes up with the solution for county government, 13 CIRA would back off of this project in a heartbeat. We 14 are -- we are not -- this is not -- if there was a solution 15 out there, regardless of who it was, we would not be here 16 before you today. This is a project that, again, I can't 17 emphasize enough that is -- that is a vision of county 18 government, that is built by county government, that is used 19 by county government, and last but not least, paid for by 20 county government. Yes, sir? 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It seems I heard you say 22 that -- that Harris County has developed their own system, 23 and how well does that system work? And if it does work very 24 well, why couldn't we utilize theirs to do what you're 25 proposing? 7-28-08 31 1 MR. HAMLIN: Harris County, even though they work 2 well within their 4 million population, it is a project that 3 is somewhat proprietary, simply because there is so many 4 different sections of their computer system. Some of it 5 is -- is proprietary, some of it is owned by the county, but 6 it is so vast and so large, the concept does not run through 7 the mainstream of exactly the project vision that we have. 8 It -- we go back to this -- the standardization and going 9 back to the nonproprietary issue that has plagued county 10 government for so long. Ms. Pieper asked for a modification, 11 and, you know, anytime that you mention something about 12 modification, the -- the dollars roll, and I'm just not sure 13 exactly the cost on any different one. It's the same way 14 with Brazos County. If the -- if the basis of the computer 15 system in Tarrant County was something that we could utilize 16 and that we could -- without having that -- I don't know how 17 to say it. It's almost like being handcuffed, and 18 continually you have -- you know, you are restricted to where 19 that you're still incumbent -- it's still -- you know, you're 20 still dependent on that vendor, and that's what we're trying 21 to get away from. We're trying to develop a system that can 22 be manipulated, and it won't cost any one county an arm and a 23 leg, so to speak, and this is one of 254. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: You had a question? 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: On the modification part, say 7-28-08 32 1 Ms. Pieper or I, as Sheriff, do want a modification into the 2 system. Who's going to pay for that modification? 3 MR. HAMLIN: Realizing that every different vendor 4 is in a profit mode -- let me make sure I answer your 5 question. A vendor is in a profit mode; they have to make 6 money. Whenever you have a modification with a separate 7 system, it's going to cost some person some hours to be able 8 to go in and program whatever it is that you're going to 9 program. But wouldn't you rather be developing a 10 modification that is going to cost you one-tenth of what 11 you're paying now, to a county government agency which you're 12 a part of? That's the difference. It's going to cost -- 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Still going to cost. We're 14 still going to spend the same dollars. We're just going to 15 be giving it to TAC instead of a private vendor. 16 MR. HAMLIN: We're going to be spending -- no, you 17 won't be spending the same dollars. You'll be spending 18 probably -- I'm guessing -- and these are my numbers -- 19 one-tenth of what would you normally be paying a private 20 vendor, because you take out the profit side. 21 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But if the modification is 22 going to be done and we pay TAC, okay, who's going to do the 23 modification? Is it going to be a private vendor that has to 24 -- that TAC will contract with to do it? I mean, there's got 25 to still be a profit in there for that vendor to upgrade it. 7-28-08 33 1 Because I may have certain reports and certain modifications 2 that I want our jail or Sheriff's Office to be able to do 3 that Comal County doesn't use, and won't use, so they don't 4 want it on theirs, but I do want it on ours. 5 MR. HAMLIN: That is where the nonproprietary 6 action comes in, to where that you are going to have a -- a 7 board, Texas Association of Counties, that will make that 8 determination, and that can be utilized by county government 9 on a nonprofit basis. That's what I just keeping coming back 10 to. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay. So, there's going to be 12 a board that decides whether I can have that modification? 13 MR. HAMLIN: Absolutely not. If it's 14 nonproprietary and can be modified, and that's what you want 15 in your county, then that's what you'll get. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But -- I guess two things. 17 One, basically, economics. I don't know of any private 18 company that has a 90 percent profit margin. I think it's 19 more likely it's going to cost maybe 10 percent less, or 20 maybe 20 percent, 'cause very, very few companies make a 21 20 percent profit. But that's just the economics side. I'm 22 still real unclear as to why you all think y'all can do it 23 better than private business. I mean, I -- you know, profit 24 is -- profit is why business works. And why would a 25 nonprofit be able to be more efficient and more -- more 7-28-08 34 1 expertise than a profit-generated solution? 2 MR. HAMLIN: Because it will be used and developed 3 by the people on a daily basis that are using the programs. 4 You just said a while ago -- I'm not sure, Judge, if it was 5 you -- said that y'all have a program that's 75 to 80 percent 6 fulfilled your -- your request. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Or -- I have no idea. We have 8 Odyssey. 9 MR. HAMLIN: Whatever -- whatever that percentage 10 is. This vision is on a per -- 100 percent ability for you 11 to get done in your county what you need done. That's 12 basically all it is. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But -- so, Odyssey is supposed 14 to do that, and Odyssey's trying to do that. They just -- 15 it's hard, bottom line. And Legislature changes make it a 16 moving target. Every time they meet every two years, they 17 change the report; they change the structure of it. 18 MR. HAMLIN: And that's where your standardization 19 comes in. I keep going back to standardization and getting 20 county government to be able to understand that there are 21 several reports, several things that we continually do in a 22 different way that's not mandated by law. We just don't 23 standardize county government to be able to accomplish that. 24 Anybody -- any other vendor is not utilizing your County 25 Clerk and your District Clerk and your Sheriff and your Tax 7-28-08 35 1 Assessor/Collector and your Health Department Director to be 2 able to develop a program that can be utilized in their 3 county. No one else is doing that. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I guess -- it seems to me that 5 your efforts would be better spent on the state -- the 6 Legislature, the Office of Court Administration, to tell them 7 to standardize. To lobby them and say, if the State would 8 quit making all this stuff so difficult, then the private 9 vendors would solve the problem a lot cheaper. But there's 10 no one telling the State to solve the problem. 11 MR. HAMLIN: Well, and I think that's part of 12 the -- the vision that we have for county government, is that 13 we are going to work with all the different entities, 14 including O.C.A., to say, "Look, we've got a project. This 15 is what county government is going to be using, by and large, 16 in the state of Texas, and we need to know what it is, or why 17 do you do the things that you do? Why do you require this 18 report or that report, or in this manner or that manner? Can 19 we come up with a solution to standardize it across the state 20 of Texas?" 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Mr. Hamlin? 22 MR. HAMLIN: Yes, sir? 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Am I understanding that a lot of the 24 savings to government entities, county government, comes 25 from -- again, back to your concept. You come with the 7-28-08 36 1 vision, you solidify that vision, you see that it's doable, 2 as it were. You then contract with a software developer, so 3 to speak, people that are in the business and have the 4 capability of writing software. You contract with them, they 5 put together the product, the software package. They're 6 paid. They make a profit. 7 MR. HAMLIN: Right. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: And on an ongoing basis, they will 9 continue to act as a distributor, as well as for upgrades, 10 changes and so forth. They'll contract, but the real savings 11 is the licensing, whereas with a private vendor, it's 12 proprietary, and what we have is a -- a multitude of various 13 licensing fees that we pay to these private vendors. Is that 14 where the real savings is? 15 MR. HAMLIN: Judge, you've outlined several things 16 that are the key points. You're absolutely right. The other 17 thing that is a -- a visionary cost savings to counties is 18 that the more counties that are involved that cost-share in 19 this project, it -- it eliminates that single county from 20 having to -- to spend all the money that it's going to cost 21 on any given software vendor. That's one of the biggest -- 22 the licensing, one of the biggest cost savings that you can 23 talk about. But what it boils down to is, the more counties 24 that we have involved in this, the less it's going to cost 25 each county. 7-28-08 37 1 JUDGE TINLEY: So, the proprietary aspect would be 2 Texas Association of Counties, and there would be no 3 licensing fees to county governments to utilize this system; 4 is that what I'm hearing from you? 5 MR. HAMLIN: Right. Yes, sir. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Next question, timeline. There are 7 a number of counties, including Kerr County, that have 8 recently acquired software systems and made substantial 9 investments in those systems, and in doing so, have gotten 10 themselves on the hook for a multi-year payout for the -- for 11 the privilege of acquiring that system. And what are we 12 looking at timeline here? Let's take your normal case 13 scenario that you're looking at, with the vision, the 14 solidification, and moving forward. What's the real timeline 15 that you're looking at here? 16 MR. HAMLIN: Three to five years. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: For the product to be on the ground 18 and running? 19 MR. HAMLIN: Yes, sir. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Question. In your 22 conclusion recommendations, you talk about this -- or you 23 define this as a comprehensive integrated justice information 24 system. My question is, what, if any, other modules are a 25 part of this package? 7-28-08 38 1 MR. HAMLIN: All. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: All? 3 MR. HAMLIN: All. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Everything that we have in 5 Odyssey would be replicated in your -- maybe more? 6 MR. HAMLIN: Of course, as you well know, the -- 7 the CJIS, the Criminal Justice Information System, is the -- 8 is the largest component of county government. This is 9 absolutely the beginning, as we see it, to a complete 10 solution for county government as a whole. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second question is, you 12 talk about in this conclusion that the commitment for funding 13 needs to be completed by June 1st. I guess that's of this 14 year, so there's obviously some slippage. 15 MR. HAMLIN: Our -- yes, sir, there is. Our -- I 16 think we were a little bit aggressive on the timeline when we 17 first initiated the scope of work on the project. We had 18 anticipated a -- and maybe I was just being a little bit more 19 -- I'm not for sure. What I'm trying to say is, I was hoping 20 that there was going to be more counties on board early on, 21 and there wasn't. And I think that I probably underestimated 22 the amount of confusion out there with county government, not 23 just whether it's one elected official or another. But I 24 think it's -- it's really hard to get a grasp on 254 25 counties. There's a lot of commissioners and judges, clerks, 7-28-08 39 1 tax assessor/collectors in these smaller counties that have a 2 part-time that they have to deal with being an elected 3 official. They have other things that they have to do to be 4 able to make a living, whether it's farming and ranching or 5 running a generator off their shop -- well, that kind of 6 dates me, but -- we haven't had a generator in how long? 7 Alternator shop. It's really hard for these people to 8 dedicate the time that y'all have dedicated to be able to get 9 on board and know how fast technology is changing, the cost 10 of technology. You -- the average citizen out here is just 11 flabbergasted a lot of times in the communities because of 12 the amount of money that we're spending on technology. The 13 amount of money that we have -- when we first started out, 14 you know, spending $1,200 or $1,300 on a computer, and you'd 15 buy three or four, and commissioners would just all but, you 16 know, just completely have a fit 'cause you're spending all 17 this money on three or four computers. And, you know, how 18 many of those do you buy a year? If you buy a computer 19 today, three years from now, you know as well as I do, you've 20 got to replace it. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: As a follow-up to Commissioner 22 Williams' inquiry, my recollection of the initial proposal 23 when it came out was that you were wanting a commitment to be 24 generated from our upcoming budget year, our '08-'09 budget, 25 which, of course, we put into place generally somewhere in 7-28-08 40 1 the first or middle part of September of each year as part of 2 our overall budgeting process. I assume that's still what 3 you're looking for? 4 MR. HAMLIN: Yes, sir, Judge. In fact, you have a 5 copy -- hopefully you have a copy of the resolution that we 6 have given each one of the commissioners courts across the 7 state. As you see this, this is not a -- I don't know how to 8 say it. This is not a commitment from you that, if we get in 9 the middle of this and this miracle vendor comes across, and 10 all at once the -- all of the answers are there, all of the 11 questions have been answered, that we're going to just keep 12 the money and spend the money. We were looking for a 13 commitment by resolution, along with the -- the funds, so 14 that we can go ahead and get the funds ready to go and start 15 with the visionary project, the first stage, the first step. 16 But if, for some reason -- our goal is to have 50 counties 17 before we start. If we don't get to 50 counties, and this 18 committee says, "This is a great idea. We've done our due 19 diligence; we've tried, but we just can't go forward," each 20 and every penny that any one of the counties has put forward, 21 we're going to reimburse you. There won't be any cost 22 associated with it whatsoever. But this is a very, very hard 23 decision for the committee, that we have committed ourselves 24 to reaching 50 counties in the state of Texas on the initial 25 step. And -- and if we don't get to -- to our goal or close 7-28-08 41 1 to our goal, then each one of the counties that have stepped 2 up and sent the resolution in and committed the money, that 3 we're going to return that back to you, and in totality. So, 4 that's the hope of the committee. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Any more questions for Mr. Hamlin? 6 We thank you for being here today. We appreciate you coming 7 down and telling us about this program and answering our 8 questions. 9 MR. HAMLIN: Well, y'all have had some tough 10 questions, and I appreciate everyone that has -- has asked 11 questions. These are all questions that we're sooner or 12 later going to have to answer. And I know that the -- the 13 purpose and vision of this committee is one that is 14 worthwhile to raise the professionalism of county government 15 across the state of Texas. And it's really hard sometimes 16 for commissioners courts like yourselves to sit back and say 17 that considering county government in all these other 18 counties is something that you need to do, but for the 19 betterment of county government as a whole, and to have all 20 of us standardize as much as possible, this is a project that 21 needs to go forward. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, sir. 24 MR. HAMLIN: Thank y'all. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: We appreciate that. The next item 7-28-08 42 1 on the agenda, Item 4, to consider, discuss, take appropriate 2 action on requested Kerr County funding commitment to the 3 Texas Association of Counties for participation in and/or 4 support of development of a county controlled and owned 5 software system for courts and beyond. Gentlemen, as I'm 6 sure all of us realize, that has budgetary impact, and we're 7 in the process of doing a lot of budgetary things. It might 8 be well if we were going to defer on that to see where that 9 might fit in the rest of our budgetary actions, and to look 10 at that later in light of those budgetary discussions. 11 Anybody have any feelings different than that? 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I'm willing to deal 13 with it right this moment and say no. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I just -- I can't imagine us 16 voting to spend 15,000 of the taxpayers' dollars on something 17 that may or may not be going on, when things are short and 18 tight as they are. And I've always been leery of someone 19 coming down here from Austin that's had a vision. You know, 20 you kind of got to watch those things, and I just -- you 21 know, I don't share that same vision. I'm not part of the 22 vision. I haven't had the vision. And so I would -- I'm 23 going to say no today, and tomorrow. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Anybody else on the Court have 25 any -- I'll leave it to the pleasure of the Court. 7-28-08 43 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm kind of with Commissioner 2 Baldwin. Primarily, I think that there -- I think the focus 3 is wrong. You've got to get the State to change -- to agree 4 to at least integrate everything at a state level, and the 5 Legislature -- maybe legislation to require the State to do 6 it would be supportive. But -- and maybe a lobbying effort 7 to get that done, but until you get the State on board, I 8 just don't see that you can fix the problem. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I guess if we hadn't just 10 spent a million dollars plus on Odyssey and any associated 11 expenses to that since then, I might -- I might have been a 12 little more favorably disposed to this. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think another thing -- I said 14 75, 80 percent. Odyssey is probably -- John, do you have an 15 idea? Or, I mean, I know we hear -- and we hear very loud 16 the problems with Odyssey. How much of Odyssey is working, 17 in your mind? 18 MR. TROLINGER: Well, we've got individual 19 problems. We got a problem today we where we can't run some 20 certain forms that we're going to get patched, and that patch 21 is going to come this week. But overall, the problems get 22 fixed, and we have full functionality. Maybe the County or 23 District Clerk can tell you something differently. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: 80 percent. 25 MS. PIEPER: I was thinking 70, but -- 7-28-08 44 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's going south. 2 MR. TROLINGER: The problem -- the problem is, you 3 know, week to week, there's different problems. I can't 4 quantify it overall. 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Problem is, when we patch one, 6 normally it messes up something else. It just takes a while 7 to get the patch to patch the patch. 8 MR. TROLINGER: But that's a good -- that's a good 9 overall answer, I think. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: As I said, pleasure of the Court. 11 Anybody care to offer a motion? Let's move on, then, if we 12 might. We have a 10 -- excuse me, 9:55 item that we're 13 slightly overrun on, Item 6. We'll do that right away. 14 Consider, discuss, and take appropriate action regarding the 15 Guadalupe River Parade. We have with us today Mr. Marvin 16 Willis, who's been heading up this project for a number of 17 years now, and pleasure to have you here, Mr. Willis. 18 MR. WILLIS: Good morning, Judge. Morning, 19 Commissioners. I'm here today to request the use of Flat 20 Rock Park for the 16th at 4 p.m. for the Guadalupe River 21 Parade. This is our sixth year to do this, and that's why I 22 come before you today, just simply for that reason. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What part of the park do 24 you want to use, Mr. Willis? 25 MR. WILLIS: I think we're going to be pretty big 7-28-08 45 1 this year if we don't have a flash flood, so we're going to 2 be just past the boat ramp and down the road a little ways. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I don't want to wish you 4 any bad luck, but -- 5 MR. WILLIS: It happened last year, but we've had 6 -- that's the only year it's happened, so I think we'll have 7 a pretty good crowd. Most of the larger organizations in 8 town -- 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Your area of use usually is 10 somewhere in the area of the -- of the ramp. 11 MR. WILLIS: Well, the floats will go in at the 12 ramp, but we're going to be inside the park itself this year. 13 We'll have Harry and the Hightones for the dance there on the 14 street going around the park, and then we'll have some 15 vendors set up. Of course, all the floats will be there, and 16 hopefully you guys will all be there this year. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Have you made arrangements 18 for cleanup? 19 MR. WILLIS: Yes, sir. Yes, sir. As a matter of 20 fact, we all attended the U.G.R.A. cleanup yesterday, and our 21 group picked up 22 bags of trash. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Great. Great. Move 23 approval. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 25 MR. WILLIS: We'll get it done. 7-28-08 46 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded as 2 indicated. Question or discussion? All in favor, signify by 3 raising your right hand. 4 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 5 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 6 (No response.) 7 JUDGE TINLEY: It carries. Thank you. 8 MR. WILLIS: Thank you. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: I appreciate having you here 10 Mr. Willis. Look forward to being with you. 11 MR. WILLIS: Okay. Have a good day, sir. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a 10 a.m. item, and we'll go 13 to that now, a presentation from Mr. Adan Munoz, who is 14 Executive Director of the Texas Commission on Jail Standards. 15 Mr. Munoz, glad to have you here, and appreciate you 16 accepting our invitation to come down here. As I'm sure our 17 Sheriff has indicated to you, we're kind of bumping the top 18 on our jail census, and we've got some concerns on expansion 19 and some questions. Did you have a question for him, 20 Commissioner? 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, I just wanted to tell 22 Adan, please don't talk about having a "vision." (Laughter.) 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: He said he was going back to 24 Austin. 25 MR. MUNOZ: I just told the Sheriff when I heard 7-28-08 47 1 you talk about "vision," I think I better go back home. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Absolutely. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: But you're not originally from 4 Austin? 5 MR. MUNOZ: No, sir, I'm originally from 6 Kingsville, Kleberg County. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Sheriff of Kingsville, King 8 County -- 9 MR. MUNOZ: King Ranch, Kleberg County. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Kleberg County. 11 MR. MUNOZ: I've had a diversified career, sir, 12 including a former vendor. I wouldn't want to be a vendor 13 before you today, either. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Beat up on everybody but folks from 15 Kleberg County, didn't we? 16 MR. MUNOZ: Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Well, that's 17 about the only -- that's the only place that they actually 18 won't listen to me. Judge, Commissioners Court, thank y'all 19 very much for the opportunity to appear before you this 20 morning. I understand from Commissioner Baldwin, from his 21 phone call, and from the e-mail I received from the Judge, 22 and in speaking with the Sheriff this morning, obviously, 23 Kerr County is not any different than anybody else in the 24 state of Texas right now as far as overcrowding and so forth. 25 I think they're legitimate concerns. I'm here to actually 7-28-08 48 1 answer your questions, because I believe part of what 2 Commissioner Baldwin asked of me was to come before you and 3 maybe address the issue of tents, if you may, and certainly 4 that's a subject that is open for discussion anywhere and 5 everywhere that I go in the state of Texas. As the Executive 6 Director of the Commission on Jail Standards, I'd be more 7 than happy to address any and all of the questions that you 8 have for me. 9 I can tell you right now, what I'll do is I'll pass 10 out for each one of you to review -- my apologies for not 11 getting it to you ahead of time. I believe the Judge also 12 asked me for the justification and authority by which the 13 Texas Jail Commission operates off of. It's covered in the 14 letter addressed to the Judge. We're -- you know, as y'all 15 read through it, but more importantly, I think also the 16 follow-up documents that are attached to the handout I just 17 gave you is a step-by-step of what it takes for tents to go 18 up. Tents, gentlemen, is a temporary solution to a permanent 19 problem anywhere in the state of Texas. Tents can only be 20 constructed -- tents are permissible, first of all -- let me 21 back up. Tents are permissible in the state of Texas, but 22 they're only for temporary situations, "temporary" meaning a 23 length of three years. 24 So, when we speak -- as the Jail Commission speaks 25 to Commissioners Court, it's -- just coincidentally, the 7-28-08 49 1 investment and things that y'all have been talking about as 2 budgetary situations prior to my getting up here to speak, 3 any time you invest in anything, obviously, you want to see 4 it long-term; you don't want to see it go away. Anytime you 5 invest in tents, it's a short period. It's a short-period 6 solution. Plus, more importantly, you'll see in the third or 7 fourth item down, the tents, it's only meant for minimum 8 security prisoners. You can't house anything else other than 9 minimum security prisoners. In talking to the Sheriff just a 10 little while ago, he doesn't even have enough minimum 11 security prisoners to be able to place into, say, a 48-bed 12 tent, 24-bed tent. Plus each construction that you do of 13 each tent has to be provided with electricity, air 14 conditioning, everything else that you would do with brick 15 and mortar. So, personally, to tell you -- and 16 professionally, as a former sheriff, where I sit in this 17 capacity today, you've got a short-term solution for a more 18 serious problem that you have. 19 In talking to the Sheriff -- and part of the 20 handout that I gave you also, Kerr County's jail population 21 has steadily been going up over the last ten years. I 22 brought you a month-by-month handout that says that your 23 population is steadily going up. Your population is driven 24 by your courts, either the lack of, to get them out of the 25 court system, get them out of jail, is what drives your jail 7-28-08 50 1 population. The other thing that drives your jail population 2 is classification. You can't mix and match. You've got to 3 classify them by minimum, medium, and maximum security. It's 4 just -- it's just a -- you know, where you've got 192-bed 5 capacity, you could actually be full at 168, as a number I 6 throw out, because you're full of beds of minimum or you're 7 full of beds of medium or you're full of beds of maximum. 8 I've also seen where the figures in the years -- in 9 the last ten years, you used to take in contract prisoners, 10 but the need for your own prisoners now, that has driven 11 where you are. You're not deriving any income either, but 12 each county has its own needs. Apparently, Kerr County has 13 dips. It has rises and has its, you know, dips. And 14 that's -- whether that's controlled by summer crowds, 15 tourists, whatever it is, only you yourself may know what 16 drives the capacity of each jail. Also, I will tell you, as 17 part of the last handout that I gave you, in order for you to 18 take a strong, strong consideration, one of the things we 19 hear statewide as I travel throughout the state is that tents 20 are good enough for our soldiers; tents are good enough for 21 Arizona. Well, Arizona doesn't have any standards. They 22 don't have any jail standards whatsoever. And the handout 23 also briefly tells you the amount of lawsuits that that 24 county has paid, because it's just not conducive. 25 You know, you and I -- and as a former sheriff, I 7-28-08 51 1 can tell you, and the Sheriff of Kerr County can tell you, we 2 want to pick them up, put them in jail, and throw away the 3 key. Unfortunately, that's not the way the system works. 4 Also, you want to see them contribute something to society by 5 punishing them. Unfortunately, inmates are given privileges, 6 or that's the way standards were provided for in Texas, so 7 that it will keep counties from getting sued and having to 8 wind up paying liability issues, much like Arizona has and 9 Maricopa County. That's briefly what I've got for you as far 10 as presentation. Going to open this up to question and 11 answer, which I believe is more likely what you need. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Mr. Munoz, thank you for coming 13 down. As you've indicated, when you go around the state into 14 various areas, you learn of the notoriety of Maricopa County, 15 Arizona, and the public has this vision that -- that we can 16 house these jail inmates in tents and derive labor from them, 17 require them to grow their own food and all these things, and 18 they don't -- they don't hear about the liability issues. 19 They don't hear about the lawsuits. But we get these 20 questions as elected officials all the time of why -- why are 21 these people in jail having such a good deal of it? Why are 22 -- why are they not required to work? You know, we can 23 barely pay our utility bills to get air conditioning, but it 24 doesn't seem to be a problem for them. They're out of the 25 heat, they're warm in the winter, nice and cool in the 7-28-08 52 1 summer, get meals provided for them that are approved by 2 dietary standards. If there's special diets required for 3 health or religious reasons, why, they get those. And -- 4 and, you know, we get blasted with both barrels of that very 5 frequently. And, you know, you're the authority that must be 6 responded to when we don't abide by those standards, and 7 so -- 8 MR. MUNOZ: Minimum security -- minimum standards 9 are driven by the infamous statement that Commissioner 10 Baldwin so adequately made at the beginning of this meeting, 11 called attorneys. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: I see. 13 MR. MUNOZ: And attorneys represent inmates, and 14 inmates bitch and gripe about everything. I guarantee you 15 that right now. I mean, it's just a way of life. We have a 16 complaint section in our agency that we get anywhere from 5 17 to 10, 15 a day. That's not counting the e-mails; that's not 18 counting the phone calls from the parents, from the friends 19 and so forth saying, "My poor child didn't get his medicine 20 today. My poor child's socks were wet today," and so forth 21 and so on. So, as long as there are individuals like that 22 who feel that they have a lawsuit against a county, that's 23 the reason minimum jail standards were created, so that we 24 hopefully can keep you out of the liability issues that 25 certainly exist, because we cannot control the inmates and we 7-28-08 53 1 cannot control the inmates' families and what they want or do 2 not want. And I will agree with you again; the perception of 3 the county is that that's what jails are for, is to lock 4 people up and punish them. But, unfortunately, if you don't 5 treat them a certain way, they have a right to sue you. And 6 I think -- I think you'll -- when you speak to your insurance 7 carriers, part of the rationale for the agency -- for the 8 Commission on Jail Standards is to try and keep you in 9 compliance, so that way, when an inmate does sue you and 10 you're in compliance, your defensibility is substantially 11 better than being out of compliance. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: The standards, themselves -- the 13 origin of your authority for the standards are done by the 14 Legislature; is that correct? 15 MR. MUNOZ: Yes, sir. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: They're not, per se, mandated by 17 federal courts for jails in counties in the state of Texas? 18 MR. MUNOZ: Sometimes federal court decisions 19 sometimes drive the adaptation or the change of standards a 20 little bit, but certainly -- but they're not driven by 21 federal court decisions. They're driven by the State 22 Legislature, the administrative codes, yes, sir. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: If the standards are to be relaxed, 24 I'm going to call it, for lack of a better term, to provide 25 something that's less of a burden on county taxpayers, that 7-28-08 54 1 would have to come from the State Legislature and what they 2 mandate to your agency; is that correct? 3 MR. MUNOZ: That would be correct, sir. Any change 4 in standards is either driven administratively by us for 5 change -- let me give you a quick example. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 7 MR. MUNOZ: For example, we had a -- we had an 8 agency call us about two, three months ago. Actually, it was 9 a complaint driven by a mother of a female prisoner that was 10 in jail. What she was complaining about was that when the 11 daughter was given an exchange of clothing to wash them, the 12 agency was not giving her an exchange. They were taking her 13 clothes and going to wash them; in the meantime, she sat 14 there in her underwear. So, for clarification, what we did, 15 we told that agency, "When you take it, you've got to give 16 them something to cover themselves." An exchange of clothing 17 is not after you wash it, you do the exchange of clothing. 18 So, a change in standards for clarification came within us. 19 I have a commission that I report to. The commission will 20 adapt -- will take our recommendation. We adapt the 21 standards to clarify. 22 However, then you also have statutes created by the 23 Legislature. Legislature can always say -- for example, 24 there are some -- there's some facilities here in Texas we 25 can't touch because they only house federal prisoners, but 7-28-08 55 1 those facilities are contracting with county government. 2 Now, you ask me, as a former county official, if you -- if 3 Kerr County were to contract with a federal government just 4 to house nothing but federal prisoners, so you wouldn't make 5 money; you're drawing money, the extension of liability 6 extends to Kerr County. But some legislator was thinking 7 about some facility in his district that he wanted to make 8 sure that we couldn't touch, and they could operate any way 9 they want to, hire anybody they wanted to, not even be 10 certified jailers through training. So, thereby, we couldn't 11 touch them. That's horrible. But, nonetheless, that's a 12 statute that I've got to live with. Now, we're trying to 13 change that, because it shouldn't be any different, but those 14 are just two quick examples, for example. But they're driven 15 internally by us, or they're driven by state statute. Yes, 16 sir? 17 JUDGE TINLEY: With regard to the relaxation of -- 18 of those standards that would significantly reduce the burden 19 on county taxpayers, let me ask you to look into your crystal 20 ball. If that -- if there were any appreciable reduction in 21 those standards, do you see those as passing muster with the 22 federal courts? 23 MR. MUNOZ: No, sir. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 25 MR. MUNOZ: No, sir, not at all. 7-28-08 56 1 JUDGE TINLEY: So, basically, what we're looking at 2 is -- 3 MR. MUNOZ: Any time you relax -- 4 JUDGE TINLEY: -- a requirement by federal courts. 5 MR. MUNOZ: Any time you relax, you know, somebody 6 -- somebody's going to file a lawsuit to challenge it. You 7 challenge it, the federal government is going to come in and 8 overtake it and say, "You're going to do it this way." Which 9 is exactly the reason the Texas Commission on Jail Standards 10 was created in 1975, is because of the state government -- as 11 you well remember, the state prison system was under control 12 by the federal government, 'cause they basically told them, 13 "You don't know how to run it." So, sheriffs and county 14 commissioners and courts throughout the state of Texas 15 decided, you know, that we need to set up an agency that we 16 can control -- or not we control, but we can create so it 17 will monitor Texas jails, so the federal government doesn't 18 come in and take over. Which is what this agency does. Yes, 19 Commissioner? 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: The focus of most people's 21 attention with respect to tents seems to be Maricopa County, 22 Arizona. In your handout, on the last page, I note that you 23 tell us that -- apparently, I think you're telling us that 24 they -- Maricopa County spent $400 million to build a 25 building with 4,100 beds; is that correct? 7-28-08 57 1 MR. MUNOZ: That's correct. Yes, sir, that's the 2 number. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That tells me also that 4 Tent City in Arizona, if not now, will soon be a thing of the 5 past. 6 MR. MUNOZ: Well, not in Maricopa -- it could be, 7 depending on their local -- remember, now, what I said a 8 little while ago. They don't have any standards, so they can 9 keep them up as long as they want to. But they're also going 10 to continue to get sued as long as they want to. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: If they're spending 12 $400 million on a building, would it seem to be 13 counterproductive to keep them outside if you've just built 14 a $400 million building. 15 MR. MUNOZ: But it is -- you know, that's -- this 16 is why -- for example, I'll give you a quick example. There 17 was a county in south Texas that just pushed and pushed and 18 pushed to build a jail -- I mean, excuse me, build a tent. 19 Ever since they built it and spent close to $275,000 to equip 20 it with air conditioning, to equip it with beds, equip it 21 with staffing and everything else, they haven't used it. 22 They took it down during the hurricane, 'cause they were 23 afraid it was going to wind up in Kerr County with the 24 hurricane. So, all I'm saying is, it's just not practical. 25 It can be used, but it's not practical. That's not -- that's 7-28-08 58 1 not your problem in Kerr County. Because, again, that's just 2 not the -- that's not the solution you're looking for. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And they can only be used 4 for one classification? 5 MR. MUNOZ: Yes, sir. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And that classification is 7 some classification that we don't deal with on a regular 8 basis. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That classification is 10 minimum, and I normally won't have -- cause my outside 11 trustees normally have to be minimum. You won't have but 12 three to five that I can really fit into that classification, 13 or just not housing the minimums, you know. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: If we have that -- have 15 those -- the numbers large enough to put a tent up, you still 16 have to air-condition it and heat it. And I remember back in 17 the olden days when we were talking about building jails, 18 that the lighting -- there was a certain amount of 19 candlelight that was required in those rooms so they can 20 read. And -- 21 MR. MUNOZ: Everything you put -- everything you 22 put -- 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So they can read the law and 24 sue us. 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 7-28-08 59 1 MR. MUNOZ: Everything that you would have to build 2 around brick and mortar, that same thing you'll have to put 3 inside a tent, except in three years you're going to have to 4 take it down. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Then, after three years, you 6 got to take it down anyway. 7 MR. MUNOZ: Because it's supposed to provide a 8 temporary solution for you; it's not -- again, it's temporary 9 housing, tents. It's not permanent. So, again -- 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I'm with -- I'm with 11 all your friends and the Judge and this group here, saying 12 that if it's -- if tents are good enough for our military 13 people, it's damn sure good enough for these nuts. But the 14 law says, so we live by the law. 15 MR. MUNOZ: Yes, sir. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And right now, the last 18 research I did, Maricopa County has paid out right at 19 $42 million in lawsuits that this county has paid, where 20 we're fortunate enough that our insurance deductible right 21 now for lawsuits is $10,000 dollars. The last I heard, when 22 Maricopa County can get insurance, their deductible is 23 normally a little over a million dollars per lawsuit, okay? 24 And, Sheriff Arpaio is considered the most sued sheriff in 25 the United States. Now, that's not counting the hundreds 7-28-08 60 1 that are still out there that haven't even been heard yet. 2 MR. MUNOZ: Realizing also that the Sheriff from 3 Kerr County can do some of things that that sheriff can do; 4 he can give them pink underwear, give them all the other 5 things, but that's his desire. You know, but the tent 6 situation is just a libelous suggestion for you. That's the 7 best answer I can give you. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. The pink underwear issue 9 doesn't reduce your costs. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, sir. The bottom line on 11 that is, they issue them underwear. We don't. You know, 12 they got to come with their own or pay it out of commissary 13 themselves. I'm not getting into pink underwear or any other 14 color, because we're not furnishing them to them. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Now, that is a cost savings, 16 Sheriff. 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's right. 18 MR. MUNOZ: There you go. Yes, sir. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Any other questions for Mr. Munoz? 20 MR. MUNOZ: Before I leave, I just want to -- some 21 of you might not have met -- Jackie Semmler is your local 22 inspector that inspects the Kerr County Jail. She's here 23 with me and in attendance today. I wanted some of you that 24 haven't met her -- she's been working for me now about six 25 months? 7-28-08 61 1 MS. SEMMLER: Almost a year. Be a year -- 2 MR. MUNOZ: Almost a year. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: She's the one we need to be 4 friends with. 5 MR. MUNOZ: Yes, sir, not me. Yes, sir. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Long as she's not on her way 7 out there right now. 8 MR. MUNOZ: She's a former jail administrator in 9 Burnet County and Callahan County. Very fortunate to have 10 her as one of my inspectors, and she is responsible over Kerr 11 County. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Fantastic. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Appreciate you coming down. I 14 was waiting for you to give us some kind of good news, some 15 of the -- some cost savings, some new thing we can build 16 that's not going to be very expensive. I guess you're just 17 going to tell us the bad news. 18 MR. MUNOZ: Well, you know, one of the things 19 that -- that, unfortunately, when we come from state 20 government, we don't bring a long-term solution. As someone 21 so adequately said a little while ago, however, we do try 22 to -- you know, having been a former sheriff, having been a 23 former vendor, and having worked in state government now my 24 second -- this is my second tour of state government. I used 25 to work for the governor; I used to work for the Attorney 7-28-08 62 1 General's office. I can also understand this dilemma that 2 commissioners courts are currently going through throughout 3 the state of Texas, and certainly we're amenable to try and 4 work wherever we go, inspection-wise, jail overcrowding-wise, 5 whatever. I've instructed my inspectors -- I'll tell you 6 this, I take my staff to heart. It's one thing to find you 7 in noncompliance; the other thing is, before we leave that 8 day, we're going to find you a probable solution to your 9 problem before we leave, because the quicker we can lessen 10 your liability, the quicker your county's going to be able to 11 do their job. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Super. 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: One question I would have. 14 Since we're at 192, we know some of the changes that would 15 take place, kind of like when the county hits 50,000 16 population. But once we go over 200 beds, besides the 17 recommendation of an infirmary, what other thing are we going 18 to have to consider with the addition of beds? 19 MR. MUNOZ: Just basically that, your infirmary. 20 Your medical situation is the only thing that basically 21 changes. That's one thing that y'all need to start looking 22 at also. In discussing it with the Sheriff, I realize you 23 have a multi-district District Judge situation where a lot of 24 your -- a lot of your prisoners sit in your jail a long 25 period of time. That's what's creating your jail 7-28-08 63 1 overcrowding problem. It's not necessarily that you're 2 having a peak in crime. They're sitting in your jail, and 3 when they sit in jail taking up bed space, it thereby creates 4 a situation where, you know, your PR bonds come in. One of 5 the things that we've been seeing -- one of the things that 6 the strategic planning session we had in Austin tells us is 7 you need to try and maybe think about getting -- hiring a 8 consultant to do an in-depth study of your county criminal 9 justice system, because we can do a facility needs 10 assessment. We can tell you you're going to need 220 beds -- 11 I'll just pick a number -- by next year, but that number is 12 also driven by the number of how quickly you get your 13 prisoners in and out of jail. 14 You can get folks to come in here and do an 15 in-depth study. And, trust me, I'm not promoting the private 16 sector, but I do know that we cannot do the in-depth study 17 for you. What these guys will come in here and do, they'll 18 study the relationship between your County Attorney, your 19 Sheriff, your District Attorney, your District Judges, your 20 District Clerk, and so forth and so on, to try and come up 21 with a problem solution. One of the counties that comes to 22 mind real quick is Midland County. Midland County are 23 shipping out anywhere from 30 to 50, 60 people a day. 24 They're now under capacity, just because of the way their 25 revamped structure -- how that works in the criminal justice 7-28-08 64 1 system. 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Be wonderful if that would 3 work. 4 MR. MUNOZ: Yes, sir. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Do you have some -- or can you 6 get some consulting firms that do that type of -- 7 MR. MUNOZ: We can give you -- for example, we can 8 give you a list of three or four or five, and then after 9 that, it's up to you. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I picked up one the other day 11 that I can give you the information on, that were at the 12 sheriffs' deal last week. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: This might be also an appropriate 14 place to mention, as it concerns our jail inspection, I know 15 in the majority of the past several years, I've been present 16 for at least a portion of that, and the Sheriff has done an 17 excellent job, and I'm sure if those scores have been 18 reviewed, he ranks right up there at the top with all of the 19 inspections that occur in this state. I've heard him issue a 20 challenge to your inspector when the inspector comes on-site, 21 "I dare you to find something." 22 MR. MUNOZ: Well, you know what? And that's a good 23 feeling. I'll guarantee you, my inspectors get a real good 24 feeling if they come in a facility that's well run, and that 25 all comes back to how your sheriff manages. Not only do you 7-28-08 65 1 have an excellent sheriff -- and I'm not saying that because 2 I'm sitting in Kerr County and don't want to get a ticket. 3 You've got an excellent sheriff that cares, and this county's 4 also got a jail administrator that cares about the jail, and 5 that reflects on down -- 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 7 MR. MUNOZ: -- down the line to the personnel. If 8 you got a good sheriff, a good jail administrator -- I've got 9 counties, I guarantee you, they couldn't care less, and they 10 think that we're the enemy; we're only there to zap them and 11 so forth and so on. But if you've got good management style, 12 you'll have a safe jail, I guarantee you. Considering what 13 you have to work with, and including -- I'm sure you've got 14 turnover. 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Oh, yeah. 16 MR. MUNOZ: You know, turnover is horrible. You 17 know, and in a jail, it's just -- 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You've said enough about him. 19 You can go ahead and go. (Laughter.) 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Let him keep talking. It's 21 about time. 22 MR. MUNOZ: Talking like a former sheriff. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: One thing y'all will notice on 24 this handout is -- the one that -- the one I printed up that 25 I've given each of y'all. If you look at it, you'll see 7-28-08 66 1 confinements here. This is today's population as of this 2 morning, and how many days each of those inmates individually 3 has has been combined in our jail, and you'll see that it is 4 a court problem that we have in this county. 5 MR. TROLINGER: That's a report from our Odyssey 6 software system. (Laughter.) 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That part works? 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But you will see, these aren't 9 -- it's not a misdemeanor problem. This is our district -- 10 it's a district court problem. Rex does too good at moving 11 them through; they have court every week. It's our other 12 ones that are -- are really going to cause us to spend 13 millions if they don't start doing something, moving these 14 inmates through. 15 MR. MUNOZ: Also what's going to happen, instead of 16 you taking contract prisoners, you're going to have to be 17 shipping them out, because, again, unfortunately, that's 18 where we come in. If we come in and find a classification 19 problem, we're going tell the Sheriff, "You got to move them, 20 put them somewhere else," and you'll be paying -- Smith 21 County in east Texas is paying a million dollars a year. 22 They're the tax base for Gregg County, the other county 23 involved. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And Jackie will love to hear 25 this, but the issue we have is -- right now we're okay, 7-28-08 67 1 Jackie, but the issue we have been having is we have 32 2 female beds also, and when I have 30 females -- and the 3 female beds are eight-person blocks, so there's four of them. 4 And if you have 30 of them, you can't separate them out, 5 classify them correctly in reality, 'cause you only have four 6 places to go, and there's too much overlapping. 7 MR. MUNOZ: Females have always wanted a place at 8 the table. They have found it in most jails. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Any more questions for Mr. Munoz? 10 We thank you for being here with us, sir. 11 MR. MUNOZ: Thank y'all very much. Appreciate it. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Appreciate your cooperation. 13 (Discussion off the record.) 14 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a 10:30 item that I'd like 15 to go ahead and get done very quickly, if we could, or 16 reasonably quickly. Item 8, consider, discuss and take 17 appropriate action regarding the collection of delinquent 18 court fines and fees from County Court at Law, County Court, 19 and District Court, and other related issues. Commissioner 20 Oehler? 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I believe Ms. Sue is here to 22 stand up and give us a little presentation, and -- 23 MS. GLOVER: I am. Good morning, everyone. Rex 24 and Steve -- 25 JUDGE TINLEY: You need to identify yourself for 7-28-08 68 1 the record. 2 MS. GLOVER: I'm Sue Glover. I'm with Perdue, 3 Brandon, Fielder, Collins, and Mott. And we were here 4 several weeks ago, as y'all remember, and there were some 5 questions about our contract and making it more permissive 6 for those county offices to participate in the collection 7 program. And so Steve Lee with our office and Rex redid the 8 contract, and I think it is suitable now to everyone, in that 9 it is very permissive. And so y'all aren't -- although you 10 really couldn't, anyway; you can't act and make the J.P.'s 11 turn over their accounts or turn -- make the County Court 12 turn over their accounts, but the contract now just reads a 13 little clearer, and I think will be acceptable to everyone. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'll move approval of the 15 contract with -- with Perdue, Brandon, Fielder, Collins, and 16 Mott, for collection of delinquent -- 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Fines and fees. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- fines and fees for the 19 court. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Rex, is everyone comfortable 21 with what "delinquent" is, as per that -- that language? 22 MR. EMERSON: I couldn't tell you if everybody's 23 comfortable or not. I can tell you the term was identified, 24 and that, just as she presented, it was -- the contract was 25 relaxed to give pure autonomy to any elected official to turn 7-28-08 69 1 over cases or not. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. And to turn over the 3 cases, and to choose what cases to turn over, et cetera? You 4 know, when you were here before, we had a brand-new employee. 5 MS. GLOVER: Right. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And that was my hesitancy, 7 that we just wasn't ready to do that. But I think that we 8 are now, and I'm excited about this. And I think that she -- 9 I can't speak for her, but the -- the department head has a 10 clear understanding of how that works and what -- what is -- 11 can be handed over to you and what can't, and et cetera and 12 so forth. So, I'm certainly in favor of it. And I think 13 that there maybe are some -- right or wrong, that there are 14 some that you're willing to turn over pretty quick, huh? 15 MS. LYLE: Yes. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Was that a second? 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: All right. We have a motion and a 19 second. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: The longest second I ever 21 heard. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Any question or discussion on the 24 motion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising your 25 right hand. 7-28-08 70 1 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 2 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 3 (No response.) 4 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Ms. Glover, 5 thank you for being here. 6 MS. GLOVER: Thank y'all. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: We're going to take about a 8 15-minute recess. When we come back, I hope to address Item 9 Number 13. We'll be in recess for about 15 minutes. 10 (Recess taken from 10:32 a.m. to 10:50 a.m.) 11 - - - - - - - - - - - - 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, let's come back to order. We 13 were in recess for a short period of time. I'd like to go to 14 Item 13, if I might. We have a number of folks here for that 15 item. That item is presentation to the Court of a draft of 16 the City of Kerrville and Kerr County Economic Development 17 Incentive Policy. I put this on the agenda -- let me first 18 give a little history, if I might. As I'm sure the members 19 of the Court and some of the public recall, back in the 20 summer of '06, the City of Kerrville and Kerr County, by 21 joint resolution, authorized the development of a joint City 22 of Kerrville/Kerr County Economic Development Strategic Plan. 23 Pursuant to that resolution, a committee went to work, which 24 I was privileged to chair, and with the help of a -- I'm 25 going to say internationally known consultant, we developed, 7-28-08 71 1 over a period of about 18 months -- it got rolled out in 2 January of this year -- a comprehensive Kerrville/Kerr County 3 Economic Development Strategic Development Plan. And the 4 following month, in February of this year, that plan was 5 presented to both the City Council, the City of Kerrville, 6 and this Court, and again, by joint resolution, the strategic 7 plan was approved and adopted. And as part of that 8 resolution, there was a call, as suggested in the strategic 9 plan, for the formation of an incentives committee, an 10 economic development incentives committee, and that 11 resolution that approved the strategic plan incorporated the 12 creation of that incentives committee. 13 The committee was composed of nine members. There 14 were six of them that were identified not by name, but by 15 office, those offices consisting of Kerr County Judge, City 16 Manager of the City of Kerrville, president of the Economic 17 Improvement Corporation, the president of the Kerrville/Kerr 18 County Area Chamber of Commerce, Kerr Economic Development 19 Foundation president, and the mayor or his designee of the 20 City of Ingram. That group -- that core group was then 21 tasked with the responsibility of appointing three other 22 members to that committee, so that it comprised a total of 23 nine members. That committee was formed and began work in 24 the latter part of February, shortly after its creation, and 25 has been working ever since. I again was privileged to 7-28-08 72 1 become the chair of that committee. Mr. Paul Hofmann, the 2 City Manager of the City of Kerrville, was named vice chair, 3 and we have been working very, very hard. And last Tuesday, 4 there was a draft of that plan -- a draft, I want to 5 emphasize, that was presented to the City Council of the City 6 of Kerrville, and we are presenting that draft to you here 7 today. 8 I have a number of the members of that committee 9 here, as I've indicated, and I'd like to recognize them. 10 Mr. Paul Hofmann, City Manager of the City of Kerrville. 11 Mr. Brian Bondy, Kerrville/Kerr County Area Chamber of 12 Commerce. Mr. Warren Ferguson, a community representative on 13 that committee. Mindy Wendele, who was a very valuable 14 resource to that committee, and I think got tasked with a 15 good deal of the heavy lifting, and we appreciate that. And 16 then we have Guy Overby with the Kerr Economic Development 17 Foundation on the committee also. But with that 18 introduction, I'd like to now turn it over to Guy Overby with 19 KEDF for a short presentation. 20 MR. OVERBY: Thank you, Judge and County 21 Commissioners. Good to be with you today. I was glad that 22 the Judge -- I know he briefed you on some of the history of 23 the Economic Development Strategic Plan. I also want to take 24 it back even a couple years before the strategic plan. I've 25 kept this in this file, and it's constantly a reminder to us, 7-28-08 73 1 but back in 2004, in April, by Order Number 28618, the Kerr 2 County Commissioners Court voted unanimously to have the 3 County to review and study and recommend local government 4 incentives to help expansion of businesses and operations in 5 Kerr County, and it urged KEDF to help in that and lead in 6 those responsibilities of working with economic partners. 7 I'm pleased today to come to you and present to you, again, 8 as the Judge has said, a draft of recommendations that could 9 fulfill that order that you had requested back in 2004. I 10 know that seems like a long time, but we have covered a lot 11 of extensive base to get there, and I think that the drafted 12 document that we have today is a very positive move for our 13 community. 14 As the Judge has said, this is a draft. The 15 incentive committee that was formed by the resolutions that 16 you unanimously supported took their job very seriously. We 17 have looked at 12 different other communities, counties, 18 cities in our area to look at what type of incentives were 19 out there to help encourage business development and 20 expansion opportunities. We wanted to be sure what we were 21 offering were incentives that would help in those areas, but 22 we wanted to know what -- what we would be offering as far as 23 helping those developments. If you -- one of the things that 24 was called for in the economic development strategic plan 25 as we started talking about incentive development was to be 7-28-08 74 1 sure that we weren't giving away the farm in Kerrville and 2 Kerr County. We do have that quality of life that we have 3 here that we cherish, very much so. And so the -- always, 4 there's a caution for us in our strategic plan to tell us, 5 you know, not to give away the farm, but to offer different 6 type of incentives that would be made available to help those 7 business opportunities in our community. 8 If you would go to Page 2 -- and, again, I don't 9 mean to belabor a lot of things. I want to hit highlights 10 with you today. Even since this last draft, in the last 11 week, we've framed some different document and wording on 12 some of the draft that will be final -- in its final 13 presentation we hope to get along here pretty soon. But on 14 Page 2, I want to read just some of the procedures and how 15 the scoring of incentives would be, and it will talk about 16 some of those and how they would apply. The procedure, the 17 City of Kerrville Business Programs, under Kerr Economic 18 Development Foundation, will accept applications for projects 19 at any time. Applications will not be considered until 20 complete. Applications must be available to present projects 21 to the full membership of the incentive committee, or 22 designated subcommittee of the incentive committee, or both, 23 as the Judge has clearly identified those members. 24 Eligible projects can be projects within the city 25 of limits of Kerrville and within Kerr County. Applicants 7-28-08 75 1 may be businesses currently located in the city of Kerrville 2 or Kerr County, as we just stated. Each project must be in 3 compliance with all legal requirements and all plans that 4 government entities have in place, as far as that they would 5 need to follow. All projects will be required to provide an 6 economic impact analysis, or EIA analysis, including a return 7 on capital -- a return on investment calculation, job 8 creation impact analysis, and tax base adjustments, so that 9 we can look at what type of jobs, what type of wages, what 10 type of capital investment's going to be invested in our 11 community. If an applicant cannot make an economic 12 development argument along with one or more of the above 13 mentioned priorities or strategies, the applicant need not 14 apply, as the projects will not be processed. It is not the 15 intent of the policy to consider a project that is already 16 underway as originally planned when application is received. 17 The scoring of points, as our incentive committee 18 looked at the scoring, how we would evaluate, we found the 19 way that we wanted to score and the recommendation that we 20 would present to our government entities is that we wanted to 21 score it on 50 percent of capital investment and 50 percent 22 on workforce or wages in our community. Basically, each 23 project will be scored on a case-by-case basis, considering 24 added value and/or jobs created. Scoring weights for the 25 capital investment will be a maximum of 50 percent of the 7-28-08 76 1 total score, and wage and workforce, as I said, will be a 2 combined score of 50 percent. Large projects that are over 3 and beyond what we would have here mentioned in our deal will 4 be presented -- may be reviewed for maximum or other type of 5 incentives in that situation. And what would happen, again, 6 the project is considered to be -- among other things, a 7 project is considered to be a target industry type if it fits 8 within the economic development strategic plan approved by 9 the Kerrville City Council and Kerrville County Commissioners 10 in February, and shall be eligible for an incentive only upon 11 finding by the incentive committee that the project will make 12 a unique contribution to the economy, development, 13 redevelopment, tourism, or employment opportunities. 14 As we go through, you're going to see on Pages 3 15 and through 4, 5, and 6, but 3, 6, and 7, there are different 16 ways of -- different opportunities that may be created 17 through incentives that may be necessary in different areas. 18 We're going to -- they could be coming through unidentified 19 areas, maybe through the Kerrville Enterprise Zone. There 20 may be some airport development areas that are designated. 21 There may be some reinvestment zones that would be identified 22 that we would use some of those tools in. And then there are 23 also available to our government entities several incentive 24 tools, but I'm going to speak specifically on one here in 25 just a moment. That would be a major tool that you would 7-28-08 77 1 consider as far as our economic incentive policy or 2 recommendations would be. 3 But I do want to mention some of the other 4 incentive tools that government entities have. Of course, 5 the 4B sales tax is a great incentive in our community. 6 That's the half-cent sales tax that's accepted -- that's 7 collected here in city limits, but it's used on projects in 8 and out of Kerrville and Kerr County, like the Hill Country 9 Shooting Sports Center. Some other things could be waiver of 10 fees, especially -- that would be, like, from the City of 11 Kerrville. Other incentives would be like the state 12 increment financing, such as a TIF, a Section 380 grant. 13 Those are just some of those incentives that could be used. 14 And then, of course, other examples of incentives could be 15 the Freeport exemption that sets out -- like at the airport, 16 and some other things that the governor may have, like the 17 Texas Enterprise Fund, Texas Leverage Fund, et cetera. But 18 today we're going to talk about abatements. I know you hear 19 the word "abatements," and sometimes people go, "Oh," 20 especially, you know, in your communities. But we would want 21 to use that as incentives, is what we're looking at. 22 Again, I want to come back to the point we talked 23 about earlier, that our -- our strategic plan and our 24 economic incentives committee -- again, remembering that 25 we're not trying to give away the farm, but we're trying to 7-28-08 78 1 encourage opportunities to help our capital investment and 2 our wages in our community. If you would go to Page 4 -- and 3 I know that we're coming back here, but I want to kind of go 4 over with you some things as far as how the scoring formula 5 would be on a tax abatement scale. If we looked at capital 6 investment, basically, we look at how we would score one 7 point for every $200,000 invested. Basically, you would cap 8 out at 15 points for capital improvement. The total maximum 9 score that you would score on an application would be 30 10 points, 15 points on capital investment and the other 15 11 points is going to come from wages and workforce training 12 investment in your community. So, those are the two scales 13 that we're going to have, but when we look at capital 14 investment, $200,000 of investment, capped at 3 million for 15 new -- for a business expansion opportunity, could get them 16 15 points in the scoring system. One point will be scored 17 for every 10 permanent, full-time, qualified employees who 18 are going to be compensated at 50 percent of what our current 19 wages are in our community and what the state income is right 20 now per job. 21 Right now in Kerr County, our wages per full-time 22 job is at 71 percent of what the state level is. What we're 23 trying to do to our businesses that want to expand or they're 24 trying to grow here -- and we know that they can't close that 25 wage gap from 71 percent, where we are now, to 100 percent, 7-28-08 79 1 but if they can help close that gap to half of it, that's 2 going to be a scoring point for them, as far as helping their 3 business with those scoring points for that project. I also 4 want to mention to you that for businesses that have maybe 5 five employees or seven employees -- let's say five, for 6 example. Let's say that they're adding two jobs to their 7 company. We see that as a 40 percent growth. And if they're 8 going to be paying those wages and they're going to help 9 close that gap in our area here, that's just as significant 10 as a big company that's coming in on a bigger scale, and 11 we're obviously going to give them an incentive to try to 12 help their business to grow and expand in our area. 13 We need to remember that 85 percent of our growth 14 in the next five to eight years in our community is going to 15 come from existing businesses that are already here, so our 16 growth is going to be coming from the guys that are here, 17 that are established, that are trying to grow to that next 18 tier, and we need to be doing incentives to help them grow as 19 far as those can be reached. So, with that, if we look at 20 employees, they could score up to 10 points for jobs that 21 they have, as far as what they're adding. And then, also, 22 workforce development, they can score 5 points for every 23 $25,000 invested in workforce training. Coming next month -- 24 gosh, Friday is August, so it's next month -- you're going to 25 see -- if you haven't read the newspaper, I know you guys 7-28-08 80 1 pretty well know what's going on. The Alamo Community 2 College District, with Kerrville Independent School District, 3 will be starting a community college basically here on the 4 temporary building on Sidney Baker, the old math building, 5 science building at Tivy High School, and then would be 6 looking at a permanent facility at the old Tivy Elementary 7 School in the '09-'10 year. But what we're looking at there 8 is, we're also going to have some college courses there to 9 help folks to get -- get part of the associate's degree -- 10 get them interested in going to college and what's going to 11 be happening. 12 We're trying to -- we have 40 percent of our kids 13 that who are graduating from high school today in Kerr County 14 who are not going on to get further education. We're trying 15 to give them opportunities to get some education and 16 workforce training. And some of the workforce training that 17 we're already starting to look at for this year that will be 18 in place will be health care, will be the C.N.A. program, 19 which is not -- which will complement the L.V.N. and R.N. 20 program at Schreiner University, welding classes, and 21 construction classes, and so some of those courses we're 22 going to start putting in. So, we're starting to teach 23 safety courses, the basic courses, blueprint reading and all 24 those things, and keep continually building that way. But 25 our investment's here. If a company is wanting to expand or 7-28-08 81 1 get incentives, if they're investing in workforce 2 development, we want to give them an incentive for that type 3 of investment what they're doing. 4 If an application comes in and scores less than 10 5 points, that application is -- is not accepted. It would not 6 be considered for that incentive. Now, businesses that have 7 their current bases here that are expanding, a business 8 expansion opportunity here, we've geared our incentives to 9 really maximize the businesses that are here currently. So, 10 I know a lot of folks say, you know, "Well, maybe this is 11 just gearing for new businesses." Actually, it's a better 12 incentive for our existing businesses. And so what we've 13 done for business expansion opportunities, those businesses 14 that score between 11 and 15 points, which qualify for -- and 15 we have two scales of abatements that we would recommend to 16 you. There is a five-year abatement scale, and then if they 17 score between 16 and 30 points on their application, they 18 could score a seven-year type of abatement schedule. And 19 then new businesses, 11 to 18 would score -- it would be a 20 five-year abatement; 19 to 24 would be seven, and 25 to 30 21 would be reviewed, as we talked about earlier. There would 22 be clawbacks, and there would be performances that they would 23 have to meet. Those would be placed in the contract -- that 24 language be placed in the contract on what type of jobs that 25 they would have to maintain, the wages, and what their 7-28-08 82 1 commitment would be in the community. 2 On Page 11 -- I'll try to move this as quickly 3 along as we can. I don't want to take all your time, but I 4 do think it's very important to kind of give you the basis of 5 it. When we're looking at businesses that are expanding 6 here, the minimum capital investment for business expansion 7 today for this incentive to apply would be $500,000. It's a 8 half a million dollars. Basically, when we look at that, 9 they can score 10 points for a business expansion right off 10 the bat for that kind of investment scoring in our community. 11 A half million dollars. For a new business coming in, it 12 would be 750,000. Again, with the scale on Page 11, when you 13 look at a maximum incentive of 15 points, it would be capped 14 at 3 million. And then, of course, the other points that 15 would be scored would be workforce training, workforce 16 development, to give that possible maximum scoring of 30 17 points. And the same thing would be on Page 12. 18 What I would like to do very quickly is just kind 19 of give you a hypothetical situation, an example of how a 20 business expansion opportunity would happen. Actually, the 21 two examples that we're going to give to you are two true 22 stories in the Kerrville area. Here is an example here on 23 Page 12 where a business owner currently owns 4 acres of 24 land. His current facility is 7,500 square feet. His 25 company is employing 15 workers in our community. They pay 7-28-08 83 1 $12 an hour, with an annual salary of $25,000. The company 2 is currently offering medical coverage to all their 3 employees. The company has requested a tax abatement from 4 our government entities in our community, and they would like 5 to know what type of -- through their application, what their 6 scoring might be for those incentives. The company is -- 7 what they're telling you, what they would like to do is they 8 would like to expand their current site with an additional 9 12,500 square feet. The company wants to add 20 more 10 employees, and increase their wages to $14 an hour, with an 11 average salary of 29,120. And the company has also mentioned 12 to us that if they're successful in expanding their business 13 here, that they possibly may have a supplier company that may 14 be moving into our community also. And the company says, "We 15 want to invest in workforce training, $25,000." 16 And so, with that, our incentives committee could 17 take our possible examples here from our incentive areas and 18 we could review and recommend the following. We know that 19 with the expansion of 12,500 square feet and building at $125 20 a square foot, we're looking at about $1.5 million, and 21 basically how we would score that, we would give them 10 22 points for the first 500,000 automatically, and then we -- 23 remember, we have a cap of 3 million. And from 500,000 to 24 3 million, every -- from that situation, every 500,000 up, 25 they're going to get a point, 'cause we're going to give them 7-28-08 84 1 the maximum 10 points rights off the bat so they qualify. 2 So, with a $1.5 million investment, they get two additional 3 points, so they would be scored 12 points on Page 13, as far 4 as that scoring is concerned. As far as wages and workforce 5 that's added to our community, they would get 3 points with 6 the investment of $25,000, and the additional benefits 7 closing on our salaries in our community. They would be 8 scored 15 points, and therefore, the incentive committee 9 could recommend the following to our government entities as 10 far as incentive for them. 11 They would qualify, back on Page 4, in the 11- to 12 15-point scoring system, and they would come in on a 13 five-year abated scale. How that would be broken down in the 14 five-year scale you see on Page 13. We would recommend a 15 40 percent, 30, 20, 10 percent case scenario over the five 16 years, with the maximum one and two. On Page 14, as far as 17 the Kerr County tax abatement or incentive, I know that we 18 can say that for the company, this particular situation, over 19 five years, the total new tax created would have been 20 $28,000. The County's incentives to that company would have 21 been about 7,900. Kerr County's new tax revenue with that 22 current business expansion would have been about $20,000. 23 And then, of course, the City of Kerrville would have their 24 numbers also plugged in with that. I remind you that the 25 Kerrville Independent School District is not allowed by law 7-28-08 85 1 to participate in those type of incentives. And so, again, 2 what we're looking at here as far as what we have as 3 incentives, that would be for our government entities. 4 The following on Page 14 is an example of a 5 business attraction or a new business to our community. 6 You'll see some of the names that we use on there. Sometimes 7 you've got to be creative in what you're thinking about. The 8 name of this example here was the Ichabod Crane Company 9 requested tax abatement to develop a new retail location in 10 Kerrville/Kerr County. They have requested economic 11 incentives. This is the business data that they have shared 12 with us. The company has acquired 35 acres at an 13 intersection near two major highways with high traffic 14 volume. The company purchased agricultural-exempt property 15 for $2 million for new development. The company store will 16 be 95,000 square feet; they got a sweet deal where they're 17 going to be doing the construction cost at $40 a square foot. 18 The company will employ 120 employees. And I want to mention 19 this right here. Of the 120 employees that are employed, 20 5 percent of the employees will be management and have an 21 annual salary of 50,000; 40 percent, or 46 of the employees, 22 would have a wage of $10 an hour, or $21,000 annual, but they 23 will have medical coverage. But 68 of the employees will 24 have an average wage of $10 per hour, but part-time jobs. 25 The company also tells us, well, they want to be 7-28-08 86 1 involved in the community and be more involved with economic 2 partners and our activities. How would we score that? The 3 capital investment, of course, with 95,000 square feet, with 4 a capital investment of 3.8 million, they would get the 5 maximum amount that they could for their capital investment 6 in our community of 15 points. In this scenario, because the 7 jobs that they're creating in our community do not help us 8 with our wages and closing the gap that we're doing in our 9 community -- actually, it's putting more of a strain on our 10 community -- they would receive zero points for workforce or 11 workforce training investment in our community. So, 12 therefore, what we would recommend to the Crane Company would 13 be, again, a five-year abatement to them scaled out with 15 14 points. Basically, how that would look as far as the Kerr 15 County incentives would be, basically, new tax created over 16 the five years would have been $68,250. The incentive given 17 to them would have been $19,110 from Kerr County, and the new 18 tax revenue for the county would have been $49,140. 19 Basically, if we had taken what also they had received from 20 the City, their total incentive would have been about $45,000 21 as far as that's concerned. 22 Just a couple of other closing things. I did want 23 to let you know that we've talked about the process and the 24 application process, all of that. There on the last -- on 25 Page 16 was another example of how incentives might be given, 7-28-08 87 1 and again, that was an example, more of the Commerce Park, as 2 far as other alternatives that we could do. But with that, I 3 just wanted to -- to state to you today that, again, the 4 committee has done a lot of work, and they have really taken 5 their challenge as far as what the incentives committee is 6 trying to do on that strategic plan, you know, other things 7 that we're looking at, and we're making sure that we have all 8 type of information as far as what we can do for incentives. 9 We can carry that into the housing and different things that 10 we're looking at. And -- and the good thing about this type 11 of incentive recommendation to you today is that it will be 12 reviewed annually and it can be adjusted as we need to as we 13 go by. But we've looked at a lot of things here as far as 14 investment and job creation or in our community. And with 15 that, I'll be quiet. Thank you, Judge. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Guy? 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Questions? 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is -- is this -- how does this 19 draft recommendation compare with other communities? 20 MR. OVERBY: I would -- and, Commissioner Letz, as 21 earlier before, I said that we had talked with 12 others. I 22 would say that our draft is -- I wouldn't say that it's 23 very -- very on the top end of that. In fact, I think that 24 we have -- this committee and our community, we've taken it 25 to the point where it's really a very good incentive and a 7-28-08 88 1 good document for our community, and to encourage business 2 expansion. I mean, we have -- we have looked at several 3 communities. We wanted to make sure that we weren't out of 4 line with what we were doing. We wanted to be very 5 pro-economic development in our communities, but keep that 6 same type of quality of life that we have -- you know, what 7 we have in our communities, but we also needed to make sure 8 that we invest back in our workforce, because the workforce 9 issue for us needs to be our incentive that we're looking at. 10 We're not going to solve our workforce issues outside of Kerr 11 County. We're going to have to do it internally, and with 12 programs like the K.I.S.D. with A.C.C.D., that helps Center 13 Point, Ingram, our folks in Hunt, everybody. You know, we 14 got to make sure those incentives can help that. And so I 15 think that our document -- I'd like to say that we're on the 16 -- the cutting edge, really, of where we need to be as far as 17 incentives, and to offer that type of stimulus in our 18 community. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Essentially, we're competitive. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I commend you and the 21 committee for their development of this draft. I like what I 22 see. I do have a question. Inasmuch as the Airport Board 23 seems to be heading for total independence, we believe, and 24 that they are, in fact, the keepers of the airport master 25 plan, would it not be appropriate in the review process for 7-28-08 89 1 the Airport Board to be a part of the review process for 2 anything the that takes place on the airport? 3 MR. OVERBY: I would think so. As far as sharing 4 this information with them? 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No, I'm talking about -- I 6 was looking at procedure, and -- 7 MR. OVERBY: Uh-huh. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- those who would be 9 involved in the review process. 10 MR. OVERBY: Okay. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: The airport master plan is 12 a separate document, and it is -- and it is commissioned by 13 the Airport Board. 14 MR. OVERBY: Okay. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And administered by the 16 Airport Board. My question is, should they not have -- have 17 a piece of the review process for anything that takes place 18 on the airport? Just a thought. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Let me see if I can -- I think I 20 know where you're coming from. I think, necessarily, the 21 Airport Board -- when a proposal is submitted to the Airport 22 Board, for example, on some of their -- their facilities out 23 there, or a new building to be constructed, there's 24 necessarily going to have to be involvement with the 25 incentives committee, and I know that, internally, the -- the 7-28-08 90 1 Airport Board could offer some incentives of their own. 2 Reduced lease rate for an initial period of time, or some 3 other -- some other creative method of trying to get 4 development out there at that airport. But I see that there 5 would necessarily be, at the very least, an informational 6 exchange as between the Airport Board and the incentives 7 committee. I -- I just don't see it happening without that 8 if it involves the airport. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's really my concern. 10 I want to make sure they're involved in the review process. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. Any other questions for -- 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. Let's go back to the 13 Crane Company. 14 MR. OVERBY: Okay. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: They have created 120 new 16 jobs. 17 MR. OVERBY: Yes, sir. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And the percentage of the 19 abatement through the years goes down from 40 percent down to 20 10 percent through five years, -- 21 MR. OVERBY: Yes, sir. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- is what I'm understanding 23 here. Now, is that -- is that an automatic number? It's 24 built into the original agreement? Or is it tied in any way 25 to productivity? In other words -- in other words, if they 7-28-08 91 1 say they're going to create 120 new jobs -- see, I've been 2 hung up for years in this thing. If they don't create 120 3 jobs, you don't get the full deal, cowboy. 4 MR. OVERBY: Well, that's correct, Commissioner. 5 And in this particular example here, the jobs didn't score 6 any incentive, so, basically, that wasn't even considered. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. 8 MR. OVERBY: Because they were -- actually were 9 causing more of a barrier in our community, because they were 10 not increasing the wages. They were bringing jobs, but they 11 were jobs that were actually putting more of a strain on our 12 local community, so we didn't even scale that 120 in that 13 situation. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see that. Very good. 15 MR. OVERBY: And there would be clawbacks in that 16 scale that you're talking about, Commissioner. They have to 17 adhere to those -- those numbers. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I thought I heard you say 19 that early on, but I wasn't sure. 20 MR. OVERBY: Yes, sir. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I went into a coma there for 22 a minute. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: On Page 2, under the procedure, 24 the City of Kerrville Business Programs, what is that? The 25 applications, how -- who decides who handles the proposal? I 7-28-08 92 1 mean, how -- who is running with it? 2 MR. OVERBY: I think in this -- Commissioner, in 3 this example here is -- is where they can drop those -- they 4 can pick up an application and where they can be dropped off 5 at, in this particular question right -- that first line 6 there. So, a lot of times, like in my office at the Economic 7 Development office, we're going to have -- I'm going to say 8 we're going to have a good majority of the folks, when they 9 first come in to get connected in the community, we're going 10 to help. That's what our job is to do. I think a lot of 11 times, if they're coming in, they're wanting to know what 12 incentives would be there. In that situation, we would 13 accept those applications on behalf of the incentive 14 committee, and so that's how that process would go. So, it 15 may go to Mindy's office. They may come downtown. They may 16 be a Main Street business downtown who's filled out an 17 application and submitted it to her office, and then the 18 committee would come back and review that. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, the incentives committee 20 reviews all the applications regardless of where it is, 21 whether it's city or county? 22 MR. OVERBY: Yes, sir. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Or a combination? 24 MR. OVERBY: That's correct. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Then they make a 7-28-08 93 1 recommendation to the appropriate agency? 2 MR. OVERBY: That's correct. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Any more questions for Mr. Overby? 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Just one quickie, Judge. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Sure. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Who are Community 7 Representatives 1 and 2? What is that designation all about? 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Great question. Diane Green and 9 Dr. Dan Troxel are the other two community members on the 10 committee. I apologize for omitting that. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay, thank you. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: They're the other two. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: As has been pointed out, this is 15 given to you for informational purposes. At this time, it is 16 a draft. As recently as last Friday, we -- we did some 17 restructuring and a few other things, and the substantive 18 portions of the draft will likely not change much, if at all. 19 We're trying to organize the document to make it flow a 20 little better and to make it more understandable, but it is a 21 draft, and there will be corrections or will be changes. And 22 we know, as the process goes on, that it's not going to be 23 perfect. We're going to have to -- we're going to have to 24 make changes as we go. We hope to bring the final document 25 back to you for consideration and approval, along with the 7-28-08 94 1 Kerrville City Council, in early September. That's -- that's 2 the timeline that we've got built in, so we want to give you 3 as much heads up on it as we can. As we rework these drafts, 4 we'll get them to you, and -- but we'll be coming to you for 5 final approval in the not-too-distant future. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, the court order went out 7 in 2004 for y'all to do this. Let's see, that's 2004 -- 8 MR. OVERBY: I know. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let me do some math here. 10 And then this report -- I understood you to say the report -- 11 this report came out in January, and here we are right in the 12 middle of the budget. Let me think how this works. Is there 13 any relationship at all? 14 JUDGE TINLEY: No, sir. No, sir, there's not. 15 Actually, the -- this whole process did not begin until the 16 summer of '06. 17 MR. OVERBY: That's correct. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: When we launched the serious effort 19 on economic development to develop the strategic plan. That 20 took a year and a half, and then the resolution which 21 approved it in February created this committee of -- in this 22 year, and this is what we're coming with. I think rather 23 quickly, as a matter of fact. 24 MR. OVERBY: I would say a lot of the other 25 communities that we reviewed, to take the time that we've 7-28-08 95 1 done, I know it sounds -- Commissioner, that sounds like a 2 long time, but to do the strategic plan and to encompass 3 everybody and to have kind of a unified deal for economic 4 development, I think it speaks volumes for our area. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Appreciate your work. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Judge, any suggestions that 7 we might have with respect to this while it's still in draft 8 form, do we channel them through you? 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Absolutely. Absolutely. The 10 committee -- we've been meeting twice a month. We've been 11 destroying everybody's Friday mornings, and -- and 12 essentially taken all Friday morning twice a month. And 13 we'll meet again first -- second Friday, I guess, in August, 14 and we'll look at what we did last Friday, which was -- there 15 were some significant changes; not really that substantive, 16 but from an organizational and clarification standpoint. But 17 we just want you to be in the loop, and as we get additional 18 drafts, we'll provide them to you. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Very good. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Appreciate you gentlemen being here. 21 And, Mindy, thank you for being here. I failed to mention 22 that Mindy's the Director of Business Programs for the City 23 of Kerrville, and that's why she's one of the other two 24 natural conduits for this process to get initiated in, both 25 through Mr. Overby at KEDF or with Mindy as Director of 7-28-08 96 1 Business Programs, if they're coming through the -- through 2 the city channels. And that's how these things normally 3 originate, and they'll probably be the lead persons in all 4 this, naturally. Thank you. Appreciate you being here. 5 Okay. Now we can get back to where we were. Item 6 5; consider, discuss, take appropriate action to release the 7 Letter of Credit Number 7080351 for the roads in Estates of 8 Johnson Creek, and located in Precinct 4. Good morning. 9 MS. HOFER: I'm Kelly Hofer with Road and Bridge. 10 I'm filling in for Leonard this morning. The road in the 11 Estates of Johnson Creek has been completed, inspected, and 12 approved for some time. It is a private road and will not be 13 maintained by Kerr County. Therefore, the Letter of Credit 14 Number 7080351 for $7,110 should be released. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: So moved. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 18 approval of the agenda item to release the letter of credit. 19 Question or discussion on that motion? All in favor of the 20 motion, signify by raising your right hand. 21 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 22 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 23 (No response.) 24 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. We'll move 25 to Item 9; consider, discuss, take appropriate action to 7-28-08 97 1 approve the Maintenance Department to go out for bids on 2 three interior walls for the maintenance shop at Hill Country 3 Youth Exhibit Center, one 12-by-10 rollup door, one 10-by-10 4 rollup door, and one 3-by-7 walk-through door with hardware. 5 Commissioner Oehler? 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I talked to Tim about it. 7 We've had this in the plans for quite a while. The slab has 8 been poured, and feel like we ought to go out for bids to get 9 this maintenance shop closed in with the doors and all. And 10 I asked Tim to go out and figure up -- figure out what he 11 wanted, and then we'll put the specifications if it's 12 approved and go out for bids to be constructed, the walls. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: My only question is, is there 14 any way we can add more to this? 'Cause this -- because if 15 we're doing this bit by bit, every time we do it, we have to 16 have a formal, full presentation, and it costs the government 17 money. Can't we combine more bidding, rather than just three 18 doors? 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, it's three walls and 20 three doors. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Oh. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: This is to close it in, and 23 that is all -- it will be all of that project. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It is? 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: There's nothing else to do 7-28-08 98 1 until we get ready to do some more substantial work, like on 2 the concession. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: How's this tie in with the 4 fair people's desire to have storage space? 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think the next item 6 addresses that. They're already -- they already have a bid 7 in-hand, and they're closing in their portion, and we thought 8 it would be a good idea maybe to do it all at the same time. 9 And if it happened to be the same contractor, fine, but if we 10 get a -- a better figure when we go out for bids -- but 11 they're the next item, is to -- 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: These three items are going 13 to be over 25,000? 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No, but the whole project's 15 going to total out close to that, and that's where we get 16 into trouble if we don't bid. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Even though we're doing it 18 in-house, most -- a lot of it in-house, the whole project, I 19 think every time we buy a light bulb, we got to bid. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Is that right, Mr. County 21 Attorney? 22 MR. EMERSON: Short of light bulbs, yes. 23 (Laughter.) 24 JUDGE TINLEY: When in doubt? 25 MR. EMERSON: Yes, sir. 7-28-08 99 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And this is not -- I don't 3 think the bid process is going to be -- it's not a big -- a 4 big deal. The specs are very simple. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's just every time we do it, 6 we have to advertise in the paper, and that's the cost part 7 of it. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That keeps us out of jail and 9 maybe still here in the job that we presently have. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Move approval. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Stated very bluntly. 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I second it. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a motion and a second for 14 approval. Question or discussion? All in favor of the 15 motion, signify by raising your right hand. 16 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 17 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 18 (No response.) 19 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion carries. We'll go to 20 Item 10; consider, discuss, take appropriate action to 21 approve reimbursement to the Kerr County Fair Association for 22 one-half of the interior wall at Hill Country Youth Exhibit 23 Center. Commissioner Oehler? 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Mr. Bollier, it's your turn. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 7-28-08 100 1 MR. BOLLIER: Well, we're -- the shop -- where our 2 maintenance shop is, it's in the middle. The Fair 3 Association is on the river side. And when they get through, 4 whoever's going to do their wall work is going to come in 5 there and put all four walls in there, and that wall 6 separates us from them. So, what I'm asking is for us to 7 help them pay for half of that. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: So, we got a common wall with the 9 Fair Association? 10 MR. BOLLIER: Yes, sir. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: You want to split the cost of that 12 wall? We're going to do three of our own walls on the last 13 item, and we're going to split the cost, is what you're 14 asking, for the fourth wall? 15 MR. BOLLIER: Yes, sir. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's what the Fair 17 Association contacted us and asked, for us to please do that. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And I -- 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You need a court order to do 21 that? 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, if we're going to spend 23 money on it. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'll make the motion to 7-28-08 101 1 approve. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a motion and second for 3 approval of the agenda item. Question or discussion on the 4 motion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising your 5 right hand. 6 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 7 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 8 (No response.) 9 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. Let's go to 10 Item 11; consider, discuss, take appropriate action on 11 imposition of optional local fees in addition to registration 12 fee as provided by Chapter 502 of the Texas Transportation 13 Code. The State reminded me again, for the umpteenth time 14 each year, that we have the ability to impose additional fees 15 in addition to the $10 state registration fee every time 16 somebody comes and registers a vehicle. But in order to do 17 that, we've got to have a court order to make that happen. 18 The child safety fee, it's an optional fee that can be not 19 less than 50 cents or more than $1.50 that we can add onto 20 the registration fee. That's our other option. In prior 21 years we've declined to approve that, but have rather, just 22 for the coming year, approved the option to continue to do 23 the $10 county road and bridge fee on there. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, my choice is to keep 25 doing what we've been doing. Fees are an easy thing to grab 7-28-08 102 1 ahold of and raise funds and all that all the time, but I -- 2 I don't think that's the correct way to run a government. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Could this fee be used to 4 offset some of the, I guess, entities that we fund through 5 the County-sponsored, like this -- I'm looking at the child 6 abuse stuff and some of that stuff that the County Judge 7 does. Can we use that as a source to fund that? 8 JUDGE TINLEY: The information from TexDOT says 9 this fee is used for providing school crossing guard 10 services, and I don't know that we provide any of that. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Our constables do that some. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: With remaining money used for 13 programs to enhance child safety, health, or nutrition, 14 including child abuse intervention and prevention and drug 15 and alcohol abuse prevention. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All on 50 cents, huh? 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, or up to a dollar and a half. 18 What is our -- what is our $10 -- how much money does that 19 raise, off the top of your head, if you know? 20 MS. BOLIN: Not off the top of my head, I don't 21 know, but I know that it's -- 22 JUDGE TINLEY: How many vehicles do we register a 23 year in this county? 24 MS. BOLIN: We register about 55,000. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Half a million bucks. 7-28-08 103 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's half a million 2 dollars. Over half. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, a dollar is going to make, 5 you know, -- 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: 55,000. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- $55,000. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Wouldn't you think that it 9 would be good to have some kind of -- some -- somebody coming 10 forward asking for money for a specific purpose before we 11 implement it? 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We do it now. We do it every 13 year. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'm talking about the $1.50 15 maximum. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean the -- 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Child safety. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm saying we're already doing 19 the alcohol and child abuse -- the Judge's stuff. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: We have some -- I'm going to call 21 them social service agencies, for lack of a better term, that 22 we provide funding to, primarily because they provide 23 services to our courts, a lot of them dealing with -- with 24 children and others dealing with children and adults. 25 Literacy, for example. 7-28-08 104 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, will this help to 2 offset the cost to the taxpayers as far as the property tax 3 issue goes? Rather than having to pay it out of what we get 4 in property taxes, this fund established at a dollar per 5 registration could go toward paying those services? 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. Yeah, it -- 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's a tax to residents, but 8 we'd change it from property tax to vehicle tax. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: What about the D.A.R.E. 10 program? The County doesn't pay for much of it, except for 11 the salary of the officer that instructs that; pay that 12 year-round. Can that be used to pay that salary? 13 JUDGE TINLEY: I want to go look at the specific 14 statute before I make any specific commitments. What I -- 15 what I just mentioned was from the TexDOT transmittal, where 16 they talk about what these funds can be used for. But -- 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Not a huge amount of money, but 18 it -- you know, the $10,000, $15,000 we send to some of the 19 agencies -- 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Does this require us to 21 provide the service, Judge, or could we fund -- use these 22 dollars to fund other agencies that do currently provide 23 those services? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Without looking at the specific 25 statute, I couldn't tell you. I would suspect that as long 7-28-08 105 1 as you expended it to an agency that provided those services, 2 you're probably going to be okay, though. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It also could be -- I mean, I'm 4 just thinking again, without looking at the details -- some 5 of the work that Ms. Lavender does, doesn't she get involved 6 with a lot of child abuse and situations like that? I mean, 7 that's crime -- 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Crime victims. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Crime victims. A lot of that 10 which it's always hard to find a source of revenue for. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What about child welfare? 12 The Child Welfare Board. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. Yeah. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, it's just -- 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: But, you know, I would hate 16 to see us adopt something, then we -- we're not sure that we 17 can use it for that. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I agree with that. We need to 19 make sure -- 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do we have to do it today? 21 JUDGE TINLEY: No. No. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Can we ask the County 23 Attorney to tell us? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, we sure could. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: He knew that was coming. 7-28-08 106 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Be a great idea to find out 3 what we're going to use it for before we just all of a sudden 4 start charging a fee. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I agree. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: There is a requirement that we 7 notify TexDOT by September 1st of each year whether or not 8 we'll stick with what we got, or we're going to do something 9 different. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: September 1. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: So we do have the time, if you want 12 to pass it. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: First meeting in August? 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Sure. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You didn't know that was 17 coming. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: He already made the notes. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: He probably already has the 20 answer. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Item 12; consider, discuss, 22 take appropriate action regarding the restoration-slash- 23 replacement of courthouse windows. Our six months moratorium 24 with the Texas Historical Commission, as required by law, has 25 run, and we are now in a position to take whatever action we 7-28-08 107 1 deem appropriate for our windows in the older part of the 2 courthouse. The funding that we put in the capital projects 3 was how much? 4 MS. HARGIS: 350,000. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Just for the windows? 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I thought it was 180. 7 MS. HARGIS: The total project for construction at 8 the courthouse is 350,000. I don't remember the exact figure 9 for the windows. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. You have a summary sheet in 11 the backup material that gives you kind of the chronology, 12 and secondly, what kind of response we got from -- and what I 13 got were ballpark estimates, one of the restorations being 14 about $1,500 per window. The other one indicating -- that's 15 restoration, now -- 265,000 from an outfit out of Lubbock 16 that appears to have the inside track on courthouses, for 17 some reason. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Looks that way. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: The other option, of course, that we 20 have is to write some specs to submit to outside vendors 21 for -- for new windows, if we decide to go that route, either 22 double, or even single sash, where you don't have the ability 23 to even open the window, probably with wood interior and no 24 maintenance, to the degree there is such, that exists on the 25 exterior, and low-E glass. 7-28-08 108 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What -- I'd kind of like more 2 information before we do anything. I mean, I'd like to see 3 if we're going to -- like to see what the new windows that 4 are not in compliance look like, kind of know the detail on 5 that, and I'd like to find out exactly what the $1,500 per 6 window total would be. How many windows do we have? 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Seventy-seven. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Seventy-seven. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Seventy-seven times 1,500. So, 10 one of them's -- one of them's quite a bit cheaper. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Oh, yeah. One of them's 12 significantly cheaper, yeah. The windows, if they're 13 fabricated new windows to replace these, in appearance, would 14 be very, very close to what we currently have. The specs, in 15 my mind, would include that we would use as much of the 16 interior trim and facing as we have there now; that the 17 interior portion of the windows that are fabricated, and they 18 would be fabricated, would be wood which is capable of being 19 stained to match the trims that exist. The exterior would be 20 of a color -- be metal clad, but they will be of a color 21 which essentially matched up with what the exterior looks 22 like now. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, the bids we got, 24 Judge, the -- the outfit out of Lubbock, he lists about 12 25 different items that he would do. The other fellow only says 7-28-08 109 1 that he will repair, strip, and reglaze at $1,500 a window. 2 Is there something missing here? 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Well -- 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We had some of that done a 5 few years ago, and I don't think it held up very well. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's kind of why I'm 7 asking. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: I asked for a ballpark estimate, and 9 it's also based upon my -- my indication that most of the 10 windows that are repairable -- some are probably painted 11 shut -- very little, if any, interior repairs or painting 12 should be required. That's -- that was the criteria that was 13 given to him, and that's where he comes up with $1,500 a 14 window. I guess the threshold where we really are at this 15 point is, is the Court going to be insistent that we repair 16 our existing windows based upon historical considerations, 17 primarily? Or is that not as strong a consideration, and we 18 want to look more to -- as long as we can get a reasonably 19 matching appearance, but can get more maintenance-free and 20 more energy efficient windows, that that's where we want to 21 go? That's the threshold question, as I see it. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean -- 25 JUDGE TINLEY: We're going to flip a coin and see 7-28-08 110 1 which side the question comes down on? 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'd like to see a -- probably a 3 representative from both companies come down, and I'd like to 4 see a computerized drawing, which they -- both these 5 companies should be able to do, as to what it's going to look 6 like if we change out to the newer windows that I'm kind of 7 leaning towards. But I don't want to -- I mean, I need to 8 know exactly what it's going to look like before I vote one 9 way or the other. Obviously, if we replace these -- or 10 repair these, I know what that looks like. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But I do want to know exactly 13 what we're getting for our money if we buy new metal clad 14 windows, and I want to see a rendering of what that's going 15 to look like in the courthouse. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I agree with that, Judge. 17 I -- don't know that I'm inclined to bow down to the 18 hysterical crowd in Austin. So, you know, if we can -- if we 19 can select windows that are long lasting and they look 20 somewhat like our courthouse, I'm not saying we need to go 21 that route, but we want to take a look at them first. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Plus energy efficiency. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, absolutely. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Single pane windows don't do 25 much for that. 7-28-08 111 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, you can get low-E glass with 2 single pane now, and that helps you some. But -- 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm just concerned about the 4 gaps and the wind blowing in the windows, themselves. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: There are some gaps. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Especially in my office. They 7 ought to be able to bring up a sample of a window. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: A sample. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It may not be an exact one, but 10 as close as the -- the quality that we're looking at. I 11 mean, it's a pretty big decision. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, it is. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Dollars and importance. I 14 mean -- 15 JUDGE TINLEY: I've got one -- one set of -- not 16 really a proposal, but it's submitted to Mr. Bollier from a 17 representative of Allen & Allen. Those are to be fabricated 18 either -- and there's two different options there. There's 19 one that's a completely wood window, and the other one is a 20 metal clad on the outside. But I would be happy to -- if you 21 feel more comfortable getting that gentleman here to -- would 22 you prefer that? 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think so. But I have a 24 question for our County Attorney. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 7-28-08 112 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This obviously is going to be 2 over 25,000, so we have to bid it, but how do we bid it if we 3 don't know -- I mean, how do you come up with the specs for 4 windows that are -- other than just saying it's a window; 5 then it's a -- it can be all kinds of different types of 6 windows and types of wood, types of glass. I mean, it seems 7 a very difficult thing to pick -- to draw up the specs to 8 bid. I mean, unless we decide what we want ahead of time, 9 and then pretty much narrow the bidding that way. 10 MR. EMERSON: Well, I think you answered your own 11 question, 'cause there's really two ways to do it. One is 12 you write your specs very specific based on your choice and 13 then let the companies bid accordingly, and the other is you 14 write it broad and you make a best choice purchase, depending 15 on what's presented. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So we can -- we can do it real 17 broad, and then dollars are not necessarily real high on our 18 decision making. It's more of the kind of window that we 19 want. 20 MR. EMERSON: You can do it that way, sure. We 21 just need the purchase criteria, similar to what we've done 22 on some other bids. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay, that helps. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Using the example that he gave us, 25 they can essentially fabricate these windows to visually 7-28-08 113 1 match, and you could write the specs where they -- you could 2 write alternate specs for double sash, single sash, interior 3 wood, stainable, exterior hard wood, paintable and/or 4 stainable, exterior metal clad, low-E glass, double pane. 5 You can put all sorts of options in there that you want. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We want the bids to come 7 installed. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We don't need any -- we don't 10 need to be installing our own windows around here, I don't 11 believe. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. No. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: No. Whole new ball game if we did. 14 If the Court is inclined to look at new windows as opposed 15 to, "No, we don't want to consider it; we want to do the 16 historical thing," that's one direction. If the Court's 17 inclined to look at new windows, I think the next step would 18 be to develop specs to go out for bids for new windows with 19 the various options that we may have talked about so that we 20 can take a look and see what we think is the best deal 21 overall. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm inclined to go with -- if 23 there's a savings -- well, probably -- I know long-term it's 24 more beneficial to go with new windows that are probably 25 metal on the outside. That's my gut feeling at this point. 7-28-08 114 1 Just because, in talking to a builder over the weekend, they 2 said there'll never again be wood windows on a house, the 3 quality of wood nowadays has gotten so bad. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, you got to have 5 constant maintenance. They may be good for four or five 6 years. I think we're already having some problems in the 7 annex over here as part of the reason for this, and those 8 windows are not very old. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: And they need attention now. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: And, of course, it's going to take a 12 trainload of staging to get to those top ones. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm inclined -- let's try to 15 fix the problem for as long-term as we can, and save our -- I 16 mean, the courthouse is important, but let's try to save some 17 dollars on our utilities. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You can save dollars 19 long-term both ways. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Mm-hmm. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Why don't -- why don't I work with 22 Tim and the Auditor and maybe we'll develop some specs to 23 bring back to you to authorize to throw out in the clear next 24 meeting. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sounds good. 7-28-08 115 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. We'll have to overcome 2 Commissioner Baldwin's strong leanings towards historical -- 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Visions. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Oh, vision. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Keep Austin weird. Yeah, 6 that's a vision. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Historical Commission? 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: I think that's a copyrighted slogan. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, it probably is, but I 11 certainly want to be a part of it. 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Judge, could you skip down to 13 18? 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Whoa. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: I probably could. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Would that be -- is that okay 17 with everybody? They've been sitting here quite a while. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's go to Item 18, then; consider 19 and discuss request to develop a large tract in Bee Caves 20 Creek into three 100-plus acre tracts. Commissioner Oehler? 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Jim Gardner is here. He 22 called me and wanted to know what an owner would have to do 23 in order to be able to sell three 100-acre tracts out of one 24 300-acre tract, and so I told him it might be a good idea to 25 come down here and meet with us and see what all they had in 7-28-08 116 1 mind as far as what they were going to do, and if there were 2 going to be any roads to be built or how the development was 3 going to be divided. 4 MR. GARDNER: Good morning, Judge. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And all that will factor into 6 the answer. 7 MR. GARDNER: Sorry. Okay. Good morning, Judge 8 and Commissioners. Appreciate the time to visit with you 9 today. I've got some maps here I'd just like to show you so 10 you can kind of orient -- I can kind of orient you with the 11 problem that we have. I think that's five; is that correct? 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And one for her. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Probably best if you don't use the 14 word "problem." 15 MR. GARDNER: Right. Opportunity. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: There you go. 17 MR. GARDNER: What we're requesting is a variance 18 on the 40-foot requirement -- I mean on the 60-foot county 19 requirement for a road. If you'll look at this side of the 20 map, the road we're talking about is this red line. That's 21 Rocky Top Road. That is noted in all of the documents filed 22 with the county as a private community access roadway. It is 23 3.8 miles from the Cherry Springs intersection all the way to 24 the property that we're talking about, which is the one 25 outlined in blue in the lower left-hand corner. So, we're 7-28-08 117 1 talking about 3.8 miles, and we've got approximately 30 2 different homeowners along this road. The way the documents 3 are written is, each of those homeowners owns to the middle 4 of the road, so they granted a -- basically, a 20-foot 5 easement off of their property for the road initially when 6 that was -- when that was all developed. This was the old 7 Cullum Ranch, and it was developed back in the early '70's. 8 And, so, what we're requesting -- I'm representing 9 the principal involved here, who has this piece of property 10 under contract, and we're -- in our due diligence, we're just 11 trying to find out what we can and cannot do, and what we 12 have to do to comply with the county court. So, what we're 13 requesting is a variance on the 60-foot requirement on Rocky 14 Top Road all the way to the back. If we decide to develop 15 this property, we would comply with county requirements on 16 the 60-foot requirement, and it would be built to county 17 specifications. We're just trying to get the variance on 18 Rocky Top Road. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The -- let me understand this. 20 This tract right here, 310 acres, is this -- that's all y'all 21 are talking about? 22 MR. GARDNER: Yes, sir. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And all the rest of this stuff 24 is just lots? 25 MR. GARDNER: That are just other tracts that were 7-28-08 118 1 all divided back in the early '70's. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That doesn't require a 3 variance. You can do -- you can do what you're doing. And 4 if you subdivide a 310-acre tract, any roads inside there 5 would be required to be 60 foot, but you can't control the 6 40-foot. That's been -- I mean, that's historically how we 7 look at these. We just don't want you going -- Gillespie 8 County is 25 foot. 9 MR. GARDNER: I was told by Road and Bridge that I 10 needed to have your blessing. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't think so. I mean, 12 unless I'm -- 13 MR. GARDNER: I'll be glad to leave. (Laughter.) 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, no, I don't see that 15 this requires a variance. I mean, you -- the road -- we have 16 a lot of subdivisions that the access to it is smaller than 17 our minimum requirements, and we don't have the authority to 18 require you to go back and require right-of-way on these old 19 roads, whether it's a county road or a private easement or 20 whatever. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: And because it's -- the roadway is 22 not on the property in question that you're developing, you 23 don't need a variance. I mean -- 24 MR. GARDNER: Right. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: We'd be granting a variance to 7-28-08 119 1 essentially other developers -- prior developers, property 2 owners, whatever. So, you know, our -- when you develop your 3 310 acres, are there existing roadways within or along the 4 perimeter of that 310 acres? 5 MR. GARDNER: Actually, the east boundary -- the 6 whole east boundary of this -- let me show you on this one, 7 'cause it's bigger. This whole east boundary is an old ranch 8 road, all right? But what we were talking about doing if we 9 were to come in and develop this would be to come along the 10 southwest and the west road, the west fence line, and put the 11 road in on that side. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, if you lay out a new road, 13 it's going to require that you comply with our -- 14 MR. GARDNER: Right. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: -- subdivision rules and platting 16 procedures. 17 MR. GARDNER: Right. And we don't have a problem 18 with that. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 20 MR. GARDNER: We just wanted to get past this. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Good gosh, if we made you 22 responsible for that -- 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Be impossible. 24 MR. GARDNER: Okay. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I wasn't sure what the deal 7-28-08 120 1 was. 2 MR. GARDNER: Well, the Road and Bridge told me I 3 needed your blessing, so I guess I don't. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You got our -- if it's a 5 concept plan, it usually comes before us. I would say -- 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: This is kind of a concept. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: From that standpoint, there's a 8 blessing, but it's -- I don't think it's a variance. 9 MR. ARENDALE: Can I address you? 10 MR. GARDNER: This is Mr. Bruce Arendale; he's the 11 principal. 12 MR. ARENDALE: You know, what -- what we thought 13 may be required, or I guess the question I would need to ask 14 you on the existing road that's on the east side of the 15 property, that's an existing 40-foot road easement that's 16 been granted when they subdivided the whole ranch, what he 17 was talking about. Could you subdivide -- or could you 18 divide the property into smaller tracts and have access to 19 that smaller tract through the existing 40-foot road easement 20 on the east side? 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This road? 22 MR. ARENDALE: Yes. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That road's -- 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Talking about this road here? 25 MR. ARENDALE: No, the one on the east. 7-28-08 121 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Rocky Top Southwest? 2 MR. ARENDALE: Yes. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The curved road would have to 4 go to a 60-foot easement to be brought to county standards in 5 the subdivision. 6 MR. ARENDALE: It's an existing road right now. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You have to look, I think, 8 probably to the County Attorney as to how you look at that 9 document. 10 MR. ARENDALE: Okay. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 'Cause it's going to depend on 12 exactly what kind of a -- whatever created that road, how it 13 was created. That's going to be a legal determination if 14 it's -- it is possible that you can sell tracts off of that 15 road, or you may not. It just depends on that road. 16 MR. ARENDALE: Depends on how the easement was 17 created when it was subdivided? 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 19 MR. ARENDALE: The original? Okay. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: If it's just like the red 21 road, the access road, if it's the same as that, -- 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Probably can sell it. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- you probably can sell off 24 of that, as long as you have enough -- 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Long as you're over 10 acres. 7-28-08 122 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, resulting tracts. 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Ten or more. Road 3 frontage -- what is it, 200 feet or something? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, as long as they're over 5 10 acres, it wouldn't -- no, 200 foot. It wouldn't require 6 platting. But if you're going to go smaller than 10 acres, 7 it would require it to be platted. But you may or may not 8 be -- if you have to plat it, the portion you're platting is 9 going to have to be brought up to standards. 10 MR. ARENDALE: What's the 200 feet? 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You have to have 200 foot of 12 road frontage. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Per tract, that fronts a 14 public road. 15 MR. ARENDALE: Ten acres or over, 200 foot. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Minimum of 10 acres, each having 17 200 feet of frontage on the roadway. 18 MR. ARENDALE: Okay. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: In other words, you can't 20 create a flag lot where you have 60 foot and you go back and 21 then have you a lot behind you, another tract. 22 MR. ARENDALE: I understand that. Okay. Thank you 23 for your time. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Judge, can we do 16 before 25 we break? 7-28-08 123 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, let's go to Item 16, if we 2 might. Consider, discuss, take appropriate action to approve 3 purchase agreement with Tyler Technologies for import and 4 balancing of Kerr County certified roll, and authorize the 5 County Judge to sign the contract. Ms. Bolin? 6 MS. BOLIN: This is the $6,500 that I brought 7 before you previously, where they're going to import our 8 certified roll this year instead of me doing it. They said 9 they have several means for us to check as we go. At this 10 point, I told Mr. Angell last week, I do not have any 11 confidence in their system whatsoever. Their calculations 12 have caused us more grief than anybody will ever know. I've 13 talked to John about it. He said that we really don't have a 14 choice; we have to do this contract. It's going to cost us 15 $6,500, and that's what this is for, so that we can do our 16 '08's. He told me I could load them if I wanted to, except 17 if I have any questions or any problems, I could not call 18 them. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Sounds to me like a 20 percent. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Maybe a 90 percent. 21 MS. BOLIN: Anyway, it's a contract that has to be 22 signed in order for us to collect '08's. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You're recommending it, or 24 not? 25 MS. BOLIN: I don't have a choice this year. 7-28-08 124 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That means yes? That's a 2 yes? 3 MS. BOLIN: It's a pulled fingernail, yes. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Move approval. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 7 approval of the agenda item. Question or discussion on the 8 motion? 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Where's the money coming from? 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What? 11 JUDGE TINLEY: You always create those problems, 12 Jon. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Where's the money coming from, 14 the $6,500? 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Out of her budget, I guess. 16 MS. BOLIN: I don't have it. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Why didn't you say that? 18 MS. BOLIN: Actually, they agreed that they would 19 wait until the beginning of next year, so I did include it in 20 next year's software maintenance. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. All right. 22 MR. TROLINGER: Basically, The Software Group is 23 increasing the rate -- overall rate and cost to Kerr County 24 to bring it up more with their competition, is what I'm 25 seeing. Do you agree, Diane? 7-28-08 125 1 MS. BOLIN: That part, I don't know, because I 2 don't know what the competition is charging. 3 MR. TROLINGER: Okay. 4 MS. BOLIN: I just know that our maintenance -- if 5 you'll notice, in my new budget our maintenance is doubled, 6 and we're down to one program with them, and that's 7 collections. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: I have a motion and a second. 9 Further question on the motion? All in favor of the motion, 10 signify by raising your right hand. 11 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 12 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 13 (No response.) 14 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. 15 (Discussion off the record.) 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Item 14; consider, discuss, take 17 appropriate action to recover cost of repair to Kerr County 18 roads from damage inflicted by mining vehicles and equipment, 19 aggregate haulers, and construction equipment. Commissioner 20 Williams? 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I put this on the agenda, 22 Judge, because I get a -- a whole lot of telephone calls 23 often from folks who live off of C.P. River Road about 24 aggregate vehicles tearing up the roads, and I've had calls 25 as recently as last week about mining vehicles coming out of 7-28-08 126 1 pits and just making damage to the roads, and about flagmen 2 sitting there sleeping and not stopping the right vehicles 3 and causing all sorts of traffic problems. Also, I'm aware 4 of a litigation in Grayson County, which the County Attorney 5 and I have talked about, and Mr. Odom and I talked about it, 6 in which the county was successful in prevailing in covering 7 repair costs in a situation similar to this. So, what I want 8 to talk about -- I see Mr. Garcia back in the back, who has a 9 distinct interest in this particular issue. But we can just 10 talk about it, see whether or not it's something that we'd be 11 interested in attempting to pursue. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Is there some legal basis that we 13 might have to recover costs that we have, extraordinary 14 repair costs and upgrade costs to those roads that our county 15 Road and Bridge people are required to perform that we can 16 definitely trace to these folks, and possibly recover? 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Can you answer that, Rex? 18 MR. EMERSON: The answer is I think so, but I don't 19 know for sure. I do know that Grayson County was successful 20 about two weeks ago in a lawsuit for recovery of damages, 21 42,000 from one party, 20,000 from another. And I'm waiting 22 on information. I just found out about it. I just found out 23 about the lawsuit last week. I e-mailed the District 24 Attorney that handles their civil and criminal litigation in 25 Grayson County. I've not received a response back. I've 7-28-08 127 1 talked to Len, and Len was going to talk to their Road and 2 Bridge Department, and between the two of us, I'm hoping to 3 put together a full picture of what developed and how it 4 developed. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Certainly, if we've got -- if we got 6 a part of this responsible for creating extraordinary costs, 7 and we have the ability to pursue that, I think it behooves 8 us to take a serious look at it. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's why I put it on the 10 agenda, Judge. I really think the same as what you just 11 expressed. It's something we need to look at. We need to 12 know more about the Grayson County litigation, and we need to 13 have discussions -- meaningful discussions with those who are 14 causing the damage as to what they're willing to do prior to 15 getting involved in litigation. I'd like to see these folks 16 who use our roads for these purposes to step forward and be 17 proactive about the issue so that we don't have to be 18 reactive and go to court about it, and that's the whole 19 reason for putting it on the agenda. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. I guess, at this point, what 21 we need to do is let the County Attorney and Mr. Odom get 22 their information, and they can collaborate and analyze it 23 and come back to us with a recommendation. In the meantime, 24 if those that are causing us to incur this extraordinary cost 25 want to get into a dialogue, well, we're available. Is that 7-28-08 128 1 right? 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's correct. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Anything further on that 4 item, gentlemen? We'll go to item 15; consider, discuss, 5 take appropriate action to set a public hearing for the 6 2009-10 Texas Community Development Block Grant program cycle 7 for 5 p.m. on Tuesday, August 5, 2008, at the Kerr County 8 Courthouse. Commissioner Williams? 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you. This is to set 10 a public hearing, which is a requirement for applications for 11 C.D.B.G. block grants and colonias block grants, and it is in 12 connection with the upcoming grant cycle. What we'd like to 13 be in a position to do is file an application through 14 Grantworks for our additional quarter of a million dollars. 15 I anticipate that in -- in the Kerrville South Phase IV, 16 which we're going to talk about at the end of this agenda, 17 with the contract for a half million dollars, I anticipate 18 that we're going to run into some cost overruns because of 19 the length of time that's existed between the original 20 estimates of cost and now, and so this would take care of 21 cost overruns, and it would also take care of -- of Kerrville 22 South, where there are probably 15 or 20 homes in the old 23 Loyal Valley target area where folks have asked to be 24 connected since we closed those projects. These are people 25 who goofed around and didn't get their applications in at the 7-28-08 129 1 proper time, and therefore, they got passed by. And this 2 would also enable us, if we're favorably -- our application 3 is looked upon favorably, to do the balance of Quail Run. 4 The contract is going to take us from the lift station at the 5 end of Quail Run about 300, 400 feet up. It would be nice to 6 be able to take it all the way to Ranchero Road. That's the 7 purpose of this public hearing. Grantworks will come in and 8 conduct the public hearing on August 25. I move the 9 resolution. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: August 25? 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: August 5, I'm sorry. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Did you second that, Buster? 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: I have a motion and second for 16 approval of the agenda item. Question or discussion on the 17 motion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising your 18 right hand. 19 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 20 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 21 (No response.) 22 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Let's move 23 to Item 19 first, to consider, discuss, take appropriate 24 action to approve contract with Office of Rural Community 25 Affairs in the amount of $500,000 for Phase IV, Kerrville 7-28-08 130 1 South Wastewater Project, and authorize the County Judge to 2 sign the same. Commissioner Williams? 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you, Judge. This is 4 the contract with O.R.C.A. for a half million dollars, which 5 gets us into Phase IV of the Kerrville South project. And 6 engineering will get underway very quickly, as we've already 7 done that contract. I sent this down to the County Attorney 8 for review. I don't know if you've had a chance yet, Rex -- 9 MR. EMERSON: Just finished it up this morning. 10 You're well aware of this, 'cause we've done this before, but 11 there's some pretty stringent reporting requirements that we 12 need to make sure we adhere to. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yes. 14 MR. EMERSON: And, you know, don't lapse, because 15 they cut off our money if we do. And it's very stringent; 16 it's within 20 days of the end of the time period. The only 17 problem I see in the contract is in Section 10; it has a full 18 indemnity clause, so we need to add in the standard, "to the 19 extent allowed by law." It's not titled "Indemnity"; it's 20 titled "Independent Contractor," but it has indemnity 21 language all built into it. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Section 10? 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Section 10 or Page 10? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Section 10. 7-28-08 131 1 MR. EMERSON: I think it's Section 10. Let me 2 look. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Page 8. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Which page? 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 8. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: 8, okay. What is your 7 question, Rex? 8 MR. EMERSON: Well, it's just -- it has all the 9 standard indemnity language in there, so I would recommend 10 that we add the standard exception that says, "to the extent 11 allowed by law." 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, it says that. "...agrees to 13 the extent allowed by law to hold the office harmless and 14 indemnify the office..." in the one I'm looking at here. 15 MR. EMERSON: I'm wearing new contact lenses. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Did I omit that page when I 17 sent that down to you? Did that page go missing? 18 MR. EMERSON: No, there it is. I'm sorry. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 20 MR. EMERSON: It's at the end of the second 21 sentence. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: With respect to the 23 reporting requirements, we've been through this with these 24 people before, and every time that we have faced an audit by 25 O.R.C.A., we have come out with flying colors, so this is not 7-28-08 132 1 new territory we're plowing here. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The reporting is handled 3 through the Auditor's office? 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yes. Move approval of the 5 contract, and authorize County Judge to sign same. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 8 approval of the agenda item and the contract. Question or 9 discussion on that motion? All in favor of the motion, 10 signify by raising your right hand. 11 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 12 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 13 (No response.) 14 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. We'll go to 15 Item 17, to consider, discuss, take appropriate action to 16 discuss the Fiscal Year '08-'09 budget process. Commissioner 17 Letz, you asked for this to be placed on the agenda. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I put this on the agenda after 19 our last budget workshop. I was just -- I want to make 20 sure -- I think it was really answered after. I just want to 21 make sure -- we're going through and making all these changes 22 in our budget all the time -- that we have an original 23 requested budget that nobody's touching, so we have that. 24 And I guess -- where do I find that? 25 MS. HARGIS: It's the requested budget. 7-28-08 133 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's the requested budget. So, 2 the -- 3 MS. HARGIS: It's frozen. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Where's the one that's being 5 changed? 6 MS. HARGIS: The administrative recommended budget. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay, that was my main thing. 8 I didn't know if we had any other -- the other reason I put 9 it on here also, are we going to be okay for our workshops? 10 I mean, timeline? Everything going okay? 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. I don't -- we had one or two 12 mention they had a problem with scheduling after we pretty 13 well got the scheduling laid into place, and -- but I think 14 in those instances, they can have an opportunity available. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We have two more sessions? 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: At least. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Two more to start with. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Two more. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, at least two more. We got two 21 more scheduled. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's what I mean. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: We may have more than two. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'll bet. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Anything else in connection 7-28-08 134 1 with that item? Why don't we go to Section 4. I believe 2 we've got all the agenda items covered now -- yeah. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I believe so, too. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Section 4, payment of the bills. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge, I'd like to make a 6 motion. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's hear your motion, 8 Commissioner. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Pay the bills. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a motion and second to pay 12 the bills. Question or discussion? I'm looking at Indigent 13 Health Care, and it is -- 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Huge. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: -- a screamer. 16 MS. HARGIS: It is. It's not just one month. 17 Unfortunately, she waited, and we had a stack literally this 18 high. What she brought over was $350,000 worth. We've got 19 that down to the amount you see. She -- this is a new girl, 20 and she went to a conference, but this covered, I believe, 21 almost six weeks. And this should be pretty much the end, as 22 I've been told, of the large amounts that we pay, 'cause 23 their fiscal year end for indigent is August. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Has Ms. Taylor in the County 25 Treasurer's office been kind of monitoring -- or someone in 7-28-08 135 1 your office also, I believe, -- 2 MS. HARGIS: No, Nona's been monitoring. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: -- monitoring with the people at the 4 hospital? 5 MS. HARGIS: We've been monitoring, and it -- 6 actually, Nona attended a class as well this month. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 8 MS. HARGIS: And so did the person at the hospital, 9 the new person. They are going to go back -- I understand 10 that the girl at the hospital who does the work found that 11 there were some people that should be on Medicaid, and she's 12 going back and making those corrections. So, I think we'll 13 catch as many as we can. And now that she's gotten her 14 tools, because this is a new job for her, I think she's going 15 to get actually better at it as well. So, I don't know that 16 she has -- has visited with Beth; that would be the hospital 17 representative. I can't tell you that. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Okay. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge? 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Are we able to be in a position 21 to -- I know there's a -- there's a timeline requirement that 22 if you don't do something on one of those apps, they're 23 automatically approved. And we had had this problem 24 previously, that they were in a state of hiatus or 25 transition, or they didn't have the job filled, and those 7-28-08 136 1 things stacked up over there at the hospital, and as a 2 consequence, we had a whole bunch of them that maybe, had 3 they be properly reviewed, some of them might have been 4 disapproved as being ineligible. But we got -- we got beat 5 up by the timeline. 6 MS. HARGIS: I can't answer that. I can't answer 7 that right now. I don't know. I do know that we did have 8 some late ones. I'll have to ask that question. There are 9 two patients that have -- and I don't have it on the agenda, 10 but that have -- apparently you have the option, as a court, 11 to extend the amount of money you pay for a patient if you 12 want to. I'm not in a position to authorize that over what 13 the Court wants to do, but I'd kind of like to know if the 14 Court even wants me to present those, or if -- if we've 15 established that, you know, 30,000 is what we're going to 16 pay, and that's it. But we do have two patients -- 17 JUDGE TINLEY: I have received notice of that, and 18 I put something on my dictation for all the Commissioners to 19 be notified of this situation. I think we need an agenda 20 item as to whether or not we're going to deviate from our 21 current policy of a max of 30,000 per eligible individual, 22 period. We're not in a position, obviously, to act on that 23 today. But -- so we're -- we're bound by that, as I see it, 24 if that's our policy currently. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: But -- 7-28-08 137 1 JUDGE TINLEY: As far as I'm concerned. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What kind of criteria do you 3 use to deviate from that, though? Is there some kind of -- 4 something in the law that says in case this and this and this 5 happens, you can -- 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, it -- when the total payout 7 exceeds 30,000, or the other criteria has to do with number 8 of inpatient hospital days, I think, exceeds a certain number 9 of days, whichever is -- less? 10 MS. HARGIS: Mm-hmm. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Right now, we've adopted the -- the 12 minimum that we can adopt, which is 30,000 per eligible 13 individual, but we have the ability to lift that cap and make 14 it a greater cap for persons who are eligible for Indigent 15 Health care. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: First time I ever heard 17 that. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, we have the ability to do 19 that. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Interesting. I thought that 21 we had said that we really wanted Beth to keep an eye on 22 these things for a while because of her firsthand, hands-on 23 knowledge of it. Is that something I just dreamed? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: No. I think -- I think I mentioned 25 to you that I had asked her to kind of stay in touch there, 7-28-08 138 1 because I was concerned about this timeline. Now, this was 2 before I determined and was advised that -- that one of the 3 clerks in the auditor's office is as up to speed as Beth was, 4 apparently, on processing those things. But my concern was 5 more on the hospital end. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, sure. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Because they hire -- and that 8 position, who's in there, comes and goes, and if they don't 9 act on it, if it just sits there, we get stuck with it. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Win, lose, or draw. 12 MS. HARGIS: And we have spoken to the young lady 13 over there and told her that we will not, you know, have this 14 happen again. Because, first of all, it's a tremendous 15 amount of load. Even if none of the applications are late, 16 it's a huge load. I mean, it took us over a week and a half 17 just to get those in the computer. When they come over to 18 us, they're -- they're not at the amount of money we pay. We 19 have to enter every single pharmacy and every single one of 20 those, and what comes out as eligible is the program that we 21 have, and that takes hours. And -- 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'm curious about something 23 you said a while ago. You said -- you said that she saved up 24 two month's worth, and she had gone off to a workshop? 25 MS. HARGIS: Well, I don't know that that's the 7-28-08 139 1 reason that she necessarily -- 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 3 MS. HARGIS: But she had gone to a workshop, 4 because she's only been with them 90 days. She's apparently 5 a new employee. This is the first -- 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: She's gone to a workshop. 7 She knows better than to let these things stack up now; is 8 that what you're saying? Or did they teach her at a workshop 9 to -- 10 MS. HARGIS: She has the eligibility 11 requirements -- more of the eligibility requirements. 12 There's a lot to learn, I think, under these requirements, 13 and I think for someone new, this is a little overwhelming. 14 And they -- it's also my understanding there's not anybody 15 there directly to train this person. They more or less learn 16 on their own with OJT, and that's why we asked Beth to help 17 that person. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, sure. Okay. 19 MS. HARGIS: And we try to also monitor that, and 20 when we find them wrong, we call her; we explain why. And -- 21 and that's helped. But she's working very well with us; it's 22 just she -- she got behind. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Could you continue to communicate 24 with Ms. Taylor in the Treasurer's office and have her, as 25 necessary and appropriate, to kind of keep her eye on what's 7-28-08 140 1 going on over there too? I mean, I -- I don't mind having 2 two watchdogs, but I don't want to end up with zero 3 watchdogs, if you hear what I'm saying. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I think there's wisdom in 5 that. I really do. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Might be a good idea to ask 7 Mindy about that. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Well -- 9 MS. HARGIS: The only problem with Beth is that 10 she's been away almost a year now, and the requirements -- 11 some of the requirements have changed, and she's not 12 necessarily familiar with those. And that's one thing; the 13 longer you're away from it, and the new legal requirements 14 puts Beth at a disadvantage. So -- but I can ask her. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Either that, or if you're 16 comfortable with the oversight that is coming through your 17 office -- I mean, if you're comfortable that that's adequate 18 to -- I just want to make sure it's covered, is where I'm 19 coming from. 20 MS. HARGIS: I would like to check out everything 21 before I say anything. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Any other question or 23 discussion on the bills? All in favor, signify by raising 24 your right hand. 25 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 7-28-08 141 1 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 2 (No response.) 3 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Budget 4 amendments? 5 MS. HARGIS: There are none. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: That's kind of what I thought. Late 7 bills? 8 MS. HARGIS: There are none. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Reports. I've been presented with 10 monthly reports from J.P. Precinct 4, and J.P. Precinct 4 11 amended report. Do I hear a motion that these reports be 12 approved as presented? 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: So moved. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded to approve 16 the reports as presented. Question or discussion on the 17 motion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising your 18 right hand. 19 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 20 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 21 (No response.) 22 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. Any reports 23 from Commissioners in connection with their liaison or 24 committee assignments? Commissioner 1? 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No. 7-28-08 142 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Two? 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I've got a call in to Water 3 Development Board, but I understand that our application is 4 back on track for movement up there. I'll know a little bit 5 more a bit later this afternoon. But also, I want the Court 6 to know that I attended a U.G.R.A. board meeting the other 7 afternoon, because they had on their agenda the Center Point 8 project and so forth, and I detect a little bit of waffling 9 in terms of the water side of project coming from that side 10 of the equation. And I just want to make sure with Water 11 Development Board, if it turns out that water, for whatever 12 reason, determines it doesn't want to move forward, we don't 13 want that to impede our application with respect to the sewer 14 part of the project. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: There are two separate applications? 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: They're two separate. But, 17 see, they both -- the feasibility study, if you recall, had 18 two sections; it had a wastewater and water section. So, the 19 Water Development Board was kind of waiting on their 20 application to be perfected as well as ours. I just want to 21 make sure that if they decide they want to slow down or not 22 go, that it will not impede our application. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Have they made -- obviously, they 24 haven't made a final decision as to which direction they're 25 going yet. 7-28-08 143 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No. And there was a little 2 bit of -- little bit of an issue over there with Tetra Tech. 3 Mr. Groves -- Al Groves, Sr., and that board kind of got 4 crosswise a little bit, and they didn't -- he is now retired; 5 he's no longer associated with Tetra Tech. And one other 6 thing that's important that we'll have to bring back to Court 7 is that the Water Development Board, I believe, is going to 8 tell me this afternoon that all they're waiting on from us 9 would be a contract for the facilities planning, which is the 10 next level of funding, unsigned, but accompanying the 11 application. So, that's going to have to come from Tetra 12 Tech; they did the scope of work that accompanies the next 13 level of funding. I'll bring it back to Court, and if 14 necessary, and we'll get it ready to go up there to complete 15 the application. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: If U.G.R.A. backs out or 18 decides not to pursue the water side of that, where's that 19 going to go? 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What do you mean, where is 21 it going to go? 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: From the standpoint of the 23 County. Do you think the County can step into that? Talk to 24 City of Kerrville? Talk to somebody else? You know, Comfort 25 W.C.&I.D.? 7-28-08 144 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think, Commissioner, if 2 we wanted to, we could step into it. Only problem is, now 3 we're talking about a -- a water treatment facility; that's 4 what that feasibility study talked about, and using their -- 5 using the 2000 acre feet of water that they have for the 6 beneficial use of people outside the city limits for county 7 use, so we'd have to enter into an interlocal agreement with 8 them to provide water. But, yes, we would move that forward. 9 I don't know why we couldn't. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm just -- you know, probably 11 we don't have enough information at this point, but -- 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No, we don't. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, the water side of the 14 equation is, from my standpoint, critical to the county. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's very important, no 16 question. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, if U.G.R.A. doesn't want to 18 get into the water business, which they said they wanted to 19 do, then someone needs to get into this business. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We need to find a way, I 21 agree with you. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, so, you know, it's -- 23 and, I mean, we need to get some kind of direction from 24 U.G.R.A. board as to where they're going, because if they're 25 not going there, someone needs to pick that slack up for the 7-28-08 145 1 eastern part of the county and other parts of the county, 2 probably, as well. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think they're at the 4 point where they're going to have to, pardon the expression, 5 fish or cut bait, and that in order for their application to 6 move forward as it has to, they're going to have to have a 7 contract, unsigned, that accompanies their application, which 8 is separate from ours. So, if they determine that they're 9 either not going to use Tetra Tech, or if they're going to 10 use another engineering firm, then they need to move along. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. All right. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything else? 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No, sir. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: You got anything for us? 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just one short thing, is that I 16 don't -- hopefully, Commissioner Williams got my e-mail, but 17 we have a -- he and I have a meeting set up with Scott Gross 18 and Max Hamilton Thursday morning -- Thursday afternoon to 19 try to resolve the airport governance agreement prior to our 20 joint meeting. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thursday. This Thursday? 22 MR. EMERSON: I don't have a copy. I still haven't 23 received a copy. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And that's a good -- leads us 25 to the next question. We need to get with you, Rex, as to 7-28-08 146 1 where we go on what we're going to work off of at that 2 meeting. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Scott called me Saturday and 5 set that up. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Did you get my e-mail -- or 7 my voice message about prodding your counterpart down the 8 line for a draft? 9 MR. EMERSON: I did, but I haven't received a 10 response, and I don't have a copy. So -- 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What time, Commissioner? 12 Thursday? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 3 o'clock, I believe. It's in 14 the e-mail. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I haven't opened my e-mails 16 up yet; I'm busy in court. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's in your e-mail. I think 18 it's 3:00 -- 2:00 or 3:00. That's it. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'm not going. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You're not invited. 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Good. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: And I know Commissioner Baldwin's 23 not invited, 'cause last time he showed up when two others 24 were present, -- 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That was a problem. 7-28-08 147 1 JUDGE TINLEY: -- he caught a lot of sand about 2 that. Do you have anything for us, Commissioner Oehler? 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I don't need to say any more. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: All right. Do we have any reports 5 from elected officials or department heads? 6 MS. HYDE: It's just a pass-out. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: The Sheriff put one finger up in the 8 air; I guess he was testing the wind. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No. We did not get the grant 10 we applied for, for the assistance with the -- 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Radios? 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: -- exchange of car radios. I 13 wanted y'all to know that. The Chief Deputy is at AACOG this 14 morning in San Antonio trying to figure out some -- I think 15 the State has passed down some funding, and they're dividing 16 it up amongst the COG's. It's a long shot, but he's up there 17 to see if there's any way we can get ahold of some of that 18 funding. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Who are you working with 20 now, Sheriff? 21 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I don't know who it was. It's 22 all to do with TDEx and everything coming out of Austin, is 23 where it went. But Clay has sat on a couple of those 24 communication committees with me, so he went for us, so he 25 went back to see. But we're going to have some issues with 7-28-08 148 1 car radios. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Ms. Hyde? 3 MS. HYDE: Just a pass-out, the blood drive that we 4 had talked about. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Can't squeeze blood out of 6 a turnip. 7 MS. HYDE: They'll set up on this side of the 8 parking lot. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything else? 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Want to give blood today? 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The 13th. 12 MS. HYDE: 13th. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: All right. Bring them on. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Boards? Commissions? Committees? 15 Reports? Nothing? We're adjourned. 16 (Commissioners Court adjourned at 12:33 p.m.) 17 - - - - - - - - - - 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 7-28-08 149 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 1st day of August, 2008. 8 9 JANNETT PIEPER, Kerr County Clerk 10 BY: _________________________________ Kathy Banik, Deputy County Clerk 11 Certified Shorthand Reporter 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 7-28-08