1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT 9 Budget Workshop 10 Monday, August 29, 2011 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 GUY R. OVERBY, Commissioner Pct. 2 JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Pct. 3 25 BRUCE OEHLER, Commissioner Pct. 4 2 1 I N D E X August 29, 2011 2 PAGE 3 Review and discuss FY 2011-12 Budgets and fiscal, capital expenditure and personnel matters related 4 thereto, including, but not limited to, employee health care benefits, step and grade, and staffing 5 levels 3 6 --- Adjourned 119 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 3 1 On Monday, August 29, 2011, at 9:00 a.m., a budget 2 workshop of the Kerr County Commissioners Court was held in 3 the Commissioners' Courtroom, Kerr County Courthouse, 4 Kerrville, Texas, and the following proceedings were had in 5 open court: 6 P R O C E E D I N G S 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. 8 Let me call to order first a Commissioners Court workshop 9 scheduled and posted for this date and time, Monday, August 10 29th, 2011, at 9 a.m. It is that time now. The -- the 11 agenda item for the workshop is to review and discuss fiscal 12 year 2011-12 budgets, and fiscal capital expenditure and 13 personnel matters related thereto, including, but not limited 14 to, employee health care benefits, step and grade, and 15 staffing levels. I just wanted to address any items that are 16 still hanging with regard to the budget so that we can get 17 that finalized and move on with our process. Commissioner 18 Baldwin, you had indicated a desire that we have an 19 additional workshop, and have you got something that you'd 20 like to -- 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: -- bring to our attention? 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I do. I have, I think, some 24 just simple questions, maybe things that I don't completely 25 understand, but some things that I want to possibly set aside 8-29-11 bwk 4 1 and vote on separately, if we could, when we get to that. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I've got quite a bit. Do 4 you want me to just start right out? 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Start wherever you want, I guess. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Page 8, Election Services. 7 Judges and Clerks, the second line there, 108. It looks like 8 that there is a salary increase in that. Is that what that 9 is, from 32 to 34? And the question is, do we -- do we pay 10 judges and clerks out in the polling places as if they are 11 salaried employees? If there's an across-the-board raise, 12 they get raises too like that? 13 MS. BOLIN: No. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: The increase is based upon -- of 15 course, it shows projected year end, 37, and then, of course, 16 requested, 34. Were you anticipating a greater number of 17 election judges and clerks this year? 18 MS. BOLIN: Not to my knowledge. 19 MS. MABRY: If you'll notice on the bottom of the 20 page where the note is, it says -- it does say, "I did a flat 21 across-the-board increase on that line item as well." 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. So, his question, is very 23 pertinent, then, to the reason for his inquiry. 24 MS. MABRY: Yes. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. So that adjustment needs to 8-29-11 bwk 5 1 be made. 2 MS. MABRY: I'll make that. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: If, in fact, they're not included, 4 right? 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I would think so. I can't 6 imagine increasing them by 6.5 percent, as if they're 7 employees. 8 MS. MABRY: I'll also remove the FICA and 9 retirement that goes along with that increase. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. We got into an issue where we 11 tried to pay them and 1099 them, and we got into all sort of 12 a hassle here a year or so ago. And if you'll recall, there 13 was a delay and we had to ask them for W-4's, and we got some 14 push back on that. It really got to be kind of messy. But 15 -- but we pay them as though they are wage-paid employees. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge, you -- you threw out 17 a number there. Let's see. In the current budget, it was -- 18 the number is 32,000. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And recommended, you -- what 21 was the number you threw out? 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, there was projected year end 23 showing 37, and then requested, of course, is the number that 24 you -- 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 8-29-11 bwk 6 1 JUDGE TINLEY: -- raised a question about, that 2 being 34. Which, of course, is up from the 32. 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think there was an over -- 4 I think, after the fact, we had to increase that line item 5 because of some additional expenses. 6 MS. MABRY: Yes. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: For some reason. I don't 8 know why it would be projected to be that if it wasn't that 9 she ran over in her -- the amount she had to spend on that. 10 MS. MABRY: The projections that are in there right 11 now are projections that were done very early, so they may or 12 may not be in line with current. So, those -- those will 13 have to be looked at. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: What do you think we ought to 15 do? Do you think we ought to go back and do -- that your -- 16 MS. HARGIS: Next year's a big election. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Or should we do what you did, 18 which was split the difference between the projected year end 19 and -- 20 JUDGE TINLEY: We're going to have the 21 Constitutional amendments election in November. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Mm-hmm. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: We'll have primary elections next 24 year. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: March or February. 8-29-11 bwk 7 1 MR. HENNEKE: Likely a runoff. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, possibility of a runoff. 3 MR. HENNEKE: Six-person U.S. Senate race. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: So, we're going to have more 6 activity this time than we normally do. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But a lot of those we tend to 8 consolidate in the courthouse, like the runoff. In the past, 9 we've always consolidated that in the courthouse, 'cause then 10 we don't have all the judges in the field, but we have more 11 costs, you know -- 12 MS. PIEPER: Gentlemen, during that redistricting, 13 if there's another -- an additional voting district, and they 14 have to open up another polling location, that will mean more 15 judges and clerks there. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think we've reduced that; 17 we're going the other direction. 18 MS. BOLIN: We're actually keeping it the same, 19 because we created 1 and 2 where we just went away from -- 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Adding one and we're taking 21 one away. 22 MS. BOLIN: Right, so we're staying the same. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, what are we doing with 24 that line? 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I note that '08-'09 actual 8-29-11 bwk 8 1 shows to be 34,000. '08 -- '12, of course, that would be 2 '12-'13 that we'd be looking at as a comparable to the 3 '08-'09 on the four-year cycle. We can drop it back to this 4 year's 32, or we can leave it where it is. What -- you got 5 any particular thoughts about that, Commissioner? 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, I do not. That's 7 somebody else's call. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Ms. Auditor? 9 MS. HARGIS: Well, we spent 27. We won't have -- 10 it'll be the following year, we will have the presidential 11 election. So -- and we don't have the May ones, unless we 12 have a runoff. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. Because the general 14 won't be until -- 15 MS. HARGIS: The general won't be until the 16 following year. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, '12-'13. 18 MS. HARGIS: I mean, I don't mind bringing it down 19 to 30, but I think we need a little bit of leeway there, 20 because we do have the FICA and -- we don't pay it on -- if 21 they don't go over $600, then they stay in a 1099 category, 22 but if they go above, then we have to pay FICA, and that 23 makes a difference in what we do. So, if we could -- we can 24 bring it down to 30. 25 MS. BOLIN: I think 32 is what I originally asked 8-29-11 bwk 9 1 for. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Why don't we just peel it back to 3 this year's 32, then. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I agree. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 32. But my issue wasn't 7 exactly what the number is going to be. My issue was down in 8 the notes down here, it increased 6.5 percent. You see that 9 throughout the budget with the salary increase, and I just 10 wanted -- I just can't imagine treating those folks out in 11 the field like they're full-time county employees. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: I understand. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, is that -- 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Point's well made. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is that 6.5 percent 16 disappearing, and -- 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- all that stuff? 19 MS. MABRY: As we speak. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you. And then down at 21 the bottom, employee training, the note says increased to 22 3,500 based on projected overages. Let's go back up to the 23 line, 216, employee training. It didn't change. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Hmm-mm. 25 MS. HARGIS: No, that's an old -- it must be an old 8-29-11 bwk 10 1 note. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I've got an old piece of 3 paper that I'm dealing with? 4 MS. HARGIS: No. There's permanent notes, and then 5 next year's notes, and it depends on where they put them. A 6 lot of times the folks have been putting them in the wrong 7 spot. 8 MS. BOLIN: This is not my note, either. 9 MS. MABRY: No, this is my note. It says 3-2 of 10 '11. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I don't care whose note it 12 is. I just want to know what the number is supposed to be. 13 Is it 2,500 or 3,500? 14 MS. HARGIS: 2,500 is what she requested, 15 Commissioner Baldwin. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And the footnote says 3,500. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Budget number is correct. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: It indicated next year note, so 19 maybe they're looking at the presidential year. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is that where we're at? 21 Okay, thank you. Let's see. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: You're on a roll. Keep it going 23 there, Commissioner. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. Page 10 and 11 -- 25 that would be County Clerk -- Item 315, Books, Publications 8-29-11 bwk 11 1 and Dues. And then on the notes, which would be on Page 11, 2 it lists all of the -- lists these newspapers. And I'm 3 just -- you know, is that something that we -- is that 4 absolutely needed in the courthouse? I know that we canceled 5 ours -- 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- a couple of years ago, 8 because it wasn't -- it was a luxury. You know, I think some 9 offices -- and probably the County Clerks use it for some 10 kind of information or something. You know, I don't know. 11 I'm not -- I'm not judging. I'm asking. 12 MS. PIEPER: We cut out the -- the public notices 13 and stuff as backup, to make sure that -- 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Out of both newspapers? 15 MS. PIEPER: Yes. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: They cheek to see, number one, if 17 they're run timely, right issue, and that the proof is 18 correct, and also that they're, in fact, run. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Page 12, Records 20 Management. The very top one, salaries, filming. The 21 recommended budget is $96,000. Now, do we pay -- is that a 22 separate person that sits in there and films, or a separate 23 two people that sits in there and films? Or are these 24 regular County Clerk employees, or how does -- how does this 25 thing work? 8-29-11 bwk 12 1 MS. PIEPER: There's two employees in that 2 department that do the recording and the indexing and then 3 the scanning, and -- 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And that's all they do is 5 that? They don't come out and sit at the desk and do other 6 things? 7 MS. PIEPER: They are -- they are cross-trained if 8 we have to have them up front, but they're -- 99 percent, 9 they're in that department. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And the $96,000 is the 11 salary for both of those employees? 12 MS. PIEPER: Correct. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Page 13, Mental Health, 14 there's a supplement and a Court-appointed attorney increase, 15 and it talks about for new legal hearing requirements. Is 16 that -- the State is requiring these increases? 17 JUDGE TINLEY: What's happened -- 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: By law? 19 JUDGE TINLEY: What has happened is that there will 20 be additional hearings held at the Kerrville State Hospital, 21 because they are going to have to renew med petition -- or 22 med orders on patients there if they renew commitments, 23 whereas previously they did not. We've already seen an 24 increase in the number of those hearings, and that's the 25 reason for it. There was some sort of a deal that was struck 8-29-11 bwk 13 1 with at least one or more of the advocacy groups to hold new 2 hearings on -- on medication orders. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. And the State is 4 requiring these new medication order -- 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Department of State Health Services 6 has mandated that their hospitals get these orders, yes. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And so we're raising the 8 supplements here just because of the workload? 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm, exactly. Additional cases. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. I'll get to you, Tim. 11 Hold on. Let me see here. Page 16. Let's see, Capital 12 Outlay, move to Fund 16. In other words, the 570 is moved to 13 Fund 16. Is that what I'm seeing correctly? 14 MS. MABRY: Yes, sir. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Now, are all 570's 16 throughout the budget moved to Fund 16? 17 MS. MABRY: Yes. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I beg to differ with you, 19 but I'll show you in just a minute. 20 MS. MABRY: There are probably two to three -- 21 MS. HARGIS: There's some little ones that we 22 didn't move. 23 MS. MABRY: Yeah. We didn't have any notes as to 24 what they were for, so we left them until we had advisement 25 about where to place them. 8-29-11 bwk 14 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 2 MS. HARGIS: I think we have one that's 4,000, one 3 that's 2,000, one that's three, and another one that's one. 4 They're small. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 434 didn't go over. Okay. 6 Page 17, Nondepartmental. It looks like the wellness and 7 fitness program is going away. And the footnote -- I thought 8 I saw a footnote saying something -- oh, yeah, here it is. 9 The line item has not been used in the two years since its 10 creation, so it will be removed. I can't help but agree. 11 I -- I love the program and what it was set up to be, 12 preventive-type health issue. But it's -- if you're not 13 going to use it, let's don't do it. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Is that also in connection with the 15 reimbursement for the -- 16 MS. HARGIS: Yes. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's what that is. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: -- fitness? Okay. Well, we've now 19 got the Sheriff's operation out there, so -- 20 MS. HARGIS: It was my understanding once y'all put 21 that into place, that the -- we weren't going to reimburse 22 anybody any more. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: That needs to be eliminated, that 24 10,000? 25 MS. HARGIS: And it's also my understanding that 8-29-11 bwk 15 1 under the TAC program, if y'all decide to choose that, they 2 have a wellness program included in -- in that -- in that 3 package. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: If we decide to choose TAC? 5 MS. HARGIS: Yes, sir. I'm not assuming anything. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. And then on that same 7 page, Nondepartmental, down at the bottom, 571, contingency. 8 Why -- why are we putting $100,000 in contingency for 9 Nondepartmental? 10 MS. HARGIS: We have spent 50,000 so far this year, 11 and we had some other items that we -- we were requested that 12 we have put in there. 13 MR. TROLINGER: One example would be, there's an 14 old server, the Legacy server, and I'd asked to have 15 contingency there in case it completely crashed. And, for 16 instance, the voter registration relies on it for old data 17 and a couple other things. I believe that was 25,000. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is this where all your stuff 19 is? 20 MR. TROLINGER: No, sir, that's just one item that 21 I know specifically in there. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: There are some things from 23 I.T. that are in -- 24 MR. TROLINGER: That's the only I.T. contingency 25 that I know of in that line item. 8-29-11 bwk 16 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That item could come out of the 2 capital. That would be a capital item, would it not? 3 MS. HARGIS: We don't have any money left after we 4 did the things he absolutely had to have. And legal fees and 5 other things associated, you know, we can put a lot of stuff 6 in there, and I've had to move -- I've had to get money other 7 places for a lot of the fees that y'all have expended this 8 year. We spent that $50,000 this year in the first two 9 months of the current fiscal year, so -- on the L.C.R.A. line 10 and, you know, some other professional legal -- engineering 11 fees that we did. I wasn't sure as well if we're finished 12 with the redistricting, fees for those attorneys. We do have 13 some money left, but we haven't paid them everything, and I 14 just was -- it's a fall back. And -- 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let me ask you something 16 while you're there. You're talking about legal fees for 17 redistricting. Isn't that a professional service? 18 MS. HARGIS: We did have -- we do have some, yes, 19 sir. We -- in the current budget, we have 32,000. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'm trying to find out why 21 we need a contingency fund there. I mean, what do you use it 22 for? Tell me what you use it for. 23 MS. HARGIS: We use the contingency fund for what 24 you -- what comes up special for the Commissioners Court. I 25 have a -- 8-29-11 bwk 17 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That makes a difference, 2 then. 3 MS. HARGIS: Well, the L.C.R.A. line, any 4 engineering fees that are over and above what we normally 5 would look for, and any -- 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What do you use professional 7 services for? 8 MS. HARGIS: We use -- we used up all the 9 professional services this year as quickly as -- used that 10 first, and then we go to contingency. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay, thank you. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, I want to follow up on 13 those two a little bit more. It seems to me that both of 14 those items are increased a lot, professional services and 15 contingency. 16 MS. HARGIS: Well, you've spent -- 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Your projected year end for 18 professional services is 22,000; we're going to 75. And 19 contingency projected year end is 52,000; we're going to 20 100,000. I don't disagree that we need to increase them, but 21 I think you can take 25,000 off of both of those. And then 22 on immunizations -- 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What -- why did that go from 12 25 to 35? 8-29-11 bwk 18 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: 'Cause isn't some of that 2 included in -- 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Our health insurance. 4 MS. HARGIS: No, the immunizations were because of 5 -- partly because the shots that Janie needs are very, very 6 expensive. I think they're about $15,000 or $20,000. Most 7 of that is for those -- the rabies, and they have to be 8 renewed, some of them, every year. Some of them every two 9 years, according to her. But we did add those because of her 10 asking for additional. And then we can -- we've been told to 11 reduce that, because the flu shots can come out of our 12 regular health insurance policy, which I hadn't -- hadn't 13 reduced it just in case. Keep in mind, now, the more we 14 tighten these things down to the infinite, it makes it harder 15 for me to find money when we go over costs, and that's one of 16 the reasons I did contingency. We went over medical in 17 Rusty's area. We're probably going to go over more than I've 18 got. There are areas where we go over, and there's nothing 19 we can do about them; they're mandatory. And we try to make 20 sure we have enough money in those line items, but we've cut 21 them down so tight that we -- we need somewhere that we have 22 a little bit of flexibility. 23 MS. WHITT: Y'all created a separate line item for 24 me, though, for my immunizations. Mine shouldn't be in 25 there. 8-29-11 bwk 19 1 MS. HARGIS: I don't remember, Janie. 2 MS. WHITT: I've got it right here, 642-487. And 3 that was for six post-exposure. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Pre-exposure? 5 MS. WHITT: Post. Post-exposure, in the event 6 they're needed. And if we do -- if y'all do allow me to hire 7 that one position, then we'll take the pre-exposure out of 8 this. But mine shouldn't be in there. 9 MS. HARGIS: Okay, let's go back. I'm sorry, 10 I'm -- the one -- one of the reasons that it's still high, 11 we've spent all the money, is because we ordered -- in the 12 past, have ordered the vaccine in September to be given in 13 October. It has to be ordered about a month in advance, 14 since we have to order the flu vaccine in September. But now 15 that we don't have to order it, and the -- and I don't know 16 for sure, all of this. If everybody's gotten -- I think 17 everybody who wanted hep shot series has gotten those. We 18 also, remember, decided to put tetanus in here, and that was 19 going to be pretty expensive, and I think that we've kind of 20 backed off on that, or at least I decided maybe -- perhaps 21 that if we have someone who gets in that situation, give 22 them -- because if we put that out there, everybody would go 23 get a tetanus shot. 24 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Tetanus shots are good for 25 five years, I believe. 8-29-11 bwk 20 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Ten. 2 MS. HARGIS: Ten years. 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I just got one. I get one 4 every 5 or 10 years, whether I need it or not. 5 MS. HARGIS: The problem we ran into when we sent 6 out the e-mail is that a lot of folks can't remember when 7 they last had their last tetanus, and that's why it was a 8 little hard to determine how many people were going to do it. 9 You know, based on the new stuff, I mean, we can take it 10 down. I mean, that wasn't my -- you know. But I know we put 11 it up. We also talked about doing pneumonia this year when 12 we were originally doing this. And this was a number 13 provided from -- partly provided to me from a prior party, so 14 if you want to bring it down, I don't have a problem with 15 that. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Is hepatitis C also covered in 17 there? 18 MS. HARGIS: We hadn't talked about hepatitis C. I 19 don't -- you know, to be honest with you, I'm not that 20 familiar with all of these shots. I was just given a number, 21 and that's what I plugged in. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Sheriff, your folks are the ones 23 that probably have the greatest risk. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They take the whole series. 25 MS. HARGIS: They've got it though -- 8-29-11 bwk 21 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They take the whole series, 2 and I believe, if I'm not mistaken, just about everybody I 3 have has already had it. Now, we'll have some -- some new 4 hires and some changes where, you know, we may need four or 5 five series throughout the entire year, but that's about it. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Is there -- are there separate funds 7 covering that in your budget? 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No. 9 MS. HARGIS: No. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 11 MS. HARGIS: No. 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, that comes out of that or 13 somewhere else. It doesn't come out of my budget. 14 MS. HARGIS: I mean, since we get the flu shots, 15 the hep shots are about, what, 20 -- 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: When we go through the series, 17 they get pretty expensive. I couldn't tell you what the 18 whole -- 19 MS. HARGIS: Do you want to bring that down 10,000? 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Three shots? 21 MS. HARGIS: Three shots. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And it's expensive. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It's over $100 for the whole 24 series. I couldn't tell you -- 25 MS. HARGIS: Oh, it's more than that. 8-29-11 bwk 22 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm looking at historical on 2 the immunizations. We didn't even have it in 2007. Then it 3 went to 19, 10, 12, 10, 14, 12. I mean, to me, it ought to 4 be right -- say 15,000. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: 15. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 15. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's a pretty good jump. 8 MS. HARGIS: I think our -- our new H.R. Director 9 has some ideas on that as well. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: What's the consensus here? Leave it 12 at 12? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 15's fine. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: 15? 15 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 16 MS. HARGIS: Is everybody else okay with 15? 17 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Mm-hmm. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And it still seems -- we have 19 professional services. Contingency is okay, but it seems 20 like we haven't been over 28,000 in five years. 21 MS. HARGIS: What, in professional services? 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 23 MS. HARGIS: We went over this year. We should 24 have, because we moved money in there. Here's the -- tetanus 25 shots were 10,000. Pneumonia shots were 12. The flu shots 8-29-11 bwk 23 1 were 43. And then contingency, so there's your -- 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm back on professional 3 services. Our big professional services is the audit, and 4 that's a separate line item. 5 MS. HARGIS: Tess, can you please go to 6 Professional Services? No, stay in that sheet. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Redistricting won't be much, 8 because -- 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's already budgeted this 10 year. 11 MS. HARGIS: Redistricting is budgeted under a 12 special line item. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I remember we put that money 14 there, you know, in case we needed an engineer, needed a 15 lawyer out of San Antonio or those kinds of things. 16 MS. HARGIS: I guess I need to see what we spent so 17 far this year. Minimize that; don't get rid of it. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't want to take it to 19 zero. I just don't want to triple it. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's pull it back to 60. 21 MS. HARGIS: Wait just a second, please. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Makes sense to me. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Me too. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: We're done, Ms. Auditor. Is 8-29-11 bwk 24 1 that it? 2 JUDGE TINLEY: You're on a roll. Keep rolling. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Just -- here's one of 4 those things that I just simply don't understand. We've got 5 Judge Brown -- 6 JUDGE TINLEY: What page are you on? 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'm sorry, Page 20. He does 8 not get a salary increase. Some folks don't get a salary 9 increase. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: He's capped. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: At 1,000 below the District 12 Judges. Do the District Judges not get a salary increase? 13 MS. HARGIS: No. Only the Supreme Court gets an 14 increase. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Supreme Court, okay. But we 16 increased his retirement, but not his salary. That's just 17 kind of a little different. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: That probably got caught in the 19 total roll-ups, the increased retirement on him. 'Cause I 20 think they did a -- they accumulated all the salary numbers 21 and figured the retirement on that, and then rolled it up by 22 6 and a half, so he probably got caught in that whip. 23 MS. HARGIS: What? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: The retirement. His retirement 25 increased. 8-29-11 bwk 25 1 MS. HARGIS: Oh. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: But it was based on a cumulative 3 number, rather than going in and doing them each 4 individually, so we can scale him back. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Page 24, the jury fund. 6 Line 570, capital outlay is $6,000. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Hmm? 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Did you ask a question, or 9 did you agree with me? 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Are you showing 6,000 on capital 11 outlay, juries? 12 MS. MABRY: Yes. That was the folder and sealer. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Say again? 14 MS. MABRY: The folding and sealing machine that 15 Linda had requested, that you asked me to put in. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, on the notices she's sending 17 out. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, my question is, why 19 isn't it moved over to the rest of the capital outlays? 20 MS. HARGIS: We took the large items and left the 21 small. That was one of the smaller ones. After I allocated 22 the ones -- the major ones, we had no money left. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Of course, the district 24 courts, you don't see the salary increase. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Buster? 8-29-11 bwk 26 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir? 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Will you go back to district 3 courts, Page 25? 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Certainly. Is that what 5 your heart desires? 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: My heart desires. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It shall be done. Okay. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: In the 198th, I know the 9 Court-appointed attorney stayed basically flat, but it's 10 increased here quite a bit, and I thought that we were -- had 11 those pretty much under control a little bit. I was 12 wondering -- we've gone from a projected year end of 100,000 13 to a budget of 195. Historically, we're -- 195 isn't too 14 high, but it looks high compared to what I'm hearing. 15 MS. HARGIS: Well, the 198th is the big ticket item 16 this year. We're actually moving from the 216th to the 198th 17 because of the way the two new -- the judges are doing the 18 court now. The 198th is handling probably 50 percent or 19 better of the Kerr County cases, and so they're -- 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But I'm looking at the 216th. 21 MS. HARGIS: The 216th we've been stealing from for 22 the 198th. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, let's increase the 198th 24 and reduce the 216th. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, that's his point. 8-29-11 bwk 27 1 MS. HARGIS: I don't -- 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We're increasing the wrong one. 3 MS. HARGIS: No, we didn't -- 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We've increased the 216th by 5 100,000, or 90,000. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: 95. 7 MS. HARGIS: The current budget's 171, and I 8 increased it to 195. That was their request, not mine. I 9 think that's probably about right, by the time we get to the 10 end of the year, because we have two more months worth of -- 11 of attorneys' salaries coming in. And, unfortunately, those 12 things lag behind 90 days. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: And where are we now? What's the -- 15 MS. MABRY: 86. 16 MS. HARGIS: 86 right now. We're beginning to see 17 some of Rosa's -- 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 19 MS. HARGIS: But, again, whatever he's not spending 20 is going to the 198th, and I can't predict how that's going 21 to happen next year. Right now we are moving budget 22 amendments every month from the 216th to the 198th. The 23 198th spent all their money last month, so they are out. So, 24 I'm saying if we -- we need to kind of balance it between the 25 two courts, because I don't know what the division will be 8-29-11 bwk 28 1 next year. Next year it may go all to the 216th. We have 2 traditionally spent about $400,000 in legal fees, and 3 unfortunately, a lot of those come in at the end of the year, 4 and then we're out of balance. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: I think the point is that for the 6 216th, -- 7 MS. HARGIS: We were out. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: -- we maybe need to reduce that. 9 MS. HARGIS: We -- in 2009-'10, we were at 171. 10 The year before that, we were at 226. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 12 MS. HARGIS: The year before that, 172. So, I 13 think the balance in the middle is the 195. We can reduce 14 it. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's take -- let's take the 216th 16 to 175. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 175. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: And then let's go to the 198th, and 19 let's take that up to, say, 150. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I agree. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'd increase it the same amount 22 the other one was decreased. We don't need to spend more 23 money. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That would be 20? 25 JUDGE TINLEY: I think it's about 20. 8-29-11 bwk 29 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Take it up to 140. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, 140. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 140. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Thanks. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is that it? 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Back to you, Buster. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you, sir. That was 9 good exercise. All right. Page 28, the jail court. Now, I 10 asked about this the other day. Line 417, jail 11 Court-appointed services. And I think someone -- y'all told 12 me that that was the -- 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Lawyers. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- bad lawyers. Now, where 15 did they come from? 16 MS. HARGIS: They -- 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Where did this $26,000 come 18 from? 19 MS. HARGIS: The -- the 216th D.A. appointed an 20 attorney to serve for jail court at -- and I'm -- I think 21 it's -- is it 1,500 a month? 22 MS. MABRY: I don't remember. 23 MS. HARGIS: Can you -- and unbeknownst to us, they 24 did that this year. We did manage to work it in the budget, 25 but she is the defense attorney for that court. Now, if she 8-29-11 bwk 30 1 doesn't -- if she's not there, she doesn't charge us. But 2 it's -- I want to say it's either 1,500 or 2,000. I think 3 it's $500 a week. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: It's 500 a week, and that comes out 5 to 26,000. 6 MS. HARGIS: And the 216th D.A. made that 7 agreement. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Now, did that -- my question 9 is, did that move from somewhere else in the budget, this 10 $26,000? Did it move from somewhere else into this line? 11 MS. HARGIS: This year it did, yes, sir. We took 12 it from -- 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And those other lines have 14 been reduced by the same $26,000? 15 MS. HARGIS: The 26 is -- is for defense attorneys, 16 and we -- you just reduced the defense attorneys some more in 17 those other line items. That's where we took it from this 18 year. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And we're still happy that this 20 is working and reducing our jail population? 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Sometimes it does, sometimes it 22 doesn't. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I mean -- and my point is 24 that, you know, we're spending, you know $80,000, and the 25 intent is to get the jail population down and move cases 8-29-11 bwk 31 1 quicker. And if we're doing that, great. But if we're 2 really not doing that, maybe we ought to just go back to the 3 old way and save $80,000. 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They're doing it. They are 5 moving a lot more, but the jail population is continually 6 increasing. As I told you earlier, over the weekend we were 7 at 181, 182, with 41 females. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Rusty, you can sit down now. 9 (Laughter.) 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I figured that. But they are 11 moving. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: They are moving them quicker? 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They are moving cases through 14 there. It's just everything's up. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: If they weren't doing this, 16 you'd be overpopulated and we'd be really -- 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: We would really be looking 18 bad. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's all I wanted to hear. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And I'm not questioning the 21 jail court at all. I'm questioning where that money came 22 from. I mean, there's a brand-new $26,000 there, and I need 23 to know about that, because I am nosy. All right. Page 29, 24 Crime Victims Rights Coordinator, the county match. It 25 appears -- I'm not sure what I'm seeing here. I guess that's 8-29-11 bwk 32 1 my question. The permanent notes says it moved to Fund 50. 2 Why would you -- is that a salary that you moved over to Fund 3 50? 4 MS. HARGIS: That's the media release -- no, sir. 5 That -- as you recall, you retained Ms. Lavender to do media 6 releases every month about three years ago. Commissioner 7 Letz asked her to do that, and you're paying her for doing 8 that. And she was concerned that it be in this fund because 9 of it being a grant, and so we moved it to Fund 50. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I agree 100 percent. What's 11 Fund 50? What is that? 12 MS. HARGIS: Fund 50 is Indigent Health. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 14 MS. HARGIS: And she was partially over that. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, the moneys we pay her 16 for doing the newspaper program are -- 17 MS. HARGIS: Are in 50, as well as the money we pay 18 her for doing Indigent Health. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. And are there others 20 -- other salaries in Fund 50? 21 MS. HARGIS: Well, we have the coordinator, which 22 we just promoted to the H.R. Director, and that's it. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 24 MS. HARGIS: That's a -- 5 percent is all 25 Ms. Lavender gets. 8-29-11 bwk 33 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: October 1, when I look at 2 the new budget, I'll be able to see those salaries clearly in 3 Fund 50? 4 MS. HARGIS: Yes, sir. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you. Okay, Page 30, 6 216th District Attorney. Let's see. What is this supplement 7 that we're talking about here? 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's one the Legislature said 9 we had to do. We didn't give it to Amos. He wanted us to go 10 back four or five years. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is that what it is? 12 MS. HARGIS: Mm-hmm. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Super. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We said no. But it's in there. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: But we would consider it in future 16 budgets. And, in fact, we are. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, okay. Thank you for 18 answering that. My next question, what are the expenditures, 19 the $235,000? 20 MS. HARGIS: That's Kerr County's share of his 21 total expenditures. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Multiply that times what, 23 four? 24 MS. HARGIS: It's based on population. And, 25 actually, our share went down, because the -- the other 8-29-11 bwk 34 1 counties are growing. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Page 31. I don't -- this is 3 the 198th District Attorney. I don't see the new $30,000 4 employee. 5 MS. HARGIS: We -- I was told to take it off. I 6 can put it back. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is that one of those items 8 that we need to set aside and vote on? 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Possibly. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Or -- 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I think. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I mean, I -- personally, I 13 can see -- this is my own thing. If we have -- if we look 14 like we can do it financially, I think that that would be a 15 plus to the overall program, having that employee there for 16 him. But -- 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Particularly if we don't have to 18 incur the benefits because we can carry it as a contract. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Correct. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I differ, but that's okay. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I mean, you know, if 22 there's three of us that think that we don't need it, let's 23 throw it in the trash and go on down the road. I mean, fine 24 with me. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: But we can vote on that 8-29-11 bwk 35 1 separately. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We can vote on them separately. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: How are we going to hold 4 that out to vote on it separately? 5 MS. MABRY: How do you want to do that? 6 (Low-voice discussion off the record.) 7 MS. MABRY: We can plug it in. 8 MS. HARGIS: Can we get a general -- I mean, the -- 9 I'd leave that to Rob. You'd have to go into -- these are 10 both workshop sessions. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I tell you what, I'll hold 12 it out. 13 MS. HARGIS: I have it written down. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We'll vote on it when we go 15 into session at some point. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All right. 17 MS. HARGIS: I had it in there and I took it out. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you. Page 32, 19 District Clerk. I'm just curious about this number. 20 Part-time salaries, $14,040. Why not $39? Or 41? Or how 21 about 14,000? How did you come up with the $40? How do you 22 do that? I agree -- 23 MS. HARGIS: That request came from the clerk's 24 office. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. And then Line Item 8-29-11 bwk 36 1 420, telephone. Throughout this budget, all the telephones 2 moved to I.T. 3 MS. HARGIS: That's correct. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Now, why is this one still 5 in? 6 MS. HARGIS: All of the -- some people have 7 Windstream fax machines, and those that have Windstream -- we 8 only moved the Hill Country, not the Windstream. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you. 10 MS. HARGIS: As well as cell phones. Cell phones 11 stayed. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay, 34, the J.P.'s. I 13 want to deal with all four of them at one time here. 14 Actually -- let's see. Something I never have understood, 15 and I guess there -- and I think there's a couple of them in 16 the room maybe that would be able to explain this to me. The 17 conference line. J.P.'s -- and I think that everybody's been 18 here a while now, and they should all be required to get the 19 same amount of hours and the same -- you know, just like us 20 kind of thing. But if you look at the J.P.'s, the conference 21 line -- like, J.P. 1 is $3,300. J.P. 2 is $3,500, J.P. 3 is 22 $2,000, and J.P. 4 is $2,000. Why are they different? 23 JUDGE TINLEY: I don't know this to be the case, 24 but there might be some -- something in there for the clerks, 25 too. Some of the clerks have stuff that they attend, and -- 8-29-11 bwk 37 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I would apply my same 2 thinking, though; that if they're required to do it, they're 3 required to do it. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, it should be all of them. I 5 know -- I know this current year, J.P. 2 had a lot of 6 extra -- 7 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Right. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, I understand that. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: We plugged in additional funds for 10 that. Ms. Mitchell? 11 JUDGE MITCHELL: Commissioner Baldwin, what it is, 12 is we're required, after the first year, 20 hours of 13 education. And it depends where you go, the location. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Ah. 15 JUDGE MITCHELL: And they have narrowed our schools 16 down. Used to be they'd have them close by, closer -- more 17 of them closer by. They don't now; they're spread all over. 18 They try to get them in west Texas, east Texas, and so those 19 that go further, it costs more. I always try to stay in San 20 Antonio or Austin. That's why mine's -- 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, you can go to Austin or 22 go to Las Vegas. 23 JUDGE MITCHELL: They don't have them in Las Vegas, 24 but -- 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But is 2,000 sufficient for a 8-29-11 bwk 38 1 J.P.? 2 JUDGE MITCHELL: Yes, it is. And the reason mine's 3 2,000 this year is because we're required now to take 15 more 4 hours, so now it's 35 hours instead of 20 hours. 5 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Does 2 just have more 6 training to go to? I mean, he just has more training his 7 first -- 8 JUDGE MITCHELL: His first year, yes, he has to 9 have 80 hours. 10 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: 80? 11 JUDGE MITCHELL: 80. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And this first year is over 13 with? 14 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yes. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, he got it this year. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So he should be at 2,000. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So they all go to 2,000? 18 And then right above the conferences, Line 309, postage. 19 MS. MABRY: I had reduced that based on a 20 projection, and then it was brought to my attention that 21 toward the end of the year, they buy more postage, and so I 22 increased it back to 800. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Because the footnote 24 says it's reduced from 1,100 to 500. 25 MS. MABRY: It was initially, yes. 8-29-11 bwk 39 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So we're back to 800; this 2 is correct numbers. Okay, thank you. What -- do we want to 3 set aside the J.P.'s conference line to vote separately, or 4 did somebody automatically do that? 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Fine by me. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'm fine with two. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: The consensus seems to be two. 8 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah, I'm fine with that. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You just automatically do 10 that? 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Well -- 12 MS. HARGIS: It's already been done. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It's your budget. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: That's right. I was going to make 15 the point, Commissioner, if I filed it and it says two, then 16 it may be subject to a separate vote. Otherwise, it won't 17 be. So, we'll plug in two and see where it goes. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. That's the J.P.'s. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: You're doing so good, Commissioner, 20 I think I'm going to let you make a run at this next year. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Oh, no. It interfered with 22 I Love Lucy last night. (Laughter.) Let's see. Page 39 and 23 40, County Attorney -- actually, Page 40. On the notes on 24 Page 40, assistant salary and secretary salaries, that last 25 sentence, "I am advised that elimination of these C.P.S. 8-29-11 bwk 40 1 attorney positions is a possibility under the current state 2 budget discussions," blah, blah, blah blah, blah. Has all 3 this stuff happened? 4 MR. HENNEKE: It didn't happen. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It did not happen. So these 6 numbers can change, then. 7 MR. HENNEKE: I do not believe that any new 8 positions -- that contingency was that if the Department of 9 Family and Protective Services, C.P.S., quit sending their 10 lawyer to Kerr County to try the C.P.S. cases, the County 11 Attorney's office would be required to assume that burden. 12 So -- but the two new positions discussed in the footnote, my 13 understanding, are not written into the numbers that are part 14 of the budget. But that was just a placeholder notifying 15 you -- 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 17 MR. HENNEKE: -- that the possibility existed. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. So, the current -- on 19 the assistant salaries, the current budget is 113, and it 20 goes up to 129. Is that the 6.5? 21 JUDGE TINLEY: There are also -- if you'll recall, 22 there were two -- they're increases in there for each of 23 those assistants. If you'll recall on that special list that 24 we had. 25 MR. HENNEKE: I can explain. 8-29-11 bwk 41 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I do remember that. 2 MR. HENNEKE: Okay. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. Okay, Page 42. That 4 would be Human Resources, about halfway down. Line 225, 5 insurance consultant. Is that Mr. Looney? 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, it is. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And the footnote here says, 8 "This line item was put into my budget for the first time." 9 This year, obviously. And it is for our consultant for 10 insurance. 11 MS. HARGIS: That was a permanent note; that was 12 done two years ago. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. All right, that 14 answered that. And I understand -- 15 JUDGE TINLEY: I think we previously carried that 16 under Professional Services, if I'm not mistaken. And then 17 we -- 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Put it in the proper place. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. Yeah, that's where it 20 belongs. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Page 43, County 22 Auditor, official salary. My note says, "Please explain." 23 It has something to do with Longevity, 6.5. 24 MS. HARGIS: Which line item are you referring to? 25 Mine? 8-29-11 bwk 42 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, ma'am, you. 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: About 9 percent. 3 MS. HARGIS: No. There is -- there was a mistake 4 on my salary for the requested budget from last year. The 5 salary should have been, I think, 77,000 for this last year, 6 and it's coming out at 78. I don't know where the 86 came 7 from. 8 MS. MABRY: I think what had happened is two of us 9 had put in longevities when we were first calculating all the 10 budgets, and we did it redundantly. We didn't realize each 11 other had done it, so we removed it. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, if there's longevity due, it's 13 due. And then, of course, 6.5 would be -- but verify that. 14 MS. MABRY: Yes. Actually, I just reran the 15 numbers on Friday, and she received a longevity in July. And 16 I calculated it based on her salary after the longevity, so 17 it should be correct. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I thought that was all set 19 pretty much by the District Judges. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'm assuming that we will 21 vote on this budget at some point in our lives. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So I'm going to need to know 24 what that number, administration recommended number, is going 25 to be. When will I find that out? Not this moment, though, 8-29-11 bwk 43 1 will I? 2 JUDGE TINLEY: No, it will be hopefully later on 3 today when I file it. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'm going to hold that out. 5 Good. Page 44, County Treasurer. It appears -- I'll look at 6 this son of a gun again, a-g-i-n. That bonds and insurance 7 have been removed, zeroed out. And I'm thinking in the back 8 of my mind that we might have a new Treasurer, and -- 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Going to have to bond that 10 person. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That person's got to be 12 bonded. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So I'm not sure what 15 insurance is, but I'm pretty sure -- 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Mindy? Is Mindy here? 17 MS. HARGIS: Some of the -- some of the offices are 18 required to have additional insurance -- 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 20 MS. HARGIS: -- for their function, according to 21 state law, and I think the Treasurer's one of them. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Especially those that handle 23 money, probably. 24 MS. HARGIS: Yes, sir. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 8-29-11 bwk 44 1 MS. HARGIS: She has to have a bond, and then she 2 has to have an additional insurance policy on her and her 3 deputy. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: It appears that the 1,500 was enough 5 to cover what the requirement was for this year. I assume 6 those were all put in place up front, so it looks like we 7 need to restore 1,500 there. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay, I agree. And just for 9 fun, you know, down at the bottom in the footnotes, you have 10 bonds and insurance, and then the next one is employee 11 training. What is "CIO"? 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Certified Investment Officer. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Very good, thank you. I see 14 why this is your budget. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, Commissioner, five heads are 16 better than one. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Page 46, Tax 18 Assessor/Collector, reinstating the salary from last year. 19 Did -- does that mean that you joined us in reducing yours? 20 MS. BOLIN: I'm sorry, I was talking to Robbin. 21 Yes. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Does that mean that she 23 reduced hers along with us? Thank you for that. I didn't 24 realize that. Page 48, Courthouse and Related Buildings. 25 Down in the footnotes, Maintenance Superintendent, requesting 8-29-11 bwk 45 1 7.5 percent. The Judge is offering 6.5. Is 6.5 percent 2 salary increase not enough for you? 3 JUDGE TINLEY: He was one of those that was on the 4 list. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I was under the impression he 6 was going to get an increase due to responsibility increase, 7 and that he hasn't -- 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Additional facilities and -- 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: He wasn't -- he's still below 10 our previous Maintenance Director by a fair amount, and we 11 were trying to get him up in line as he's increased in -- 12 grown into his job. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, you know, if you feel like he 14 hasn't done an adequate job, we can get him up there and you 15 can talk to him about that. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: We will. Wait till 17 everybody leaves. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'd rather it just be 20 amongst us. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: I see. You want me to help you? 22 (Laughter.) 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All right, the uniforms, two 24 down. Line 316, uniforms. Permanent notes, "This budget is 25 a consolidation of two maintenance budgets. I believe this 8-29-11 bwk 46 1 should include more employees." What -- what does that mean? 2 JUDGE TINLEY: We took the uniforms out of another 3 maintenance budget, that portion of it, and included it over 4 here. Was that parks or -- or Ag Barn, or jail? 5 MR. BOLLIER: We took -- we took all the uniforms 6 and put them in 510 and 316. We did that last year. But we 7 are also coming out of my budget -- out of that budget is 8 also the airport. Am I not right? 9 MS. HARGIS: That's correct. 10 MR. BOLLIER: The airport, and they're taking 11 uniforms and they're spending money out of that -- out of 12 that line item that I did not put in there for them. It's 13 only to cover those who work for the Maintenance Department. 14 And so we're -- we are running low -- am I right? -- because 15 of that. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: So, that needs to be put in 17 the airport budget. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm, exactly. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I agree. I agree. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, we need to take that out of 21 your budget if they're not going to be yours. 22 MR. BOLLIER: I mean, I think that we put it in 23 there when the airport started and all that, and they hired 24 and they -- and it was late when we put it all in there. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, those people are still our 8-29-11 bwk 47 1 employees, so I can understand why this year we've got them 2 in there under our contract services. 3 MR. BOLLIER: Which, you know, the Court allowed us 4 to pay -- I mean, to have our uniforms, and plus pay for our 5 steel-toed boots out of there. And the airport went and 6 bought some boots out of there, which took a little more 7 money out of there, so that was the whole -- you know, I'm 8 just requesting that we please put that in the airport budget 9 so there's no more wondering where that money went. 10 MS. HARGIS: The airport -- in the contract, the 11 current contract that we have with them for maintenance, we 12 pay for that as part of the $158,000. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: I understand, 'cause they're still 14 our employees. 15 MS. HARGIS: Right. We can't -- we can put it in 16 our budget under airport, but we can't put it in their 17 budget. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right, okay. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 20 MS. HARGIS: But in our line item, we just have the 21 158,000; we don't break it down. And we -- and it was also a 22 problem with getting him -- a contract and so forth. I think 23 we had some problems with all of that, so that's the reason 24 we put it under Tim's. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Will that cost will be split 8-29-11 bwk 48 1 with the City? 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Should be. 3 MS. HARGIS: It's part of the 158. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: If they come under a separate budget 5 at the airport and they're actually airport employees, 6 that'll be split fifty-fifty. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Still an airport expense, 8 though, whether it's -- whether they're Kerr County employees 9 or whether they're city employees. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Where do the uniforms go, 11 the airport uniforms? Where do they go? In his budget? 12 Or -- 13 MS. HARGIS: We have had them in his budget for -- 14 to consolidate with the company, for one thing, because we 15 didn't have a separate Tax ID number for them. And because 16 it's included in our contract, it was easier to put it there 17 and keep up with it, because there's no one -- I mean, I can 18 split it out and send it out to him. It's just a little 19 confusing. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It just seems to me that, 21 you know, you have -- you have an item in the maintenance 22 budget, and he doesn't supervise them. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You know, just -- to me, 25 that -- you need to break them out. 8-29-11 bwk 49 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, next -- next year, those 2 uniforms for those people should not be in his budget. If -- 3 if they're carried anywhere, we need to do it under a 4 separate airport, I would think. 5 MS. HARGIS: It's kind of hard to break out 158,000 6 just for the uniforms, though. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: I understand that. 8 MS. HARGIS: So you understand where I'm at. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Be a shared expense, if those 10 employees end up being employees of the Airport Board, under 11 the Airport Manager, which is where I think this thing is 12 going. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Sooner, probably, than later. 14 MS. HARGIS: I'm confused. So -- 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, let's just leave his at 8,000, 16 and that ought to carry you for next year. 17 MR. BOLLIER: Yes, sir. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Absent the airport employees, right? 19 MR. BOLLIER: Yes, sir. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Page 50, Jail Maintenance. 22 The bottom line goes from last year's budget from 98,000 to 23 116,000 this year. Why such a large increase? What -- I 24 can't see it anywhere. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Commissioner, what page are you 8-29-11 bwk 50 1 on? 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: On Page 50. 3 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: 50. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Mm-hmm. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Somebody want to try to 6 answer that? 7 JUDGE TINLEY: And you said it goes to what? 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 116. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, let's see. There 10 are -- 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's in the jail; blame it on 12 Rusty. 13 MS. HARGIS: It's jail maintenance, and jail 14 maintenance requested an additional $12,000 for maintenance 15 expense, because there's some big-ticket items coming up 16 there. Also, you have the salary increase in that, so that's 17 about -- about the 14,000 that it would have gone up from 98. 18 MR. BOLLIER: We went up in 451 from 40,000 to 19 60,000, because we ran out of money in that line item, and 20 I've been making budget amendments to cover that. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: On jail repairs? 22 MR. BOLLIER: Yes, sir, 451. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: It's 20,000. That's it. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And that would probably be 25 conservative with some of the issues we're starting to have 8-29-11 bwk 51 1 out there. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, what I saw was the 3 current budget is 98,000, and there's requested 102, and then 4 the administration recommended, 116. And I just kind of 5 wanted to now how it got from 102 to 116. 6 MS. HARGIS: Well, the next year notes at the 7 bottom, "Increase from 48,000 to 60,000," Maintenance line 8 item. 9 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's just anticipated age 10 wearing on things in general, correct? 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: A little high, maybe. 12 MS. MABRY: That was requested by Tim personally. 13 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, projected is 108. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Page 56. I just want to 16 make a comment here. I don't want to do anything in 17 particular. Park Maintenance. This up-and-coming year, Tim, 18 we've added -- we're going to be doing some Kerrville South 19 fire station stuff, maintaining that property until we get a 20 building there. But the property still needs to be 21 maintained. And the Upper Turtle Creek school and cemetery; 22 he's taken that on, so there's two fairly large increases in 23 his workload. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Tim, what is the building 25 repairs under parks? 8-29-11 bwk 52 1 MR. BOLLIER: Building repairs under parks, it 2 carried me through -- that's -- that's 513-450. Those 3 building repairs there include the jail, Juvenile Probation, 4 Adult Probation, the new annex, the -- all the parks, 5 includes the school, everything that doesn't have -- that's 6 where all that money comes from, is 513. That's what I use 7 it for. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Why does it come under parks, I 9 guess is my question. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Good question. 11 MR. BOLLIER: I -- 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Why wouldn't it be under 13 whatever the other one -- 512? 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Courthouse and Related Buildings. 15 MR. BOLLIER: I -- I really don't know that answer, 16 because that's just the way it was set up when -- when I came 17 here, and I just kept it there. I was just -- I just kept it 18 there. But every related building comes out of there except 19 for the courthouse and the jail. I mean, every facility I 20 have comes -- comes out of that except for a very -- for a 21 few of them. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Seems like it ought to go 23 under -- move it, like the Judge says, to Courthouse and 24 Related Buildings from Building Repairs, just shifting it. I 25 don't have a problem with the amount, just -- 8-29-11 bwk 53 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Shift it to the proper -- 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just pay the right -- yeah. 3 MS. HARGIS: And this is the way y'all restructured 4 it when I first came here. I mean, we can do it again, but 5 it -- it takes our tracking system out. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I guess -- I don't see why it 7 would be under parks. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Where should it be? 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Courthouse and Related 10 Buildings. That's what he's doing, repairs on buildings. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: We got his jail stuff separate. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What's the problem with 13 moving it? 14 MR. BOLLIER: The jail and the Ag Barn and -- and 15 the courthouse are -- are the only three county entities that 16 I have that have their own budget. They all come out -- all 17 the rest of them come out of 513. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: How much of this building repairs is 19 related to, say, the Ag Barn? 20 MR. BOLLIER: None of that is related to the Ag 21 Barn. The Ag Barn has its own. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. So it needs to go to 23 Courthouse and Related Buildings, then. 24 MR. BOLLIER: Yes, sir. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 8-29-11 bwk 54 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Because it looks like we're 2 spending a bunch of money on parks that we're not spending on 3 parks. 4 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. That's a big drop when 5 you take that out. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Of course, we haven't spent 7 a penny at Center Point. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Never. 9 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Watch it. 10 MS. HARGIS: Do you want to rename it? You're 11 going to lose history here, so how do you want to do it? 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Building Repairs is fine. I 13 just think it ought to be under -- 14 MS. HARGIS: You want the whole department moved? 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, just that one line item. 16 513-456 ought to go to -- 17 MR. BOLLIER: No, no, no. 450. You do not want to 18 move 456. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It's building repairs. 20 MR. BOLLIER: I'm thinking 454. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 450. 450. 22 MR. BOLLIER: That's 450. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It ought to just go into 510. 24 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Take it to 510? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah, which is Courthouse and 8-29-11 bwk 55 1 Related Buildings. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I have a question, then. The 4 way it's run on this -- I'll ask it so hopefully Overby 5 doesn't have to. Say, for instance, that we did decide to 6 allow the survey of the Center Point park. 7 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Right. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Where would we put that 9 money? If we were to allow that expenditure, and also some 10 other -- 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Good question. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Would it require 13 engineering? That's a professional service. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's why we're -- if that 15 were to be done, that's where it would need to be put, and 16 not in parks. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's where I'd put it. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That wouldn't be a huge amount. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No, that's not a big amount 20 of money. 21 MS. HARGIS: Okay. 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: 1,500. 23 MS. HARGIS: We have a parks fund. We have $25,000 24 set up in that parks fund for that. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Okay. I was just checking to 8-29-11 bwk 56 1 see. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: And that 1,500 could come out 3 of that fund if we did that. 4 MS. HARGIS: Yes. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Now, that parks fund, is that a 6 capital fund? 7 MS. HARGIS: No, it's just -- it's just a separate 8 fund that was set up. That's how we ran the repairs through 9 for the parks. It's any structural or anything like that 10 that you do; a survey, tables, park-related. His -- again, 11 when I first came here, there was a realignment, and we set 12 these up, and I don't know why that one was named Parks. You 13 want it -- I mean, I can rename the fund -- I mean the 14 department. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't -- the name of the 16 department's fine. It's the Parks Maintenance. 17 MS. HARGIS: 'Cause it's not necessarily parks 18 maintenance, is it? It's -- 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Not if it's building repairs. 20 MR. BOLLIER: Not if it's building repairs. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We always had a -- is there 22 another Parks budget that you're telling me about? 23 MS. HARGIS: Mm-hmm. That was only used -- it 24 wasn't for maintenance. It's for -- for professional fees, 25 for large-ticket items that you would -- you know, permanent 8-29-11 bwk 57 1 items that you would put in your parks. The, you know, 2 expenditures on port-a-pottys, things like that, that 3 actually pertain to the parks. Not -- not the cemeteries or 4 things like that, but the main parks that we own. 5 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Some improvement like the 6 parking lot that we did this past year. Some of those areas 7 came out of those funds. 8 MS. HARGIS: Right. And the picnic tables, the 9 concrete picnic tables we put in both Flat Rock and the 10 other. So, those are -- that is a true budget for just those 11 three parks. 12 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Right. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, what you're saying is that 14 this entire -- 15 MS. HARGIS: This is maintenance of everything, of 16 anything that's not included in the jail or 17 courthouse-related, or the Ag Barn. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: I still think Building Repairs needs 19 to go over to the Courthouse and Related Buildings. 20 MS. HARGIS: I moved that, but would you like to 21 have the department renamed? 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: General Maintenance. 23 MS. HARGIS: That's what I was thinking. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: General Maintenance? 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Simple. 8-29-11 bwk 58 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What about Captain 2 Maintenance or Lieutenant Maintenance? (Laughter.) Have you 3 ever thought of that? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Corporal. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Corporal Maintenance. 6 Corporal punishment. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Oh, yeah. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: You're on a roll. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All right, sir. Page 57, 11 Constable -- the constables. I wasn't aware that we have a 12 clothing allowance for the constables' -- 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Oh, yeah. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- department. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's been there a long 16 time. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I know it. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They've ordered shirts and 19 everything. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is that what it is? I don't 21 see them wearing uniforms, but it's those nice shirts? Could 22 we get some put in there for us? 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Sure. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'd like to have one, 25 especially a big star. 8-29-11 bwk 59 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Commissioner, I requested 2 that some time ago, and -- 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, let's talk about it. 4 Do you want to vote on it? 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You know, I know that we'd 6 like for them to all have, you know, some white shirts and a 7 little patch on them or something, but I don't think they all 8 buy and wear the same thing. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: I think the rationale behind it is 10 that anybody that's in any sort of a law enforcement status 11 needs to exhibit outwardly some sort of badge or emblem 12 signifying that, so that you don't run into the issue of 13 whether or not somebody understood they were a law 14 enforcement officer, or don't know they're a law enforcement 15 officer. 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Actually, the way the Traffic 17 Code reads and that, Judge, unless it's an actual badge, a 18 hard badge -- the emblems, like on this shirt, is not 19 sufficient to distinguish that you're a law enforcement 20 officer, as far as if something happens. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Could I wear one of those? 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Got to be a badge. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: I think most of them actually 24 probably -- I know Ray Garcia, he's got a badge-holder that 25 he wears on his belt. And I suspect -- 8-29-11 bwk 60 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Most do. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: -- the rest of the others do also in 3 addition to that distinctive insignia on their shirts or 4 whatever. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. I don't have any 6 problem -- I guess I don't have any problem; I just want one. 7 Next thing you know, I'll be wanting a gun, so don't give 8 this to me. All right. Page 58, that would be Constable 2, 9 Line Item 456, Equipment Repair. That line item is not in 10 the other constables' budgets. And in the other constables' 11 budgets, there's a 454 that sayeth "Vehicle Repair and 12 Maintenance." Is that the same thing? 13 MS. HARGIS: No. He has a computer that he put in 14 his vehicle. The others don't, and that -- some of that 15 computer equipment is what he has used that for in the past, 16 to repair that. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Well, he doesn't have 18 a Vehicle Repair and Maintenance line, then. Everybody else 19 does. 20 MS. HARGIS: He has an Operating Equipment, and I 21 think that's where he takes his out of. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: I think they use those 23 interchangeably; one of them just calls it something 24 different. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, we have one constable 8-29-11 bwk 61 1 that calls things differently than other things? Well -- 2 JUDGE TINLEY: But the number's the same. 3 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Same amount. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You thought I was through, 5 didn't you? I am running out of gas. I'm not sure -- I'm 6 not sure what this is. Page 67, Juvenile Probation. From 7 the current budget to the administrative recommended is 8 decreased by about 30 grand. What is that, Judge? New laws? 9 JUDGE TINLEY: No. Actually, our state funding has 10 decreased, probably in the neighborhood of $60,000, best we 11 can tell. But what has happened is, on our -- our -- our 12 cost of housing has decreased. That's come down two years in 13 a row, I think, hasn't it? 14 MS. HARGIS: Yes. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yes. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. And that's primarily due to 17 the cost of housing. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Because we've -- fortunately, we're 20 having to pay for less. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I knew there had to -- 22 JUDGE TINLEY: You want to put some more money in 23 there? 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No. I just -- no, thank 25 you. 8-29-11 bwk 62 1 JUDGE TINLEY: You just wanted to know what the 2 good news was for a change? 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I wanted to know what the 4 good news was, that's right. Page 70, Department of Public 5 Safety. We did all the right things there. And my question 6 is, you know, we -- so we've drawn a line through the 7 secretary salary and -- and the overtime and accrued 8 vacation, all that stuff, and FICA and group and retirement 9 is all X'd out. We provide telephone. Now, I'm assuming 10 that that's the cell phones that we provide. And then what 11 is 569, Operating Equipment? 12 MS. HARGIS: They have always asked for a capital 13 item in that area every year, for any repairs to their office 14 supplies. Now that we're not supplying an employee, I don't 15 know if that's necessary. 16 MR. TROLINGER: And we also provide a computer and 17 a connection to our county network so they can look up in our 18 criminal justice system. It makes them really efficient, 19 being able to integrate with us. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Look at John. You go ahead, 21 brother. 22 MR. TROLINGER: I'm standing behind this, because 23 we really need to keep that. Even though they've lost the 24 secretary, the D.P.S. sergeant -- head has come to me -- of 25 the Kerrville office has come to me and said, you know, "Our 8-29-11 bwk 63 1 troopers will still go to this computer and look these things 2 up." So, they'll just have to do it personally instead of 3 with the help of the secretary. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And this operating 5 equipment, is that -- 6 MR. TROLINGER: I believe a portion of that, and 7 then also the telephone line item, we have -- we have 8 broadband as part of that. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: And the batteries for their 10 flashlights. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Batteries for the 12 flashlights? 13 JUDGE TINLEY: I'm serious. That's one of the 14 things they've told us about for their, quote, equipment. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Lots of them. 17 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's lots of them. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And just a general comment; 19 on Page 72, First Responder expense, looks like it's doubled 20 there. Don't know if everybody was aware of that at the 21 table or not. You need to know that before you vote on this 22 budget, I think. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Appears that the EMS contract went 24 up, too. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Did it really? 8-29-11 bwk 64 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, it did. I've noticed that. 2 Actually, it went up last year too, this current year that 3 we're in. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Dang sure did. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can we go back to Page 71? 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 71? 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'm there. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I believe the -- the airport 10 operations, it shows 175,000. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Mm-hmm. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's probably high. I think 13 we can probably take 25,000 off of that and still be safe. 14 We're still in the midst of a lot of negotiation and talking 15 about the airport with the City. But from their comments, 16 and from talking with the Auditor, I think we can probably 17 come down a little bit there. But the Judge seems to have a 18 little bit of a -- his expression may not be quite -- you 19 know, anyway, it's just a -- 20 JUDGE TINLEY: I don't know where we're going to 21 end up on that thing. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We could pay 100 percent again. 23 Who knows? 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's what they want for us 25 to do, and not give us credit for that. 8-29-11 bwk 65 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, maybe we ought to leave 2 it where it is. 3 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Be safer right now, till we 4 see where we're going to land at. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: If we were allocating capital, I'd 7 agree with you, Commissioner, 'cause once we put it there, we 8 lock it up. By doing it here, we don't lock it up. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: First Responder went from 11 14,000 to 31,000 -- basically, 32,000, so that's a -- that's 12 a pretty good size increase. 13 MS. HARGIS: Here's the breakdown, Commissioner 14 Baldwin. He wanted the digital radios, 1,975; portable 15 radios, 1,141 -- I mean 6,846; and then mobile radios, 800. 16 And then he wants to keep eGenesis, continuing it, 300. I 17 think we agreed to pay for that last year. AED's, 7,055, and 18 then fuel reimbursement was the 15 that we put in to 19 reimburse them for their gasoline that you requested. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: How much have you got in there for 21 reimbursement? 22 MS. HARGIS: 15,000. That's, I believe, the number 23 we agreed on at the last court meeting. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Some of these items, of course, were 25 items -- numbers for items that we were hoping to put in a 8-29-11 bwk 66 1 grant request on. 2 MS. HARGIS: The AED was 7,500, yes. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Very good. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I understand that we are 5 still pursuing a grant request on that. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: We're trying to find a way to do it. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Different route. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: We're trying to find a way. But it 9 specifically says that that particular grant must be 10 submitted by a fire department. 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, I think that she has 12 found a fire department to do that. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, good. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And it's not Kerrville. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: We tried that one and it didn't 16 work. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. We were wanting to 18 help by trying to get a grant. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: May I move on? 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, sir. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Page 77, Rabies and Animal 22 Control. It appears that there is about a $7,000 decrease in 23 the budget. Yea for her. Page 79, 449, Hill Country CARES. 24 We've put $1,000 in there, and I'm going to apologize to 25 everybody; I have never heard of them. My wife says that 8-29-11 bwk 67 1 they do something neat. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: That's the successor to the Crisis 3 Council. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay, fantastic. Great, 5 just changed names. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Are you through with that 7 one, or you got more to say about this one? 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: About the budget? I've got 9 a couple others. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Okay, I'll shut up while you 11 say something. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. And then the one 13 right above the Hill Country CARES, Item 448. That would be 14 Alamo R.C.& D. I haven't even heard those words in years. 15 Do they still exist? 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. Oh, yeah. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: They have a big office 18 somewhere over in -- 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Pecan Plaza. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, not -- no, it's not in Kerr 21 County. It's up the road. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do we do anything? 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: We don't do anything in Kerr 25 County. I have not heard a peep. Have we spent any money? 8-29-11 bwk 68 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: That's George Holekamp's -- 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, I know. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: They used to do things like 6 standpipes out on -- you know, on a ranch or little pond -- 7 which ponds don't exist any more -- where a truck could pull 8 up there and pump right out of the -- right out of the pond. 9 But -- 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't know why we want to 11 fund it, 'cause I don't know that they -- I mean, I don't see 12 that they're doing anything. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I haven't even heard those 14 words in two or three years. Let's take -- do you want to 15 vote on that? 16 JUDGE TINLEY: I think Mr. Holekamp's one of your 17 constituents, isn't he? 18 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: He's in 2. My question is, 19 what does the other previous years -- I mean, the $1,000 20 budgeted for this past year -- I mean, is there any history 21 for that? 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We used to spend a fair amount. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: 1,500. 24 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: So, it's coming down to 25 1,000? 8-29-11 bwk 69 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's -- 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'm going to probably say 3 leave it in there, guys. Sorry. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You don't want a battle with 5 George? 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: No, I want to visit a little 7 bit more. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Ginny might be worse. 9 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll visit with him a little 10 on that. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Are you going to come back 12 before we vote on the budget, or just -- you're just going to 13 go visit? 14 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll talk with him. How 15 about a telephone call? 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All right. Line Item 446, 17 Economic Development. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: There you go. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I have -- for two years, 20 I've -- I've moved that we totally eliminate that thing, and 21 I'm getting real close to it again. But, actually, I want to 22 reduce it from the 25,000 to the 1,000. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: That's probably a matter we need to 24 vote on separately, I would think. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay, that's good. Das gut. 8-29-11 bwk 70 1 That's all I had on that. 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: If we were to reduce that 3 amount, I would recommend that we put some extra into the 4 Dietert Claim for the Meals on Wheels program. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Great idea. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Now, they -- they will have enough 7 to qualify for their -- for their state grant funding under 8 Texas Department of Agriculture. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They didn't ask for any 10 additional. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, plus I didn't see 12 anything come through that they had requested anything new. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, they sent a letter. 14 Nobody came personally. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Ms. Woods -- 16 MS. HARGIS: She came. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: In dealing with her previously, I 18 had told her I wanted to make sure -- I wanted to preserve 19 her ability to go after those state grant funds, and she said 20 she understands that things are tight over here, and 21 appreciates all that we can do for her. That, at a minimum, 22 is what she wants. I'm sure she'd be happy to have some more 23 straight county dollars, but -- 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, I wonder if we could 25 put that in the trapper contract, Buster. 8-29-11 bwk 71 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No. (Laughter.) Okay. I 2 got down to eight pages, and I love Lucy came on. Sorry, I 3 didn't finish it. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's all I have. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: On Page 80, under Extension, is 7 that -- the difference from the projected year end to the 8 budget request, is that adding a person in there? What is 9 that big difference from 21,000 projected year end to -- 10 MS. MABRY: Those projections were done at a very 11 early date, and so they are probably not current with what's 12 in there. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, the current budget's 14 probably accurate. We're not changing anything in there. 15 MS. MABRY: Right. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: We do not have one of the -- part of 17 the salary of one of the agents in what's being expended. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 19 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Is that the gal from College 20 Station, the new gal? Who was that? 21 JUDGE TINLEY: No, that's a separate deal. 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Separate deal, okay. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's it. That's all I had. 8-29-11 bwk 72 1 JUDGE TINLEY: You got any more that you want to 2 throw out, Buster? 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, sir, I don't. Thank 4 you. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Overby? 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Hmm-mm. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Letz? 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Go ahead. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, go ahead. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, I think there's some 11 other areas we need to look at possibly, you know, making 12 some deeper cuts. But I don't believe we've talked about it 13 in the past, and -- and, you know, it's kind -- in one way, 14 it's a good thing, and in another way, it's a bad thing. You 15 know, our contribution to the retirement program has gotten 16 pretty large. The percentage is way higher than the 17 contribution of the employee. If we were to take and reduce 18 -- think about reducing that, or say what that amount would 19 be and how much we could save to be able to bring our 20 projected tax increase more in line with what we really need, 21 I would be in favor of doing that. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What's our current -- 23 JUDGE TINLEY: 2.3. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 2.3? 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 8-29-11 bwk 73 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We've increased that slowly the 2 past few years to get it up to 2.3. Used to be about 1.9, I 3 believe. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: That's correct. Starting back about 5 eight, nine years ago, it was 1.9. 6 MS. HARGIS: It's up because of -- we have to 7 pay -- 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I can't hear you. I'd like 9 to be able to hear you. Thank you. 10 MS. HARGIS: Yes, sir, I'm sorry. Remember, the 11 percentage is higher because we have to pay back the money 12 that was lost in the -- on the funding from the stock market. 13 That penalty is about 2 percent. That won't go away, because 14 we -- what they did is they took the loss of the -- of the 15 interest income over a 10-year period, and we're all paying 16 that back, depending on how much money we had in there. Our 17 funding dropped when -- when the fund dropped, then it 18 brought us back down to 85 percent instead of being at 95 19 percent or 94 percent funding as far as our employees are 20 concerned. In other words, our pot of money that we had set 21 aside for our employees all dropped 10 percent. So, for the 22 next 10 years, we're having to allocate an additional amount. 23 It didn't go up as much this year as I thought. They did 24 have another small hiccup this last year. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That would be to maintain the 8-29-11 bwk 74 1 status-quo, though, and not necessarily be -- be an exact 2 match of dollar-for-dollar. 3 MS. HARGIS: No, but I don't think the 4 contribution's going to go down as much as if we were just 5 having a contribution to reduce down to another level, 6 because of the fact we have to keep -- to get our fund back 7 to the -- to at least 93 or 94 percent. I mean, we can check 8 on it, but basically, when we looked at the incrementals, 9 it's not been that big. The big hit -- we were at 6.9 when I 10 got here, and then all of a sudden we almost doubled to pay 11 back the fund. That's really where the hit came. We -- and 12 we were at 7-something the next year, and then all of a 13 sudden 9, and then -- to pay back, and then 11. Now, it's my 14 understanding that the Legislature wants to redo this 15 T.M.R.S. And this is a defined benefit plan, and I'm not 16 going to tell you I know as much about this as I should, but 17 the defined benefit plan is where you put a specific amount 18 of money in. They want to change that to a non-defined, and 19 then that's where there's even more fluctuation in what your 20 contributions would be. It's more risky. The funds that had 21 that in the past lost more money than we did in the defined 22 plan. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Ms. Lantz, why don't -- why don't 24 you get a number of what our contribution rate would be from 25 T.C.D.R.S. if, say, we dropped to 2.2. 8-29-11 bwk 75 1 MS. LANTZ: Okay. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay? That will give us the number 3 that you're looking for. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's right. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: I do know that a lot of the increase 6 in the past few years is -- is because of needing to rebuild 7 the funded portion of our plan. So -- Sheriff? 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That, and also trying to 9 increase that amount for future. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Just a comment I would make 11 is, again, I think it's off the employees' backs. And I can 12 -- I think Bruce would understand that. If you'll recall, 13 what a lot of agencies are based on is highest three years of 14 salary, okay? And Kerr County and T.C.D.R.S. never has been 15 that way. A lot of us, and myself included, that went back 16 to work here 25 and 30 years ago, if you'll remember what 17 salaries were, okay, there was so little put in back then in 18 the county, and the last few years finally started trying to 19 get that up. We're still not at the highest; the County 20 wouldn't go to the highest, which is either 2.4 or 2.5. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: 2.5. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I don't remember. But we're 23 right in between. And I think, in fairness to all the 24 employees, you know, I would just hate to see the County cut 25 back much on what those vested employees have done for the 8-29-11 bwk 76 1 last 25 or 30 years by hurting them back on their retirement 2 again. And there may be a difference -- I understand your 3 point, Bruce. I'm not going to argue it. I just feel that 4 with the different types of retirement systems where you're 5 based on highest three years, that's a major difference, than 6 if you're based on what you put in the pot and what the 7 County has -- has assisted in putting in that pot. And I 8 think it's a -- you know, really, it's -- the highest three 9 years is a little bit better for the employee than even this. 10 And the thing about it, cutting us back I think is the wrong 11 way -- 12 JUDGE TINLEY: We'll get a number and see what the 13 real dollars are. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Let's talk about insurance for 15 a minute. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. Yeah, I was going to 17 bring that up. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Speaking of pots. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm not sure how I get there. 21 But -- 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Actually, it's the 23 Sheriff -- the Sheriff's question, too. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Do you want to duct-tape him 25 before you get started? 8-29-11 bwk 77 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The H.R.A. contract -- or 2 account, I'm glad we're able to bring it back, but I think we 3 should reduce the amount from 500 to 300. I think that's -- 4 it still covers the employees; that gets them to the doctor 5 when they have the flu and things of that nature, and it'll 6 help save us some, not a huge amount. But I really am happy 7 we're able to get back onto the H.R.A. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And also, if we do go with 9 TAC, I believe that we will have better -- everybody will 10 have a little bit better insurance than what we had. It's 11 going to be less costly to go to the doctor and have 12 prescriptions. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Which brings me to my 14 question about -- you know, we've -- we've kind of -- in my 15 mind, we've kind of given a nod of our head to TAC that we're 16 kind of wanting -- I'm leaning that way. And I understand 17 Mr. Looney's role in all that, and I agree with it. But I 18 see Mr. Malek in the room, and I'm not sure -- it confuses me 19 just a little bit of what his role is; what -- it seems -- it 20 seemed to me that we've kind of given a nod to TAC, and then 21 just where -- where does Mr. Malek fit in? If we went with 22 TAC, where would he fit into that -- that operation and all 23 that? And I just -- I love him to death. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Ask him; he's right there. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I love him to death -- I'm 8-29-11 bwk 78 1 fixing to. I love him to death, and y'all tell him that for 2 me. But I just -- every time I see him, I get confused. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: He has that effect, evidently. 4 MR. MALEK: I guess you want to talk to me, then. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I expect so. 6 MR. MALEK: My role in this part of it was to -- I 7 mean, I'm negotiating with TAC. I mean, when we first 8 started out with Humana and TAC, they were at a 5 percent 9 increase, and so my job is to then negotiate that. And so, 10 you know, so far we've knocked about $170,000 off that 11 number, just from me being able to do that. It would be a 12 little bit different -- unfortunately, you know, because this 13 is a public forum, TAC finds out things that are said here, 14 and they think -- they think they're in, and that's kind of a 15 difficult situation for us. And I still think there's more 16 room to negotiate with them, and that's part of why you pay 17 me to do that. And same thing with Humana. You know, some 18 of the things that we've added in their whole program that 19 weren't there before -- I notice that one of the line items 20 you were talking about was the wellness. The reason you 21 haven't spent any money in the wellness budget is because we 22 were able to get the other vendors to pay for that. 23 And so that's what I did; I got them to pay for 24 part of the wellness program that we did have in. The same 25 thing with the flu shots and things like that. Some of that 8-29-11 bwk 79 1 was negotiated. Those are some of the things that I picked 2 up on when you were just talking about it. It seems like you 3 have a pretty big number put in there, and we think we can 4 get a lot of that covered under the health plan. So, that's 5 part of the value that -- you know, that I bring to this. 6 Also, I do all the -- the day-to-day operations, you know, 7 claims, people calling us. I mean, I was just looking at -- 8 you know, because I have to look at my cost on this to see, 9 you know, where I am, and, you know, whether our firm makes 10 money off of this. And last year, 12 months running, we did 11 2,236 e-mails in relation to your -- to your account. That's 12 probably a little more than we would on an account your size, 13 but there's a lot of things last year that changed. We went 14 from self-funding to fully insured. We did a lot of changes 15 to the retirement -- excuse me, to the retirees and how 16 they're being treated. So, again, that's part of my role. 17 You know, last year we had 20-some-odd retirees, 18 and we were able to get a great number of those off and onto 19 the Medicare supplement plans. That's really good for the 20 retiree, and really good for the County. And so we still 21 have five or six more on there, and the plan is to try and 22 get those remaining, because I think that single item has had 23 more impact on the claims experience for the group than just 24 about anything else, albeit the employees did take a big hit 25 in terms of benefits. Getting those people off had a bigger 8-29-11 bwk 80 1 impact on the claims, which really drives the pricing. So, 2 those are just some of the things that we do. I mean, I've 3 got a whole list of them if you -- 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, please don't go into 5 them. Maybe I've misunderstood Mr. Looney's part of this 6 thing, then. Well, thank you. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Wait, wait, wait. I have a 8 question, then. Who pays you? Are you paid out of the -- 9 what -- how do you get your money? 10 MR. MALEK: The insurance company pays me. So, 11 basically, they tell me -- you know, I -- I go through and I 12 tell them what percentage or what amount of money to build 13 in, and they build it into the pricing. So, the insurance 14 company pays me. I'm not paid by the County. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, Blue Cross/Blue Shield 16 would pay you? 17 MR. MALEK: In this situation, Blue Cross would pay 18 us, correct, like Humana is paying us now. And then we 19 negotiate that with them, you know, apart from the pricing 20 that you guys end up with in the end. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner, I may be more confused 22 than you at this point. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Oh, god. (Laughter.) 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Mr. Malek, you're the representative 25 of the broker in connection with our current plan with 8-29-11 bwk 81 1 Humana, correct? 2 MR. MALEK: Correct. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: And, of course, the broker is 4 compensated in that respect through that plan, correct? 5 MR. MALEK: Correct. That's right. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. With regard to the -- to the 7 possibility of striking some sort of bargain with the TAC 8 pool, my best understanding is that Mr. Looney has acted on 9 our behalf and made the initial approach; either he did or we 10 did. I know we've been talking to them through our H.R. 11 department for probably a year or more about submitting a 12 proposal to us. Am I -- am I mistaken about that? 13 MR. MALEK: Pretty much. I mean, I'm the one who 14 approached TAC, and have over the years. Until this year, 15 they haven't bid on your account, and a big part of the 16 reason why is they just didn't feel like they had an 17 opportunity. Somebody had to talk them into -- to doing it, 18 and that was -- that was my job. I put the proposal together 19 and gave them the reasons why I thought it would be a good 20 idea for them to participate in this. And -- 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I guess I really am confused, 22 then. I thought -- I noted in the proposal that TAC 23 submitted to us that there was included there, with respect 24 to the insurance products, a commission which aggregated 25 approximately $62,000, if I recall correctly. Is that about 8-29-11 bwk 82 1 right? 2 MR. MALEK: It's somewhere in the neighborhood. A 3 little less, I know, because as the premium's starting to 4 drop, that also drops as well. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. But that's calculated into 6 our premium. 7 MR. MALEK: That's right. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Is it not? Has to be calculated 9 somewhere, I guess. 10 MR. MALEK: Yes. I mean, not the whole amount. It 11 depends on, you know, actually how you set it up. But, yes, 12 in the event -- a good part of that is part of the pricing. 13 It's like any insurance that you buy, any property, casualty. 14 You're paying an agent whether you know it or not. The only 15 thing that we require as an agent -- as an agency is that we 16 fully disclose everything that we earn. So, I mean, that's a 17 big deal to us. We don't like there to be a secret. 18 Everything is up front with us; we're fully transparent from 19 that point. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: So, if I'm hearing you correctly, 21 your -- your entitlement to a commission is based upon the 22 fact that you view your actions as being the procuring cause 23 of any subsequent deal we may make with TAC? 24 MR. MALEK: That's right. I'm actually placing the 25 coverage, if you -- if you want to say it that way. Someone 8-29-11 bwk 83 1 -- a licensed agent has to place coverage, and so that 2 licensed agent is myself. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, dealing with a pool -- dealing 4 with the TAC pool, isn't that a different situation? 5 MR. MALEK: Not necessarily. I mean, there are -- 6 it is different, because TAC is the actual manager of it, but 7 Blue Cross still is the insurance carrier behind this, so the 8 risk is with Blue Cross. And so, just like any other thing, 9 you have to have licensed people that deal with it. Like, if 10 TAC was to come present their program, that person has to 11 have an insurance license, whether it's a pool or not a pool, 12 because you're -- you have an insurance product, and you have 13 to have an insurance license in order to present that. And 14 TAC's role in this is -- is like an administrator. It's like 15 having, you know, an extension of Blue Cross. They have an 16 agreement with Blue Cross to market their product exclusively 17 branding the TAC name, but it's really nothing more than Blue 18 Cross. Should we want to go to Blue Cross direct, we could 19 have actually done that without TAC, and the pricing would be 20 different -- or could be different. I'm not saying it will 21 be, but it could be different because of their role in the 22 pool. So, it's still the same kind of a scenario. 23 So, you can actually end up with two different Blue 24 Cross quotes in this scenario, one through TAC and one 25 through Blue Cross. One of the two may not want to 8-29-11 bwk 84 1 participate if one or the other is doing it, so that really 2 complicates things. And I've run into that with other 3 counties as well, where actually Blue Cross is the 4 administrator of the plan, and TAC is not really involved in 5 it other than, you know, saying that they're part of it. Or 6 they're actually part of it; they're acting as the 7 administrator in this case. So, they do brand a few things. 8 The wellness product they brand as TAC, but Blue Cross has a 9 wellness program that's very similar to that; they just don't 10 brand it with the TAC name on it. So, I hope that clears it 11 up a little bit. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That does a little bit. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I -- you know, if you wouldn't 14 mind, could you furnish us with copies of the communications 15 that -- that you've had which evidences this procuring cause? 16 MR. MALEK: Sure. I helped with the RFP. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Obviously, you know, we're talking 18 about a sizable sum of money that we need to be concerned 19 about. 20 MR. MALEK: Right, I understand. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: If, in fact, you have earned 22 something, why, we want to be fair with you. If you haven't, 23 why, that's another issue, of course. I'm sure you 24 understand that. 25 MR. MALEK: I understand. Now, just so you know, 8-29-11 bwk 85 1 we're right in the middle of this. You know, I'm still 2 not -- I still wasn't done with Humana and TAC versus, you 3 know, trying to get the best possible pricing. Depending on 4 where this goes and who hears this, it can have a real big 5 impact on where this thing is getting ready to go, 'cause I 6 have a whole laundry list of things that I sent to them that 7 I want them to agree upon that they're going to provide the 8 County. Just the same thing that I did with Humana. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Humana is also making efforts to 10 obtain our renewal of our current plan, or some modification 11 of it, is my understanding. 12 MR. MALEK: Right. Right. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: And you're also acting as the 14 representative of the broker in that regard? 15 MR. MALEK: Yes, that's correct. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: When are we going to -- I was 17 kind of -- in my mind, we had made a decision. We haven't 18 voted, I know. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: No, we haven't made a decision. 20 We're trying to get narrowed down, as I understand it, to a 21 number in the budget so that we would be comfortable that we 22 had adequate funding plugged into the budget. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. Right. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: But insofar as selecting a 25 particular plan or -- or carrier or anything in that regard, 8-29-11 bwk 86 1 that's something that's still open. But -- 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That comes later. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. I would like to see the 4 documentation -- 5 MR. MALEK: Sure, no problem. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: -- that you rely on as the procuring 7 cause in order to entitle you to a commission. 8 MR. MALEK: Just so you know, because you went -- 9 we went directly to TAC, we still have one thing that we 10 haven't done to them, and that's request that we -- one of 11 the -- since they're an intergovernmental pool, we have to 12 request from them that we want a proposal from them. That 13 was the only piece that was missing. I remember sending an 14 e-mail to Gary, and I think I copied you on it. We have to 15 ask them that so that we can basically circumvent the bidding 16 laws in this case -- I don't know if that's a good word to 17 say. We're using a different method to acquire the proposal 18 from them than what we normally do. Normally, we would go to 19 the request for public bids, and then we would, you know, let 20 anybody and everybody submit their bids. In this case, we 21 did not do that. We went through the -- their exemption, and 22 so we have to do that. That's one of the things that's still 23 missing as part of this, so it's a different way we're doing 24 this now than we have in the past, because we're going 25 directly to the current vendor and then to TAC, and we're 8-29-11 bwk 87 1 just using those two. We're not using any other vendors, 2 'cause then we would be in a public bid situation. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: I understand. 4 MR. MALEK: The whole thing would change. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: I understand. 6 MR. MALEK: So -- 7 JUDGE TINLEY: But because of the pool arrangement 8 and TAC being a governmental entity representative, as it 9 were, -- 10 MR. MALEK: Right. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: -- they're not bound by the same 12 procedures. 13 MR. MALEK: That's right. They have an exemption 14 through state law that allows them to offer their program. 15 Which, again, if we went directly to Blue Cross versus not 16 going to TAC, which we could do, we would actually have to go 17 into the bid process -- 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Sure, I understand. 19 MR. MALEK: -- and things like that, with a 20 different -- different rules would then apply. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Any other questions? 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I just wanted to 23 comment that I think what I'm confused about is I saw -- I 24 mean, we contacted TAC. And he came down and sat in that 25 chair right there and talked to us, and then I've seen 8-29-11 bwk 88 1 e-mails come from the furthest places on earth, providing TAC 2 with insurance -- most of it seems like it came from 3 Mr. Looney, and some of it came from the Auditor, and some of 4 it came from the Treasurer and et cetera, et cetera. And 5 that may be where you're -- it may have all come out of you; 6 I have no idea. But I know that most of the information that 7 TAC requested came out of here. And -- and then -- 8 JUDGE TINLEY: It had to come from Humana too. 9 Because -- 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I guess, yeah. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Sure. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And it just seems to me like 13 when they get ready to put in a bid and tell us what their 14 program is, that would be something that they would send to 15 this Court or to Mr. Looney, or both. I just don't see 16 the -- I just don't see his -- his play in this whole 17 picture. I just don't understand that. That's why I'm 18 confused. I thought Mr. Looney -- like, when they bid, that 19 bid would go to Looney, and he would evaluate it and then 20 come back and -- evaluate it and evaluate any other company 21 that had bid on it, and come back and say, "Okay, here's your 22 best shot," like he's done in the past. I just -- I'm just a 23 little bit mixed up about all that. 24 MR. MALEK: Well, that information didn't come 25 directly from the County; it all came from me. I keep all 8-29-11 bwk 89 1 the historical information that I've had over the past few 2 years for this particular purpose of going to bid. Now, Gary 3 does compile some of that, but in this situation, I ended up 4 sending the Request for Proposal directly to TAC. Because 5 they send me -- they actually have a format that I have to go 6 through to -- to collect that information. And so, 7 generally, a county entity doesn't have -- or don't have the 8 ability to collect all those -- that information. And -- and 9 that was part of my role in it as well. But, again, when you 10 deal with TAC, if you don't -- there's a difference between 11 having an agent and don't have an agent. If you don't have 12 an agent, you do not have anybody to negotiate on your 13 behalf, other than dealing with TAC directly. And that's -- 14 that's a big part of my role in this situation. Again, I 15 have -- like I've got them on notice, I've got a laundry list 16 of things that I would like them to provide us that they 17 haven't provided us in their proposal. There's quite a bit. 18 And then again, final price; we haven't said best and final 19 offer or anything of that nature, because that would imply 20 that we're going in a bid situation. But we do -- we do know 21 what Humana's renewal is. And so part of that is they're 22 competing against each other, and we create that atmosphere 23 of competition, where if you just went direct to TAC, you 24 don't have that. You just have whatever the proposal is, and 25 that's it. 8-29-11 bwk 90 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Would not Mr. Looney have the 2 ability to negotiate with TAC on behalf of the County? If 3 he's a consultant that we have retained? 4 MR. MALEK: I guess he could. In this case, that 5 doesn't seem to be the -- I mean, that isn't the case now. 6 Generally, you do have an agent that represents one or more 7 of the parties, and they'll come to -- like, in this case, 8 Mr. Looney would come to myself and say, "Okay, I need you to 9 get your carriers to do these things." Or other agents; it 10 wouldn't necessarily just be myself. And get that agent 11 who's representing the company to do that. So -- and TAC 12 does have the ability -- or has -- they do use agents in 13 quite a bit of their bid situations. I use them in other 14 counties that we represent. And then there's other 15 situations where we -- you know, we go direct to them, and we 16 don't use them. So, it just depends on the situation. 17 Sometimes TAC wants to be involved and sometimes they don't 18 want to be involved. It just depends on their -- what their 19 view of the -- of your risk is. Which, you know, has changed 20 considerably after all the things that we're -- we put 21 together to make the risk appear better for them so that they 22 would actually want to quote. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Any more questions for Mr. Malek? 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, sir. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I have a question. And I 8-29-11 bwk 91 1 wasn't -- I wasn't going to ask it, but now I am. I don't 2 remember hiring you. 3 MR. MALEK: Well, you don't specifically hire us. 4 You go through the RFP process. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 6 MR. MALEK: And as part of the RFP process, you 7 have to go through a licensed agent to -- 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 9 MR. MALEK: -- get to a company. And so I -- I 10 represent those agents. So, you didn't hire me and you're 11 not paying me; the insurance company is paying me. In this 12 case, Humana, and in the case of TAC, TAC or Blue Cross is 13 paying us, so -- or would be paying us. So, that's how it's 14 always worked, just like on your property and casualty or any 15 other type of insurance that you have to try to -- 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 17 MR. MALEK: -- obtain, you're going to go through a 18 licensed agent. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 20 MR. MALEK: And so -- so that's kind of how it 21 works. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I guess I never asked the 23 question. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I was thinking it, too. 25 MR. MALEK: It's the same with your property. 8-29-11 bwk 92 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You got a representative and 2 you don't even know that they're doing it. 3 MR. MALEK: Well, in this case, you may not even 4 know who the broker is because of the way their structure is 5 on the property and casualty side of things. So, you just 6 don't know who it is. You've probably never even met him, 7 and yet somebody's making a commission off of your account, 8 because that person had to place your coverage through 9 whatever company that may have been. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Any more questions? 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, sir. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. 14 MR. MALEK: All right. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Let's give her a little 16 break here. We're going to take a recess, and -- 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: We're going to come back to 18 this? 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, we can. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah, I got something else. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: The Sheriff brought up pot, 22 and I want to talk about it. 23 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: He had a comment. 24 (Recess taken from 10:55 a.m. to 11:15 a.m.) 25 - - - - - - - - - - 8-29-11 bwk 93 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Let's come back to order for 2 our workshop, if we might. Have we pretty well wrung out 3 what we've got on our workshop -- budget workshop issues? 4 Commissioner, you got any more that you're working on? 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir, I have -- I have a 6 couple of questions that I forgot to ask earlier. The issue 7 with the Sheriff and the Chief Deputy's salary, that space in 8 there -- and I can't remember what all those little details 9 are, but are we okay? Have we done anything to throw that 10 out of kilter, and are we good for another year? Seems like 11 to me we need to -- 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Need to do one thing or the other; 13 either abide by it, or do away with the policy. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: We need to fix that thing 15 one way or the other, and I couldn't care less which way it 16 is, but I think it needs to be fixed and go on down the road. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: We need to look at what the current 18 differential is between Chief Deputy and the Sheriff. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What -- isn't there some 20 kind of county policy or something -- 21 JUDGE TINLEY: 5,000. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: 5,000. It has to be 5,000 23 different. And I don't think that the chief deputy this year 24 got any kind of longevity pay. I think he got that stuff 25 last year, if my memory serves me well, which it doesn't. 8-29-11 bwk 94 1 So, it -- I don't think we have done anything to throw it out 2 of kilter again, but eventually it will. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: If, in fact, it is within the 5,000, 4 I think the appropriate thing to do would be to put it on the 5 agenda for the Court to take the opportunity to decide 6 whether or not they want to keep that intact or not, as one 7 option. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Mm-hmm. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: The other option, of course, would 10 be to increase his. And we need to know that pretty quick, 11 because we've got to let -- 12 MS. HARGIS: They're exactly 5,000 apart right now. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Exactly? We don't have that issue. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: But I don't -- you know, 15 Clay, didn't you get -- get some kind of stipend last year 16 for, like, longevity? 17 MR. BARTON: Got a step increase last October. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Step increase. That means 19 you're getting old. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Infirm. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Infirm. Old age stuff. 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That was rough. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: When will something like 24 that happen again? 25 MR. BARTON: Two more years. 8-29-11 bwk 95 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: See, it'll happen in a 2 couple more years. Rusty's salary is frozen forever; I think 3 we agreed to that. (Laughter.) 4 JUDGE TINLEY: We just said it was maxed; we didn't 5 say it was frozen. It could come down. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, it could come down, 7 that's exactly right. But next year, or two years, Clay's is 8 going to bump up, and here we are in the same deal again. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, basically, Rusty is a 10 special elected official that gets longevity. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Basically, that's what that 12 is. 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Just because there's not 14 enough salary separation. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Longevity is determined by 16 the vote. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Longevity is determined by 18 the vote. Well, yeah. Yeah, we can fix it. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This year it's not a problem. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Talking about the vote first. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: This year is not a problem, 22 that's correct. The other item is, I'm thinking at some 23 point in our lives, we are going to deal with this Treasurer 24 issue of appointing a new Treasurer, electing one, buying one 25 or whatever it is. And my question is -- two questions. 8-29-11 bwk 96 1 When are we going to do that? But more importantly, related 2 to today's agenda item is, if we appointed one between now 3 and October, would that affect the budget in any way? Would 4 the numbers change? Do we need to deal with some numbers 5 today? 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: There will be some training 7 and things like that that are required in the beginning. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Certifications. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: That's all it would affect, though. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: A few dollars? 11 MS. HARGIS: Well, unless the Treasurer stayed. If 12 the Treasurer stayed, if you appointed -- if you're going to 13 appoint somebody, then she would be gone? Because there's no 14 extra salary amount in her line item if we -- if we appointed 15 someone for her to train. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Oh, I see what you're 17 saying, yeah. 18 MS. HARGIS: For her to train. There would not be 19 sufficient funds for that. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I believe that she said she 21 would help with transition. I don't believe -- 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't know that that meant 23 help for free. 24 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Right. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Maybe we ought to add a little 8-29-11 bwk 97 1 part-time money there. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: For the transition part? 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, I don't know. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I don't know. I'm just 5 asking a question. Just -- you know, 'cause I don't want us 6 to get down to October 1 and whatever we're going to do, and 7 then not -- and then not have it budgeted. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Good point, Commissioner. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do you have any idea what 10 we're going to do? 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I think we're going to be 12 required to appoint someone to fill that position till the 13 next general election. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Now, if I'm interested in 15 it, do I need to bid on the thing? Or -- 16 JUDGE TINLEY: We're going to need to -- 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- need all kinds of stuff 18 from me? I'll have to hire Mr. Malek. Where -- where'd he 19 go? 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I don't know if he's got a 21 license to do that. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Oh. So, we -- we're going 23 to have to appoint somebody before October 1. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Tim, where's your budget? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 540. 8-29-11 bwk 98 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: If we were to appoint 2 someone today -- this is a legal question, I think. If we 3 were going to appoint someone today, you'd appoint them 4 effective October 1? 5 JUDGE TINLEY: I believe that would be correct. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Or would they be ready to 7 swear in today? 8 MR. HENNEKE: No. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: You can't have but one at a time. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Can't have but one at a 11 time. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is that it? 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No. I still want to know 14 when we're going to do it. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Are you suggesting that we need to 16 put the word out that we are accepting expressions of 17 interest from persons who would like to be considered for 18 appointment to the office of Kerr County Treasurer? 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir. And I'm assuming 20 when someone of interest comes along and says, "Well, what 21 does it pay?" then the budget numbers will remain the same. 22 That's my real question. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Exactly. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Everything will be -- remain 25 the same, so that we can say, "You work for free for the 8-29-11 bwk 99 1 first three years," and then... (Laughter.) 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The question I have is, the -- 3 I know the Treasurer has advised us of her intentions. Has 4 she made a public announcement? I would hate for us to start 5 advertising before she's publicly announced what she's doing. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, that's probably true. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think we need to make sure -- 8 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's done first. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. And I don't know -- I 10 don't know; I'm not sure. I mean, obviously, it's common 11 knowledge in the courthouse, but -- 12 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Not publicly. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You're right. I believe 14 you're right. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is that it? 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes, sir, that's all. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I have -- go ahead. 18 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: No, go ahead. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Our H.R. Director gave us a 20 holiday schedule in our packet of stuff, and I have a comment 21 and a change on it. Several years ago, we -- because of 22 where New Year's Eve fell, we started giving two days for New 23 Year's Eve, and that has carried on. It kind of made sense 24 this year, and it's kind of making less -- doesn't make sense 25 to me -- 8-29-11 bwk 100 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: For next year. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- next year, because New 3 Year's Day is on a Sunday, and I think the standard day to 4 give off would be that Monday. We've had -- which I have no 5 problem with, but I don't think we need to give December 30th 6 off. Especially, that causes problem for the Tax Assessor, 7 being the last day of the year. So, I think we need to 8 delete the New Year's Eve day holiday, which is not on New 9 Year's Eve day; it's on December 30th. And I don't recall if 10 we added a holiday just overall when we did that. It seems 11 to me that we used to be at 12, and now we're at 13. 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think there was one added. 13 But my suggestion would be to add -- add Monday after Easter, 14 and take that day off if you wanted to have another option, 15 because a lot of people travel over the Easter -- they'd have 16 Good Friday and Monday, rather than taking New Year's Eve 17 off, which doesn't make any sense to me at all. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And the -- or it can go -- you 19 know, I just don't think it makes sense to put it in on New 20 Year's Day. There's a lot of holidays right there. It's a 21 bad day for the Tax Assessor. I think we ought to either 22 delete it or move it. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: I feel likewise. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's the way I feel. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I agree. 8-29-11 bwk 101 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. What about the issue of the 2 Monday following Easter? 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'd kind of -- I mean, kind of 4 what we're looking -- I know that it helps a lot of the 5 employees if we do it when the schools have holidays, which 6 are standard on Mondays. I'm not sure; I haven't looked at 7 the K.I.S.D., so maybe Dawn could look at the local schools; 8 Comfort, K.I.S.D. -- Comfort first. And -- (Laughter.) 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Always, of course. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Anyway, and look maybe if 11 there's a good date that fits there from a -- a federal 12 holiday that goes with a school holiday. It seems to me that 13 the schools are getting further and further away from any of 14 the holidays that are, -- 15 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Right. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- in my mind, normal. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So I'm not sure it's going to 19 help, but you might look at where -- a recommendation of what 20 to do. I don't have a big problem -- 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I would agree with that. 22 It's just a thought that I had, because there are -- there is 23 probably more travel during the Easter weekend than there is 24 over -- over New Year's. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 8-29-11 bwk 102 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: So, anyway, that's just a 2 thought I had. It doesn't mean it has to be that way. 3 MS. BOLIN: Also, March 2nd is for Texas 4 Independence Day. When we saw that, we went ahead and 5 checked with Secretary of State. That is the last day of 6 early voting for the presidential primary, so we have to be 7 open. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Every year. 9 MS. BOLIN: Sorry. It just falls at the wrong 10 time. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How about San Jacinto Day? 12 JUDGE TINLEY: What are they doing in Comfort? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, they used to have off the 14 opening of deer season. (Laughter.) 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I can tell you in April, 16 there's going to be -- the Hunt sesquicentennial's going to 17 be going on. We might want to take a day off for that. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Whatever. Have to get 19 permission from the City to do it. 20 MS. BOLIN: And for the New Year's Eve day, we 21 could always take Columbus Day, like we used to, since 22 everything else is closed. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Is that a bank holiday? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes, Columbus Day will be. That's 25 normally -- 8-29-11 bwk 103 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That would coincide, except 2 it doesn't have anything to do with schools. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: They used to be off, but they 4 don't any more. They don't care about any of that stuff any 5 more. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They didn't even know that 7 Columbus existed. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Doesn't make that much 9 difference where it goes. I just don't think it fits on that 10 day. And if December -- or March 2nd is not a good date, 11 I'll defer to Commissioner of Precinct 1 for alternatives for 12 that one. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. He's the -- 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Can we just take another day 15 off and call it Texas Independence? I like the words "Texas 16 Independence." There's meaning there. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Don't you wish there was 18 another one to celebrate that hasn't happened yet? 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. So, Ms. Lantz is going to 21 check the school schedule down in Comfort, right? 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 24 MS. LANTZ: I think I already have it. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Opening day of Little League 8-29-11 bwk 104 1 or something. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: March 2nd is a Friday. We 3 could do Monday, March 5th, and call it Texas Independence 4 Day. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. That's what I want to 6 do. 7 MS. BOLIN: Sorry, that's the day that everybody 8 comes in and picks up their stuff so they'll be ready for 9 Tuesday election day. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Buster, I tried. (Laughter.) 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I appreciate it. When -- 12 when did business interfere with a good party? That's what I 13 don't get. It's been going on for two or three years now. 14 We'll talk about it more. Let me -- let me put my little 15 thinking hat on. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Are you done, Commissioner? 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes, sir. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'm not. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: All right. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You know, we have -- we have 23 some department heads that have quite a bit of 24 responsibility, and I'm just kind of looking now, and I'm not 25 going to pick on anybody in particular. I'm just going to -- 8-29-11 bwk 105 1 I'd like to see some parity with Maintenance and 2 Environmental Health, and also Animal Control, and the 3 salaries of those people. Every -- now, Tim does have a lot 4 more responsibility, more buildings and more things to do. 5 But, you know, we've been operating one short in Animal 6 Control, and there's been a lot of weekends and stuff when 7 they're working, doing animal control county-wide, and called 8 out all times of the day and night for various things, and I 9 believe that responsibility is at least equal to the 10 Maintenance Supervisor. Plus that person has been here 11 longer. So, I don't care how we adjust that or where we wind 12 up, but I think those two ought to be somewhat equal, and I 13 throw Environmental Health in the mix too, because of the 14 things that they've started doing with code enforcement and 15 some of these things that haven't been done in maybe forever; 16 a lot more time being spent on those things. So, I just 17 thought I'd like to see -- I'd like to see us equalize 18 somewhat those three positions, whatever that number winds up 19 being. I don't believe that one really has much less 20 responsibility than the other one. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You're talking about just 22 department heads, not talking about the worker bees? 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'm talking about department 24 heads. I'm talking about the managers of those departments. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Mm-hmm. 8-29-11 bwk 106 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think you have to look at 2 responsibilities, the number of employees and budgets and 3 things like that as well. I mean, I don't -- you know, 4 there's -- I mean, they're different. It's very hard. Just 5 trying to equalize, I'm not sure it makes sense. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, you know, let's just 7 put it -- let's put it into -- if you don't want to do 8 responsibilities as far as the workload and number of 9 employees, what about the liability of -- of rabies cases and 10 bite cases and things like that that have to be handled 11 immediately? And, you know, they can't very well go home for 12 the weekend and sit there and wait till Monday morning. A 13 lot of times they get called out late in the night, early, 14 you know, Saturday mornings, Sunday mornings, and an exempt 15 employee. And I know that Tim has times when he has to go 16 and do some things that he wasn't expecting to do on 17 weekends. But, you know, there's a lot of -- there's a lot 18 of responsibility that goes with human -- public health and 19 safety. And in one -- and I don't know; I feel like that -- 20 I mean, I believe she's been here 15 years, if I'm not 21 mistaken, and been manager now for what, about seven? 22 MS. WHITT: Six. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Six. I was close. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The -- I mean, I don't -- maybe 25 I didn't -- I just did it real quick, looking around. 8-29-11 bwk 107 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: This is the difference that's 2 proposed right there. If we go with what's proposed, that's 3 what the difference would be. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: See, I don't think that that 5 variance is huge. I mean, it's $5,000, but it's also a fair 6 -- I mean, there's a number of employees you supervise. And 7 I understand that in Animal Control, there's -- I mean, 8 there's responsibilities in all of them. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, all of them have the 10 same responsibilities -- I mean, not the same, but they all 11 have fairly large responsibilities, and -- 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Bruce, do you have those 13 numbers right in front of you? 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. The number that's 15 proposed in this year's budget for -- I don't have -- 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Just tell me the salaries. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: 51,5 for Maintenance, and 18 46,112 for Animal Control. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And Environmental Health is 20 about 50? 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Right at 50, -- 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- okay, for that one. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Almost 51. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, that -- see, there's 8-29-11 bwk 108 1 your -- 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So if we took 500 away from 3 Maintenance, and then put everybody else at 51? 4 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll support that at 51. I 5 think that -- 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think you have -- wait. But 7 on the Maintenance, no, you have to look back at what we were 8 paying before. 9 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, the Maintenance 11 Supervisor was paid, you know a lot more than Tim's making 12 now. It was basically the same job, and the -- you know, and 13 we started low because of the experience factor, and that was 14 what, five years ago? I don't know how long. Six years ago? 15 Six years ago, we brought him on and we told him at the time, 16 you know, we would adjust it. So, I mean, I don't -- I just 17 don't know that -- 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I don't mind -- 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Jonathan, if you actually 20 remember, the jail used to have their own, and then 21 Maintenance absorbed it too. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. I mean, I just think 23 there's a -- you know, it's a pretty good size department. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It is. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And the others are smaller, but 8-29-11 bwk 109 1 they have a lot -- 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They have a smaller number of 3 employees, but they -- 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: They're very important, both of 5 them. And I don't know how you balance all that. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, I think that one way to 7 balance it -- I mean, this is a big increase. Of course, Tim 8 hasn't had an increase in a while, and I understand that. 9 But I also understand that -- you know, we talked about the 10 chief deputy there a while ago, you know, getting these 11 things, and we don't have those sort of things, I don't 12 believe, for our department heads or appointed officials that 13 we do for the others, do we? 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, but I don't think that 15 they're -- I mean, their number-two people in those 16 departments aren't making -- in the situation where they're 17 making more -- more than the manager is. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Mm-hmm. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's a different -- I mean -- 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's a different situation. 22 'Cause Rusty -- or Clay makes as much money, but that's a 23 little bit different situation with that. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, I just see that those 25 departments -- I mean, you're looking at some pretty loyal 8-29-11 bwk 110 1 folks there, and you're seeing some things get done that have 2 not been done in the past. And, you know, with having -- you 3 know, having had the City now for several years, that has not 4 made it easier, and some of that needs to be addressed too. 5 But it's just one of those things. I'm just taking up for a 6 person, I think, that has it coming, just as much so, if not 7 more so, than -- than Maintenance. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Maybe we can take a separate 9 vote on that. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's fine. I just think we 11 need to get them -- you know, whatever we can do to -- to 12 somewhat get a little bit of parity there. I just think that 13 $5,000 spread's a little bit too large. I'll be quiet on 14 that. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Got anything else? 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, the only other thing I 17 would mention is, I think we need to look at the impact on 18 the overall budget of what the difference in the amount of 19 money we would need to fund 4 percent, as opposed to 6.5. I 20 believe that's about 100,000 per percent, if I'm -- somewhere 21 in the ballpark. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, we can sure look at that. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: See where we come out on this 24 thing, and see, you know, whether we can get to where we 25 balance it between everybody gets something; employees get 8-29-11 bwk 111 1 something, the taxpayers don't get it quite as badly, and 2 we're able to fund the City without putting it on the backs 3 of our employees. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I think anything you take from 5 the employees is going to go to the City, is kind of the way 6 I'm looking at it. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, it can go into 8 reserves. It's just a matter of how high you want to go on 9 the tax increase, and what exactly it's going to go for, the 10 way I see it. And I think I said it the other day in maybe a 11 different way, but what has basically happened, in my humble 12 opinion, is that we have asked our department heads and 13 elected officials to -- to decrease their expenditures and 14 hold the line on employees, and from that savings that they 15 have done what we asked, we would be able to give some 16 increases to those that are left. I don't want to see any of 17 that savings that we're doing go to pay the City. That needs 18 to stay with our employees, because that's -- and the 19 management, and then do the best we can with the rest of it. 20 I know that we don't have to go up; I just want to make sure 21 we can totally justify it, 'cause it's the City that's caused 22 this to happen. And we told you it was going to happen, and 23 so we need to make sure that the funding -- increase in taxes 24 is going to do just what we said it was going to do when it 25 happens. 8-29-11 bwk 112 1 JUDGE TINLEY: If I'm hearing you correctly, 2 Commissioner, you're saying that we shouldn't ever consider 3 an increase in the tax rate to benefit our employees, and I 4 disagree with that. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well -- 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Their costs have gone up. Actually, 7 what I've proposed is -- particularly when you stop and 8 consider the fact that going into this year's budget from 9 last year, on average, they lost approximately 9 percent of 10 their real wages to offset the hickey that they took on the 11 health care plan. 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Mm-hmm. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Because they went from a $400 14 deductible to a $3,000 deductible, and -- and a $24,000 -- 15 2,400 is 10 percent on a higher employee. It's less on a 16 mid-level employee; it's about 9 percent. So, when you add 17 that to the C.P.I. increase from -- from the last one that 18 occurred, and it's now running 8.73 from the last numbers I 19 saw, they're not even staying up with C.P.I. And, to me, 20 that says that we're continuing to budget -- or at least 21 balance a part of our budget on the backs of the employees, 22 and I just think that's dead wrong. Our operation here is 23 only as good as these employees are. It can't be any better 24 than that, because we're a service organization. And -- and 25 we've experienced situations where they were continually kept 8-29-11 bwk 113 1 below parity of -- of employees in other local government 2 positions, similarly situated, and what we saw was a bunch of 3 turnover. And when you factor in the cost of what that 4 turnover costs you, the administrative setup of a new 5 employee, the training, the experience, I think it's just 6 being penny wise and pound foolish. So, actually, I think 7 what the employees are entitled to is significantly more than 8 the 6 and a half that I've put in there, because of the 9 reasons I've mentioned. I've -- I've put in the 6 and a half 10 in order to be conservative and try and demonstrate to the 11 taxpayers that -- that we're going to accurately compensate 12 our people, but we're going to share the pain. They're 13 entitled to more, and -- but we're going to keep it at 6 and 14 a half. That's my rationale. It wasn't because that's all 15 that I thought they were entitled to. I think -- 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I don't disagree with what 17 you're saying at all. It's just a matter of -- a matter of 18 where we are in time and the economy that we're in. And, 19 yes, you know, it's unfortunate that we have to be -- to be 20 paying, you know, all this extra money for nothing -- mostly 21 nothing, in my opinion. It's not better service than what we 22 had, and we're paying an unfair share, but that's what we 23 agreed to -- what the majority agreed to, so we have to fund 24 it. I just think that -- you know, I know this has a bad -- 25 and it sounds different coming from me, but I'm looking at a 8-29-11 bwk 114 1 more balanced approach to do something every year over a 2 period of time, and not try to do such a large amount. I 3 know sometimes you have to do a large amount in order to kind 4 of get the boost to get toward equal. It's just hard to do 5 at this particular time. And I've kind of come a long way 6 just to agree to do something. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, I understand. You know, it's 8 the -- you know, when a taxpayer or citizen says, "Well, 9 this, is not a good time for a tax increase," -- 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Never is. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: -- and you ask them -- say, "Well, 12 tell me when there is a good time for that," and their 13 response is, "Well, I don't know, but not now." Which is the 14 same answer we'll get if the economy's burning through the 15 stratosphere. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Mm-hmm. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: You'll get that same answer. And -- 18 and because of that, there's a tendency to -- to be concerned 19 about one's own longevity and to attempt to do so at the 20 expense of the employees. I think that -- I think that's 21 wrong. And I just -- you know, if it's right, it's right. 22 If it's not, it's not. And it's plain, pure, and simple. As 23 I've told the local newspapers, I don't like to advocate for 24 a tax increase, but I think if the need's there, and it's 25 due, that's what you got to do. 8-29-11 bwk 115 1 MS. BOLIN: Mm-hmm. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: And -- 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We don't have a choice about 4 that, in my opinion. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's -- I mean, we would 7 have a choice if we want to take and -- and deny any kind of 8 increases for anybody for any reason. And that would be 9 balancing the budget off the back of the employees. But if 10 we -- if we give what -- what we can from the savings, I'm 11 more than willing to go along with that, and then worry about 12 it next year, and hopefully be able to do a little more. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, this talking about next year, 14 you always hear, you know, "We'll get them next year." Well, 15 that doesn't pay this year's grocery bills or this year's 16 utility bills. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It will help. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: This year's gasoline bills. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It will help. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, it seems to me that we've 21 made some changes today -- while they're not huge, we've 22 probably cut, I'm guessing, 100,000 out of the budget today, 23 or something like that. And the Judge made it clear to me at 24 the last meeting that he was going to file the budget, which 25 he could, that he wants to file, and I suspect he's going to 8-29-11 bwk 116 1 do that. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I think a lot of this 4 conversation, really, I mean, is -- you know, we'll probably 5 have it again. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Mm-hmm. 7 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Jeannie, we increased our 8 volunteer fire departments from 15 to 27. Is that in the 9 budget? 10 MS. HARGIS: From -- 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Volunteer. We were going to 12 look at doing $100,000. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 14 MS. HARGIS: Yes, we did. 15 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: What page is that on? 16 MS. MABRY: Let me get to it. 17 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I saw it earlier. I just 18 want to go back and look at it. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: We increased those in-county from 15 20 to 27, and the two that assist from two to four. 21 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 22 MS. MABRY: Page 89. 23 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: 89? Okay, thank you. 24 MS. HARGIS: They're all getting -- instead of 25 15,000, they're getting 27. And then two small ones are 8-29-11 bwk 117 1 getting four, so we spread that out based on their ratio. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: They've been at 15 for how 3 long, again? 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, they got two more -- I 5 believe -- was it last year or year before they were at 13 6 for a long time? 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It was at 15 -- 8 MS. HARGIS: It's been 15 since I've been here. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 2007, it was 15. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Before that, they were -- 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: They'd been -- 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They'd been at 15 for a 13 while. I know at one time, they were at 13, seems like, for 14 a long time. Of course, that was a long time ago. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But -- 16 JUDGE TINLEY: You know, I think -- I think that 17 number right there is a direct effect of the increase that we 18 were required to pay for our city fire contract. And while 19 that's something that we're doing on our own that wasn't 20 required by that, I think that that's a direct result of -- 21 of that action on the city fire contract. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I agree. I just -- I feel 23 strongly about that one. I'm willing to -- I'm willing to 24 take the hit for it. If somebody wants to hit me for it, 25 well, go ahead. 8-29-11 bwk 118 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, yeah, that's -- 2 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You know. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: I got no apologies for that, 4 Commissioner. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: None whatsoever. And I don't 6 have any apology for raising the employees up, you know, to a 7 certain amount. I'm not sure I can go the whole thing, but 8 it's -- however the Court winds up voting in the end is what 9 matters. 10 MS. HARGIS: Here's retirement. 11 MS. LANTZ: Judge, I got those calculations. 12 That's what Jeannie is handing out. 13 MS. HARGIS: This is the retirement calculations 14 that you requested. Everybody gets a copy. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Let me have it. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You can't have all that. Oh, 17 I'm sorry; I thought that was just one. No, you can't look. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you. 20 MS. HARGIS: To bring it down 1 percent, or to 21 bring it down to 2.2, it's .43 percent. And based on our 22 salaries, I'm going to give you an estimate, because there's 23 a range there between 80,000 and 84,000. The actual rate for 24 the retirement is the -- as you can see, is really not that 25 high. It's that unfunded liability that -- that is a killer, 8-29-11 bwk 119 1 which is the 3.32 and the 3.21. And you really want that 2 fund to be in the 90 percentile. You don't have to have it 3 at 95 percent, but it would be nice to have it between 91 and 4 92 percent. So, I hope that answered that question. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Thank you. Appreciate it. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Mm-hmm. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Anything else on the -- on the 8 budget issues? Okay. We will -- we'll adjourn the workshop 9 at this time. 10 (Budget workshop adjourned at 11:50 a.m.) 11 - - - - - - - - - - 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 8-29-11 bwk 120 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 2nd day of September, 8 2011. 9 10 JANNETT PIEPER, Kerr County Clerk 11 BY: _________________________________ Kathy Banik, Deputy County Clerk 12 Certified Shorthand Reporter 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 8-29-11 bwk