1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT 9 Special Session 10 Monday, April 26, 2010 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 April 26, 2010 2 PAGE 3 --- Commissioners' Comments 6 4 1.1 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action regarding vehicular traffic in Greenwood Forest 11 5 1.4 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action on 6 4-H Horse Club's rebuttal comments regarding April 12, 2010, Commissioners Court Item 1.12 25 7 1.7 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action 8 regarding request to authorize County Auditor to pay bills shown on attached list through weekly 9 direct payables, excluding any items the County Auditor determines would require Court approval 47 10 1.2 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to 11 approve new telephone system service for county courthouse 52, 73 12 1.10 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to 13 present Distinguished Service Award to Kerr County Historical Commission 70 14 1.3 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to 15 declare a 10' x 4' wood conference table as surplus and approve sale of same 76 16 1.18 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action on 17 proposal from Peter Lewis for professional services in connection with demolition of old 18 outdoor arena/construction of new outdoor arena at Hill Country Youth Exhibition Center 77 19 1.5 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action 20 regarding new mass notification system (Code Red) including, but not limited to, how the public is 21 notified, possibility of localized notification instead of notifying entire the county, opt-out 22 options other than waivers, how to sign up 86 23 1.6 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to reset the public hearing to rescind court order 24 regarding Cummings Lane currently being maintained partially by County and partially by residents 101 25 3 1 I N D E X (Continued) April 26, 2010 2 PAGE 3 1.8 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to set public hearing for revision of plat for 4 Tracts 130 and 131 of Y.O. Ranchlands, Section Three, Precinct 4 102 5 1.9 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to set 6 a public hearing, if necessary, for revision of plat for Lots 23A and 23B, Twin Springs Ranch II 105 7 1.11 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action on 8 policies and procedures for use of Hill Country Youth Exhibit Center 110 9 1.12 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to 10 approve contract between Kerr County and J3S, Inc., d/b/a Branch Water Services, for hydro- 11 graphic survey of Flat Rock Lake 125 12 1.13 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to rescind Court Order #31481 dated October 12, 13 2009,and authorize advertisement for construction bids for Phase IV, Kerrville South Wastewater 14 Project immediately following City of Kerrville approval of revised plan and specifications 129 15 1.14 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action 16 regarding sums to be budgeted for payment of jail docket defense attorney(s) 130 17 1.15 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action to 18 address possibility of prohibiting the sale or use of restricted fireworks in any portion of 19 unincorporated area of Kerr County pursuant to LGC § 352.051 for Cinco de Mayo holiday 131 20 1.16 Acknowledge receipt of Quarterly Investment 21 report from Patterson and Associates for quarter ending 3-31-10 132 22 4.1 Pay Bills 133 23 4.2 Budget Amendments 133 4.3 Late Bills 135 24 4.4 Approve and Accept Monthly Reports 136 25 5.1 Reports from Commissioners/Liaison Committee Assignments 136 4 1 I N D E X (Continued) April 26, 2010 2 PAGE 3 5.2 Reports from Elected Officials/Department Heads 138 4 1.17 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action regarding insurance issue on individual 5 (Executive Session) 148 6 --- Adjourned 149 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 5 1 On Monday, April 26, 2010, 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 posted and scheduled for this 10 date and time, Monday, April 26, 2010, at 9 a.m. It is that 11 time now. Commissioner Williams? 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Good morning. Will you 13 please rise and join me for a word of prayer, followed by the 14 pledge of allegiance. 15 (Prayer and pledge of allegiance.) 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Please be seated. At 17 this time, if there's a member of the audience or the public 18 that wishes to be heard on any item that is not a listed 19 agenda item, this is your opportunity to come forward and 20 tell us what's on your mind. If you wish to be heard on any 21 of the agenda items, we'd ask that you fill out a 22 participation form. There should be some located at the rear 23 of the room. That's not essential, however. If we get to an 24 agenda item and you haven't filled out a participation form, 25 if you wish to be heard on that item, get my attention in 4-26-10 6 1 some manner; I will give you the opportunity to be heard on 2 that item. But right now, if there's any member of the 3 audience or the public that wishes to be heard on any matter 4 that is not a listed agenda item, feel free to come forward 5 at this time and tell us what's on your mind. Seeing no one 6 coming forward, we will move on. Commissioner Williams, do 7 you have something for us today? 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Not a great deal, Judge, 9 except that just to take note of the fact that the WorkSource 10 board of directors -- that's the Alamo WorkSource; those are 11 the folks who run all the workforce centers, and -- and we 12 have one of the best-equipped and newest and most efficient 13 ones in the 11-county region surrounding Bexar County. That 14 board of directors is meeting here this afternoon at the 15 Alamo Colleges, and so if anybody wants to go sit in and find 16 out what takes place with the WorkSource and the rules and 17 regs of that in conjunction with the Texas Workforce 18 Commission, I'm sure you're invited to do so. That explains 19 the tie, Commissioner, and the coat. Commissioner Oehler's 20 always reminding me that I shouldn't be preaching up here. 21 That's pretty much it, Judge. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Commissioner Letz is 23 running a few minutes late. He had a family issue he had to 24 contend with; he'll be here shortly. Commissioner Oehler? 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Several things. One of the 4-26-10 7 1 most important, I think, to mention is the fact that during 2 the last flood, we lost a -- lost a member of the community 3 to the water, and then there were some other people that were 4 actually saved. And we live in the greatest part of the 5 world, as far as I'm concerned, but there are so many giving 6 people and people that are willing to help and serve and 7 volunteer. There was a group that came together that's 8 unbelievable, hundreds of volunteers in the community. It 9 was just total support of -- of helping with everything that 10 needed to be attended to, and you can't say thank you enough 11 for all those people that get involved in every kind of 12 incident we have around here. And, anyway, I've got a little 13 press release I'm going to give the papers today thanking the 14 volunteers and all the people that assisted. Another thing 15 is, over the weekend Janie had a -- a clinic over at Doyle 16 School, and I think I'd like to have her get up and talk 17 about what -- what they did over the weekend with Animal 18 Control and -- and with the veterinarian from Hunt that helps 19 her a lot. Janie? 20 MS. WHITT: Well, this is the first time that we've 21 ever done this, and we had a huge turnout. It was much 22 better than -- than we ever expected. We had about 40 -- 38 23 to 40 vaccinations. I know that doesn't sound like a lot, 24 but for that area, it's huge. Dr. Barbutti did say that that 25 was probably one of the best clinics she's ever -- ever put 4-26-10 8 1 on. We had a great time. And what we did find is that a 2 large number of those people that came in to have their pets 3 vaccinated were already -- their pets were already spayed or 4 neutered, which I believe had a lot to do with the -- with us 5 going door-to-door passing out flyers for free spay and 6 neuter. So, it was a great turnout. It was great, so we're 7 planning on doing this again, probably in about six months. 8 So, we're just very pleased. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's it. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Commissioner Baldwin? 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. There was a 12 basketball game last Thursday night. You know, I'm not going 13 to talk about it, but if I were, I would say that, just 14 bottom line, the old geezers beat those high school kids, and 15 it was 100 percent coaching. (Laughter.) The County Judge 16 was the head coach, and I was his faithful assistant. I 17 carried the towels for him, so he could rant and rave, and we 18 won that thing. But -- (Applause.) Thank you. Thank you 19 very much. Once we figured out the politics of the thing. 20 Referees can still be bought. (Laughter.) This Thursday 21 we're having a dinner on the grounds. And for -- I see we 22 have a room full of some strangers to me, so I want to 23 explain that right quick. Occasionally, we -- we have a 24 function out on the front lawn of the courthouse, and what 25 we're doing is we invite the entire community, business 4-26-10 9 1 people, residents, to fix you a sack lunch and come down to 2 the courthouse. We set up tables out there. And we want 3 people -- we want neighbors coming down having lunch with 4 neighbors, is the bottom line. And while you're here, we 5 even provide a little bit of entertainment. This week the 6 Wolf sisters are going to be here, and a couple of the 7 prettiest girl voices I have ever heard, and they do the new 8 Texas sound, whatever that is exactly. But, anyway, 9 that's -- that's this Thursday, and we do it from -- somebody 10 help me. What time do we do this? 11 MR. BARTON: 11:45. 12 MS. HYDE: 11:45. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 11:45 to 12:45. So, you can 14 grab your little bag, be back at work or be home or be at the 15 dentist, whatever it is. So, that's this Thursday at 11:45, 16 right out here on the front lawn, and it's really a fun -- 17 fun, neat thing. I think we're onto something kind of fun 18 and neat for the community. That's all, Judge. Thank you. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, sir. The commissioner's 20 right; it was all in the coaching. (Laughter.) Once we 21 figured out the approach to our strategy, why, things -- 22 things got better. A couple of items. I had earlier talked 23 about our financial people putting all of our business 24 online; any citizen in this community can go online, and it's 25 not hard to find, plug into our finances, and literally see 4-26-10 10 1 every nickel that Kerr County spends, when it was spent, what 2 it was for, and who got the money. And it's total 3 transparency. As a result of that, the Comptroller of Public 4 Accounts of the state of Texas has established an award, and 5 it's called the Gold Leadership Circle, and we are now one of 6 a few counties. Hopefully there will be more as time goes by 7 that -- that participates in this total transparency. The 8 funding, by and large, in the state of Texas flows back and 9 forth from counties through the Comptroller, and so they're 10 the main watchdog of state finances. So, I -- I, again, want 11 to give recognition to our Auditor's office and our 12 Treasurer's office, and also H.R., Ms. Hyde. She handles all 13 the payroll functions and all the benefits. All of those 14 offices are participating in a collaborative effort to put 15 all of our finances online. So, if you want to take a look, 16 just turn on your computer, go to our web site. There's a 17 link there, and you can see everything we're doing. 18 The other thing I'd like to mention is our 19 Sheriff's Office/Adult Probation Annex that's underway out at 20 the Law Enforcement Center. In spite of a little rain 21 overnight Friday night, they were there bright and early 22 starting at 3 a.m. on Saturday, and they poured that slab. 23 It looks great. Looks like it's going to get a good cure 24 with some moisture, and we're off and running with that 25 project. In the meantime, Mr. Odom and his Road and Bridge 4-26-10 11 1 people are continuing to work on the collateral side issues; 2 parking lots, drainage issues, and they're getting those 3 knocked out in first-class fashion. We really appreciate the 4 work of your guys and gals, Mr. Odom. They're doing a 5 fantastic job out there. That's all I've got, so let's get 6 on with our agenda. The first item on the agenda is to 7 consider, discuss, and take appropriate action regarding 8 vehicular traffic in Greenwood Forest Subdivision. 9 (Commissioner Letz entered the courtroom.) 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Ms. Nancy Ebright. 11 MS. EBRIGHT: Yes, sir. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, ma'am. And you're a resident 13 of Greenwood Forest? 14 MS. EBRIGHT: Yes, sir, I am. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, thank you. 16 MS. EBRIGHT: Thank you, Your Honor and 17 Commissioners, for letting us appear, and we appreciate you 18 hearing our plea for help. Our purpose is for the concern 19 and safety of the residents of Greenwood Forest due to the 20 high vehicular traffic and speed with which it goes through 21 Greenwood Forest, particularly on Oakview, Skyview, and 22 Wedgewood Drives. We went around Greenwood Forest and did 23 petitions, and I have three different petitions here that I 24 would like for your consideration. The first one is a 25 petition to add ingress or egress to Westwood Oaks 4-26-10 12 1 Subdivision other than through Greenwood Forest. I know this 2 is a county road, and it certainly cannot be closed off, but 3 if they had another access to either Goat Creek Cutoff or to 4 Ingram Hills Road, it would certainly alleviate some of the 5 traffic. And I have a petition summary and background that 6 says basically -- I think you all had a copy of those; at 7 least I left a copy with the secretary in there -- that there 8 are approximately 177 residences in Westwood Oaks, and that 9 we would urge you all to please consider maybe ingress or 10 egress, such as from Colt Court over to Ingram Hills Road, or 11 to Goat Creek Cutoff by Gray Moss Court and Nimitz Drive. 12 You know, those are the two that we listed on the petitions. 13 And we received 181 signatures on that. 14 Now, at our meeting last Monday -- Monday? 15 Tuesday. Last Tuesday, I also had a couple of people tell me 16 that they thought that there should be an access from Skyview 17 in Westwood Oaks down behind Wedgewood, but that would be 18 along that Nichols Creek -- Nichols Creek, which is a 19 floodplain, and I don't know if that would be a possibility. 20 But that would come out on Business Run Drive there. But 21 these are petitions for ingress and egress. We are also 22 concerned about this 72-lot development that was proposed 23 before you gentlemen in June of 2009, the Uvalde Gin Tract. 24 I looked at the Commissioners Court minutes of June the 9th, 25 and on Page 29, Line 1, Phoenix Summit Limited proposed this 4-26-10 13 1 72-lot development. And during that time, Mr. Odom referred 2 to a traffic count that he had done on May the 21st through 3 the 26th, and showing -- I'm just refreshing your memory, 4 showing that there was 3,999 cars during that five-day 5 period, and 300 and -- 3,800-some-odd went onto Westwood 6 Oaks. And that was also showing that if there were 33 cars 7 per hour, on a 24-hour basis, which would come out to around 8 800 and some-odd cars a day on Skyview. 9 Also in there, I thought it was very interesting 10 that on Page 39 of those minutes, Lines 11 and 12, that 11 Commissioner Oehler admitted that -- or said, "I can 12 understand people on Skyview having a problem. It's already 13 a high-speed racetrack." We really agree with you, 14 Commissioner. Also, TexDOT did a traffic count on Skyview. 15 They had a counter near the Ingram Post Office, and one on 16 Oakview Drive, and this was in 2005. And it was two days or 17 less, because they put it in one morning and took it out the 18 next morning. And five years ago, their count was 2,010 19 vehicles on Skyview near the post office, and 1,500 on 20 Oakview Drive at the entrance to the subdivision. Now they 21 have just done this same thing. They placed counters at 22 these same spots this past Thursday -- I mean this past 23 Tuesday, and on Thursday I was in contact with the 24 representative for TexDOT here in Kerrville and was told that 25 that information would not be available for us for several 4-26-10 14 1 months, because they do this on a five-year basis, and they 2 go around the communities throughout the state and gather the 3 information on the counters, and then they go back and 4 process it all. So, he said that he was sure he would not 5 even be able to get the information immediately. 6 Then the other concern that we have -- oh, I might 7 mention that this Uvalde Gin Tract, I talked to Andy Phillips 8 Friday, and he says that that is not immediately going to be 9 developed as a single-family development because of the 10 economic situation right now, and so the entire property is 11 still for sale. But we know that it's going to be developed 12 eventually, because it's already been through the Planning 13 and Zoning Commission of -- the Kerrville Planning and Zoning 14 Commission. So, that was in July of 2009. And then in 15 addition to that, the Holly Hill property up behind Holly 16 Hill, east-northeast of Holly Hill, and northwest of Skyview, 17 behind my house at 208 Skyview Drive, there is a property, a 18 parcel -- in fact, two years ago it was three parcels they 19 were offering for sale, one 27-acre, one 28-acre, and one 20 30-acre parcel. And recently, I have been told that they're 21 now offering a 37-acre parcel up there. But the access to 22 that is a road into Holly Hill. And I do not know if they 23 have been before you or any other governing body to talk 24 about that. I did not find anything on that. But we are 25 concerned about other developments being allowed to come 4-26-10 15 1 through Greenwood Forest. We're inundated with traffic, and 2 we are very concerned about others coming in there as well. 3 Our second petition, for which we have 164 4 signatures, is to obtain speed bumps or humps in Greenwood 5 Forest. And there have been a number of auto accidents 6 resulting in mailboxes destroyed, yards invaded, wherein sod, 7 shrubs, and small trees were damaged, parked cars being 8 struck, and we feel that it's only a matter of time before a 9 pedestrian is hit. Because of the excessive speed of 10 traffic, primarily to and from the Westwood Oaks Subdivision, 11 many of us fear to walk the streets or to cross the streets 12 to access our mailboxes, and many of us have to do that. So, 13 on this one, the action petition is for -- is to help solve 14 the problem of speeding vehicles to and from Westwood Oaks 15 Subdivision by placing speed bumps or humps along Skyview 16 Drive, Wedgewood Lane, Oakview Drive, and other high-traffic 17 areas. And as I said, I have 164 signatures on that 18 petition. 19 Let's see. My third petition here is a stop sign 20 at Skyview Drive and Wedgewood Lane, and I have 164 21 signatures on this one as well. There is already a three-way 22 stop at Wild Timber, and it is run quite often. And the 23 reason I think it is run so often is because of the fact that 24 as the people from Westwood Oaks come out around that curve, 25 they start speeding before they ever hit -- they're on 4-26-10 16 1 Skyview, and they start speeding before they ever hit the 2 Wedgewood intersection, and accelerate right on up that hill. 3 And then they don't even -- once they get to the crest of the 4 hill where the stop sign is at Wild Timber, they don't think 5 about it or they just ignore it and sail right through it and 6 go on, and then they usually do stop at Oakview, I 7 understand. But a stop sign at Wedgewood would require them 8 to slow down before they ever hit Greenwood Forest, slow down 9 in their own subdivision. And then if they had to stop 10 there, then maybe they would be going slowly enough that they 11 would respect the one at Wild Timber as well. 12 Gentlemen, think about how much you could increase 13 the county coffers if you just put a patrol officer out there 14 on Wedgewood and gathered all the violators stopping at a 15 three-way stop at Wedgewood and Skyview, and I would venture 16 to say that you could pay for those -- actually, it would 17 only require two signs, because there's already one at 18 Wedgewood. So, the two signs on Skyview, I believe, would 19 pay for themselves very shortly. And I think that it's 20 apparent that Skyview doesn't get all of the traffic from 21 Wedgewood Oaks -- I mean from Westwood Oaks, because they are 22 turning now on Wedgewood and screaming down it. It's 23 becoming a second raceway to Wild Timber and then on to 24 Oakview and out to Junction Highway. And, of course, 25 Oakview, being the major entrance to Greenwood Forest, also 4-26-10 17 1 gets considerable traffic. 2 In summation, we feel that there are valid concerns 3 for continuing additional traffic problems in Greenwood 4 Forest, particularly if these other developments go forward, 5 and so we would like very much to have you consider some 6 remedy. We would love all three of these to happen, but we 7 would appreciate your serious consideration on our problem, 8 because we have many residents who are physically unable to 9 move quickly to cross streets to get to their mailboxes, and 10 we have a lot of new families moving into Greenwood Forest 11 with young children. And we have had cars in the -- in the 12 yards innumerable times because they've lost control either 13 going down the hill or coming up the hill, and we don't want 14 a fatality. And I don't think you all do either. I would 15 like to thank you for your attention to our presentation, and 16 we sincerely plead for some help. There are directors -- 17 other directors and residents here from Greenwood Forest, and 18 if I haven't taken up too much of your time, and if you'd 19 like to hear from any of them, I'm sure some of them would be 20 happy to speak. I do have a synopsis of my comments, as well 21 as a couple of other little handouts for you all if you're 22 interested. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: You're going to leave the petitions 24 with us, I presume? 25 MS. EBRIGHT: Yes. Yes. 4-26-10 18 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, good. 2 MS. EBRIGHT: Yes, absolutely. And -- let me get 3 these back together here. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Does any member of the Court have 5 any questions for Ms. Ebright? 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No. I mean, she's -- she's 7 stated the problem about as well as anybody possibly could. 8 That is -- it's a bad situation and, you know, we need to 9 figure out some way to address it somehow or other. The 10 quick fix, of course, is she's requested a stop sign. Once 11 before, Leonard did a traffic count out there, and I don't 12 believe it was warranted, what you told me, that we really 13 could have another stop sign at that point. But any fix is 14 going to be somewhat expensive, other than a stop sign. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, particularly the fix of a new 16 access road. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, new access road. And I 18 don't believe that that -- that Phillips subdivision, that 19 was not going to access through Greenwood Forest. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: You're talking about Goat Creek? 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Goat Creek Cutoff. 22 MS. EBRIGHT: Well, it shows on their plat, the one 23 before the -- let me see if I can find it here right quick. 24 The one before the Planning and Zoning Commission, and 25 according to the Planning and Zoning Commission minutes, it 4-26-10 19 1 shows Greenwood -- Skyview Lane -- I mean Skyview Drive. 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Probably came out through -- 3 MR. ODOM: Came out two ways. Came -- 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Came out both ways. 5 MR. ODOM: -- both ways. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I can believe that. 7 MS. EBRIGHT: It wasn't mentioned in your June 8th 8 meeting, but in the July 9th Planning and Zoning Commission, 9 the plat shows -- 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That it comes, one access 11 through Skyview, and one -- 12 MS. EBRIGHT: On the back, it shows the back one 13 going into Skyview Drive. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Okay. I wasn't aware of that 15 one. 16 MS. EBRIGHT: Thank you very much, gentlemen. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Thank you very much. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, ma'am. Commissioner, I 19 suppose that being in your precinct, probably the next step 20 would be for you to get with the Sheriff, from a law 21 enforcement/safety standpoint, and Road and Bridge -- 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: -- management, and see where we go 24 from here. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, I know the Sheriff has 4-26-10 20 1 patrolled it. I know they can't be everywhere, but he claims 2 they have patrolled quite a bit there, and I've had Bob 3 Terrill who did it for a while. Of course, Bob's been kind 4 of under the weather here lately, so he hasn't been able to. 5 But I will do that. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Commissioner, you have, on the 8 alternative access, which is obviously a -- or additional 9 access -- a costly solution, but I think it would be good to 10 start looking at that. Because, I mean, it might be that we 11 need to, you know, look at another option out there. It may 12 be it's going to cost money. It'll take a long time to do, 13 but some of our other projects take years and years to do, 14 and it certainly wouldn't hurt to start figuring out a plan. 15 And with the subdivision that -- Phoenix, whatever the other 16 one Andy Phillips is working on, there may be a way through 17 that process to get additional right-of-way. I'm not sure. 18 I'm not that familiar with that area. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, I'm familiar with it. 20 I do agree, but like I say, we need to get started on 21 something. It's just figuring out a way that, you know, we 22 can -- we can spend a lot of money on something, but if 23 people won't use it, -- 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- you know, that's the other 4-26-10 21 1 problem. You know, Skyview just happens to be the direct 2 route to the post office and downtown Ingram and everywhere 3 else, and, you know, I don't know how we can mandate somebody 4 using it, but we do need to start working on it. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Look at that whole -- 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Looking at the options. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- whole area. 8 AUDIENCE: If you put the speed bumps plus the 9 egress, they'll take the quickest way out. If they have to 10 slow down for the speed bumps, they'll go out anywhere you 11 let them where they can go 50 miles an hour. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, ma'am? You had your hand up? 13 MS. KIMMEY: Yes, sir. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: If you'd come forward, tell us your 15 name and address and whatever comments you have to make. 16 MS. KIMMEY: Yes, sir. I'm Judy Kimmey. I live at 17 120 Skyview Drive right there on the corner of Wild Timber 18 and Skyview. And, first, let me say thank you to his 19 department. They're doing all they can. They can't be there 20 every day, but they write seven, nine, ten tickets every time 21 they're there. And one of the times that is so extremely 22 heavy is early in the morning and late -- late in the day. 23 And, again, I've seen three accidents there. They're not 24 slowing down. They're coming, like she said, up that hill -- 25 and maybe I'm -- I'm all for the speed bumps, because I think 4-26-10 22 1 it would help to just slow them down a little where they 2 won't be just going straight through. I was nearly hit 3 broadside this past week, and it wasn't at my house; it was 4 down at the corner of Skyview and Oakview. And had I not 5 turned and looked -- the lady ran straight through in an 6 S.U.V., and she just went back like this. She didn't even -- 7 she had to be going 50 or 60 miles an hour. We see a lot of 8 this from my house. And so, just as one of the residents, 9 I'm with Nancy in pleading, we need some help. And I thank 10 you. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Ma'am? 12 MS. CARSETH: My name is Marge Carseth. I live on 13 Sherwood Lane in Greenwood Forest. Mr. Oehler knows we have 14 a problem on that street as well, double. It is a 15 two-block-long street. Half of it is uphill. For some 16 reason, that hill seems to intimidate people, and they feel 17 like they have to gun it up the hill. They also, on the 18 reverse, seem to love to go flying down that hill. 19 Mr. Oehler did try to help me several years ago, and did put 20 a stop sign in there. Unfortunately, he didn't go about it 21 the right way, did not get it approved the right way, and it 22 had to be taken down. While it was there, it helped. I 23 have, even on an interior street like that, almost been 24 broadsided. Then the other problem we have on that street, 25 I've nicknamed it Sherwood Raceway. And it is. It's -- and 4-26-10 23 1 there's young people, and now there's young children coming 2 back in the neighborhood. They're going to run across the 3 street, and so somebody's going to get killed. It's just a 4 matter of time. And then when you try to exit Sherwood Lane 5 onto Skyview, same problem. They're coming, like the other 6 two ladies said, hell-bent for election. They're either on a 7 beer run to the Mini-Mart or they're late for work, or 8 hurrying to get home for a beer. You never know which way it 9 is, but it's a mess. It's just a very dangerous mess. 10 You would never have thought this. I've lived 11 there almost 30 years, and it's getting worse by the day. 12 And when I first moved there, the access to what's Winwood 13 Oaks or Westwood Oaks, whatever it's called, there was a 14 fence across there. There was a fence across where you put 15 the stop sign on Sherwood Lane too. Now they've been opened 16 up by the County, because they made them county roads. 17 That's a blessing and it's a curse all at the same time. I 18 don't know why -- since that's a separate subdivision, why 19 you couldn't replace that barrier on Skyview, because there's 20 private property in between that you go over. Before you get 21 into Westwood Oaks from Greenwood Forest, there's an area 22 there that is private property, and you're crossing that. I 23 don't know why you couldn't close it off there and force them 24 to go out onto either Goat Creek Cutoff or Colt Road, or 25 there's another way you can go; I think it's called Acorn. 4-26-10 24 1 I'm not looking at a map, so -- you could also go over to 2 Nimitz Road, which would take you back out to Goat Creek 3 Cutoff. Those are the shortest -- if you look at a map, the 4 shortest connectors that you'd have to do the least amount of 5 grading and finishing of a road. But aside from that, the 6 only other solution is the speed bumps. But, trust me, this 7 is a serious problem. It's just a matter of when it's going 8 to happen. Somebody's going to be either badly injured or 9 killed. And it sounds impossible in an interior subdivision, 10 but it is happening. And I've talked to Mr. Oehler multiple 11 times in the past, and he, I think, agreed with me. That's 12 why he went ahead and put the sign up, but unfortunately, 13 didn't go about it the right way. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That was years ago. 15 MS. CARSETH: Yes, it was. I mean, so this is not 16 a new problem. This is an ongoing problem, and that's 17 evidence of it right there. I hope you will give it some 18 serious, serious consideration. It's important. Thank you. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you, ma'am. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Thank you. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, sir? 22 MR. CALDWELL: If it's all right, I'll stand here 23 rather than step on people's toes. I think my mouth is big 24 enough, people can hear me. My name is Glen Caldwell, 203 25 Skyview. And I can sit out front on my front porch and watch 4-26-10 25 1 that stop sign be totally ignored, just like that. And 2 speed, people are often going at least 50 going through 3 there, and it's a 30-mile zone. My next-door neighbor drives 4 her car across the street to get her mail because she's come 5 so close to being hit. And I have people who live down the 6 hill from me. I believe it's -- I can't remember the number, 7 but they have small children, and they've told me, "If I'd 8 have known the traffic was like this, I'd have never moved 9 here." And this is a principal of the school. So, we really 10 need some help, and we appreciate your assistance. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Anything else any member 12 of the Court has to offer? You're going to follow up? 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Do the best we can. I don't 14 know. You know, we got to get started. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. We'll go to a timed item of 16 9:30; Item 4, to consider, discuss, take appropriate action 17 on 4-H Horse Club rebuttal comment regarding April 12th, 2010 18 Commissioners Court agenda; specifically, Item 1.12. The 19 agenda indicates that 4-H Horse Club representatives are here 20 to present that item. 21 MS. HIERHOLZER: I only brought one agenda. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's fine. We can make 23 copies. 24 MS. HIERHOLZER: Good morning, Commissioners. My 25 name is Gaylynn Hierholzer. Rusty and I are second cousins. 4-26-10 26 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Oh, no. 2 MS. HIERHOLZER: I know. Did he leave? I don't 3 blame him. Anyway, I'm here on behalf of the 4-H Horse Club 4 here in Kerr County. I am the co -- I am the manager of the 5 club, but I come before you as not only the manager, but as a 6 member of the 4-H Horse Club, as a parent of a member of the 7 4-H Horse Club, and a concerned citizen. Our horses are more 8 than pets to us. We take extremely good care of them, 9 because we hope that the horses take extremely good care of 10 our children. Our horses are not only our partners with our 11 children, but also our horses are athletes, and they need to 12 be well cared for, more so than just a pet. These horses are 13 groomed on a regular basis. Their feet are seen to, to make 14 sure that their hooves are in good condition. They go to the 15 dentist. Probably your own pets at home don't go to the 16 dentist. These horses go to the dentist. They're on wormer 17 programs. It's not something that we take lightly, because, 18 as I said before, they are not only athletes, but they are 19 equine partners to our children. 20 That being said, it was mentioned at Commissioners 21 Court on the -- would have been the 13th, I believe, last 22 Commissioners Court, that the outdoor arena, which is the 23 Kerr County 4-H arena, was not being used, and that, to 24 quote, "They want the indoor arena even when the outdoor 25 arena is available for practice." And we use the indoor 4-26-10 27 1 arena for safety reasons. As a great example, last Friday 2 night, we knew a storm was coming in. We knew there was 3 going to be lightning. We knew there was going to be hail. 4 It was supposed to hit San Antonio around 11-ish, so we in 5 good conscience knew it was going to hit here probably 6 somewhere between 9:00 and 10 o'clock. We had checked to see 7 if the indoor arena was available for safety reasons. If you 8 have a horse with shoes on that are metal and you have 9 lightning in the area, you need to get those horses put up. 10 We did not want our children in the outdoor arena, 11 knowing full well a storm was coming, knowing full well 12 lightning was coming. And any meteorologist will tell you, 13 if you can hear thunder, there's lightning associated with 14 it, and you need to get inside, because just because you 15 can't see it doesn't mean it's not there. So, we did have 16 the rodeo that we had scheduled last Friday night at the 17 indoor arena for safety's sake of our children. We did call 18 just to make sure it was available and set up, not 19 specifically for us, but they were having a roping on 20 Saturday. We do not change the arena's configuration, so we 21 were able to use the indoor arena. We would have preferred 22 using the outdoor arena, because it was so hot in the indoor 23 arena, but for safety's sake, we moved to the indoor. 24 As far as the outdoor arena usage goes, we have, at 25 least for the past two years, every Wednesday night, used the 4-26-10 28 1 outdoor arena for practice, whenever weather permitted. Or 2 if the rain had been flooding us out, which happened in 3 January, we usually just have to cancel, because the ground 4 gets so muddy that it's a safety issue for the horses. All 5 it takes is one of those horses -- that's not a pet; this is 6 an athlete -- to slip down in that mud, and then we have a 7 problem. So, the only time we ask to use the indoor arena is 8 when it's a safety condition, a safety concern for either the 9 horses or the kids. You don't want your kids out there when 10 it's 32 degrees, if it's raining, if it's lightning, if it's 11 thundering. So, we usually have practices every Wednesday 12 night, and Tuesdays and Thursdays as needed. And we do this 13 depending on the -- on the kids. Some of the kids are very 14 good riders and some are not, so we try to encourage them to 15 come practice. It's like anything else; the more you 16 practice, the better you're going to become. 17 We do book the indoor arena whenever we're having a 18 clinic. The clinics, there again, are for safety issues. We 19 do things like how to approach your horse; we do tack checks, 20 and we want to make sure that -- because these are very 21 important for our club, that we have the indoor arena 22 available to us. We do use the outdoor arena if we can, 23 because it's cooler. It's breezier. It's -- it's just more 24 conducive to the kids communicating with each other. But we 25 always try to schedule the indoor arena, because the safety 4-26-10 29 1 clinics are so important that we want a backup plan just in 2 case. This is not something you can do as a rain day. We 3 want these safety clinics done for the sake of the kids. On 4 our rodeos, we use the outdoor arena unless it's a weather 5 concern. If it's been raining for three weeks, there's no 6 way you can use the outdoor arena, so we do book the indoor 7 arena as a backup. We do schedule rain dates just in case, 8 because we can't always get the indoor arena. 9 As far as last year, we had -- we used the indoor 10 arena three times. One of it was for our scheduled spring 11 rodeo series, and the other two times were for fundraisers or 12 our clinics. Other than that, we use the outdoor arena every 13 Wednesday, like I said, weather permitting. Sometimes -- 14 like, there's TAKS test this week. We probably -- we may or 15 may not practice because of TAKS test. If we do, it will be 16 early, 'cause we have -- we have concerns with the kids' 17 schedule also, as far as what they've got going on. The way 18 the rodeos are set up is we kind of throw some dates out for 19 the kids as far as when they want to have a -- how many 20 rodeos they want to have, and we let them vote on it. We do 21 try to schedule where we can, if we need to, to have that 22 outdoor -- the indoor arena available to us. If we need to, 23 okay, but it's not -- it's not that we book the indoor arena. 24 It's we use it as a backup, okay? 25 As far as the outdoor arena goes -- oh, and let me 4-26-10 30 1 back up. As far as scheduling, it's been confusing to us of 2 sorts, because when I first joined the club, we had to call 3 Jamie at the Extension Office, and then it changed to Alyce 4 and Tim. Then it went back to the Extension Office. Then it 5 went back to Jody and Tim, and now it's back at the Extension 6 Office. And sometimes I -- I hesitate to even ask, because 7 it's -- I'm not -- I'm not sure of the last S.O.P. that came 8 out on who we're supposed to call or what we're supposed to 9 do, so I do hesitate. We met with Commissioner Letz and 10 Oehler discussing the new outdoor arena, and it was brought 11 to our attention, because I was concerned with these safety 12 issues, that as long as we gave Tim and Jody three to four 13 days notice of our need to use the indoor arena, that it 14 wouldn't be a problem. I know back in January, it rained 15 constantly. Constantly. We had rodeo series coming up. We 16 needed our athletes, both human and equine, to practice. We 17 had nowhere to practice. We did use the indoor arena, I 18 think, two times. We used it two times. We locked it up 19 when we got done. We turned the lights off when we got 20 finished, and we leave it exactly as we found it, okay? 21 Outdoor arena improvements, we have -- we've 22 painted fences, we've repaired the concession stand, we've 23 put new appliances inside the concession stand. We had an 24 icemaker there at one point. It was -- it was not 25 cost-effective to repair or replace it. We, at the cost of 4-26-10 31 1 the horse club, bought new arena lights, because we had some 2 shadow issues going on; we had some horses shying, and I was 3 afraid the kids were going to get hurt, because the horses at 4 night were shying from the shadows. So, we bought some big 5 lights, added more lights than the lights that were already 6 there. Guadalupe Electric donated the labor. We had new 7 wiring put in. They even were so nice to come after our 8 practice on a Wednesday night, come back with their 9 cherry-picker bucket and reposition lights to make sure we 10 took care of those shadows, and they -- they donated all of 11 the labor for that. We -- we paid for the wiring and the 12 lights and everything, the horse club did. But we put new 13 chairs in the announcer's stand, 'cause the kids like to go 14 up there and mess -- tear up things. And one thing I want to 15 point out is when the fair uses the area, it -- without fail, 16 the electricity is turned off, and everything that we have in 17 the refrigerators and freezers goes bad, so it's cost us 18 several hundred dollars both years. And we don't say 19 anything, and we just go along, and -- but it's been an 20 adverse problem for us. 21 As far as safety issues go, the outdoor arena -- I 22 don't know exactly how to keep this from happening, but the 23 bathrooms seem to be destroyed, and then whenever we need to 24 use the outdoor arena, it's a safety issue. Water's running 25 everywhere. The arena before last, we were down to one 4-26-10 32 1 toilet for everybody, and I've never had so many little girls 2 want to know, "Why do they have that hand-washing thing on 3 the wall?" 'Cause we were in the men's room. (Laughter.) I 4 have gone up there before, and people go in there and play 5 and do whatever, and we had a loose wire on the ground. I'm 6 so glad I didn't turn the electricity on, because there were 7 kids in the arena, and I could just see that wire swaying 8 around. The arena ground is wonderful in the outdoor arena, 9 except when it gets really, really wet, and then it's just a 10 mud pie. And that's when we need to use the indoor arena, 11 there again, just for safety's sake for the kids and the 12 horses, okay? Because, like I said, these are not -- they're 13 not backyard ornaments, and they're not ranch plugs that 14 these kids are riding on. 15 One of the things that we do when we use the 16 outdoor arena as far as safety things is we do rope off the 17 area around the concession stand and the stands so that the 18 participants don't ride into the area, and our audience 19 doesn't get involved with the horses, so that there's not a 20 problem with that. And, like I said, indoor arena, it's just 21 a safety issue. The only time we want to use it and have 22 access to it is when we can't use the outdoor arena. I know 23 sometimes we have a bit of a problem with getting the outdoor 24 arena plowed, and that just keeps the ground from being like 25 cement. I don't know if you've ever -- you know, mud gets 4-26-10 33 1 rained on, it dries, gets rained on, and before long, you've 2 got a really hard, almost concrete surface. It's horrible on 3 these horses' legs, okay? And you have a problem with 4 slipping. And we have just asked, if it's at all possible, 5 just if we could get a regular schedule of breaking up the 6 ground, just dragging through it and getting the clots broken 7 up. There was an issue about the indoor arena being used by 8 an individual. That individual -- let me check and see if 9 she's here. Did she come? No, okay. She was not able to 10 come. She did write a letter. Would you like for me to read 11 it to you about that and the events, or just give you a copy 12 of it? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Either way, whatever. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Your call. 15 MS. HIERHOLZER: Pardon? 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Your call. 17 MS. HIERHOLZER: I'll go ahead and read it so 18 everybody can hear what was said. This letter came to me on 19 April the 23rd. It's from a lady in our horse club, and her 20 name is Tessa Friddle. She writes, "On Wednesday, March the 21 24th, 2010, at about 8:30 a.m., I went to the fairgrounds in 22 my car to ask if I could ride in the indoor arena. There was 23 no one in the office, so I left a note on the desk with my 24 cell phone number, asking someone to call me about when I 25 could ride in the arena. I drive around the back of the show 4-26-10 34 1 barn, and the back and side doors were open and the lights 2 were on. I found an employee in the pig barn and asked if I 3 could ride in the indoor arena. He said I had to check with 4 Tim, and gave me his phone number. I dialed (830)459-4872 at 5 8:53 a.m. from my car at the pig barn. The person identified 6 himself as Tim, and I asked if I could ride in the arena. He 7 told me that was being used for a roping that weekend. I 8 told him it was only Wednesday. I asked him if the arena was 9 privately owned, and if could I talk to the owner. He said 10 it was owned by Kerr County. I then asked him who I could 11 call to use the arena. In the past, I had called Sheldon and 12 put my name on the list to use the arena, and it wasn't a 13 problem. 14 "I asked him if the 4-H Horse Club was going to be 15 able to practice in the indoor arena this evening, and he 16 told me no because the taxpayers would have to pay for an 17 employee to be present, and the taxpayers didn't want to do 18 that. I then asked Tim again who I could talk to about using 19 the arena, because it was not a problem in the past. Tim 20 became very irritated with me, then told me if I came during 21 normal business hours, I could use the arena. I repeated 22 what he said, that I could use the arena during normal 23 business hours, and he said that was correct. So, I told him 24 I would be right back with my horses. I parked my truck and 25 trailer by the back of the arena. I entered through the back 4-26-10 35 1 door by the stalls, which was already open. I entered the 2 arena at the nearest gate and tied one horse while I rode the 3 other. I rode for about two hours. There were community 4 service workers sitting near the back of the arena and 5 employees walking around the arena during the time I was 6 riding. I put the barrels back where I found them and left. 7 I did not open any doors, nor turn on any lights while I was 8 at the arena. 9 "On Wednesday, March 31st, 2010, I entered the 10 indoor arena through the side door with my daughter and our 11 horses about 3:30 in the afternoon. We walked two circles 12 around the arena, and an employee came and told us that we 13 were not supposed to use the arena because it was going to be 14 used on Friday. I told him I had been told by Tim that I 15 could use the arena during normal business hours, and the 16 employee told me I had to check with the Extension Office. 17 We walked out of the arena through the side door and were met 18 by Laurinda Boyd and the employee. She told me no one was to 19 use the arena unless it was a scheduled function, and that 20 the issue was being heard at Commissioners Court. I 21 apologized and explained that it was my understanding that I 22 had gone through the proper channels and assumed I was given 23 correct information and instruction about using the arena. 24 She unlocked the 4-H arena and we rode over there. 25 "As a resident of Kerr County, I would greatly 4-26-10 36 1 appreciate being able to use the indoor arena to work my 2 horses. I find that the rain this year been an issue getting 3 my horses exercised. I also find that horses need to 4 experience a completely enclosed arena when they have not 5 done so in the past. They act different when in a new 6 setting, and it would be a great help to me and others to be 7 able to use the facility which is owned by our county. I 8 agree that rules have to be in place to manage the indoor 9 arena, but it seems that there can be some compromise that 10 will suit everyone. Certainly, no minors should be left 11 alone to ride, only with an adult present. In the past, 12 there was a sign-up sheet in the office so that everyone knew 13 who was using the arena at what time, and if there was any 14 trash or damage, it was clear who was responsible. At other 15 arenas I've used to work my horses, everyone who entered the 16 arena had a signed release on file, and signs were posted 17 stating the codes that protect the facility owners from 18 damages. Thank you. Tessa Friddle." 19 In closing, thank you very much for hearing our 20 rebuttal. We do have some indoor arena usage for this year, 21 but we prefer using the outdoor. Is there any questions how 22 we go about -- 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Question. 24 MS. HIERHOLZER: Yes, sir? 25 JUDGE TINLEY: How many members are there of the 4-26-10 37 1 4-H Horse Club? 2 AUDIENCE: Twenty-four. 3 MS. HIERHOLZER: Twenty-four. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: How many? 5 AUDIENCE: Twenty-four. 6 MS. HIERHOLZER: Twenty-four. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Twenty-four? Okay. Are all of 8 those members very active, somewhat active, marginally 9 active? 10 MS. HIERHOLZER: I would say over half of them are 11 very active. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. And -- 13 MS. HIERHOLZER: The others -- 14 JUDGE TINLEY: -- the others, slightly less than 15 half, are -- 16 MS. HIERHOLZER: Yes, sir. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: -- somewhat active? 18 MS. HIERHOLZER: But they're younger, a little bit 19 intimidated, and that's why a lot of the things -- we don't 20 aim at the really good riders, the really proficient riders. 21 We aim them at the younger riders that are trying to learn 22 how to ride. We take a lot of time going over and over and 23 over, you know, how to saddle, how to get on your horse, how 24 to turn a barrel. And it's a little redundant, but that's 25 the kind of thing -- especially when you're in a club like 4-26-10 38 1 this, it's a learning process, so you have to really take it 2 slow and be -- and be really patient. You know, "I told you, 3 don't kick the horse." You know, that kind of thing. And so 4 -- but the ones that are really, really active are the ones 5 with -- that do rodeos, that have the really nice horses, 6 that need to -- that have athletes as equine partners. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make a couple of general 8 comments, and I know we have another agenda item related to 9 procedures out there. But I think, you know, to your -- your 10 comment -- I guess it was the letter that you read. The -- 11 it is a county facility, open to county residents. However, 12 it is also not right for -- I mean, when someone goes in to 13 use that facility, there is still at least some maintenance 14 that has to go on to rework on the surface, and that costs 15 money. We have to have -- we really just can't have people 16 using the facility without county employees present to kind 17 of be monitoring it. So, it really is -- I mean, it's a 18 county facility open to the public, but it can't be open -- 19 just because it's costing every taxpayer. If one person's in 20 there using it, it's costing all the other taxpayers for that 21 person to be able to do that, and that's not right. That's 22 why we have a fee structure set out there for the use of that 23 facility. 24 MS. HIERHOLZER: As far as the 4-H using the indoor 25 arena, we always do it as a group. 4-26-10 39 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 2 MS. HIERHOLZER: It's a 4-H function. You're 3 talking about just the individuals, right? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I was talking about the letter 5 you read, the comment that because she was a -- because she 6 was a taxpayer of Kerr County, she should be able to use it 7 pretty much whenever. That's really not correct, in my mind, 8 because there is a cost whenever the facility is used. And a 9 general comment which will probably address it more than the 10 other one. I mean, there is a -- when things are 11 scheduled -- you mentioned one of the comments between -- or 12 the letter between Tim and that individual. He has a 13 schedule that we give him, and a very short -- or little 14 manpower to do things. And when things get -- you know, it 15 may not seem like it's that much work to get it ready, but if 16 we have an event on Friday night, it has to be done several 17 days in advance. I mean, we can't just stop everything -- 18 Tim and his group can't just stop everything, go out there on 19 Thursday afternoon and get it ready for a Friday event. He 20 has lots of things county-wide that he's responsible for. 21 So, you know, I am pretty adamant on that. I mean, there's a 22 schedule, and it's a cost to all the taxpayers if we don't do 23 it like that. So, I think that the Maintenance Department, 24 who's responsible for that facility, you know, has to be able 25 to set a schedule of when it is and isn't used based on the 4-26-10 40 1 booked functions out there. That being said, there are times 2 when, certainly, the 4-H needs to be able to use it. But 3 generally, the outdoor facility is for the 4-H Horse Club. 4 We're getting ready to build a new facility, we hope, and 5 clearly, we want that to be the primary -- that's your 6 facility. There are weeks when y'all may not be able to 7 practice. I mean, if it rains a lot, then we -- it just 8 happens. You know, I know y'all want to have -- you 9 mentioned you have practice every Wednesday. Well, you know, 10 there are times when lots of outdoor events just have to 11 cancel them some weeks, and you can't always just go into the 12 indoor facility, depending on scheduling. That's just a 13 general comment, but I think we're going to address it a 14 little bit more on another agenda item. 15 MS. HIERHOLZER: One thing I was going to ask. If 16 the arena is set up, as this past weekend, set up anyway for 17 a rodeo-type function, for a roping, and there's nothing that 18 needs to be done as far as setting up, where is -- is there a 19 problem in that? 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I still -- I'm not 21 willing -- 22 MS. HIERHOLZER: I can see what you're talking 23 about. I don't mean to interrupt, but the county fair, of 24 course. Dog agility, of course. You know, gun and knife 25 show, if they happen to use it, of course. Wild game dinner, 4-26-10 41 1 of course. But if it's set up for a rodeo-type situation 2 anyway -- 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think the -- I just really 4 think, in a general answer, if I'm paying money to rent that 5 for a rodeo function, I expect it, as someone paying for it, 6 for that surface to be pretty much perfect when I get in 7 there, pretty much plowed, the moisture content correct. I 8 mean, if you go in there and start working, even riding one 9 horse around there, it has to be reworked again. I mean, you 10 know, when someone's -- if I was renting it, I would be upset 11 if I went into a facility that I'd paid for and there was 12 hoof prints and, you know, just not a perfectly level 13 facility. So, I think it depends on the function, and I'm 14 going to defer to the Maintenance Department as to what needs 15 to be done, the condition it needs to be at all the time. If 16 they decide it needs to be closed, it needs to be closed. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Ms. Hierholzer, based upon your 18 comments, it occurs to me that in 2009, then, you indicated 19 that there were three times that you folks used the indoor 20 arena? 21 MS. HIERHOLZER: Mm-hmm. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: But -- and that may have been due to 23 inclement weather. So, you indicated every Wednesday, so if 24 it's every Wednesday, that's 52 in '09, less the three, are 25 you telling us? 4-26-10 42 1 MS. HIERHOLZER: Outdoor arena. We have not 2 been -- 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, ma'am. 4 MS. HIERHOLZER: I forgot to give you this. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: You would have used the outdoor 6 arena not less than 49 times in 2009? Is that what you're 7 telling me? 8 MS. HIERHOLZER: Yes, sir. Well, there again, 9 weather. It depends on the weather. The outdoor arena, if 10 it's -- if it's sloppy, muddy, wet, and we feel like it's 11 going to be a detriment or that it's dangerous for our horses 12 or for our kids, then no. But we plan to use the arena. 13 It's just to give -- every Wednesday night, we have a 14 practice. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: I guess my -- my bottom-line 16 question is, how many times did the 4-H Horse group use the 17 outdoor arena in 2009? 18 MS. HIERHOLZER: I'll have to get back with you on 19 that, because I know Wednesdays; I know I've used the outdoor 20 arena on weekends, on Thursday nights. I didn't keep a 21 calendar of it. I didn't know I was going to need to, but 22 it's used frequently, the outdoor arena. 23 AUDIENCE: At least once or twice a week. 24 MS. HIERHOLZER: That's what I'm saying, at least 25 once a week, and sometimes more. I mean, we have some 4-26-10 43 1 members that check out -- 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Minimum, once, one and a half 3 times. We can then -- 4 MS. HIERHOLZER: Minimum, yes. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. We're talking about 75-plus. 6 MS. HIERHOLZER: Yes. Well, and then plus -- plus 7 our rodeos. And, like I said, we practice on Wednesdays, and 8 sometimes we have additional practices, the clinics. And I 9 was going to say we have one -- well, no, three members that 10 use -- they don't get the key every weekend, but fairly 11 regularly on the weekends. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, thank you. 13 MS. HIERHOLZER: Yes, sir. 14 MR. WALSTON: Judge, if I could, during the last 15 Commissioners meeting, one of the comments and I think one of 16 the concerns that y'all had was how much we use the indoor 17 arena and how we had access to the indoor arena. As she 18 mentioned, she contacts either Tim -- she -- she's now 19 contacting through our office. We contact Jody and confirm. 20 Nobody in 4-H program ever uses the indoor arena or the 21 Exhibit Hall without approval from the County in some form or 22 fashion, so I just wanted to clarify. I think in the last 23 meeting, it wasn't -- it was questioned as to whether we had 24 access; we just used it when we wanted to. That's not the 25 case. 4-26-10 44 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I think there was another 2 issue, and that was the reason for my question about the 3 extent of use by the 4-H people of the outdoor arena. 4 MR. WALSTON: Yeah. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: That's the reason I was asking the 6 questions I was asking, because there seems to be some 7 conflicting information about that. And -- 8 MR. WALSTON: It's used a lot by individuals during 9 practice, and also on Wednesdays as a scheduled function, and 10 then for the rodeo. So -- 11 MS. HIERHOLZER: It may not be on the maintenance 12 schedule that the outdoor arena has been plowed, because it 13 was always met with less than favorable reception. And 14 sometimes we'd go ahead and just, you know, walk the horses 15 through it, because the ground would be so hard, and it had 16 been months since the ground had been broken up. But I'm -- 17 I'm one that usually takes the path of least resistance, and 18 so -- and when you feel like you're taking money out of other 19 people's coffers by asking that the ground be plowed, then 20 you just kind of do with what you've got, I guess is the 21 nicest way. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Roy? 24 MR. WALSTON: Yes, sir? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can I ask you a question? Do 4-26-10 45 1 we have a -- I guess your statement you just made of people 2 that's used it off and on as they want, or, you know, for 3 private practice. Do we have a release agreement or 4 something that's been approved by the County Attorney, or any 5 time -- 6 MR. WALSTON: We've got the equine law. It's a 7 liability -- that no sponsor is liable, and I've got a copy 8 if you want me to leave it with you. I've run it through the 9 previous County Attorney, and it's posted, as to the release 10 of liability that -- on the sponsors as far as equine events 11 and activities. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay, I just wanted to make 13 sure. 14 MR. WALSTON: Any equine event. And I'll leave you 15 a copy of it as to -- 16 MS. HIERHOLZER: Doesn't matter what facility, 17 right? 18 MR. WALSTON: Yeah. Indoor, outdoor, any 19 facilities. 20 MS. HIERHOLZER: There is no liability. 21 MR. WALSTON: No liability as far as equine. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You might could just run it by 23 the new County Attorney at some point. I don't think it's a 24 rush, but I think we need to make sure -- 25 AUDIENCE: It's a state law. 4-26-10 46 1 MR. WALSTON: It's a state law. 2 MR. HENNEKE: Thank you. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything further from anybody on the 4 Court? 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But let me go back. 6 MR. WALSTON: Yes? 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I heard you say "event." I 8 want to make sure -- see, we're allowing citizens to go in 9 there and use it for practice, and that's what I want to make 10 sure, that it's -- that's different than an event. 11 MR. WALSTON: That's still going to be considered 12 an event. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 14 MR. WALSTON: Anything related to working with 15 equine, it falls under this. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, if there's a broken pipe 17 out there on that facility and the horse gets injured on it, 18 there's no liability, even though the County may know it's 19 there? 20 MR. WALSTON: Now, if there's some wrong with the 21 facility, there -- 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's what I'm saying, you 23 know. There's -- we just need to make sure that we're 24 covered, 'cause if people are using it as they want, that's 25 the kind of thing we're looking at. 4-26-10 47 1 MR. WALSTON: Yeah. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. Rob, will y'all get 3 together on that? 4 MR. WALSTON: Holler at me if there's anything 5 different. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything else? Let's move to our 8 10 o'clock item, if we might. Item 7; consider, discuss, 9 take appropriate action regarding request to authorize County 10 Auditor to pay bills shown on attached list through weekly 11 direct payables, excluding any items the Auditor determines 12 would require Court approval. Ms. Soldan? 13 MS. SOLDAN: I submitted a copy of the list of 14 bills that we're asking the Court that we can go ahead and 15 pay at the auditor's discretion. I think you guys all have 16 that list. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: This is an update of the prior court 18 order? 19 MS. SOLDAN: It is. Expanding that. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: How far back? 1980-what? 21 MS. SOLDAN: '83. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. It may be time to update 23 that. 24 MS. SOLDAN: Maybe. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Give us a little sense of 4-26-10 48 1 the last item, "Other reimbursements as approved by the 2 County Auditor, excluding any items the County Auditor 3 determines would require Court approval." Enlighten us a 4 little bit, please. 5 MS. SOLDAN: It would be most likely reimbursements 6 if somebody -- if one -- somebody from a department had to 7 purchase something out of their own money rather than going 8 through proper channels and using the budget. It would just 9 be reimbursing them for that. Unless it was something the 10 Auditor thought it should come before the Court so that you 11 knew what they were purchasing. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Such as the type of item or the 13 amount of purchase? 14 MS. SOLDAN: Right. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay, thank you. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, the Auditor's office brought 17 this to me prior to completing the agenda item, and it seems 18 like they've -- the things that are being used for direct 19 payables now, that are routine, and then those that might 20 create some sort of a problem if we -- because of the time 21 frame in which we consider bills, twice a month. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Seems to me like most of it's 23 covered, but I don't like the "other reimbursements as 24 approved by the County Auditor." I don't think that -- I 25 mean, that can be construed as just about anything. 4-26-10 49 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, it could. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's why I asked. 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Outlines what else -- you 4 know, things that need to be -- that are legitimate, that 5 could cause, you know, late fees and various problems. But I 6 don't know what other reimbursements might -- I need an 7 example of that, I think. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I think they just gave one. 9 Occasionally department heads will -- will -- 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Stamps. Go buy stamps at the 11 post office. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Stamps, or they'll have to do 13 special postage on something, other small reimbursement 14 items, supplies, of that nature. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Okay. I just know that that 16 can be construed to be just about anything, in my opinion. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, it could, but what I'm hearing 18 is, if the nature of the purchase or the amount is anything 19 more than somewhat nominal, that it would go on the regular 20 bills to be approved by the Court. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How about if we -- we could put 22 a dollar limit on that, which kind of keeps it nominal. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, make it nominal. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Not-to-exceed number? 4-26-10 50 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Not to exceed $100. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What is the range that's 3 usually -- that you usually see in this, Ms. Soldan? Zero to 4 50? Zero to 100, or what? 5 MS. SOLDAN: I don't know that there's really a 6 range. If it's something that is out of the ordinary, it's 7 taken to the Auditor for her to look at, and then she decides 8 yes or no. And she does decide yes or no sometimes. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: I think the Sheriff occasionally, 10 with his people going out of town, or having to just jump and 11 run, go get somebody that they got a detainer on, and he uses 12 his own credit card for some of those kind of things, or 13 other extraordinary expenses. 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That does happen fairly often. 15 Either that, or it's going to be a school somewhere, where at 16 the last minute, there was too much to use a county vehicle, 17 and they used their own, get reimbursed for gas. But I would 18 agree with Commissioner Letz and Oehler that if you put a 19 limit, at least my department -- I don't know about the rest 20 of them -- limit it at $100; I think that would cover 21 99 percent of it. And then after that, it can wait the two 22 weeks to come to court. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, because it's already -- 24 what you're talking about is already covered, travel 25 advances, travel reimbursements. It's already listed, so 4-26-10 51 1 that wouldn't even come into play on other. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: You'll have that, or you'll 3 have -- yeah, the meals at times. You know, when they're 4 coming back in, and the credit card, whatever. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Still travel reimbursements. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 7 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: These would be -- 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I don't know. That's just -- 9 MR. HENNEKE: I've got a question about the 10 delegation, and I can research and report back, but that 11 seems to be a broad catch-all that would potentially 12 circumvent y'all's, you know, authority of approving 13 expenditures. And if the Court wants, I can look at it and 14 come back. But it seems like most of the other categories 15 are covered there, and then that last one would be a -- 16 anything else under the sun, which I think poses a problem. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: If we put a cap of $100 on it -- 18 MR. HENNEKE: I think that that would limit the 19 delegation, Judge. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: And be reasonable? 21 MR. HENNEKE: Yes, sir. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Move approval of the 23 listing of -- of bills for direct payment, and add on the 24 final item, other reimbursements, "not to exceed $100, as 25 approved by the County Auditor," so forth and so on. Move 4-26-10 52 1 that approval of that list. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a motion and a second for 4 approval as indicated. Question or discussion? All in favor 5 of the motion, signify by raising your right hand. 6 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 7 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 8 (No response.) 9 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Okay. We've 10 got a -- let's go back to Item 2, all the way back to the 11 beginning. Consider, discuss, take appropriate action to 12 approve new telephone system service for county courthouse. 13 Mr. Trolinger. 14 MR. TROLINGER: Yes, sir. Good morning. The 15 background, just to rehash a little bit, the Court, on the 16 last decision -- or the last court, we were requested to go 17 out and get a written best price for each of the items listed 18 service. We sent out proposals to each of the three vendors 19 in writing with a fill-in-the-blank. Judge Tinley has those 20 this morning, and they're in sealed envelopes. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Kind of like the Academy 22 Awards. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. Okay. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Do you have one number from 25 each one of those this morning, rather than multiples, so 4-26-10 53 1 that we can compare apples to apples? 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, let's see if we can -- see if 3 we can get apples to apples here. The first one I have is 4 from Windstream. And the short version is, primary rate 5 interface via copper wiring, at 400 a month; long distance of 6 2.8 cents per minute. That's .028. The next one is from 7 Time-Warner. The primary service rate interface -- it's a 8 PRI, I assume -- fiberoptic, 449. Long distance, 3 cents per 9 minute. This one also shows 350 installation and number 10 reporting. I don't know that we've got this on the other 11 pricings. The last one is from Hill Country 12 Telecommunications. Primary rate interface, PRI, via 13 fiberoptic, $559.80 per month. Long distance, unlimited, 14 zero. No charge. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Any installation fees on 16 Hill Country? 17 JUDGE TINLEY: It's not noted on the pricing 18 request that the I.T. Manager put out. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What's our -- John, what's our 20 monthly -- maybe that's an Auditor question -- our monthly 21 long distance? 22 MS. SOLDAN: It's over $200 a month. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How much? 24 MS. SOLDAN: A little over 200 a month, maybe 230. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: At what rate? 4-26-10 54 1 MS. SOLDAN: Five -- I think it's 5 cents a minute. 2 MR. TROLINGER: It's 6 cents a minute right now. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Six cents a minute. So, it's 4 about $100. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What? 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm just -- that's a -- I'm 7 just thinking, if their prices were about 3 cents a minute, 8 if it goes to 3, we're spending that much right now; that's 9 about a $100 value. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah, okay. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, under our -- you know, 12 possibly more. Okay. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let's see. Windstream is 14 staying with our copper wire? Did I hear that? 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: There was installation fees. 17 And we -- did -- I mean, everybody has to install. Is 18 there -- did we ask for installation fee numbers? 19 MR. TROLINGER: I did not. Previously, they'd been 20 rolled in with the monthly cost. Basically, they take that 21 and estimate it over one, three, or five years and roll it 22 into the cost. That's why we received the broad difference 23 in pricing previously. The representative from Windstream's 24 here. Kimberly Dandurand would like to speak on that issue. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's make sure we got the 4-26-10 55 1 information first, okay? 2 MR. TROLINGER: Okay. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Time-Warner's is 449. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Plus 3 cents a minute? 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. And Hill Country is a flat 6 559.80. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Correct. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Unless I'm mistaken, the 9 recommendation all along has been to go to a PRI line, 10 correct? 11 MR. TROLINGER: Yes. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That takes care of one. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That means that, long-range, 15 the Windstream proposal doesn't work for us, just the other 16 ones, which are pretty close. 17 MR. TROLINGER: Well, they're all PRI lines, but 18 the difference is that the existing line -- Windstream's 19 proposing to use their existing line without upgrading it to 20 fiberoptic. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let's hear what she has to 22 say about it. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 24 MS. DANDURAND: Sure. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Then we can run her out of 4-26-10 56 1 here; she can get back to Boerne. 2 MS. DANDURAND: Good morning, gentlemen. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Good morning. 4 MS. DANDURAND: This morning I did approach the 5 Judge and mentioned that I had an update to our offer, and I 6 realize it was after this submission, so that's why I did 7 not -- it did not include. We -- every time we have quoted 8 the PRI to you, you all -- you do understand that it has been 9 quoted several times? We did quote it with our fiber -- or, 10 excuse me, with our copper wire, so that's what we gave to 11 you Friday. When we saw the -- the request for new pricing, 12 it was via fiber, which we had not discussed. Our data plans 13 did not -- had not been run. That does take several days, 14 sometimes a week, and so we were not able to confidently, in 15 good conscience, say that we could offer you the upgrade. 16 Couldn't give pricing. In a sealed envelope this morning, I 17 was confirmed by my data team that we could provide that 18 pricing. Didn't change. It is apples to apples. But I 19 couldn't, in good conscience, give that to you on Friday 20 until that had been confirmed. Whether that's taken into 21 your decision -- I understand that can be your decision 22 either way, but it is available either way. So, again, as 23 John said, PRI, either way, is met by Windstream or the other 24 companies. But both -- both transmission mediums are 25 available. So -- 4-26-10 57 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: If it's available, why 2 didn't you quote it? 3 MS. DANDURAND: Whether we were able to do it at 4 that price point was -- was a form that we could not commit 5 to. We were not aware if our costs were going to be upside 6 down, and we could not offer that to you upside down for 7 Windstream until we were confirmed that this morning. So, 8 you know, like I said, we wanted to submit a bid either way, 9 giving you a PRI, which is what you needed, but we could not 10 commit to that RFP in good conscience, saying we could do 11 fiber until that was made available to us. So, like I said, 12 I understand if it's not accepted, but I just wanted to let 13 you know that that is available. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Ms. Dandurand, I would point out 16 that the request for pricing which you received from 17 Mr. Trolinger, the very first line says, "Kerr County desires 18 PRI, primary rate interface, voice service via fiberoptic 19 cable. 20 MS. DANDURAND: Yes, sir. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: I think it's fairly clear on what 22 we're requesting. 23 MS. DANDURAND: Yes, sir. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Thank you, ma'am. 25 MR. TROLINGER: If I may, Judge, just to clarify? 4-26-10 58 1 Kimberly, when you bring in the fiberoptic, you'll leave the 2 existing copper, so we'll have dual copper and -- 3 MS. DANDURAND: Correct. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Who owns the copper now? 5 MS. DANDURAND: Windstream. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: There's a gentleman that 7 raised his hand. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: I'm sorry. Yes? 9 MR. SUTTON: I'm with Hill Country Telephone. I 10 didn't know if I could just take 60 seconds? 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Surely. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Certainly. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Just come on up and give us your 14 name and address, and tell us what you got to say in 15 connection with your proposal. 16 MR. SUTTON: I'm Kerry Sutton. I'm at 206 Indian 17 Creek in Ingram. And I just wanted to just to give you kind 18 of an idea of what Hill Country Telephone is doing. You 19 have -- I'm sure you have three proposals from three solid 20 companies here, so I really don't have anything against 21 competition here, but I just wanted to let you know that Hill 22 Country, we're completely in a -- a makeover, if you will. 23 We've been here since 1951, and we are -- in the last several 24 years, we are doing more in the last three years probably 25 than most companies have done in the last 50 or 100. We're 4-26-10 59 1 absolutely committed to this market. The last six months, 2 we've dumped in several millions of dollars into this area, 3 in the way of 30 miles of fiberoptic cable for the Kerrville 4 business district. We -- we have our cabinet right out here 5 on your property, which is one of our hubs for this area. 6 One of the things that we are completely focused on is 7 economic development, which is the reason we started with the 8 business district here in Kerrville. We see public safety, 9 the flooding that was only here recently. We certainly want 10 to take things like that into consideration, and how can our 11 network better supply public safety needs for this area? And 12 we believe that being able to connect to the courthouse, as 13 well as to city offices, education, emergency response, and 14 so on is very critical for this community. 15 And so, you know, that being the case, we certainly 16 would like to make sure you, you know, consider our offer as 17 well, accordingly, and in kind of the big plan for this area. 18 One of the things that we're also working on is telemedicine 19 with the hospitals, with the rural areas, and being able to 20 get connectivity back to them for people that are not able to 21 either travel, or maybe don't have the -- the quick responses 22 that a local hospital or doctors may provide to them. So, 23 Hill Country is completely focused on that as well. And the 24 last thing is that we are completely -- with our staff, our 25 general manager at our company is working with both the 4-26-10 60 1 regulatory, as well as the legislative bodies in the state of 2 Texas, as well as the federal government, in insuring that 3 rural communities such as Kerrville and the surrounding hill 4 country has all the economic development opportunities in 5 something like a telco system, public utilities and so on. 6 So, we are completely -- and I use that word a lot, but it 7 really is who we are as a company, looking at the totality of 8 who we are, being hill country people. We are right down the 9 street. We have over 100 employees. I'm sure you see our 10 trucks all over town. And we want to -- we want to be here 11 connected as much as -- as much as possible, as much as we 12 can, to everybody in town for the greater good of the 13 community. And I do believe that is the big differentiator 14 between Hill Country and our competition. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Mr. Sutton, stay there for 16 me for a moment, please. Last couple of weeks, I kind of 17 looked to y'all, and trying to figure out what makes you tick 18 and why -- I mean, I grew up here, and I'm suddenly hearing 19 about Hill Country Telephone for the first time, in positive 20 language. 21 MR. SUTTON: Correct. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And you came from -- you 23 used the word "makeover," which is -- that's a nice word, or 24 two words. You came from the olden days, once, into the 25 future, and you -- you didn't -- and you did that almost 4-26-10 61 1 overnight. I mean, it was -- 2 MR. SUTTON: True. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- very fast and very quick. 4 And how you did that, I see, is with money. You spent a lot 5 of money -- 6 MR. SUTTON: Yes, sir. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- to get from Point A to 8 Point B, and that sounds like to me that you are really 9 futuristic minded, that you can see down the road. That you 10 -- you know, there's things out there that y'all want to 11 participate in, and that you have some vision -- hell, I may 12 be looking for a job, so I'm selling myself here. 13 (Laughter.) You know, if you -- the future that you can see 14 down there, you not only want to participate in that, but you 15 want to make it available. I mean, I've been reading all 16 these things. 17 MR. SUTTON: Sure. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And I kind of see all that 19 in your -- in the way you all are doing things. We -- we 20 have an interest in that -- or I do; I this think whole Court 21 does, in the same things. Like video conferencing, as an 22 example. 23 MR. SUTTON: Yes, sir. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You mentioned the medical 25 field, which is -- I also read that in the near future, folks 4-26-10 62 1 can sit at home and confer with their doctor over the darn 2 computer. That's incredible to me. If we have doctors by 3 then. But video teleconferencing -- 4 MR. SUTTON: Yes. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- that we can communicate 6 and -- I mean, the court systems can communicate, and in 7 outlying areas. And you guys would make that available, and 8 what else? Can you -- can you tell me some things other than 9 that that you might -- while I look up a sentence here that I 10 want you to explain to me? 11 MR. SUTTON: Our leadership of our company has 12 literally said that there is no end -- or no bounds or limits 13 to what our company will consider. Now, of course, good 14 business rules state that everything must be, certainly, 15 profitable, and we're certainly not looking to be, you know, 16 unwise in our financial decisions, of course. However, we do 17 believe that technology is growing faster than any of us 18 could ever imagine, and we don't necessarily know what's 19 going to be two years, five years, ten years down the road. 20 So, our core of business is building an infrastructure here 21 that whatever the technology may be, we are -- we're already 22 there. We talked about fiber versus copper just briefly here 23 a second ago, and in the Kerrville market, everything we're 24 building is fiber. And we can take that fiber, which may 25 have a life of, I don't know, 40 or 50 years, but the 4-26-10 63 1 equipment on both ends can be changed out, so that you can 2 put -- literally anything your mind can imagine, you can 3 transport over that fiber. We have -- I know it's not 4 exactly what you asked. 5 The first part of that is to build the 6 infrastructure, so whatever we need to do, we can put it on 7 that. Everything. Video from, once again, public safety for 8 maybe cameras. We've considered looking at options with the 9 -- the local police, the County as well, and various ways how 10 can we make their job easier, better, safer, both for their 11 officers, as well as for the people around town, without 12 giving too much away. We've looked at connectivity. 13 Education is a huge thing, the hospitals reaching out to 14 people. If you can put conferencing over our network to the 15 schools, you know, Kerrville school system can connect to San 16 Antonio, they can connect to Harvard, they can connect to -- 17 I don't know, somebody in Tokyo if they wanted to on getting 18 education. The world has completely shrunk, and if you can 19 -- if you can get to the world over a network, there is no 20 bounds. There's no limits on economic development. There's 21 no limits on medicine. There's no limits on what you can 22 learn, what you can research, where you can go. And so it's 23 hard to answer your question like that, but we're -- we're 24 looking just as far down the road as we possibly can. And we 25 meet with individuals routinely, saying, "Hey, this is what 4-26-10 64 1 we see. What do you see? What do you need?" Because, 2 obviously, our 100 employees don't have all the answers for 3 what technology is going to have to do in the future. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's fantastic. You 5 actually did answer my question, and you answered my next 6 question too. I was looking at this business magazine with 7 Mr. Wilson -- 8 MR. SUTTON: Yes, sir. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- featured in it, and he 10 makes a comment, "Once you get the fiber in place, bandwidth 11 can carry whatever it needs, making possible applications 12 that haven't even been thought of yet." 13 MR. SUTTON: That's correct. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That is -- that's futuristic 15 thinking. That's looking down the road. God, I love that. 16 That's neat stuff. 17 MR. SUTTON: Our kids going to go to a four-year 18 college today will literally be studying things and 19 technology the first years of college that have not been 20 developed by the time they graduate. Technology is literally 21 happening that fast. And while we don't know what that is, 22 we do know that if you -- you can't get to it, it's useless 23 to you. If you -- it's no good for San Antonio or Austin to 24 have something that we can't get to, because people will live 25 in San Antonio or Austin; they won't live here. But if we 4-26-10 65 1 have the connectivity here, people will move businesses, and 2 doctors will -- we talked about doctors earlier. Doctors 3 will come here, law offices, education, research will come 4 here if they can get to the same network that a research 5 facility in San Antonio or Austin might do. So, we -- we can 6 seriously believe that economic development, safety, 7 education and those types of things are completely contingent 8 upon your network that you have in your community. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It's just like -- it's just 10 like if I were at home evaluating a purchase, these things 11 are things that I desire, and that, to me, means a savings of 12 money. I can translate that into savings. So -- 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I've been impressed by the 14 progress your company's made. Talk to us about a couple 15 issues that I think nobody has really got into. Talk to us 16 about redundancy in the event of a primary system failure, 17 and secondly, talk to us a little bit about installation, 18 what's required and how long it would take. 19 MR. SUTTON: Sure. On the installation, we are in 20 the business corridor. Folks like yourself, we do not have 21 installation charges. That is market price. We've looked at 22 what our competitors have out there, and we don't believe 23 competitively that we can walk in here and say it's a great 24 service, but it's going to be, you know, "X" dollars to 25 connect. So, we are -- we are connecting the majority of our 4-26-10 66 1 services -- unless there's some reason that it's completely 2 off the chart, we are not charging for installation services. 3 As far as redundancy, our fiber's connected to the Texas Lone 4 Star Network ring, which rings the entire state of Texas. We 5 have a network that travels west of here up around San Angelo 6 and back around to Dallas. We also have a southern ring 7 which goes down through -- and I'm not a network guy -- that 8 goes down south of San Antonio, back down to San Antonio. We 9 have two points of connectivity to the internet world, going 10 out to the internet cloud, as people discuss it. Internally, 11 we have rings through town here. We have rings down through 12 Tarpley, through Leakey, and we have another ring that goes 13 out through Fredericksburg. So, locally, we have -- we have 14 rings, meaning that if there's a physical cut here, the 15 internet can travel in one more direction. 16 One of the great things about living in the hill 17 country, the people -- we have fences, and we have landowners 18 that like to put fences up and dig post holes and things like 19 that, so the inevitability of a fiber cut is just that things 20 do happen, as we just saw here several months ago. Stuff 21 happens. That's part of us living here in the hill country. 22 What we are constantly doing is looking at ways that allow us 23 the freedom to say, hey, through different technology -- it 24 could be a microwave, could be satellite; it could be 25 multiple fiberoptic rings. We must have diversity out of 4-26-10 67 1 this area, such that one fiber cut doesn't do anything except 2 cause somebody to flip a switch; instead of going to the 3 left, you go to the right. That is one of the things we're 4 currently working on. We've met with the City; the City had 5 concerns as well about diversity, so we are -- we're looking 6 at all of those things. Internet did not go down during that 7 cut, but however, everything was so -- everything slowed down 8 so dramatically that everybody -- everybody felt the 9 slow-down, if you will, here a couple weeks ago. Our long 10 distance did. 11 We have since turned up our -- last year, we've 12 turned up our tandem in Comfort, so we are looking at other 13 ways we can route long distance services as well, so every 14 avenue, every egress out of this market, we are looking at 15 all the ways possible to get out for a case of emergency. 16 God forbid there be some type of terrorist attack which took 17 out a major -- a major pipeline connectivity. We -- and we 18 can't just sit back and say, "Well that happened; we can't do 19 anything." We must have redundant networks, and this is 20 something we discuss every week about, "How can we insure the 21 safety?" Goes back to public safety, education, and economic 22 development in this market. And so we are -- we are required 23 internally, as well as our responsibility to you, to have 24 that diverse network. And so while it's not perfect today, 25 it's continually being developed and designed. 4-26-10 68 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Question I had. You mentioned 2 all the things that you will be able to do with fiber, -- 3 MR. SUTTON: Mm-hmm. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- and we -- and the public 5 will be able to do with fiber. What is different about Hill 6 Country Co-Op versus Time-Warner? Their proposal is to put 7 in fiber as well. What's -- why is your -- what you're doing 8 different than what they would be doing, or do you know? 9 MR. SUTTON: I'm not a -- I'm not a network 10 engineer, so I certainly don't want to -- I'm not, certainly, 11 completely qualified to answer that question. However, there 12 are different -- well, I'm not going to speak to Time-Warner. 13 I'm just not qualified. I'll just say that our fiber comes 14 in directly to you, and it's one fiber directly from our -- 15 you know, from our switching office directly to you, and so 16 at the turn of a switch or a computer entry, I can light that 17 fiber up and make it literally as big or fast or huge as you 18 want, you know, that fast. Some other carriers cannot do 19 that, because they don't have the network to do that. And, 20 once again, I won't speak on the competitor; I just don't 21 know. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Don't know, okay. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Any more questions for Mr. Sutton? 24 Thank you, sir. In fairness, we've heard from two of the 25 proposers. Do we have a representative from Time-Warner 4-26-10 69 1 present? I want to give that individual an opportunity. It 2 seems we don't, okay. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: The Sheriff's here. 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Not for Time-Warner. But if I 5 may, Judge, the only thing I have a concern about with any of 6 them, and I just -- it hasn't really been addressed, is the 7 amount of time it takes to service something in case there is 8 -- in case of an emergency. I know -- and I'm not saying 9 good or bad about any of them -- with Windstream, we do have 10 the ability to, where we have gone down several times, 11 especially on an emergency line, and we had certain phone 12 numbers and that that we're able to call, and it takes them 13 less than -- most of the time, less than ten minutes to get 14 to our facility to fix those -- those items for us. And then 15 again, we have what happened a few weeks ago, where it didn't 16 affect Kerrville, but it sure affected everybody outside the 17 city limits of Kerrville, where we couldn't get -- get 18 emergency phone calls coming or going. And I think those 19 kind of situations and how it will interface with our end of 20 the 911 system, since Kerrville has the main part of it and 21 then it gets transferred over to us, how is it going to 22 interface with that to make sure we don't have any problems 23 with incoming 911 calls? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, thank you. Gentlemen, do you 25 want to move forward and take action on this? Or we're going 4-26-10 70 1 to be taking a recess here in a little bit. Maybe come back 2 after recess, give you an opportunity to chew on these things 3 during the recess? What's your pleasure? 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Sure, that'll be fine. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Let's come back. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And pick it up. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: What I would like to do quickly is 9 call our 10:30 item before we do take our recess. It's Item 10 10; to consider, discuss, take appropriate action to present 11 Distinguished Service Award to the Kerr County Historical 12 Commission. Commissioner Baldwin asked that this matter -- 13 don't you run off, Ms. Leonard. 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: She didn't hear you. 15 AUDIENCE: She didn't hear you. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: She's just not paying attention, is 17 she? 18 MS. LEONARD: I'm not. So, what else is new? 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Why don't you come up here, Ms. 20 Leonard? 21 MS. LEONARD: You thought I was leaving? I have a 22 display that we have in Houston. I'll show it to y'all real 23 quick, showing everything we did last year, and why we got 24 the Distinguished Service Award. And this was on display in 25 a huge room. I can't -- how many other people were there? 4-26-10 71 1 AUDIENCE: That got awards? 2 MS. LEONARD: Now it's all falling apart. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: You may want to turn that around so 4 that the audience can see it. 5 MS. LEONARD: Okay. Now things are coming unglued 6 here, so -- 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Do something, Buster. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Come up here. 9 MS. LEONARD: Anyway, we did lots of things last 10 year, so -- and the main thing we did was transfer all our 11 archives to Schreiner, and Jeanne Schumacher Sutton with -- 12 come up here. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I've got some tape here. 14 Maybe -- 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Put it on the top. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Do a quick repair here. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It's called old Ingram 18 repair. 19 MS. LEONARD: Luckily, it stayed together in 20 Houston. 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's what went wrong. 22 MS. LEONARD: Really. Anyway -- 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We'll fix it up. 24 MS. LEONARD: All right. But, anyway, Jeanne 25 probably can tell you a little bit about the archives 4-26-10 72 1 transfer. 2 MS. SUTTON: Well, this is the 35th year of the 3 Kerr County Historical Commission, and we had 35 years of 4 accumulated documents and photographs and other -- and 5 publications and some memorabilia that were here in the 6 courthouse, and the Commissioners Court and Logan University 7 at Schreiner came to an agreement that we could transfer all 8 of those out to Schreiner, where they can be housed in an 9 environmentally-correct building, and they are now available 10 to the public. We have oral histories. Francelle Robinson 11 is -- Collins is in charge of the oral history program. We 12 have over 60 oral histories of notable citizens of Kerr 13 County. Some are deceased; some are still living today, and 14 they tell about an hour of their life in -- in Kerr County. 15 They're very interesting. And then all of the background on 16 the 60-something historical markers in Kerr County, they all 17 have a little manuscript that describes all the history 18 behind them. Those are also available to the public for 19 their viewing out at Schreiner. 20 MS. LEONARD: Anyway, that's why we got the award. 21 Thank y'all. 22 (Applause.) 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Don't run off. Don't run off. This 24 is from the Texas Historical Commission, and it is the award 25 itself, the Distinguished Service Award to the Kerr County 4-26-10 73 1 Historical Commission in recognition of its active and 2 well-balanced preservation program. Thank you for all the 3 work that you do. 4 MS. LEONARD: Thank you. 5 (Applause.) 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's a Hunt girl and two 7 Center Point girls. (Laughter.) 8 MS. SUTTON: That's right. 9 AUDIENCE: Is that good or bad? 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's good. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Why don't we be in recess for 12 about 15 minutes. 13 (Recess taken from 10:44 a.m. to 11 a.m.) 14 - - - - - - - - - - 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Let's come back to order, if 16 we might. Are we ready to proceed, gentlemen, on -- on Item 17 2 on the agenda? 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I am. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. So, we'll come back to Item 21 2; consider, discuss, take appropriate action to approve new 22 telephone system service for the county courthouse. We've 23 got all the info, I assume. Does anybody not have it? Okay. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think we got all that 25 Mr. Trolinger gave us, plus what you read, Judge. I'd like 4-26-10 74 1 to offer a motion. I think we've kicked this thing around 2 now for weeks, seems like indefinitely, and the solution that 3 we're seeking is not getting any closer, 'cause we keep going 4 back to the well. I think now we're at a point where that's 5 not necessary any longer. I'm a little curious about the -- 6 the offset with respect to unlimited telephone long distance 7 access. The Commissioner ventured a -- a possible number 8 there. I think it probably is greater than that, based on 9 our long distance usage, which, in my mind, then renders the 10 proposal from Hill Country Telephone as being the lowest, if 11 you take into consideration the value of long distance 12 service to the county. So, in that -- with that said, I 13 would like to offer up a motion that we award the bid for 14 courthouse service to Hill Country Telephone -- 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Telecommunications, I think. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Hill Country 17 Telecommunications, or whatever -- 18 JUDGE TINLEY: That was the bidder, I think. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And it is for $559 a month, 20 with unlimited long distance service. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 559.80. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: .80. Thank you, sir. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'll second that emotion. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion is made and seconded to 25 accept the proposal from Hill Country Telecommunications. 4-26-10 75 1 Question or discussion on the motion? 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Mr. Trolinger, have you had any 3 communication with them on how long it will take to get done? 4 MR. TROLINGER: I have not asked Hill Country 5 specifically, but the typical timeline from the other two 6 vendors has been, I think, five weeks, were the answers I 7 received. So, the cost -- the time that it takes to actually 8 port the lines over, I think that's what the question is. Do 9 you have any idea about it? 10 MR. HESS: Five weeks sounds like a long time for 11 us. I would -- I'd like to check on this, but I would think 12 that two weeks would be a good amount of time. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And you are, sir? 15 MR. HESS: I'm Mark Hess. I'm with Hill Country 16 Telecommunications. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you. 18 MR. TROLINGER: So, I'm going to realistically say 19 it will be five weeks to do it, because there -- we have to 20 coordinate with the -- you know, with Windstream to switch 21 the numbers over, and there's quite a bit of planning 22 involved to making sure that goes smoothly when we switch the 23 numbers over. We want to make sure it works that weekend, 24 and I think we'll have probably a dry run, just -- just from 25 experience. 4-26-10 76 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I have a question. A lot of 2 this is -- is brought to the forefront now because of the new 3 phone system. And we know this fixes that problem, correct? 4 MR. TROLINGER: Which problem? 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All of them. 6 MR. TROLINGER: Well, the echo problem's gone. The 7 delay problem's gone. Currently, we just have the major 8 issue of the incoming faxes not being able to come in on that 9 line, and we do think that this will resolve that issue; that 10 we'll be able to bring -- 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Caller ID is still a 12 factor. 13 MR. TROLINGER: And, of course, we'll get caller ID 14 with this system. That's a new feature. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Any more questions? All in favor of 17 the motion, signify by raising your right hand. 18 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 19 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 20 (No response.) 21 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. We'll go to 22 Item 3. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Wow, number three. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Consider, discuss, take appropriate 25 action to declare a 10- by 4-foot wood conference table, 4-26-10 77 1 Inventory Number 001078, as surplus and approve sale of same. 2 Mr. Walston. I've heard during the break that -- that 3 there's multiple possibilities for use of that. 4 MR. WALSTON: We're going to trade. It's kind of 5 like the trade; we're in the middle of a trade. We do have a 6 10-foot by 4-foot conference table in our master gardener's 7 room that is not needed by the master gardeners. It takes up 8 a lot of room, and they'd like us to get rid of it and find 9 another home for it. So, with that, I'd -- 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Hang on to it. We'll be in touch. 11 MR. WALSTON: Okay. We may have to take it apart 12 to get it out of there. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Got to do what we got to do. 14 MR. WALSTON: It can be taken off. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That will probably work in 16 the new -- somewhere. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: He can use it. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: We're going to find a place for it. 19 MR. WALSTON: Good deal. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. The addendum item, Item 21 18, is a timed 10:15 item. It was up at the top and not out 22 to the side like I'm used to seeing. So, I'm going to call 23 Item 18 now; consider, discuss, take appropriate action on 24 proposal from Peter Lewis Architect and Associates for 25 professional services in connection with the demolition of 4-26-10 78 1 old outdoor arena and construction of new outdoor arena at 2 Hill Country Youth Exhibition Center. I put this on the 3 agenda. We had Mr. Lewis running with this ball a little 4 bit, and he thinks we need to get something nailed down, so 5 he submitted a proposal. I know I've got an original here. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I don't think I have one. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We got it. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Hmm? 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Should be -- 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Is it on the backup? 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'm looking. I don't see it. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's on the backup. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Basically a standard time and 14 expense -- 15 MR. LEWIS: Yes. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Like we worked on before? 17 MR. LEWIS: Yes, sir. Except, you know, the annex 18 was a different deal, 'cause we had -- 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, yeah, that was a project. 20 MR. LEWIS: Yes. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: That was a project, so that had a 22 separate contract. 23 MR. LEWIS: And this is just -- it's certainly 24 important to have it in front of Commissioners. It is in -- 25 it is to identify this as a distinct project from the other 4-26-10 79 1 projects that we do and get it on the books as such, and 2 that's how we -- that's how we book it. I'm sure that's how 3 the County wants to. We appreciate the opportunity to learn 4 a little bit more about rodeo arenas. We have been working 5 with Commissioner Letz and Oehler and with some other folks, 6 and by the time we're done with this, it might be a 7 marketable service for Peter Lewis Architects and Associates. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: The thought that comes to my mind, 9 then, is what should we be charging for the tuition? 10 MR. LEWIS: Wish I hadn't said that, Judge. 11 (Laughter.) 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay, demolition. Are we 13 talking about some -- does that mean everything comes down to 14 the ground? 15 MR. LEWIS: Yes, sir. In our documents, what we've 16 got out there, the -- let me back up. The -- this project's 17 bidding right now. We have already distributed three or four 18 sets. A gentleman came in this morning while we were having 19 a staff meeting and picked up a set. We've had an interest 20 from one general contractor and from a couple subs. The 21 scope includes demolition of the existing arena, and in its 22 entirety, with the salvage going to the contractor, and so 23 the County doesn't have to deal with that, and then 24 construction of an arena and a press box. We also have a 25 schematic design for bleachers to -- and covered bleachers to 4-26-10 80 1 be done at some time in the future, and that's part of the 2 scope as well. The County will be providing any of the site 3 work, grading and preparing the area of the arena, as well as 4 restoring the existing arena area, and the County will also 5 be providing electrical and lighting for the press box, and 6 any lighting that needs to happen around the arena. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That will be separate and 8 apart, along with the restroom facilities and all that. This 9 is just strictly at this time for the arena itself. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is anything from the old one 11 being reused? 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: The bleachers. We talked 13 about the bleacher -- the seats. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Benches. That's about it. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That are up in the stands 16 now. Those are -- 17 MR. LEWIS: As it stands now, they're -- those are 18 going to the contractor, so we are having a pre-bid meeting 19 on Friday of this week to clarify any questions 20 contractors -- bidders may have, interested bidders may have, 21 and if we want to carve out that piece -- 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I thought we did. 23 MR. LEWIS: If we did, I apologize, I didn't get 24 that. We -- and we can do that. There will be some 25 questions that will come up. We'll issue one addendum, and 4-26-10 81 1 then you're receiving bids a week from Monday -- from the 2 next Monday, so two weeks from today you will receive bids at 3 10 a.m., is what I -- 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think we'd want them to take 5 them out as part of the demolition. I mean, just give -- get 6 with Tim as to where we store those, the benches. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Going to reserve them? 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah, reserve them. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They can tear them down, but 10 pile them up wherever Tim wants to put them. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. So, what I'm hearing 12 is that Leonard and the Road and Bridge Department will do 13 the groundwork. The County's going to provide all the 14 lighting, and we'll use the old seats. Exactly what are 15 y'all doing? (Laughter.) 16 MR. LEWIS: We're just enjoying the ride. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yippy ti yi yay. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And, Commissioner, for the 19 public as well, the reason Commissioner Oehler and I thought 20 it made sense to do it this way was that the -- to try to 21 allow more the welder-only types to be able to build this 22 facility, which is what essentially it is. Once you add the 23 electrical into it, then they're going to have to -- 24 basically, you start drawing in general contractors, which we 25 thought we'd be limiting the number of bidders, potentially. 4-26-10 82 1 And the electrical's -- pretty much the main part of the 2 electrical will be the lighting down the road, and that, you 3 know, is a little bit of a separate issue in our mind, and 4 thought it made sense just to pull that out right now. 5 The -- either the electrical and the announcing booth, press 6 box, either between the Maintenance Department, or maybe we 7 can use one of our local contractors here to get that little 8 piece done. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Not a lot there. I think the 10 lighting is a separate issue, separate bid. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: What's the proposed completion date 12 for the new outdoor arena? 13 MR. LEWIS: We don't -- we have not assigned it; it 14 is a bid item. I think we have an outside window on it, 15 but -- and I don't have my bid -- I apologize; I don't have 16 my bid documents. We do actually have bid documents. We 17 have drawings and specifications, since -- to answer your 18 question. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Took him a while to figure 20 that out. 21 MR. LEWIS: Without tongue in cheek. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do we make the copies for 23 you? 24 MR. LEWIS: No, I do that. You do pay for those, 25 but I do that. 4-26-10 83 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And the old arena stays until 2 the new one's built. 3 MR. LEWIS: Yes. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Good. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And then we demolish the 6 old one. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, they demolish it. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's part of the bid. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: The demolition. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: You've resolved the question that 12 was put before me over the weekend. The fair people 13 indicated that they've got a bull riding scheduled for 14 October in connection with the fair, and they just wanted 15 some assurance they're going to have someplace to do it. 16 And -- 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The -- the facility is not 18 being designed for bull riding. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: I informed this individual there 20 would not be any bucking chutes in the new arena. If there 21 were some portable chutes that may be necessary, well, that 22 would be up to them. 23 MR. LEWIS: But the new arena would not have 24 bucking chutes. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's really being designed more 4-26-10 84 1 as a horse arena. I mean, the -- 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Roping. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- the structure of it and the 4 wiring and such will be used -- I mean, it may work for 5 bulls, but it really is designed for horses. 6 MR. LEWIS: And there's no doubt that this is an 7 eight-week -- six- to eight-week project. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's if they move slowly. 10 MR. LEWIS: I think the press box, just getting 11 that, and that's a separate vendor. Possibly, you know, they 12 have -- 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Depends on who gets the bid. 14 MR. LEWIS: Yeah. You do have -- right now, as I 15 said, we've got one general contractor who has picked up a 16 set. I think they may find that if they're competing against 17 someone who does welding principally, but can do some of 18 these other things, it will be difficult to beat, but open 19 competition is healthy, and we'll find out. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: You know, we've enjoyed open 21 competition recently. 22 MR. LEWIS: Yes, sir. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I know we had a list of all the 24 people that inquired. Have they picked up -- do you know, 25 Jody? 4-26-10 85 1 MS. GRINSTEAD: I called seven, so if we only had 2 three or four, then not all of them have. And I've spoken 3 with all of them. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 5 MR. LEWIS: Basically, what we got, we've got -- 6 it's a small packet. We have a couple sets ready for anyone 7 that wants to stop by quickly, and -- and then we also 8 print -- it's pretty easy to print out a set on demand. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay, great. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. But the issue before us now 11 is the proposal for Mr. Lewis' services, rendered and to be 12 rendered, I suppose. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What's he going to do? 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Time and expense? Time and 15 expense. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Same deal we've had in 18 previous deals, huh? 19 MR. LEWIS: Yes, sir. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I move for approval -- I'm 21 not sure what it is that we're approving -- of the proposal 22 from Peter Lewis Architect and Associates. 23 MR. LEWIS: Buster, just to illuminate, we are -- 24 in addition to the preparation of bid documents, we're 25 handling the bidding, and we will be your agent during 4-26-10 86 1 construction as well. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you, sir. 3 MR. LEWIS: With counsel from at least two of the 4 Commissioners during the course of that. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a motion and a second. 7 Question or discussion on the motion? All in favor of the 8 motion, signify by raising your right hand. 9 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 10 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 11 (No response.) 12 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Okay. Now 13 we're going to come back to Item 5; consider, discuss, take 14 appropriate action regarding the new mass notification 15 system, that being Code Red, including, but not limited to 16 how public is notified, possibility of localized 17 notifications instead of notifying the entire county, opt-out 18 options other than waivers, information on how to sign up. 19 Commissioner Oehler? 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, I guess I'm -- I don't 21 know how many phone calls y'all might have gotten on this 22 issue. Most of them were complimentary of being called. 23 It's the first time we've used that notification system since 24 we've had it installed, and some people would like -- you 25 know, they think they -- I believe they think they want to 4-26-10 87 1 opt out and not be called. They want to know how to do that. 2 Is there a way to do that? You know, those might be the very 3 same people that, you know, in a different kind of emergency 4 would like to be notified, so it's kind of a -- but for the 5 most part, people that have called me and expressed an 6 opinion, it was positive. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: My phone calls and e-mails 8 basically were positive. I did have one -- one caller who 9 lived in the Riverhill section of town who questioned why we 10 would call him at 11 o'clock and wake him up, and call him 11 again at 6:30 in the morning and wake him up to tell him the 12 same thing. And I said, "From an abundance of caution. 13 That's all I can tell you." 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, and I had one -- one of 15 the ones that was negative was from the Coronado area, and 16 they couldn't understand why they needed to be notified if 17 the river was on flood or if it was raining; they knew it was 18 raining. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It does call into 20 question -- your putting it on agenda is valid, in that it 21 does call into question -- and this is the first time we've 22 used it, right, Rusty? 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No? On this broad a scale? 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. 4-26-10 88 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: On this broad a scale, 2 okay. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: County-wide, yes, definitely. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It does call into question 5 whether or not -- 'cause we're notifying people who we know 6 would be impacted by the river coming out of its banks and 7 the creeks and so forth, whether or not we cut too wide a 8 swath. I would ask that -- or say that to you in the form of 9 a question. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay. My turn? Number one, 11 this is the first time we used it on a county-wide issue. 12 Back when the phone lines all went down, we used it for 13 e-mail only. We tried to use it in all areas outside the 14 city limits of Kerrville for e-mail only, because you had no 15 other way to try to advise people on how to contact us or go 16 about getting help. On this one, as y'all know -- and 17 everything -- if people want to complain, they probably 18 should complain to me, because I am the one that authorizes 19 it and directs when it gets sent and what gets sent. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's what we told them. 21 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I hope so. All right. And I 22 did -- I did get one that evidently called and accused me of 23 being a democrat, and accused me of all kind of things. But 24 I will tell you this; we've had 21 people opt out since this 25 occurred, and we've had 108 new ones sign up. Okay? It made 4-26-10 89 1 20,000 phone calls, and in less than an hour. It actually 2 went out at 10:39. Now, I know the time on your message or 3 whatever may say 11:39. That's 'cause of the difference 4 between here and Florida, where it bounces back to. I'm very 5 proud of the system. I think it's one of the biggest 6 advantages in warning that this county could have ever done, 7 really worth the money. The reason I did it at 10:30 at 8 night, one, we had, in a matter of less than 35 minutes, as 9 Bruce is aware of, we had three people washed off, okay? 10 Three different vehicles. We were able to, with Kerrville 11 Fire Department, successfully rescue one lady hanging in the 12 tree that probably wouldn't have lasted another five minutes, 13 seriously, because she couldn't hang on any more. And about 14 ten minutes after we got her out of the tree, a floating boat 15 dock hit that tree, so she would not have survived. The 16 second one was up around Camp Arrowhead or Flaming Arrow; 17 that one was rescued by another resident, and saved us. And 18 the third one, we know what happened to Mr. Spikes. 19 All three of these people got washed off because it 20 happened so quick out west that there was no time at all to 21 get any type of barricades up to cover all the crossings, 22 okay? I spent the night in between two of those crossings, 23 the rest of that night, and they couldn't have gotten the 24 barricades up to those until way late the next morning, 25 because you couldn't get to them. My concern was, and why I 4-26-10 90 1 decided totally on it being a county-wide one, was because it 2 was going to affect the entire Guadalupe River. Those of us 3 that have been here long enough, and I think most of y'all 4 have, that have seen this and will remember, and one thing 5 I'm not proud of, but I do remember very vividly, is spending 6 about 72 hours in a helicopter when we pulled out 13 dead 7 kids down on the east end. Okay? I don't want to go through 8 that again. So, if I upset 30 people and save one life, or 9 upset 500 and save one life, I'm going to do it. 10 The bottom line was, that's going to affect the 11 entire river. I chose to send it out county-wide, because I 12 don't know who's coming from a place, going to a place, 13 whether they're a Kerrville resident or a county resident 14 that's going to come around the curve and cross a water 15 crossing that has not been barricaded, okay? That was a very 16 sudden deal. It wasn't like several days of rain where it's 17 gradually going to come up. That one -- I watched that one 18 crossing that I sat at out west; I watched it come up over 19 5 feet in less than five minutes. I think what happened to 20 the gentleman we lost, he could not have crossed Lone Star 21 Crossing if the water was up much at all, but yet he was able 22 to. It was the next crossing that caught him, less than half 23 a mile down -- up the river, and it came up so much, it got 24 him in that half a mile travel distance. So, I think -- and 25 he's from around here. He was from around here. I think we 4-26-10 91 1 had to do something to notify everybody that could have 2 possibly crossed that river anywhere, whether it was 3 Kerrville, Center Point -- 'cause, you know, if it comes up 4 10 feet in Hunt, it's going to come up 15 to 20 feet when it 5 hits Center Point. So, I notified everyone. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Sheriff, question -- or two 7 questions. County-wide -- I was out of town in that period 8 when that flood came through. And I'm glad you did it; I 9 think it certainly was warranted. But I don't -- I didn't 10 hear any feedback from Ingram on the far western part. Are 11 you sure it went out to that part? 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It went out. I have the stats 13 on the calls it made and everything. It did go out. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What happens if you get an 15 answering machine? It skips it? 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Depends on what type of 17 answering machine. Most of the time, it will leave a message 18 or try and recall it. A lot of times, it doesn't. Now, for 19 some reason, some of our cell phone providers -- like, I got 20 an e-mail this morning early from a resident that said they 21 got it on their house phone right when we sent it out. It 22 didn't come across on their cell phone for three days. Now, 23 I can't tell you what happened there, other than cell phone 24 providers are different things. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think -- I mean, I think 4-26-10 92 1 you're -- you certainly made the correct decision, because 2 the east end of the county didn't get that much rain. And, 3 you know, some of us not paying attention might hit the 4 Guadalupe over Lane Valley bridge; that's a pretty high 5 bridge. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The reason I put it out at 7 6:00, 6:30 the next morning is, the main thing I was looking 8 at and thinking about and trying to make that 9 determination -- and I had already made it that night, okay, 10 because I wasn't in the office; I was sweeping along the 11 river. But the reason we did it at 6:00 is I wanted to catch 12 all the school administrators, and primarily students and 13 that getting ready to leave their homes, either parents going 14 to work early or students going to school. I wanted to try 15 and advise people, because there wasn't any way we were going 16 to be able to get barricades up. You know, it happened too 17 quick. I couldn't ask Road and Bridge to do it. TexDOT was 18 trying; they couldn't get to them, and we were just stuck. 19 So, it's one of those situations -- it also sent out 20 800-something e-mails. I think it was -- 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I got one. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: -- the first time in 30 years 23 of my doing this that I felt comfortable, and really felt 24 like we very well may have -- and hopefully I'll never know, 25 but I think we very well may have, in this instance, saved 4-26-10 93 1 one or two or several lives. I can't tell you what the stats 2 are, but I know that a lot of people were caught unexpected. 3 You know, I have a lot of those so-called old-timers around 4 here, which I kind of feel I'm getting to be one of those, 5 and I know when it's raining. I know what that river's going 6 to do. You don't need to be waking me up at 10:30, 7 11 o'clock at night. Well, granted, but you're not everybody 8 in this county. And my job is to try and provide public 9 safety for most everybody that we can possibly provide in 10 this county. We do have the capability, Bruce, of drawing 11 off an area. 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, I know. 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Setting up blocks, setting up 14 all those different things, okay? We have -- we use it for 15 calling in emergency personnel. When I have a certain 16 operation, it gets activated when we have to do that, 'cause 17 it makes those calls go quick. Those that opt out, there is 18 a form, okay, that you can opt out. We fill in this. If 19 they want to opt out, this one stays on file, because -- and 20 nothing else does. I don't keep people's phone numbers or 21 anything like that. This one will, for one reason. If they 22 opt out, they opt out of the system totally. There's not a 23 partial opt-out or a temporary opt-out. They're out of it. 24 If we have a fire moving towards their location, if we have 25 a -- a suspect we're hunting near their residence, if we have 4-26-10 94 1 a lost child or an Alzheimer's person and we use it for that, 2 and they've opted out, they're not going to get that warning 3 or anything else. And I just -- I'll get on a soapbox over 4 this one, because -- 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's why I wanted to get 6 this on the agenda, Rusty, to give you an opportunity to 7 explain why you did what you did and how people can opt out. 8 But they need to understand if they opt out, -- 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They're out. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- they're out. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They're out. I just -- you 12 know, I think we -- this County, in investing what they have 13 in this system, may have well saved a life, and it may have 14 paid -- and it's not something we use very often. I've used 15 it three times in a little over two years that we've had it, 16 almost three, and those three times have, unfortunately, been 17 in the last couple of months. We did one when the phone 18 service went down. We did two times right then. Those are 19 the three times that that system's been used. It's not 20 something we want people crying wolf. But a 30-second phone 21 call, even if it is at midnight or 1 o'clock in the morning, 22 that can save somebody's life, I'm not going to feel bad 23 about waking someone up for 30 seconds. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I agree with you. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Lady back here had a question? 4-26-10 95 1 AUDIENCE: No, I just wanted to make a comment, 2 that I live in Mr. Letz' precinct just slightly west of Lane 3 Valley, and I didn't get a call. And I live on the river. I 4 had a lot of people in Kerrville call me and ask if we 5 floated away. Because I -- you know -- 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I would ask two things. One, 7 do you have an unlisted phone number? 8 AUDIENCE: No. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay. Supposedly -- and there 10 were issues, and that's why eventually we were going to try a 11 county-wide call, just to do it. I know it did do Center 12 Point, 'cause I had some people down there that did call me 13 and let me know. It did do that. Do you have a 995 prefix? 14 AUDIENCE: Yes. 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: See, that one I'll check on, 16 'cause the ones I know are 634 prefixes. I'll check with 17 Code Red and make sure on that. But right now, the way it 18 is -- and it's just something good to bring up. If you are 19 listed in the white pages, and your number got dumped into 20 the system automatically, that's how people were in it that 21 didn't sign up. But that's only your home number, okay? If 22 you are -- are unlisted, you have to sign up. If you want 23 your cell phone or your e-mail address in there, you have to 24 sign up. And that's signing up by just going to the Kerr 25 County website or the Kerr County Sheriff's Office website, 4-26-10 96 1 clicking on the Code Red emblem on there, and it takes about 2 30 seconds to sign up for it, and you can put any of your 3 deals. And the way it works, once they sign up, then I go 4 through every morning and I approve those that are -- that 5 have signed up. That's the only time that anybody gets to 6 see their information, as far as their address and their 7 phone number and their name, because once I approve it, it's 8 gone. It's in that database. I can't pull it back up. 9 Nobody else can. If you're not sure if you signed up, you 10 just go sign up again, 'cause it just eliminates out 11 duplicates. If you change your number, just sign up again. 12 And it's not a public database that gets sold by any company 13 anywhere, any time, or anything like that. There's no 14 advertising coming from it or anything else. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: So, this lady that has a 995 prefix, 16 her solution would be -- 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Go on the website. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: -- to come sign up. 19 AUDIENCE: Okay. I'll tell the neighbors also. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah. And that's what even 21 Code Red, the people that operate it, will -- will really 22 tell us, because sometimes that happens. When you're dumping 23 white pages in, they may -- 'cause they can't tell the 24 geographical boundaries, so the biggest recommendation for 25 anybody wishing to have it is go on that website and sign up. 4-26-10 97 1 If they don't have a computer, can't go on that website, all 2 they have to do is call us. We fill out a piece of paper, we 3 enter it for them, and then this is shredded and everything 4 else just goes, so it doesn't stick around. The only ones we 5 will keep are the opt-outs. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I suspect that most 995 didn't 7 get a call. And rather -- I mean, I don't want to miss 8 people. Hill Country Co-Op should be able to give us a list 9 based on their little boxes, all the Kerr County ones. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, it's not us that -- that 11 does that. It's the Code Red part that does that. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But Hill Country Co-Op can get 13 the information to the Code Red people, I would think. 14 Because, I mean, I don't know how -- I've got phone numbers 15 listed at my home address that are also in Comfort. 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, I mean, I can see there's 18 some confusion there, but there's a lot of 995's just right 19 up over here. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Right, just right out here. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We need to make sure that 995 22 got incorporated into the system; they didn't assume that -- 23 the Code Red didn't assume that was all Comfort. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The best thing we can do, and 25 the best way -- because, realistically, more and more people, 4-26-10 98 1 even 995 or whatever, are doing away with their land lines 2 and going to cell phones. Plus I -- and no matter what Code 3 Red does, those aren't going in there, if it's a cell phone 4 or an e-mail, you know, exchange. What I really recommend -- 5 and I will come out to some of the community deals; we've 6 been going all over the county trying to get more and more 7 people signed up and doing it over the last couple years -- 8 is people go in and sign up. Because we even have cell phone 9 numbers in there that are -- actually, the cell phone may be 10 out of Colorado. It may be out of Washington. I'm not 11 looking at the prefix. And that's one of the guidelines, is 12 I don't look at the prefix and the preview of where the cell 13 phone is. What we look at is, do you have property in Kerr 14 County? Where's that property at? If you associate that 15 cell phone number with your property in Kerr County, we're 16 approving that to go into the database. So, by far, the most 17 efficient and surest way is for -- is to go online and sign 18 up for it, or call us, fill that out, and give us all those 19 numbers. 20 AUDIENCE: That's better than it going through the 21 cell phone provider, right? It's going straight to our 22 phone -- cell phone, and not the provider? 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It's going straight to your 24 cell phone. It will send out cell phone, text. This one, we 25 even had -- 4-26-10 99 1 MR. BARTON: Boss, I don't think that's text. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah, it's supposed to do the 3 text. Cell phone, text, e-mail, and it even does the 4 hearing-impaired, okay? We type it out. And then it does 5 your online. So, it's -- but you really need to keep it 6 accurate. You can add up all of them. Husband may have one 7 cell phone number, you may have another, and then you've got 8 to put them all in. This doesn't limit you on the number. 9 Only thing is, when activated, you may have three phones 10 ringing in your house all at one time. 11 AUDIENCE: That's okay. 12 MR. TROLINGER: Sheriff, how do you opt out? Do 13 you have to call your office directly? Can do you that on 14 the web site? 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'm not sure I have the 16 opt-out on the web site right now. I think you're calling us 17 and we're filling out the forms that we keep it on file. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Rusty, going back to cell 19 phones for just a second, there are a lot of people who have 20 -- use cell phones as a primary form of communications, and 21 have eliminated land lines; they're not in the directory. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So for those people, then, 24 if I'm understanding you correctly, the safest way for them 25 to be on this list is for them to go to the website and sign 4-26-10 100 1 up; is that correct? 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: If they're -- if they only 3 have a cell phone, the only way for them to be on this list 4 is to go to the web site and sign up, or call my office and 5 let us get them signed up. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think that word needs to 7 get out, because I don't know if you noticed or not, but the 8 white wages of the telephone directory are shrinking, and 9 that's the reason. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They are, drastically. But 11 no, if they -- you know, and it's just a gamble, and yes, we 12 had some. I'll take the 23 complaints any day. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I understand. It wasn't 14 meant to be, you know, aimed at hurting or, you know, causing 15 ill will on you. It was mainly for you to explain to 16 everybody -- 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I appreciate the chance. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- how the system works. 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But I wondered at first. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No, I wasn't attacking you. 21 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Unfortunately, in my business, 22 normally it's one side against the other side, so I -- 23 whether it's a call officers go to, or something we don't 24 satisfy people. And I'm not here to -- 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We worked a long time to 4-26-10 101 1 get it done, and I'm glad it works. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: A lot of that was because of 3 this Court, and especially the action you showed at several 4 of those meetings on getting it all done and getting the bid 5 stuff sent out, so this has been one of the best tools in the 6 world. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All in the coaching. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: All in the coaching. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I appreciate it. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Is that it on that item, 11 gentlemen? We'll go to Item 6; to consider, discuss, take 12 appropriate action to reset the public hearing to rescind the 13 court order regarding Cummings Lane, which is currently being 14 maintained partially by the County and partially by the 15 residents. This is one where we had difficulty because I 16 failed to get it on the agenda, and so we had to back up and 17 regroup. And this is the regrouping, correct? 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It's -- I guess whatever the 19 second meeting is in May would be the earliest we could have 20 it. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: First meeting in June. Well, 22 26th -- 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Second meeting in May, 24 wouldn't it? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Need 30 days. 4-26-10 102 1 JUDGE TINLEY: May, that's going to be the 24th. 2 That won't give us 30 days. 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: This is the 26th, isn't it? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: First meeting in June. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: First meeting in June. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: 14th of June. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I move we set a public 8 hearing regarding Cummings Lane for June 14th, 10 o'clock, 9 2010. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded to set a 12 public hearing on the Cummings Lane issue regarding 13 maintenance there for June 14th, 2010, at 10 a.m. Question 14 or discussion on that motion? All in favor of that motion, 15 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. Item 8 is to 20 consider, discuss, take appropriate action to set a public 21 hearing for the revision of plat for Tracts 130 and 131 of 22 the Y.O. Ranchlands, Section Three, located in Precinct 4. 23 Mr. Odom? 24 MR. ODOM: Yes, Judge. Thank you. Good morning. 25 Almost afternoon, isn't it? 4-26-10 103 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes. 2 MR. ODOM: I have two property owners that own 3 adjacent property to each other, and they would like -- they 4 have a 60-foot easement running down between the center of 5 both properties, and Tract 130 has agreed to move that off 6 the center line of Tract 131 and 130 to the east up against 7 his property, and Tract 130 will still have that 60-foot 8 easement. If the Court agrees to that, then I would like to 9 ask the Court to set a public hearing for Monday, June 14th, 10 2010, at 9:30. 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: So moved. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded to set a 14 public hearing on the matter for June 14th, 2010, at 15 9:30 a.m. Question or discussion on the motion? 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Why -- why would there be an 17 easement in there? What would you use that easement for? 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: There's Lee. 19 MR. VOELKEL: I can tell you that if you'd like for 20 me to. When -- with the Y.O. Ranchlands -- this is Phase 3. 21 When it was platted, the Schreiners reserved a couple 22 easements; I think there were two in each phase, so they can 23 access their ranch, which is south of these lots from Y.O. 24 Ranchlands. And what I hope to have for you at our public 25 hearing is a letter from the Schreiners agreeing to moving 4-26-10 104 1 the easement from that -- from the lot line, 130-131, to 130. 2 But the easement was for the Schreiners to access their 3 ranch. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, they no longer need to 5 access their ranch? 6 MR. VOELKEL: No, they're going to access it, but 7 they're going to access it on the east side of Lot 130. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: The way it should have been 9 in the beginning. So, this whole thing just disappears, 10 then? The easement? 11 MR. VOELKEL: No, sir. We're moving it from the 12 lot line of 130-131 to the east side of Lot -- 13 MR. ODOM: 130. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Move it over on the property 15 line. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. Where it should be. 17 MR. VOELKEL: It will still be 60 feet wide, and 18 still be able to access the ranch. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. 20 MR. VOELKEL: From the ranch. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do you own this property? 22 MR. VOELKEL: No, sir, I do not. 23 MR. ODOM: His dad does. 24 MR. VOELKEL: Right. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Your dad does? 4-26-10 105 1 MR. VOELKEL: No, he doesn't. 2 MR. ODOM: No, I'm being facetious. Don't -- 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Any other questions or comments on 4 the motion? All in favor of the motion, signify by raising 5 your right hand. 6 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 7 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 8 (No response.) 9 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Item 9 is to 10 consider, discuss, take appropriate action to set a public 11 hearing, if necessary, for revision of plat for Lots 23-A and 12 23-B of Twin Springs Ranch II located in Precinct 2. 13 MR. ODOM: Yes, sir. Scottie and Cynthia Thompson 14 own Lot 23-A and 23-B in Twin Springs Ranch II. The 15 Thompsons would like to combine both lots and make one lot 16 52.81 acres. This land falls within the city's ETJ of 17 Kerrville. The City is having a public hearing on May the 18 20th, 2010, for this revision of plat. The landowner and Lee 19 Voelkel would like to know if another public hearing through 20 Kerr County is necessary or required. The landowner would 21 also like to know -- request that the County waive the plat 22 review fees, since they have already paid these fees to the 23 City of Kerrville. At this time, we ask the Court if a 24 public hearing is required, and if the landowner must pay the 25 plat review fees. If a public hearing is necessary, we ask 4-26-10 106 1 the Court to set a public hearing for Monday, June the 14th, 2 2010, at 9:45 a.m., regarding revision of plat for Lots 23-A 3 and 23-B of Twin Springs Ranch II, Volume 7, Page 361. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And my response -- I'll let -- 5 I mean, Rob may disagree. I think we do need a public 6 hearing here. Without an agreement with the City of 7 Kerrville on the ETJ, they have to comply with our rules as 8 well, which -- 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Oh, absolutely. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- state law says they have to 11 do a public hearing. I did -- and on the -- the plat fees, 12 my recommendation was on this that -- 13 MR. ODOM: O.S.S.F. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- they have to pay the 15 O.S.S.F. fee and the filing fee, but the other fees I think 16 should be waived, because I don't think the property owner 17 should be penalized by the lack of agreement between us and 18 the City of Kerrville. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Why don't we get the City to 20 waive theirs, and let's collect ours? I mean, I'm not sure I 21 agree with you on that. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Great suggestion. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: How many years have we been 24 at this, and this is exactly -- exactly what caused us to get 25 in, trying to figure this thing out. 4-26-10 107 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. I -- I was taking the 2 easier course of action on this one. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I know. I know. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Taking the high road. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Taking the high road. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Jon always wants to get along. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: He does. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's just something people 9 don't realize. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: This is another example of 11 the reverse of a subdivision; they're combining instead of 12 subdividing. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah, which is very 14 beneficial. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We try to encourage that to 16 happen with the least amount of resistance. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I would move the public 18 hearing be set for June 14th, 2010, at 9:45 a.m. And, let's 19 see, we're going to waive which fees? 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Waive the -- well, they're 21 required to pay the O.S.S.F. fee and the filing fees. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And the only fees required 23 will be the O.S.S.F. fee and the filing fee. 24 MR. ODOM: Good. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Second. 4-26-10 108 1 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a motion and a second. Let 2 me -- let me raise an issue here about whether or not, with 3 the agenda item as we have it here, we can grant a variance 4 or waiver on those fees. We may have to do that later. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think you're right. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think so. Okay, strike 7 the last part of the motion, then, -- 8 MR. ODOM: Just a public hearing. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- referring to the fees. 10 We'll set the public hearing for the 14th, and when we go 11 beyond that, then we can just talk about fees. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Give Buster time to go try and 13 collect at least half of what they got. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You tell those owners I 15 tried to get it in there. 16 MR. ODOM: I will tell them that. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Only one here. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Any other question on the motion? 19 All in favor of the motion, signify by raising your right 20 hand. 21 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 22 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 23 (No response.) 24 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Good work, Commissioner. 4-26-10 109 1 JUDGE TINLEY: I think we pretty well got you taken 2 care of today, don't we, Mr. Odom? 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: He's leaving. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: We're working on some more contract 5 matters for you, Mr. Odom. I want you to know -- 6 MR. ODOM: Do you want me to stay for -- 7 JUDGE TINLEY: -- your work is appreciated. 8 MR. ODOM: It seems like it is. I appreciate the 9 up -- the notice ahead of time. May I ask -- this was 10 Friday, is a preconstruction meeting? Am I -- is that what 11 Peter said? 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah. 13 MR. ODOM: Did he say a time? I'm sorry. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Actually, it's pre-bid, and I 15 think it's mandatory. Generally his are pre-bid. I didn't 16 catch the date. It's fairly quick. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't think you need to be 18 there. 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Friday. 20 MR. ODOM: Okay. 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We'll work that out later, 22 whenever we get closer to doing it. 23 MR. ODOM: And there's something else other than 24 the rodeo grounds? 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Oh, well, I've got some matters that 4-26-10 110 1 I'm taking some proposals on now, Leonard. We'll get -- 2 we'll be in touch. 3 MR. ODOM: Always an opportunity to excel, always. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: You guys do such good work, we want 5 everybody to see the benefit. 6 MR. ODOM: I appreciate -- Kelly appreciates it, 7 and I appreciate it. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Let's go to Item 11; 9 consider, discuss, take appropriate action on policies and 10 procedures for use of the Hill Country Youth Exhibit Center. 11 That's pretty broad. That can be anything out there. Okay. 12 Mr. Bollier? 13 MR. BOLLIER: Yes, sir. At the last Commissioners 14 meeting, you guys had asked Jody and I to put something 15 together for procedures out there at the Hill Country Youth 16 Exhibit Center, and we have done that. I believe each one of 17 you have received a copy of that. And if there's -- if 18 there's any questions or concerns, please ask. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Any questions? Issues for 20 Mr. Bollier? I -- I made one notation as to the keys that 21 are obtained from the Extension Office, which requires the 22 4-H leaders to make arrangements with the Extension Office to 23 get the keys for the facility for their events. I added, and 24 should return those keys to the Extension Office promptly 25 after those events are concluded -- each event is concluded. 4-26-10 111 1 I think that was probably implied, but -- 2 MR. BOLLIER: Yes, sir. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Mr. Walston, you got -- 4 MR. WALSTON: Well, I guess my question on that is, 5 we've got right now, and intend on continuing it, our 6 shooting sports leaders are using that three nights a week. 7 If they're going to have to come to the office every day, get 8 the keys, brings it back, they're going to be through late 9 that evening. Do they bring it back at 8 o'clock that 10 morning and come back and get it at 4 o'clock that afternoon? 11 I mean, that's the problem we run into. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I think what we're trying to 13 prevent is a bunch of these keys floating around. 14 MR. WALSTON: I understand. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: I don't know how many you got 16 floating out there. 17 MR. WALSTON: What it's saying here is we don't 18 have -- we have one key that goes out, and it has to come in 19 and out every day, so that's going to be a problem that we're 20 going to run into. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, that -- if there's only one 22 key, you're going to have to be able to control it so that 23 all those that are needing that key for whatever purpose -- 24 MR. WALSTON: So, we're not going to be able to -- 25 for those that are using it on a daily basis, there's only 4-26-10 112 1 one or two people, with our shooting sports primarily, that 2 need it for a longer period of time than what is just -- just 3 for that particular event on that day. So, that's going to 4 be a problem. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Would there be any intervening user, 6 say, during the day following the evening that they first use 7 it? 8 MR. WALSTON: Maybe. Sometimes. I mean, it's 9 going to be a -- 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 11 MR. WALSTON: If it's out and we don't have it, we 12 won't be able to give it, you know. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, that would be true. 14 Ms. Hierholzer? 15 MS. HIERHOLZER: I just want to find out that 16 the -- as Roy said, the leaders, all the groups are all 17 voluntary. And I personally work in Hunt, and there is no 18 way that I can get from Hunt up here, back to my office, you 19 know, in the evening and then the next morning. And it's a 20 volunteer-type program. And I understand that all these 21 rules and regulations, y'all feel like they need to be in 22 place. But as a volunteer leader, it really -- we're trying 23 to establish something really good for the kids, and we have, 24 what, almost four -- over 500 kids. 25 MS. BOYD: 400 kids. 4-26-10 113 1 MS. HIERHOLZER: Just in our county. Like, the 2 horse club, we have kids that come from outside the county. 3 And you -- I understand that you're trying to make rules, and 4 I'm trying -- and everybody wants to make it easier for 5 themselves, but sometimes you have to realize that since 6 we're all voluntary, we're all volunteers, that it's just -- 7 it's to the point that all these rules and regulations and 8 one key, and "I don't trust you; therefore, I'm not going to 9 trust you back," and, "I don't want to do it, 'cause it puts 10 a hardship on me." And I'm -- honestly, as a volunteer 11 leader, I'm to the point that y'all have made it almost 12 impossible to try -- for the volunteer leaders to do anything 13 for the kids, because of all the rules and the, "I don't 14 trust you, and you can't do this." And we're -- of course, 15 the kids are going to tear it up. That's what is -- I don't 16 say that to a kid; that's what I'm hearing. Because it's 17 4-H; it's for the kids. And I understand everybody wants to 18 make it easy on themselves. Absolutely. It's human nature. 19 But it's a volunteer program. And I get paid for doing a job 20 that's not 4-H, and I spend a lot of time on 4-H, to the 21 point that my husband's sick of it and said that if he was 22 the guy in Austin, he wouldn't have bombed the I.R.S.; he'd 23 have bombed the Kerr County Exhibit Hall. And that's how 24 much time I volunteer my time and donate my time to do this. 25 And -- and I understand you have rules and 4-26-10 114 1 regulations, but to make it so difficult that it's almost 2 impossible for somebody like me, who's -- you know, we've 3 been in 4-H for 11 years now, with just the one child, and 4 then before, we were -- it's almost impossible. So, I 5 understand your quandary. I understand the rules. But you 6 need to realize that there is, you know, more than two sides 7 to the story. There's his side, her side, and somewhere in 8 the middle is the truth. You got to make it a combination of 9 good compromise where I, as a volunteer leader, feel 10 comfortable with borrowing the key and not getting accused of 11 tearing anything up or using electricity, or going outside my 12 boundaries or using it when I'm not supposed to. There's got 13 to be a trust issue. Just -- you know, rules are rules. I 14 understand that. But it's also a volunteer program. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, you've got to make a decision 16 as to what you do with your time. 17 MS. HIERHOLZER: Absolutely. I'm just saying -- I 18 understand that. I'm just saying it's a volunteer program. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: You know, hopefully we won't have to 20 add your husband's name to the terrorist list. But -- 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That name is Hierholzer, I 22 understand. 23 MS. HIERHOLZER: It's Hierholzer, and he really did 24 say that. That's how much time I volunteer to 4-H. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I have a couple of changes, 4-26-10 115 1 corrections, questions. In the beginning, under the item 2 Scheduling Events and Reservations, it says, "Event is a 3 legitimate 4-H event." What's -- what do you -- what are we 4 trying to say there exactly? Is that -- I mean, because what 5 I'm hearing from the horse club is they individually use the 6 outdoor arena for practice, and they can do that whenever 7 they want, correct? 8 MR. BOLLIER: Correct. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We're only talking about 10 inside. 11 MR. BOLLIER: That's correct. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Because the -- I mean, in my 13 mind, I consider the 4-H arena part of the Hill Country Youth 14 Exhibit Center. So, I mean, this is just really all we're 15 talking about, is the building? 16 MR. BOLLIER: Just talking about the building 17 itself. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay, I just wanted to make 19 sure. So, it's -- all we're saying on that is that it's a -- 20 and these rules are applying only to the building? 21 MR. BOLLIER: Yes, sir. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 23 MS. GRINSTEAD: But the reason that wording came 24 about, that was taken from a memo that was sent to the 25 Extension Office months ago, because there was some confusion 4-26-10 116 1 on a dog show where I was being told it was Center Point 4-H 2 when, in essence, it was not. So that's why -- that's why 3 everything went back to going through the Extension Office, 4 so they can verify that it is really 4-H. 'Cause I was 5 working directly with the Center Point 4-H person, and it 6 ended up not being a 4-H event. So, that's why -- I was 7 like, okay. It all went back to the Extension Office for 8 them to verify, because 4-H gets the facilities free. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 10 MS. GRINSTEAD: So that's why that wording is in 11 there. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. And then further down, 13 the Maintenance Department, about plowing the outdoor arena. 14 Now, I think there's a -- we need to -- I don't want the 4-H 15 people to be responsible for plowing that arena. That 16 doesn't make sense to me for them to have to bring in a 17 tractor. We need to get a schedule in place. And when I 18 read it, that's what this is kind of saying. I think -- I 19 mean, we need to have -- it needs to be on a schedule. I 20 don't know how often. Weekly? Monthly? How often does it 21 need to be plowed? 22 MR. WALSTON: Weekly would be good. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, can we do a weekly 24 plowing of that? 25 MR. BOLLIER: We can try. 4-26-10 117 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Or biweekly. I mean, just once 2 a -- you know, I know you have a tough schedule. If it's 3 every two weeks, I think we need to have a set schedule, and 4 then you can work within that period. 5 MR. BOLLIER: I can make it very simple. If the 6 4-H people will just let me know when they need it plowed, I 7 will be more than happy to plow it. If it's after 5 o'clock, 8 that becomes a problem. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But, I mean, why don't we just 10 have a set schedule where you just -- you plow it once every 11 two weeks. I mean, you know, or every 10 days, something 12 like that. That solves the problem, it seems. 13 MR. WALSTON: We're going to have the -- we have a 14 practice on Wednesdays. He can plow it on Wednesdays, and 15 that's it. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: How about plowing on Tuesday 17 for Wednesday? 18 MR. BOLLIER: I can do that. 19 MR. WALSTON: I mean, we've got it -- 20 MR. BOLLIER: I mean, in here also, if you read 21 deeply into this, it also states that after -- this has been 22 going on for years, but we have changed the policy now to 23 where they cannot use our equipment after 5 o'clock. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think that's good. I like 25 that. 4-26-10 118 1 MR. BOLLIER: Okay. I -- we can plow that arena 2 for them on a Friday if we know that they're going to have a 3 rodeo out there for sure. You know, I mean, if it's going to 4 rain, sure, and if they can move inside, I understand all 5 that. But we will plow the outdoor arena for them sometime 6 after lunch on Friday. And the Wednesday things, all they 7 got to do is let me know if they want it plowed. We're more 8 than happy to plow that. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm just saying, why don't we 10 just plow it every Wednesday or every other Wednesday, and 11 not have to worry about the communication back and forth? 12 MR. WALSTON: Well, and like I said, the rodeo is 13 the big deal. But that's going to be -- that's not every 14 week. Wednesday is every week. Now, the question I have is, 15 why -- why are we not any longer allowed to use the county 16 equipment? 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Liability. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Liability. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: If you have somebody on it 20 that's not a county employees, we're liable. We don't want 21 that. We can't -- 22 MR. WALSTON: So I can use it? 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You're a county employee; you 24 can do it. 25 MR. WALSTON: Gee, thanks. 4-26-10 119 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: But not a volunteer parent. 2 MR. WALSTON: Do I get overtime? 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Volunteers can't do it any 4 more. 5 MR. WALSTON: Do I get overtime? 6 MS. BOYD: I guess I could switch out, Roy. I'll 7 do it one week, you do it one week. 8 MR. WALSTON: We've been doing it, but it's never 9 been a problem. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No, but it could be. 11 MR. WALSTON: Okay. 12 MS. HIERHOLZER: Can we sign a waiver on our 13 rodeos -- our four to seven rodeos that we have a year? 14 MR. WALSTON: That's the only time -- I mean, 15 during the rodeos is when we need it. 16 MS. HIERHOLZER: When we actually have -- 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Are those at night mostly, or 18 during the day? 19 MR. WALSTON: At night. 20 MS. HIERHOLZER: At night. 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: All of them at night? 22 MS. HIERHOLZER: Our fundraisers are during the 23 day, but they're always on Saturdays, and our rodeos are 24 Friday nights. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Roy's probably going to get pretty 4-26-10 120 1 good at this after a little while. You'll get it down pretty 2 quick. 3 MR. WALSTON: Problem is, there's going to be times 4 I won't be there. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, we get back to the same 7 issue that keeps popping up. How are we going to solve the 8 plowing issue? I think it's a big issue. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Tim, just do it on a regular 10 basis. I don't know that every week needs to be done, but, 11 like, twice a month. And just do it every Wednesday at 12 3 o'clock, just like you do anything else. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What they're saying is -- 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: A schedule is a wonderful 15 thing. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's fine, except for when 17 they're having rodeos. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: If you have an event, that is 19 going to be plowed multiple times during the event. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: During the event, it's got to 21 be plowed. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: There is the problem. The 23 rest of it's not a problem. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think the regular plowing, 25 whether it's once a week or twice -- or twice a month, 4-26-10 121 1 whatever works is fine. 2 MR. WALSTON: I mean, if there's a waiver posted 3 about that, they can -- we can have the -- even the actual 4 drivers have a -- we've got designated drivers. It is -- the 5 driver is the only one that handles it at all. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Designated drivers? 7 MR. WALSTON: A designated driver. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Rob, from a liability 9 standpoint, if that person -- how can we solve that? 10 MR. HENNEKE: Well, I'm already looking at it 11 within the context of the statute on the equine activities. 12 I wasn't provided a copy of the policy; I haven't had a 13 chance to see what's being proposed with regard to liability, 14 but I'm happy to look at that within the context of what I'm 15 already going to be looking at on liability issues out there. 16 And maybe we need to adopt -- incorporate something within 17 that, if the Commissioners wanted to leave this pending for 18 the time being. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: When's your next rodeo? 20 MR. WALSTON: I don't have it with me, as far as 21 actually the June -- 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: In June? 23 MR. WALSTON: Well, actually, that's -- 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Jody, do you have a schedule? 25 MS. GRINSTEAD: I don't know. 4-26-10 122 1 MR. WALSTON: May, I believe, is the next one. 2 MS. GRINSTEAD: Do you have the indoor booked for 3 that one, for the next one? 4 MR. WALSTON: I think so. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, for that, I mean, I 6 think -- you know, there's certainly there's some times, 7 looking at it. Just need to figure out how to handle the 8 events themselves. But I think we need to keep a regular 9 plowing out there, and like I say, whatever works, whether 10 it's weekly or biweekly. We need to wait for Rob to maybe 11 get some information on the actual rodeo events. 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Nowadays, we're scared to 13 death of liability. And we probably -- in most cases, 14 probably shouldn't be concerned about things like this, but 15 we have to be. Just takes one bad incident to -- 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think -- 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- have a bad situation. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think the solution of having 19 a designated driver helps a lot. I think one person; 20 possibly get some sort of training, make sure that person 21 understands the -- you know, something to help the county. 22 'Cause it's -- my preference would be to go that way, rather 23 than pay one of our employees to be out there. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Orange vest and goggles? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And -- 4-26-10 123 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Put him in a bubble. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- next, on the keys. Where is 3 it in here about the keys and the -- 4 MR. BOLLIER: Last page. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I see it, but -- but, I mean, 6 we're talking about this time and getting it back within a 7 certain amount of -- didn't y'all talk about that? Maybe I 8 was dreaming. I was thinking of something else. I thought 9 the Judge was talking about it had to be back within a 10 certain period. 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We added that to it. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: I was suggesting that we add that 13 the keys be returned promptly after the completion of the 14 event. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Oh, okay. But not a time 16 limit? Not have to be back the same day, necessarily, or 17 something like that? Just have to be back promptly. Okay, 18 that's fine. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: It's a relative term. Lawyers like 20 to have a lot of wiggle room. 21 MR. WALSTON: So, I take it the equipment -- excuse 22 me. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: When's the rodeo? 24 MS. GRINSTEAD: May 22nd, they have a barrel race. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Barrel race. 4-26-10 124 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We could -- well, we meet 2 before that, so we can look at that. 3 MR. WALSTON: The reference on the equipment here 4 is just on the tractor? It doesn't have to do with tables 5 and chairs, P.A systems, and -- 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Oh, no. 7 MR. WALSTON: Okay. That's not in here, so I'm -- 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No, you're not going to get 9 out of that one, Roy. 10 MR. WALSTON: Well, I'm just referring to what's 11 actually here. 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. No, tables and chairs 13 are not part of the deal. Tractor. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: And we're going to allow you to use 15 hand tools, such as shovels and rakes. 16 MR. WALSTON: Brooms, mops. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Those sorts of things, yes. 18 MR. WALSTON: Okay. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Moving tables and chairs is 20 also exempt, sweeping and mopping and those kinds of things. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Are we going to bring this back in 22 early May? 10th? 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I guess so. I don't think we 24 reached a -- 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, the County Attorney needs 4-26-10 125 1 to -- 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Have a little time. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: -- maybe put a package together here 4 to -- on this equine issue, I think is where he's thinking 5 about going. Okay. We've got the insurance people here, and 6 rather than recessing now and coming -- and bringing 7 everything back at, say, 1:30 or so -- 8 MS. HYDE: Carey had to leave. He won't be back 9 till after lunch, because y'all were running so late. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, we can handle that. We can 11 handle that. Okay. Well, gentlemen, we got a ways to go 12 here, so we'll bring this Item 11 back next meeting, and 13 let's be in recess until 1:30. 14 (Recess taken from 12:03 p.m. to 1:38 p.m.) 15 - - - - - - - - - - 16 JUDGE TINLEY: All right. Let's come back to 17 order, if we might. I gather we're through with Item 11 for 18 now, at least. We'll bring it back next time. Hearing 19 nothing further, we'll go to Item 12; consider, discuss, take 20 appropriate action to approve contract between Kerr County 21 and J3S Inc. d/b/a Branch Water Services for hydrographic 22 survey of Flat Rock Lake. Commissioner Williams? 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Thank you, Judge. If we 24 take a look at the backup, not only the memorandum that came 25 from Jimmy Saunders, but -- let's see. Page 8, I believe -- 4-26-10 126 1 yeah -- which is Schedule A, talks about the scope of the 2 services. Had a meeting with the Branch Water people here in 3 the courthouse, and reviewed the scope of services with them 4 after the City of Kerrville declined the invitation to join 5 with us, and so the bottom line was to maximize the services 6 they're going to perform on Flat Rock so we know what we're 7 going to get. Page 9 and Page 10 -- Page 9 gives you a 8 schedule of everything that's going to take place. And I 9 direct your attention to the new map on Page 10, which 10 outlines exactly what is going to take place, where it's 11 going to take place. In the past, if you look at that map, 12 the -- the original proposal talked about going up and 13 establishing a Section A and a B and a C and a D, and the C 14 and D sections we thought were two sections that the City 15 might be interested in. Turns out they are not, and so this 16 map depicts a new level of services and a new area of those 17 services. 18 The dam is -- as you can see it, it's at the bottom 19 of the picture. That's Section A. And the new Section B 20 encompasses all of our -- the lake with respect to our 21 holdings in terms of Flat Rock Lake Park, and goes on up from 22 the -- to the boat ramp, just about, and all of that 23 shoreline, and catches all that. We've left untouched, then, 24 the remaining, because the City declined to do anything in 25 Section C -- what we're seeing, C and D. This is new A and 4-26-10 127 1 B, and encompasses all of the things we need done. On the 2 scope of services, it begins on Schedule A, which is Number 8 3 in your -- in your backup material, and the project -- 1.0 4 depicts the project. And if you get down to Specification of 5 Work, that's in Section 4.0, and it identifies all the things 6 that are going to take place in -- in this bathometric 7 survey. Those folks would like to get started and complete 8 all this survey work before the boating activity heats up in 9 the lake as soon as school is out, so they're pretty much 10 ready to go. I sent the contract to the County Attorney. 11 He's looked at it and scrutinized it, had some suggested 12 changes, and he worked those changes out with the J3S people. 13 Am I correct, Mr. County Attorney? 14 MR. HENNEKE: Yes, sir. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: And so it's ready for 16 action or questions or comments. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Are there new fees involved 18 here? 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No, sir. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: New costs? 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All that's included in 23 the -- 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: In the 35,000. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- in the grant? 4-26-10 128 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I'm just wanting -- 3 you'll have a hard time spelling "swanee." 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I can spell swanee. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Don't know the completion 6 time, but you're trying to get it done before the end of May? 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah, I think somewhere -- 8 exchanging documents, I think they mentioned they'd like to 9 get it done, all of the -- all of the survey work itself, 10 which is on the lake and so forth. They'd like to get in and 11 then get out by, I think, the 28th of May. Is that right, 12 Rob? 13 MR. HENNEKE: They're raring to go. I don't have 14 the exact date off the top of my head, but they're -- 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I seem to recall that date 16 as being -- so they're ready to go. As soon as we sign -- 17 sign off on it, they're ready to blow and go. So, I would 18 move approval of the contract as amended by the County 19 Attorney, so we can get the project underway. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'll second your motion. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: We have a motion and a second. Any 22 question or discussion on the motion? All in favor of the 23 motion, signify by raising your right hand. 24 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 25 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 4-26-10 129 1 (No response.) 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion does carry. Let's go to Item 3 13; to consider, discuss, take appropriate action to rescind 4 Court Order Number 31481 dated October 12th, 2009, and 5 authorize advertisement for construction bids for Phase IV of 6 Kerrville South Wastewater Project immediately following City 7 of Kerrville approval of revised plan and specifications, the 8 deadline for submission of bids to be 5 p.m. on the 20th day 9 following first advertisement for bids. Commissioner 10 Williams? 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Rescinding the court order. 12 31481 is a former court order that authorized us to advertise 13 for bids. Since that period of time, which is October of '09 14 till today, we've had difficulty working out our easement 15 problems. We finally have decided what it is we're going to 16 do, and the plans have now been revised to reflect the 17 utilization for the line and construction of the line on 18 county road right-of-way on Ranchero Road from Highway 16 to 19 Ripplewood. So, what this is, is a new authorization to 20 advertise for bids as soon as the City of Kerrville has 21 reviewed the plans. The plans are in their hands. We've 22 called them and asked them to please expedite that, because 23 we're running into a real tight window here with respect to 24 the C.D.B.G. use of those funds. And more than likely, I'll 25 have to bring back to the Court for its consideration an 4-26-10 130 1 extension -- application for an extension. But it would be 2 good if we were either advertising, or even be better if we 3 were in a position to let the bid. So, that's what this is 4 all about, and I would move approval of that. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 7 approval of the agenda item. Question or discussion? All in 8 favor of the motion, signify by raising your right hand. 9 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 10 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 11 (No response.) 12 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. Let's go to 13 Item 14; consider, discuss, and take appropriate action 14 regarding sums to be budgeted for payment of the jail docket 15 defense attorney or attorneys. I put this on the agenda as a 16 result of a meeting which Commissioner Baldwin and I had with 17 a number of the folks involved in the -- what we've commonly 18 referred to as the Friday morning jail docket. It may become 19 the Wednesday morning docket, I think, before long. But an 20 issue came up with regard to the compensation to the defense 21 lawyers. Apparently, that was one of the issues that has 22 created a problem with it. Heretofore, we had tried to plug 23 it in on a rotating basis for one lawyer to handle the cases, 24 and after some period of time, I think then it was on two 25 weeks alternating, and the compensation was going to be 500 a 4-26-10 131 1 week. They said that was inadequate, or that was the 2 impression -- strong impression that was left. I had hoped 3 to have some response from the defense bar, inasmuch as they 4 had a meeting last Thursday. I've not received anything. 5 Have you? 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, sir, I have not. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Baldwin? 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, sir. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: So, you know, whatever we do now 10 would be nothing more than a shot in the dark. I don't know 11 whether it would be meaningful to go forward now. What are 12 your thoughts? 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: My thoughts are just leave 14 it like it is until we -- I mean, how would we know what to 15 -- if we wanted to adjust the salary one way or the other, we 16 wouldn't know where to go. So -- 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Well, I put this on the 18 agenda in hopes that I would get something from them as a 19 result of their meeting last Thursday, but I haven't. So, 20 we'll bring that back once we've got something to work with. 21 Let's go to Item 15; consider, discuss, take appropriate 22 action to address possibility of prohibiting the sale or use 23 of restricted fireworks, that being skyrockets with sticks 24 and missiles with fins, in any portion of the unincorporated 25 area of Kerr County, pursuant to Local Government Code 4-26-10 132 1 Section 352.051 for the Cinco de Mayo holiday. I put this on 2 the agenda -- was that you that asked that it be put on? 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Hmm-mm. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Where'd this come from? Just out of 5 the blue? 6 MS. GRINSTEAD: It's just one of the standard -- we 7 do it at the 4th of July, Cinco de Mayo, and Texas 8 Association of Counties is the one that suggested we do it. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. That's how it got on there. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Figured there was a reason. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Anybody want to -- 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Let them shoot fireworks. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Not I. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Nobody interested? Okay. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Hasn't been this green in a 16 long time. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's go to Item 16; acknowledge 18 receipt of quarterly investment report from Patterson and 19 Associates for the quarter ending 3/31/2010. I've got mine; 20 it's in my packet. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I've got mine. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Got mine. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Got mine. 24 MS. WILLIAMS: This is just a standard quarterly 25 report that we get from Patterson and Associates. All we 4-26-10 133 1 need is for you to acknowledge that you've received it. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So acknowledged. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: We have so acknowledged. 4 MS. WILLIAMS: Thank you. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: All right. Before we take up these 6 executive session items, throw everybody out, Carey's not 7 back yet? Okay. 8 MR. LOONEY: He probably won't be here for another 9 20 minutes. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's go to Section 4, payment of 11 the bills. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move we pay the bills. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded to pay the 15 bills. Any question or discussion? All in favor of the 16 motion, signify by raising your right hand. 17 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 18 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 19 (No response.) 20 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. We've got, 21 looks like, two budget amendments; is that correct? 22 MS. SOLDAN: Yes. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: All I'm showing -- 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Wait a minute, where are 25 they? 4-26-10 134 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: In that pile of stuff. 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I know we have one. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Right there in your hand. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: In my hand? 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Your hot little hand. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: I have one question on Budget 7 Amendment Request Number 2. 8 MS. SOLDAN: Okay. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Should the remaining balance after 10 transfer be 10,5 instead of 13,5, for the equipment rental? 11 MS. SOLDAN: Yes. Did that not calculate correctly 12 on your -- you're right. That didn't calculate correctly on 13 your copy. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's why we have him 16 around. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Do I hear a motion that the budget 18 amendments be approved as per the summaries? 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So moved. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 22 approval of Budget Amendment Request Numbers 1 and 2, as per 23 summary list. Question or discussion on the motion? All in 24 favor of the motion, signify by raising your right hand. 25 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 4-26-10 135 1 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 2 (No response.) 3 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion does carry. We have one 4 late bill; is that correct? 5 MS. SOLDAN: Yes. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: This is the soil testing on the 7 project -- the Sheriff's Office annex that was done 8 throughout the entire pad project. They would come in, do 9 the subgrade, and then each time they'd add material, they'd 10 test the soil. And I don't know how many lifts there were to 11 get there, but there was a bunch of them, but this is their 12 billing. The architect says it's appropriate, reasonable, in 13 line with what those services should cost. These are the 14 folks that certify and create the insulation blanket for us 15 with Leonard acting as our general contractor for this work. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move approval. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Second. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 20 approval of late budget item to Rock Engineering and Testing 21 for 3,975. Question or discussion? All in favor of the 22 motion, signify by raising your right hand. 23 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 24 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 25 (No response.) 4-26-10 136 1 JUDGE TINLEY: That motion does carry. Monthly 2 reports. I've been presented with monthly reports for County 3 Treasurer; Justice of the Peace, Precinct 1; Justice of the 4 Peace, Precinct 2; Justice of the Peace, Precinct 2, again, 5 it looks like, apparently for different periods; Justice of 6 the Peace, Precinct 4; and District Clerk. Do I hear a 7 motion that those reports be approved as presented? 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So moved. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Second. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Motion made and seconded for 12 approval of the reports as presented. Question or discussion 13 on the motion? All in favor of the motion, signify by 14 raising your right hand. 15 (The motion carried by unanimous vote.) 16 JUDGE TINLEY: All opposed, same sign. 17 (No response.) 18 JUDGE TINLEY: The motion carries. Do we have any 19 reports from Commissioners in connection with their committee 20 or liaison assignments? Commissioner 2? 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No, sir. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner 3? 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Brief update on ETJ. I've been 24 working with the County Attorney on, I guess, evaluating the 25 City's response to us, and it'll be on our next agenda for 4-26-10 137 1 some sort of action. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We'll also be talking about 4 some airport issues next time as well. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything else? 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner 4? 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I used to have the liaison 10 duty of the library. Being as Jonathan's on that now, just 11 makes another -- makes more mouths to feed when we do the 12 appreciation luncheon that I'm helping do. Thanks, Jonathan. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Appreciate it. The Court's all 14 been invited to that, I believe. I think we have it posted. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, it's going to be on the 16 evening of the 7th. 6:30, I think. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 6:30. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Where at? The basement of 19 the library? 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Basement of the library. 21 Another thing is, Jonathan put me in the fire again. I'm 22 meeting with the Hill Country Alliance group this week, this 23 Wednesday. That doesn't look like that's going to be -- I 24 know why he put me there. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Why? 4-26-10 138 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think because we kind of 2 share the same feeling about -- 3 JUDGE TINLEY: You wanted some muscle; is that it? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, they wanted someone who 5 represented the rest of the county. I said Commissioner -- 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, they want some fresh 7 meat, I think is what they want. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think it's interesting. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'm sure it's going to be 10 interesting. I've looked at the slate of the people; that's 11 all I can say. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Remember, murder is a 13 capital offense. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Is maiming still allowed? 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I don't know about mayhem. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything else? 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's it. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner 1? 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, sir. Thank you for your 20 offer, though. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Do we have any reports from elected 22 officials or department heads? 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Just your jail population. 24 Last week we did pretty good. We stayed in the 160's. This 25 morning we were back up to 175, and about 20 females, so 4-26-10 139 1 females dropped a little bit. I don't know where we're 2 going. It's just been up a lot in the last few months, and I 3 don't know if it's going to go back down or not. But -- 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Isn't it fairly common for weekends, 5 when show you up on Monday, it has a little -- 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, not really. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: -- bubble? 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'll keep my thoughts to 9 myself, but a lot of times, weekends haven't been our busiest 10 time as far as the jail goes. It's been a lot, but a lot of 11 times, it's been Tuesday nights and Wednesday nights, believe 12 it or not, by stats on when the most people come to jail. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Church. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's a whole different 15 program than it used to be. 16 MR. LOONEY: Choir practice. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Choir practice. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But, no, we are up again this 19 morning. I hope it goes back down again, but I don't know. 20 We're getting pretty tight in jail cells. Other than that, 21 we don't have anything, other than the search last week. 22 Most likely, by the time I get all the time cards in and 23 that, I'm going to be having to make some budget amendments 24 with overtime. Not much choice. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, you saw the jail court 4-26-10 140 1 moving it to Wednesday, when there's no other courts going 2 on, so the lawyers can all be there and do their job. And 3 the judge that sits in there is a little more comfortable 4 about what his authorities are. D.A. seems to -- maybe 5 giving the prosecutor that we hired out there, giving him a 6 little more authority, and -- 7 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: One D.A. One D.A., according 8 to the e-mails that I got today, that I gave you. The other 9 D.A. is not -- evidently is not going to take part in this, 10 according to that e-mail. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's true. I don't think 12 he ever has. 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But on the flip side of that, 14 that court -- not trying to down the other one, but that 15 court's been very proactive in their -- in their clients that 16 are in there anyhow, and they set up different days, all 17 different times, and keep working with the defense attorneys 18 and move them a lot quicker. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: They're just doing it a 20 little differently, and that's fine. They have less numbers 21 than 216th does. But I think we're going to start seeing 22 some movement here. I really do. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I hope we do, because -- and I 24 didn't -- I've got a census with me. I didn't tally it up 25 this morning, but first part of last week, when I did tally 4-26-10 141 1 it up, we were at about 154 -- no, I'm sorry, 54 were 216th 2 waiting; 53 were 198th waiting. Yeah, they had jumped a lot. 3 Of course, they've had a couple jury trials lately; that 4 slows down some of the other. And I think the County 5 Attorney had 30-something at that point that were waiting. 6 And -- but -- 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Do you recall how many V.O.P.'s 8 there were? 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: 62, I believe, a week ago. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: How many of those are on 216th, 11 roughly? 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Without -- and I don't have 13 that with me. Without other charges pending, that are just 14 V.O.P.'s, I think there was 23 that were 216th. And that 15 Judge made the comment to me -- 'cause I showed that to that 16 Judge, and he made the comment to me that he was planning on 17 starting a day of just V.O.P.'s, to where they could start 18 moving some of those. You know, and those are ones, as long 19 as they just have a V.O.P. and no other charges or holds 20 pending on them, maybe we -- those we should be able to move 21 quicker, and if they'll do those, you're talking -- you drop 22 jail population by -- say you did that in both courts. 23 You're dropping it by 30 pretty easily. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: You got two ways to approach it on 25 V.O.P. If there's not other cases, you can dispose of the 4-26-10 142 1 case, number one, or alternatively, you can look at bonding 2 issues. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Either way, if you -- you got a shot 5 at getting them out of your hair, then. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right, which would help. Now, 7 there is some -- in fact, if you remember right, when we 8 first opened this jail, it was -- it was a very good 9 situation, you might put it, for all the judges, because 10 V.O.P.'s allow the judges a lot more maneuverability in what 11 to do with that client. If he's violating his V.O.P. and 12 it's just an administrative reason, a lot of them -- and 13 T.D.C., I know they hear it in their conferences and that. 14 They don't want them sending them to T.D.C. They want them 15 doing some other alternative action with them. And I know 16 what former Judge Prohl used to like to do was give them six 17 months in the county jail. Then they'd serve six months for 18 that violation, and then they'd come back out of county jail 19 and still be on -- on probation. And a lot of times, that 20 was -- you know, as far as administering it and making 21 probation mean something, with consequences, that was the 22 best tool in the world. But once we got crowded and they 23 really can't do that, I think that's also why you see more 24 V.O.P.'s, because they don't have the flexibility to sentence 25 them, you know, to six months in county jail at different 4-26-10 143 1 times. 'Cause actually, that guy on probation could end up 2 spending more time incarcerated than going to the 3 penitentiary. And so V.O.P. -- 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Couldn't the violation be 5 something as simple as not paying their dues -- or fees? 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Sure. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Fees. 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Sure. But it gave the judges 9 a lot more flexibility in how to handle that violator, so 10 that probation meant something. And what's happened over the 11 years is, you see with the number of V.O.P.'s, probation has 12 gotten to where it doesn't mean that much in a lot of ways, 13 because what are the consequences? You know. Put them back 14 on probation again, let them back out again. County Attorney 15 may be able to attest to some of that. But that's where a 16 big jail does help. Thank you. 17 MR. HENNEKE: Commissioners, if I could speak to my 18 numbers just briefly, I'd like to update the Court. And I 19 think the misdemeanor court is -- is a little bit different, 20 because the majority of the individuals in there who have 21 misdemeanors have felonies, where the felonies are the major 22 cases that are being prosecuted. And the misdemeanor cases 23 where they're being held on felonies and they have a 24 misdemeanor, that is not going to resolve itself until that 25 felony is disposed of, for reasons of proving up a felony or 4-26-10 144 1 enhancing the punishment. But I am happy to announce to the 2 Court that I went -- I looked at the docket. The number of 3 cases that I have the ability with my office to dispose of, 4 the ones that are awaiting disposition -- and when I started 5 on April 1st, there were 24 individuals in the county jail 6 that my office could get to resolution, either to sentence 7 them, get them to trial, get them out of the jail. Last 8 Wednesday, that number's down to 13. So, of the cases that I 9 can address to free up those beds, we're addressing those. 10 We're moving those cases. We're getting those cases 11 resolved. And of the cases that I have the autonomy to move 12 to adjudication and either get them sentenced or get them out 13 of the jail, we're attacking that. We're addressing that, 14 and we're having quite a bit of progress. So -- 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Fantastic. Thank you. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Good. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Appreciate your help. 19 MS. HYDE: If the Sheriff talks, I have to talk, 20 right? 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: V.O.P.'s? 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I hope not. 23 MS. HYDE: Y'all didn't go to the C.M.I. last week 24 for TAC. Kerr County won a safety award for -- for safety. 25 We were number one, and Larry will come in and he'll present 4-26-10 145 1 it to the Court. We will have the driving simulation come up 2 here in June. I was able to get Don to agree. He is coming 3 up anyhow with the simulator for the chief deputies' 4 conference. It will be held at the Inn of the Hills, which 5 will give us a full week that we can run the driving 6 simulation. It wasn't working as well last year, but it's 7 pretty nifty, which will allow us to have individuals, like 8 Road and Bridge, Environmental Health, Animal Control, and 9 the Sheriff has also said that he would utilize it, so that 10 we can let the people see what their driving habits are and 11 places that they can improve. Road and Bridge training 12 continues. We've done supervisor training. We've started 13 the safety training. In fact, we've gotten to the point now 14 where all supervisors are involved in all accident and injury 15 investigations, so that they are a part of it. "What 16 happened? Why did it happen? What are we going to do next 17 time to help insure it doesn't happen again?" And they're 18 taking that training and starting to utilize it cross-member, 19 cross-people, so that everyone is kind of doing the same type 20 of thing. 21 If we're looking at we're going to lay road -- and 22 I'm not going to say it right, so forgive me. If you're 23 going to lay the road, do the gravel and oil all that other 24 stuff, instead of going towards power lines, we're going to 25 go away from power lines. I guess y'all had heard about us 4-26-10 146 1 pulling the power lines down, so that was one of them. Every 2 accident and injury, we're going through it as a team so that 3 they can say, "Okay, here's the new rules. This is what 4 we're going to accept. This is what we won't accept." And 5 everybody's doing it the same way, so as the guys move from 6 crew to crew, which they should be, then they don't have a 7 different set of rules every time they go to a different 8 supervisor. They've got the same type of rules. We do 9 injury and accident investigation tomorrow. We've set up 10 some accidents so that they can go and actually investigate 11 some accidents and look at them. Budget. The position 12 schedule should be ready to be sent out next week for review 13 by all the officials, so that they can look at their position 14 schedules and see what we've got and what we don't have. And 15 then on 6/14, Gary, Carey, and I would like to talk to you 16 guys about the potential costs -- potential increases in cost 17 due to President Obama's "Obama Care." 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Wait a minute. I thought it 19 was going to be free. Dang. 20 MR. LOONEY: Only for selected individuals. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Duped again. Huh? 22 MR. LOONEY: Only for selected individuals. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Real quick, on that one thing, 25 and I haven't talked to him or Eva, but myself included and 4-26-10 147 1 two other members -- Buster knows this -- spent all last week 2 at the Cooper Institute in Dallas over law enforcement 3 physical fitness and mandatory testing and continued health 4 and wellness. We'll also spend all next week in Dallas at 5 the same institute doing the same thing. And there is a lot 6 of push, I know, through TAC and everything else, 7 county-wide, to get county employees to do some type of 8 physical fitness and nutrition stuff. And I think, hopefully 9 by the time this is over, the County's going to have three 10 employees that will be certified personal trainers, okay? 11 And I think -- and something I want to visit with y'all 12 about, either in our old training room or in the expanded 13 area that may or may not be available in the new building, 14 putting in something that would be open to the -- to all 15 employees of the county, and see if we can't start 16 encouraging health and wellness to help cut down some of 17 these prescription costs. I know it has mine, and I know Eva 18 and a lot of them are. But I think that we can really show 19 an initiative in this county for all employees -- I'm not 20 talking about just Sheriff's Office -- that it may help us 21 all out a lot. Just something to keep in the back of your 22 minds and think of as we go forward. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Anybody else? Elected officials? 24 Department heads? Okay. Any member of the Court want to 25 return to any of the agenda items for additional discussion? 4-26-10 148 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No. I was wondering if Jody 2 wanted to complain about her road that she lives on. 3 MS. GRINSTEAD: Does no good. (Laughter.) 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Aren't you proud to live in 5 my precinct? 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: If you talk to Leonard Odom 7 directly, it probably will. Going through your Commissioner 8 can be a problem. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, we have an executive session 10 item, so at this time the Court will go out of open or public 11 session, at 2:07 p.m., to go into executive or closed 12 session. 13 MR. HENNEKE: Judge, we're going into closed 14 session under Section 551.0785 of the Government Code with 15 regard to medical records of an individual employee? 16 MS. HYDE: Yes. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Did you say 074? 18 MR. HENNEKE: 0785. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: 0785? 20 MR. HENNEKE: Yes, sir. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Could possibly also be under 22 074, possibly a personnel matter. But either way, we're -- I 23 see we're covered. 24 (The open session was closed at 2:07 p.m., and an executive session was held, the transcript of which 25 is contained in a separate document.) 4-26-10 149 1 - - - - - - - - - - 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. We are back in open or public 3 session, and the Court will be in recess awaiting Mr. Malek's 4 return. It's 2:11. 5 (Recess taken from 2:11 p.m. to 2:37 p.m.) 6 - - - - - - - - - - 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, let's come back to order. It 8 is 2:37, and we will go out of open or public session to go 9 into executive or closed session. 10 (The open session was closed at 2:37 p.m., and an executive session was held, the transcript of which 11 is contained in a separate document.) 12 - - - - - - - - - - 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, we are back in open or public 14 session. It's 3:08. Does any member of the Court have 15 anything to offer in connection with matters considered in 16 executive or closed session? Anything else to come before 17 the Court at this time? 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Can we go to Buzzie's? 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Sure, any time. We'll be adjourned. 20 (Commissioners Court adjourned at 3:08 p.m.) 21 - - - - - - - - - - 22 23 24 25 4-26-10 150 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 official reporter for the Commissioners Court of Kerr County, 6 Texas, at the time and place heretofore set forth. 7 DATED at Kerrville, Texas, this 30th day of April, 2010. 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 4-26-10