1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT 9 Special Session 10 Tuesday, February 7, 2012 11 10:00 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 February 7, 2012 2 PAGE 3 1.1 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action regarding all aspects of demolition, bidding 4 and construction of new show barn at Hill Country Youth Exhibit Center 4 5 1.2 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action 6 regarding contract with Peter Lewis for renovations at Hill Country Youth Exhibit 7 Center 9 8 1.3 Consider/discuss, take appropriate action regarding plans presented by Wayne Gondeck 9 for possible expansion of Kerr County jail facility 9 10 1.4 Consider/discuss and take appropriate action 11 to approve order authorizing publication of notice of intention to issue certificates of 12 obligation to finance acquisition of equipment and construction or improvement of facilities 13 in the county 74 14 --- Adjourned 87 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 3 1 On Tuesday, February 7, 2012, at 10:00 a.m., a special 2 meeting of the Kerr County Commissioners Court was held in 3 the Commissioners' Courtroom, Kerr County Courthouse, 4 Kerrville, Texas, and the following proceedings were had in 5 open court: 6 P R O C E E D I N G S 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, let me call to order this 8 special meeting of the Kerr County Commissioners Court posted 9 and scheduled for this date and time, Tuesday, February 7th, 10 2012, at 10 a.m. It is that time now. The agenda for the 11 meeting has a visitors' input portion of it, so at this time, 12 if there's any member of the public or audience that wishes 13 to be heard on a matter which is not listed as an agenda 14 item, this is your opportunity to come forward and tell us 15 what's on your mind. If you wish to be heard on an agenda 16 item, we'd ask that you fill out a participation form. 17 Should be some located at the rear of the room. But right 18 now, if there's any member of the audience or public that 19 wishes to be heard on a matter which is not a listed agenda 20 item, come forward at this time. Seeing no one coming 21 forward, we'll move on. Commissioner Baldwin, do you have 22 anything for us this morning? 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, sir. Thank you. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Overby? 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Not today. 2-7-12 4 1 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Letz? 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, sir. 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Commissioner Oehler? Okay. Well, 5 let's get on with our agenda, then. First item on the agenda 6 is to consider, discuss, take appropriate action regarding 7 all aspects of demolition, bidding, and construction of the 8 new show barn at the Hill Country Youth Exhibit Center. 9 Commissioner Oehler? 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, we're to the point I 11 think we need to make some decisions about how we're going to 12 progress with this project, and it seemed that the first 13 thing that needs to be done is to get the demolition done. I 14 think we need to authorize going out for bids on the 15 demolition part of it. However, prior to that, we need to 16 have an environmental assessment done of that facility before 17 we start demolition to see if there's any asbestos or any 18 hazardous materials in there, and I think Peter Lewis said he 19 could take care of that, get somebody to go do that 20 assessment for us. And I think that's the first order of 21 business. And then once we get that done, I think we need to 22 also -- Peter Lewis, I believe, is going to come to us on 23 Monday with a proposal of what he will charge us to do some 24 of the design, development of the plumbing and the 25 electrical, the things that need to be done to get started to 2-7-12 5 1 get a real set of -- kind of a biddable plan that we can put 2 out for bid, or we can do maybe an alternate type of a bid 3 process. I think we'll talk more about that on Monday. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Let me add on that part, I 5 mean, Bruce and I met -- on the part about Peter Lewis, Bruce 6 and I met with Peter yesterday, and in talking with him, our 7 thought is to go with a flat-rate agreement with Peter Lewis, 8 'cause we really need to get started, and we really don't 9 know where we're going completely, somewhat, and we just made 10 some changes. It's not an overly complex project. I mean, 11 it's -- basically, it's a metal building, a big concrete 12 slab, plumbing and electrical. I mean, you know, it's not -- 13 there's really no finish out or all that kind of stuff. But 14 we're still, you know, looking at budget numbers and things 15 like that, and we need to get -- in our mind, anyway, we need 16 to get Peter on board under a contract so that we can start 17 moving. And what the other part of it -- I think Peter's 18 going to have that on Monday's agenda, 'cause he needs to 19 look with his engineering staff and people and figure out 20 exactly what that's going to get there. That's why we're not 21 making a decision on that today. 22 And then the other part that will be on Monday's 23 agenda also is to go into some discussion about the process 24 for the construction, whether we want to hire a general 25 contractor or whether we want to go with another process, 2-7-12 6 1 probably the construction manager at risk, something like 2 that. There's pros and cons to both. And I gave the County 3 Attorney a document today that the former County Attorney 4 prepared for me several years ago about a construction 5 manager at risk process, and I didn't want to hit him 6 blindsided, so we're not going to go into much detail other 7 than what we've said today. I think we'll have a good 8 discussion, get his feeling and input on Monday about those 9 two processes, or if there's another process that we can use 10 for the construction. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: You didn't want to blindside him, so 12 you gave it to him 15 minutes ago, right? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Maybe 10. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: But I think we'll probably 16 have this for formal action on Monday, 'cause we need to get 17 moving on this thing, and the best way to move it is to get 18 that environmental assessment done. And also, once that's 19 done, to authorize for bid for demolition. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: And you're anticipating that there 21 can be some -- maybe Mr. Lewis can bring some firm numbers on 22 the environmental assessment portion, and also a proposal as 23 to how he's going to move forward? 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Right. That's kind of what 25 we talked about. 2-7-12 7 1 JUDGE TINLEY: There's a lot of attribution to you, 2 Mr. Lewis. Is that all a clear understanding that -- that 3 you have and you're going to bring to us on Monday? 4 MR. LEWIS: It is indeed. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Good enough. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: On the environmental 7 assessment, are you comfortable with a not-to-exceed amount 8 to maybe put it out and start hiring those people? 9 MR. LEWIS: Well, no. I mean, I just I need to 10 make a recommendation. There are a couple firms that we work 11 with out of San Antonio that do that. If there's any -- if 12 there are any environmental issues found, I mean, I haven't 13 -- I have no sense of what they might be or what the scope of 14 those is. As we discussed, we think they're -- they're 15 limited in possibility, but it's really up to -- to those 16 testing services those engineering services to determine 17 that. So -- and I can get an idea of what they might charge 18 to come up and do that assessment, which is the first piece 19 of it. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think that's a good idea. 21 And the quicker we have that, the better we can prepare to 22 move forward on this deal. Of course, that's -- you kind of 23 have to do it in order. That's the first thing, is the 24 assessment, and then the demolition comes after that. And 25 then soil study comes after that in order to be able to 2-7-12 8 1 proceed with specs and engineering for the slab and 2 everything for the building we're proposing. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Actually, the first thing is 4 hiring him. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That would probably be the 6 wise thing to do. And I don't think he's going to work for 7 free, although I think he probably should, you know, part of 8 the time. But that's just my feeling; he probably doesn't 9 share that. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Commitment to the community 11 and things like that? 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. That's -- you know, 13 you have to factor those things in. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: The love for the kids. It's 15 all about the kids. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's right. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, there may be some things that 18 y'all are not totally aware of that maybe he's doing some of 19 that at the present time, and has been in the immediate past. 20 So, -- 21 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: We appreciate -- 22 JUDGE TINLEY: -- we appreciate that. 23 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Very much. Thank you. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Thank you, Mr. Lewis. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Anything else on that item? 2-7-12 9 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's all I have today. 2 Thank you. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Let's go to Item 2 on the 4 agenda; to consider, discuss, take appropriate action 5 regarding a contract with Mr. Lewis for the renovations at 6 the Hill Country Youth Exhibit Center. I believe we pretty 7 well thrashed that one. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's going to be on 9 Monday's agenda. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Item 3, to consider, discuss, 11 take appropriate action regarding plans completed by Wayne 12 Gondeck for possible expansion of the Hill Country Jail 13 facility. Mr. Gondeck? 14 MR. GONDECK: Good morning, Judge, Commissioners. 15 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Morning. 16 MR. GONDECK: I have some handouts here this 17 morning that will go along with the presentation that we 18 have. Now, I would ask you one thing; that if we could not 19 browse through the handout while we're discussing this, 20 'cause you may get into some things and wonder what in the 21 heck we're talking about or looking at there without an 22 explanation, and it may get us off track. But, anyway, 23 that's one reason why I kind of hesitate to hand out the 24 booklet ahead of -- of the presentation sometimes. 25 We were asked to -- to do an assessment or an 2-7-12 10 1 evaluation following the Jail Commission's facility needs 2 analysis for Kerr County. In doing that, we looked at 3 several things that we thought were pertinent for coming up 4 with the needs for the county. One of those is the previous 5 needs analysis for the Jail Commission, done both in 2005 and 6 2011. In that, of course, I already got a little bit 7 ridiculed at "analyses" on the sheet and the screen is with 8 an "e." But my wife's a teacher, and told me that, plural, 9 analyses is with an "e," and one analysis is with an "i," so 10 I had to go with that, 'cause she's in charge of some things. 11 We did look at the -- the jail population trends from 2005 to 12 2011, and then we looked at the Jail Commission's 13 classification requirements, how they affect your jail. We 14 looked at the existing facilities. Then we stepped back and 15 took a look at what is the State doing, and their policies 16 over the last several sessions, and how does that affect 17 county jails in general, and may be affecting both Kerr 18 County and the jail population around the state, not only 19 now, but in the future here. And then we went to identify 20 the current needs, come up with some recommended options, and 21 put some costs to that. 22 Just so that we can keep an idea of what we're 23 talking about here, I want to go ahead and put up a board 24 here also of the jail in case anything does come up, a 25 question. This is just an outline format of the existing 2-7-12 11 1 jail, law enforcement center, courts area, Sheriff's law 2 enforcement area. This is the intake and processing, female 3 area over here, male housing. This is where the exercise 4 area is down here. This is a little map I'd shown y'all 5 before about some options on what to do with female housing. 6 So, just so -- in case we have any questions, this is sort of 7 the map or plan that we're looking at there of the building. 8 First off, on the Jail Commission, they look at a 9 pretty generic approach to facility needs assessment. In 10 19 -- in 2005, they looked at your population projections and 11 they looked at your average daily population and came up with 12 a needs assessment of 288 beds by the year 2025. Now, this 13 is based on an annual -- or based on an incarceration rate of 14 2.97. Well, what they do is they go back over the most 15 previous year, typically. Sometimes they'll go back two 16 years, but at least to the most previous year, and find out 17 what is your actual incarceration rate over that last 18 previous year? Most of the time, they look at that rate 19 based on their population reports that they get on the 1st of 20 the month, which is just a snapshot of once a month. So, 21 many times, that -- if that's a high point of the month, it 22 may be a high number. If it's a low point of the month, it 23 may be a low number. 24 So, they average that over the year to see about 25 where you're at. In 2005, it was 2.97 per 1,000 population. 2-7-12 12 1 You know, and they projected that -- a 65,000 general 2 population for the year 2025. Now, they base all of their 3 data or all their projections on the Texas State Data Center 4 projections, so that's just one thing to keep in mind. If 5 their projections go up, they project it up. If it goes 6 down, they -- they go down with that. In 2011, they revised 7 those projections in two -- basically, they gave you two 8 options, and they based it on two scenarios of migration 9 under the Texas State Data Center's projections. One of 10 those was around a 50,000 population for 2030, and one was a 11 60,000 population for 2030. They also reduced that down to a 12 2.84 incarceration rate, which reduced it a little bit. So, 13 what they said is that you either need 192 beds or 240 beds 14 by the year 2030. 15 So, as you start out in this whole needs 16 assessment, needs analysis, I understand the frustration of 17 the Court. Everybody's sitting there scratching their heads. 18 Okay, we have the people in Austin that are supposed to know 19 where we're going, what we're doing, telling us that we need 20 288 beds, and then, you know, a few years later, they turn 21 around and tell us that, well, maybe not. Maybe we need what 22 we have today, or maybe we need a little bit more. And the 23 answer is -- is that there has been a tremendous of 24 fluctuation in anomaly of jail population over the last three 25 to four years, probably getting onto five years now, and it 2-7-12 13 1 not only has affected the jail population, but it's been 2 driven a little bit by the state prison population. We'll 3 get into a little bit of those reasons for that a little bit 4 later on in the presentation. 5 What we did was sort of back off of this generic 6 look at projecting your needs based on just the rule of 7 thumb, number of inmates per 1,000 population and projecting 8 that on the future there. If you didn't have a jail at all 9 out there today, we could all sit here and probably agree 10 that you need 192 to 240 beds. I think everybody could 11 probably agree on that. But that does not help you in your 12 situation. You have 192 beds out there. Your Sheriff is 13 saying we have some serious management issues with being able 14 to maintain compliance with the Commission on Jail Standards 15 with the current population that we have in the facility that 16 we have. So, those are the -- the issues that we really need 17 to focus on, is how do we take your current facility, analyze 18 that, and see what your real needs are? 19 What we did -- and we didn't just take a -- a 20 marker and wiggle a line cross a bunch of charts here. But 21 after you look through these several years, it will look very 22 much like we just wiggled a bunch of lines back and forth; 23 that we went into the emergency room and got a heart rate 24 charted out here. Fortunately, we didn't flatline along the 25 way. But many times, in looking at the jail projects, jail 2-7-12 14 1 population and everything, we're always looking at 2 straight-line projections. We'll look at the first year to 3 the end of the year, or multiple years, and all those lines 4 look very clean as far as, you know, we're going from Point A 5 to Point B, or we've had such-and-such growth. What I wanted 6 to do is that we actually did -- for 2005 to 2011, we 7 actually did take the daily census count in the jail and plot 8 every day for those years. So, this is what this represents, 9 so that you can really get an idea of the up and down and 10 the -- the trends on an ongoing basis over these several 11 years of what was really happening in the jail. And -- 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Wayne, quick question. 13 MR. GONDECK: Yes, sir. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just curiosity. The Sheriff 15 may know. What caused that spike at about the 260th day? 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: A lot of bad females. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But it's in the main 18 population; it's male and female. 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah. 20 MR. GONDECK: There is obviously -- and I went back 21 to check the data on that one, 'cause there was a couple 22 places when we first charted these out that you had some 23 major spikes, and there were some typos. I had to go back 24 and correct them. On this one here, I think if the Sheriff 25 went back and checked, that may have been one of your 2-7-12 15 1 round-up times, of a warrant round-up or something, because 2 there was about 30 intakes in a certain day there. 'Cause 3 between 20 and 30 intakes, that jumped up, that number, for a 4 day or two. So either the courts did something on that day, 5 or -- 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I hate to say it; one thing 7 that happens -- and Judge Tinley can probably attest to this. 8 If y'all remember, there was a time period there where I 9 really got kind of upset with the courts and had meetings 10 with the judges, and I had meetings with Judge Tinley. And 11 all of a sudden, for a little bit, the courts started meeting 12 more, doing more, and population -- we haven't done any 13 round-ups, okay? There was nothing other than a lot of it 14 came out publicly during that time, and some things started 15 moving, but population went up when we did it. 16 MR. GONDECK: There was actually just a two- or 17 three-day spike. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Peak. 19 MR. GONDECK: Peak. That was a significant number 20 of intakes. When you look at your daily intakes and 21 releases, you're looking at an average of eight or nine 22 intakes on a daily basis, total. That -- on those days, it 23 did go up drastically; I think about 20, 25 people all on one 24 day. And so that can take you from 140 to 160 all of a 25 sudden, and then if you don't release right away, if you're 2-7-12 16 1 not releasing a whole bunch that next day, then it will stay 2 there. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And that's about the same 4 time, if I'm -- my recollection is right, that the state jail 5 facilities told us they were full and we weren't able to 6 transport some, too. 7 MR. GONDECK: That is really the -- in 2005 was the 8 biggest peak. And I'll run through these. You can see, 2006 9 dropped down a little bit more there. 2007 was a little bit 10 volatile, and some peaks and valleys there. 2008 was all 11 over the -- the chart and had some very high numbers there, 12 especially right up and going into the second quarter there 13 of the year. And then we had a big dip in 2009, coming back 14 in 2010, leveled off a little bit more. And in 2011, we had 15 more of an up -- up-tick in the female population. Notice 16 that the males in this one, from around September or 17 whatever, that the -- the female population went up on this 18 one. So, as you can see with all these -- and I'll go back 19 to the -- these are the averages here. There was some slight 20 variations from year to year. This helps smooth everything 21 out. You don't see, when you go back to the averages, what 22 happens on a daily intake and out of the facility, and 23 everything looks a lot smoother. "Sheriff, why can't you 24 take care of these?" It looks nice and pretty. But I deal 25 with this a lot of times, where you look at the numbers, and 2-7-12 17 1 unless you get into the detail of the numbers, it doesn't 2 play out. 3 We also looked at the actual status of the inmates 4 as to how they report that to the Jail Commission on a 5 monthly basis, and this is just for 2011, charting this back 6 out. And I don't expect you to really get a lot out of this, 7 other than, basically, the -- the jail is holding who they 8 need to be holding as far as the males here. The top line is 9 the total. The second one is pretrial felons, which is what 10 the majority of county jails are intended to house, pretrial 11 felons. Pretrial misdemeanors, it drops down there, and then 12 convicted misdemeanors and pretrial state jail felonies are 13 the next one. But as you can see as you break down from the 14 pretrial felons that the remainder of those individuals that 15 are in there sort of move back and forth as to -- to who may 16 be in the majority or who may be the most on a time-to-time 17 basis. In other words, your jail population is fluid, and 18 that is one of the points I'm really trying to make. 19 On the female population -- this is not a 20 discriminatory message that I'm trying to make here, but your 21 female population in county jails tends to be a lot more 22 diverse. It's very difficult throughout the state to go 23 county by county and find as much of a trend in female 24 population in jails as you do in the male population, so when 25 you're looking at female population and trying to pick up 2-7-12 18 1 where your trends are there, as you can see, they're all over 2 the place. If you go down and look and take a section 3 vertically at any given time, the majority of your inmates, 4 as far as your status, whether they're pretrial felons or 5 pretrial state jail felons or misdemeanors or convicted, they 6 are going to be in different numbers and in different 7 categories at any given time, and that's what that -- this 8 represents. That's changing and that's moving. That's a 9 moving target at any given time. 10 I wanted to stop and discuss the Jail Commission 11 requirements, because it's something that we have to deal 12 with collectively here. Each person that comes in the jail 13 facility that is not going to be released immediately -- and 14 typically, that's in those, you know, 48 hours, or released 15 in that first 24- to 48-hour period -- that is going to be 16 placed in an inmate housing area in a cell has to be properly 17 classified before they are placed in that cell. They're 18 evaluated. The Sheriff happens to use a numerical system. 19 There's really two systems that the Jail Commission allows 20 counties to use. One's a numerical system; one's a decision 21 tree. They both basically get you to the same place as far 22 as your minimum, medium, and maximum security. 23 In looking at that, there's several areas that the 24 Jail Commission makes you go through; the current offense or 25 conviction, their offense history, their escape history, 2-7-12 19 1 their institutional or disciplinary behavior, history within 2 jails, prior convictions, alcohol and/or drug or substance 3 abuse and stability factors in the community, and are they -- 4 and sometimes, you know, also when they go through their 5 suicide screening, that sort of kicks them up a little bit 6 higher if they have a higher position in the community; that 7 that's sort of a red flag, if they've been brought in, that 8 they may end up on a suicide watch because of that. But once 9 they have gone through the -- that initial classification of 10 minimum, medium, and maximum, there's also some other 11 criteria that may flag them or place them in special housing 12 units. And the Sheriff is responsible also for the placement 13 release of those inmates to and from those -- the special 14 units, including protective custody, administration 15 segregation, disciplinary separation, mental and medical 16 separation. And also something that y'all may have discussed 17 here, may not have, as far as the care and custody of 18 pregnant inmates. That has now become more of an issue 19 because of some recent legislation and treatment of that. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Mr. Gondeck, we've got a recent 21 federal court decision requiring that inmates with mental 22 health issues be placed in an appropriate mental health 23 facility. That just came down the pike, what, a week or two 24 ago. Where do you see that carrying us? 25 MR. GONDECK: Judge, I don't have a crystal ball on 2-7-12 20 1 how that's going to play out, but that is one of the issues 2 that has been playing out, as you are well aware, for the 3 last 20 years or better as far as the appropriate mental 4 health facilities. And that -- when the State decides to 5 start closing some of the mental health facilities in the 6 state, that the jails did become more and more of the 7 depository for mental health individuals. Where that is 8 going, I think we will see more and more involvement of the 9 courts in this if the State does not take action on how that 10 is going to be dealt with. It's just -- that's just more of 11 a factual response to the realities of it. More and more 12 awareness has been placed out there publicly now with some of 13 the court rulings. I think if you ask any sheriff around the 14 state that has been dealing with this for a longer period of 15 time, you know, this was an issue that was becoming quite 16 prevalent back when I was at the agency, you know, back in 17 the early '90's. So -- and was one of the issues that was 18 being reviewed and discussed as to how to deal with mental 19 health inmates in jail facilities. It has not been resolved 20 in 20 years. I'm not sure that the court case is going to 21 resolve the issue, but it is going to put a mandate on the 22 sheriffs to do something. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: I think the federal judge gave them 24 10 days from the time of the filing of the writ opinion to 25 transition them out of there. 2-7-12 21 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And part of what I've seen 2 come from that is -- what we're talking about is mentally 3 incompetent people, okay? And I'll give you a prime example; 4 you know the one the double murder we had down in Comfort 5 area, all right? But part of the -- the, quote, solution 6 from the state hospital system is that they can't do it, so 7 they want to start doing it more like SAFP and those 8 community deals where you actually release that person and 9 wait for a state hospital bed, and then call them back in and 10 send them over to the state hospital, okay? So, reality is, 11 until something more comes out of the courts, there's no way 12 your sheriffs or anybody are going to release dangerous 13 people. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Rusty, how many -- do you 15 have any idea what percentage of mental health comes in, 16 numbers of your other -- all numbers of the jail population? 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, you've got a big 18 difference there. You've got incompetent mental health, and 19 you've got mental health patients, okay? I've probably got 20 40, 50 percent that are mental health patients too, okay? 21 But the incompetent mental health are, like us, the ones 22 waiting to go. I've had two or three that have been 23 declared -- 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What do you mean, "like us"? 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, like you, Buster. 2-7-12 22 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Like you. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And me, all of us doing this. 3 But that's what it amounts to. We did get to ship out two 4 last Friday, and -- but we still may have one or two in 5 there. 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Those went to where? 7 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Hmm? 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Those went into the state 9 system? 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah, state mental health 11 system, okay, where used to they'd go to Vernon or Rusk type 12 deal. Now they're even putting them in, like, Austin State 13 Hospital; they're putting them in Kerrville State Hospital, 14 if they've got an actual state hospital. Those are all the 15 forensics. 16 MR. GONDECK: And sometime -- at one point in time, 17 there was a major conflict as to whether or not the charges 18 were still pending or whether they had been dropped, as to 19 whether they could enter or not enter the state system. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes, because the state system 21 normally says there cannot be any charges pending on them 22 before they accept them. Well, how do you not have charges 23 pending on them, okay? That's what they are. So, they were 24 wanting them either released on personal bonds or dismiss the 25 charges. Then you have no way of doing -- it's just a -- 2-7-12 23 1 county jails are going to suffer with it all the way through. 2 That's -- you know, the reality is, it doesn't cost the state 3 anything to keep them in a county jail. I mean, you know, 4 when they're in a county jail -- it's the state M.H.M.R. 5 system that pays for the medications and everything else when 6 they're out on the street. And the state did this with -- or 7 the feds did it with the V.A. patients. Once they come to 8 the county jail, they cut off all those meds. Now your 9 county jail has to pay for it all. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Some of those are very, very 11 expensive. 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Some of those are, you know, 13 $1,000 a week on medication easily. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge, you used the words 15 "appropriate mental health facility." Is there a thing other 16 than M.H.M.R.? 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, you've got -- you've got some 18 V.A. facilities that can handle that, but essentially what 19 you've got in the state Department of State Health Services 20 now is you've got your hospitals broken down into forensic 21 or -- or civil, or some combination. You'll recall that our 22 local state hospital, for a number of years, up until 2005, 23 was -- we had primarily forensic patients, but we had, as I 24 recall, 43 -- 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Beds. 2-7-12 24 1 JUDGE TINLEY: -- civil commitment beds there, 2 where ordinary, law-abiding, taxpaying citizens could be 3 placed there. And because of the pressure, primarily up in 4 north Texas, of liability in the Dallas area of having to 5 unload some of those people, this hospital became all 6 forensic. That's what prompted the need for the Crisis 7 Stabilization Unit that we have to handle the civil acute -- 8 acute civil cases. And even now, what we see in the state 9 hospital, where you've got people that are there under court 10 order as being incompetent to stand trial, primarily -- some 11 of them, of course, are there because of being acquitted 12 because of the defense of insanity. But once they have been 13 there as incompetent to stand trial -- we're seeing more and 14 more of this -- for the specific period of time that they 15 would otherwise serve if convicted of the offense, then they 16 dismiss the charges against them to get them out of the 17 criminal justice system in whatever county they came from. 18 Once those -- once those charges are dismissed, 19 well, they can't hold them as a forensic patient, so they 20 file civil commitment proceedings against them, and we hold 21 hearings here, and then they're placed at another state 22 hospital facility that has civil commitment beds. Well, so 23 what you see happening is, the ones out of the criminal 24 justice system that are there under the Code of Criminal 25 Procedure initially are starting to occupy a lot of the 2-7-12 25 1 criminal -- of the civil commitment beds at the state 2 facilities, because the charges against them have become 3 dismissed, but it's just rolling them to another -- another 4 facility. So, the law-abiding, taxpaying citizens' ability 5 to receive mental health services for -- for serious needs, 6 other than outpatient, is becoming diminished more and more, 7 and the criminal justice system is effectively taking over, 8 directly or indirectly, the entire system. 9 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: We can only expect that 10 population to grow. I mean, you got -- 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Sure. 12 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: -- the problems with 13 personality trait disorders and bipolar and all these issues 14 that are not being treated today. And the state not taking 15 up those responsibilities, it's becoming more and more of the 16 county's responsibility. 17 MR. GONDECK: I would tell you that in working with 18 Bexar County, we just converted four of their -- well, what 19 were low-risk dormitories into mental health and special 20 housing areas. Had to upgrade the security levels, 21 obviously, on those. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: How many beds did that entail, 23 Wayne? 24 MR. GONDECK: That was right around 180 beds that 25 they increased their special housing area to. 2-7-12 26 1 JUDGE TINLEY: I guess the next question is, is 2 that going to -- is that going to pass muster with that 3 federal court order? 4 MR. GONDECK: I have -- that portion of it, Judge, 5 I do not know. I know that their health systems there are -- 6 are actually operated by the Bexar Mental -- 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Mental Health Authority? 8 MR. GONDECK: Mental Health Authority. And so it's 9 actually operated through the -- either the Metropolitan 10 Health District or University Hospitals, so -- I know each of 11 them have their own part to that that they operate within the 12 jail facility, so it's a little bit different than, you know, 13 what y'all have to deal with here. They're -- of course, you 14 know, they're dealing with a 4,500-capacity facility. 15 They're not dealing with a couple hundred beds here, so they 16 have a -- a little bit different arrangement. Plus, you 17 know, a few blocks away, they have a hospital there that 18 they -- they do have -- are contracting with as far as, you 19 know, a separate wing for those inmates that have to be in 20 the hospital. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: I apologize for getting you 22 sidetracked. 23 MR. GONDECK: These are issues that y'all, you 24 know, do need to discuss in this phase. Just one last thing, 25 that the Sheriff is required to designate each of the housing 2-7-12 27 1 areas according to their custody level and how they are used. 2 Now, those custody levels can be changed, but they do have to 3 be commensurate with the design of those cells. In other 4 words, the Sheriff can't go in and say -- if he had a minimum 5 construction area, he couldn't just go in and say, "That's my 6 high-risk area." You can always say a maximum security area 7 is a minimum-risk area, but you can't go in and say a minimum 8 security living unit is a high-risk area. But that does 9 become key when you start designating areas and where these 10 inmates do actually go. In looking at the inmates and how 11 they were classified in their medium, maximum, minimum -- 12 minimum, medium, maximum classifications over the last 13 several years, just taking a snapshot twice a year. And I 14 appreciate the Sheriff's staff actually going and doing these 15 counts, 'cause what they had to do was actually pull the 16 actual date and look at each inmate individually as to their 17 cell assignment to go back and get this information, 'cause 18 their computer system doesn't just spit out for you the 19 number of people. So, it was a manual count that they had to 20 go and do this on. 21 But in looking at this -- this is really not a 22 diagram of a fish, but it does show you that there has been 23 some -- some changes; that even though that maximum security 24 stays pretty steady, you know, through the middle of this, 25 the minimum security has sort of increased over the last 2-7-12 28 1 couple of years, and that the medium security has gone down a 2 little bit. Well, we're starting to see that coming to the 3 point of reconverging. Historically, we see that the medium 4 and minimum can sort of go up and down right now; that that 5 may not be always the areas -- it's not indicative of looking 6 at a trend here that we're going to be able to pick up. Say, 7 oh, you've got a bunch of minimums, you know, going up now. 8 It's more than likely you will have that come down, and that 9 will continue to be a -- a cyclical type of situation, and 10 that you will maintain pretty much a pretty constant maximum 11 security, and your medium and minimum may flip-flop over 12 time. 13 And I say that because, you know, the Sheriff was 14 talking earlier in the year or late last year about, you 15 know, minimum security -- housing minimum security, and we 16 want to go back and look and track, you know, how many 17 minimum security. And at the time, you know, that looked 18 like a good number, and from time to time that does look like 19 a good number. But on a consistent basis, we really need to 20 look at where does that number come from, and how do you 21 sustain that number, to be able to say that we have a 22 constant number of minimum security inmates. And, really -- 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: As far as classification is 24 concerned, you can house minimum and medium together; is that 25 correct? So, when you -- 2-7-12 29 1 MR. GONDECK: Correct. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: When you use the word 3 "minimum," you could be talking about medium as well? 4 MR. GONDECK: Correct. You can house medium and 5 maximum security together. You can house minimum and medium 6 security together. And, actually, the jail standards says 7 the only thing you can't do is house minimum and maximum 8 together. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The one thing that -- 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's pretty closed-minded, 11 isn't it? 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: One thing you have to really 13 look at, he may be in jail on a misdemeanor theft, and we'd 14 all say, "Well, that's minimum, and you can put him in with 15 all the minimums you want." But five years ago or 10 years 16 ago, he had an aggravated assault in his past. He's not 17 minimum any more, not today. He's changed now; he's bumped 18 up. In our family violence, the prior history really hits 19 you when you look at -- we got a whole bunch of minimum 20 DWI's, but their prior history jumps them up, and there's 21 nothing I can do about it. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I didn't think you could use 23 their past against them like that. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: When you put them in a cell, 25 you have to; you're required to. You're evaluating the 2-7-12 30 1 entire deal. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Past history and all that. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Or it could be -- what he's 4 talking about, classification, it could be that, you know, 5 he's in there for P.I.'s, enhanced, but he's got a violent 6 tendency and we always have to deal with him in disciplinary 7 problems, okay? But it jumps him up; he's not minimum any 8 more. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What happened to 10 forgiveness? 11 MR. GONDECK: Another thing is that the 12 classification does have to be reviewed periodically, and 13 there's different requirements of that classification review 14 that the Sheriff is required to periodically review the 15 classification. I did want to go back and look here on that 16 previous diagram here. We looked at it, and actually went 17 and looked at the -- the number of beds that you have within 18 your jail right now that are classified according to how the 19 Sheriff has this laid out, that we have 72 beds that are 20 medium-maximum security, and 100 beds that are minimum-medium 21 security. When we look at the averages on that chart of 22 combining those minimum-medium and those maximum-medium, and 23 I know that this starts blurring a little bit here as far as 24 where these cells are and where the areas are and where the 25 inmates are, that our averages are really about 85 in each of 2-7-12 31 1 those categories over that period of time. And that really 2 points out that we -- we are at a lack in the medium-maximum 3 classification. 4 Now, for the most part -- and I haven't broken this 5 down yet into where that affects us the most, as far as males 6 or females. For the most part, construction-wise, that all 7 of the -- the jail is pretty much maximum security, I would 8 say, with the exception of these dormitories. Those 9 dormitories are built with plaster ceilings, and in all 10 sincerity, should not be used for other than minimum or 11 medium security. They should not be used for maximum 12 security. So -- 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How many -- how many beds are 14 in those dormitories -- four dormitories? 15 MR. GONDECK: 12, 12, 16, and 18. So -- 16 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: About 50. 17 MR. GONDECK: 56, or -- 18 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah, 56. 19 MR. GONDECK: 56, I think. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: 58. 21 MR. GONDECK: That is the only area that's really 22 restricted there, as far as can you go to a maximum security. 23 And the overall breakdown, in the male housing we have 15 24 housing areas. In other words, when you look at all the 25 spaces that we can break down males into -- and I'm not going 2-7-12 32 1 to the separation cells yet, 'cause that's when we're talking 2 about those individuals that cannot be housed with anybody 3 else. But we've got 15 areas for the males and four for the 4 females. On the males, it's broken down 8 and 7 on the 5 medium-maximum, minimum-medium. And 11 areas -- as I said, 6 you know, there's only four areas here that are designated as 7 a medium security. Everything else is maximum security 8 design. 9 Where a large problem lies is on the female areas; 10 there's only four housing units for females. We've had a lot 11 of discussions in previous Commissioners Court meetings on 12 capacity for female housing. How many beds do you have for 13 female housing? 32 beds for female housing, plus you add a 14 couple; they're separation cells. And you're running about 15 20-something inmates most of the time. So -- but on those 32 16 beds, those are broken down into only four 8-person cells. 17 Of those, they're all designed as maximum security. Three of 18 them are designated as a minimum-medium, and one is the 19 maximum-medium security. We do have 18 male separation cells 20 and two female separation cells. In looking at that, or 21 trying to boil all that down into some meaningful -- what 22 does that mean? What we've identified as some of the 23 deficiencies here are really driven right now in your -- your 24 jail are more on the classification/separation issues than 25 anything else. Not necessarily just population; they're more 2-7-12 33 1 on the separation. 2 One is the insufficient number of spaces for 3 classification for female inmates. Two is the insufficient 4 number of separation cells; in other words, those places 5 where you have to take those females that need to be 6 separated for either disciplinary or administrative 7 segregation from all those, totally separated out by 8 themselves. And the size and number of the female cells 9 creates a tremendous inefficiency of the female capacity. In 10 other words, the number of those 32 beds that you use or that 11 you have for female housing is a very inefficient use of 12 space. On the male housing, yes, we do have a periodic 13 inadequacy of capacity. But as we looked at those several 14 years of charts from the beginning, that happens 15 infrequently. We do have, really, an insufficient number of 16 medium-maximum security cells, and could use, you know, some 17 more to deal with that classification. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: That insufficient number of 19 medium-maximum, is that driven by an excess of maximum 20 prisoners or an excess of medium prisoners? 21 MR. GONDECK: It's probably driven more by use of 22 -- the next sentence there, Judge. And it's really -- on the 23 medium-maximum, it's probably driven a little bit more by the 24 maximum, but it's also driven by -- there's two cell areas 25 here that were sort of a carryover from previous jail design 2-7-12 34 1 that are single-occupancy cells that are broken down into 2 six-person living units, that are -- are the typical linear 3 jail design. They are very, you might say, staff-intensive 4 to utilize as maybe they were originally envisioned. The 5 Jail Commission does allow you to utilize single cells for 6 administrative and disciplinary segregation. If you do that, 7 one, these are single cells and you can place one person in 8 here, but then you have to allow them out to their dayroom 9 space if you're using single cells, to allow them out once 10 each day to shower, and -- and at least one hour a day out in 11 their dayroom space. So, you have to have somebody, you 12 know, that is dealing with that, taking them out, putting 13 them back in, still making their rounds and everything else. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: How do you redesign that to 15 make it work? 16 MR. GONDECK: Right now, what the Sheriff has done 17 is to utilize that for their trustee housing, which in most 18 cases does work well. Sometimes people cringe, because it is 19 actually -- it is -- it's a benefit program. If you act well 20 in the jail, you get the benefit of trustee housing, that you 21 get basically a single housing. If you mess up, you're 22 kicked off the trustee area; you don't get to do that any 23 more. But it does build a better trustee base to where you 24 have less -- you know, trustees in a jail, as y'all may have 25 heard over time, are -- well, most of the time, the Sheriff's 2-7-12 35 1 Department call them "riskees" instead of trustees, because 2 they usually cause you a lot more heartaches than sometimes 3 they're of benefit. So, having a good trustee program to 4 where you can make it really an incentive to where you got 5 good people working for -- that's a good -- I say "good" 6 people working for you; good people in the jail. You know, 7 taking the best of the best, making an incentive, 'cause if 8 you don't make it an incentive, inmates are not going to do 9 good things for nothing. 10 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's right. 11 MR. GONDECK: I'm sorry, that's just -- that's the 12 facts of the way it is. They're not -- they're not going to 13 just be good for nothing, so if there's not an incentive to 14 do it, it doesn't work. So, what the Sheriff has done is 15 actually utilized this as an incentive; it works. So, he's 16 made good use of that and -- and not utilized these as the 17 segregation cells, which in utilizing them as segregation 18 cells, they really are very staff-intensive to actually try 19 to move, 'cause you have to move these people on an ongoing 20 basis. If you really do have people that need to be 21 isolated, a lot of times you don't want to have to move them, 22 except, you know, those that still are required to go to 23 exercise, if they're not in there -- haven't lost their 24 exercise privileges. 25 You want to keep them -- you know, move them as 2-7-12 36 1 least as possible, so you want to have a totally 2 self-contained cell where you have their -- you know, their 3 eating table in there, you have your toilet, lavatory, you 4 have their shower in there, so that they're self-contained. 5 The only time that you have to move them is if you have to 6 take them out for recreation, exercise. What you have to do 7 is one hour, three times a week, rather than every day you 8 have to move that person back and forth. So, I did -- did 9 want to explain that's one of the reasons why it was probably 10 envisioned when this facility was built that this would 11 provide more maximum security cells in those six-person 12 living units, but it really is not providing that. And if it 13 were used that way, it would take more staff time, when the 14 staff right currently is able to do other things within the 15 facility. 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The other reason -- what we 17 did originally, two of these eight-person -- eight-man cells 18 were for trustees, okay? That's two eights, so that's 16 19 beds you've used up, all right? I don't run 16 trustees, all 20 right? The inside trustees now, we run about 12, which 21 normally is these right here. Outside trustees we keep over 22 here, 'cause that's six by itself. And y'all know I don't 23 have -- so, it allows us to keep those separations in there. 24 Now, at times when -- which is not unusual, when all your sep 25 cells are full, we may have to pull all these out and use 2-7-12 37 1 them, and we still do, as sep cells when we have too many -- 2 too much. So, it's just a constant moving. But if you have 3 those as your regular cells, what Wayne is saying is correct; 4 you don't only just pull them out to go to the dayroom. You 5 pull them out individually. One comes out one hour, goes 6 back. Another one comes out one hour, goes back. And I 7 would -- I couldn't do anything but have a jailer back there 8 24 hours a day, and I don't have that capability. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Why couldn't you control 10 that -- you're talking about letting them out for one hour to 11 powder their nose. You have to have a jailer there to do 12 that? Why can't you control that from the control room via 13 camera and buttons? 14 MR. GONDECK: Commissioner, these are not the -- 15 the good actors. You know, I mean, if they're in 16 administrative/disciplinary segregation, many times these are 17 close custody inmates. So, some of those, that may work if 18 it was set up to operate the doors and everything from that. 19 But you have to also be able to manage those that -- you 20 know, fortunately, we do have food passes that -- most of the 21 time, those are cuff passes, so that you can cuff the inmate 22 before you even open the door, to deal with those level of 23 custody of inmates. So, that's what we're talking about 24 here, is those individuals that -- that have to be dealt with 25 in a close custody arrangement. We're not talking about 2-7-12 38 1 those that will come out of your cell, go down here -- 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The other thing is, none of 3 those doors, by design, are controlled by the control room. 4 All those doors, you have to be back there to control. 5 Number two is, there are no cameras back there now. 6 Hopefully in the next couple years, 'cause this Court's been 7 good, and we've been working at getting cameras in all those 8 cells. We haven't gotten cameras back in that part yet due 9 to the expense. But you've still got to have somebody back 10 there individually letting them in and out, and watching them 11 as they go. Otherwise, they'll be stashing stuff for each 12 other, 'cause they have to go to the same dayroom, same 13 everything, so everything has to be searched once you pull 14 one out -- one back out, put him back up before the other one 15 can -- 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You don't have the whole 17 group in there watching "As the Stomach Turns" together, 18 and -- 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Not if -- trustees, since 20 that's what we're using it for, yes, if they're not -- 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But if it's separation cells, 23 you can't. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You get them out one at a 25 time? 2-7-12 39 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: You have to; you can't put 2 them all together. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. Thank you. 4 MR. GONDECK: On your separation cells, you do meet 5 the minimum requirement, or the 10 percent separation cells. 6 If you have the -- or fall back in the single cells and 7 utilize that operation, you actually exceed that. Right now, 8 the arrangement that you have in access to that space does 9 not promote the use of -- let me just point this out. This 10 is the separation cell area here. All these are individual 11 separation cells. In other words, they are fully 12 self-contained; they have the shower, toilet, lavatory, 13 everything within the cells. The access to that area is 14 through this corridor here and through this corridor here, 15 off the main corridor through the open dormitory area here. 16 So, if you needed to use other than these two female 17 separation cells, that the females would have to come down 18 currently to this area here for housing in the male area. It 19 is disruptive. It is just a problematic issue to bring them 20 down and do that. Can do you that? Can you utilize it that 21 way? Yes. Is it problematic? Yes. I do want to talk just 22 briefly about some of the issues that -- on the state level. 23 And I've just thrown in a few -- 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Just real quick, on the two 25 female separation cells that we have, you also have to 2-7-12 40 1 understand that one of those two is the negative pressure 2 cell that we're required to have. So, if we have -- male, 3 female, it doesn't matter -- staph infection, you know, 4 hepatitis-type stuff, tuberculosis, any of those, we're 5 required to keep them in that cell. So, now you've lost a 6 female separation cell and you're only down to one, because 7 that one has to be used for that also. That's a 8 multipurpose. Before you moved on. 9 MR. GONDECK: I wanted to go over a couple slides 10 that have been part of the presentations over the last few 11 legislative sessions. And Dr. Fabelo and Pablo Martinez are 12 with the Council of State Governments Justice Center, and I 13 believe it's funded through the Pew Foundation, and -- but 14 has been providing some technical assistance to the Criminal 15 Justice Committee and the Corrections Committee of the 16 Legislature. And so part of the information that some of the 17 decisions of the State -- the State has been making as they 18 move through their funding process, appropriations process, 19 and their policy decision-making process, has been somewhat 20 based on a -- a justice reinvestment initiative, 21 whatever that -- 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What is that? 23 MR. GONDECK: That appears to be more of an 24 emphasis on diversions from prisons, rather than prison 25 building population -- or building additional prison 2-7-12 41 1 population. So, the Council of State Governments, the 2 Justice Center there has been providing to several states 3 this technical assistance. I would tell you that from the 4 information that they provide, and through their studies and 5 research, Texas appears on be one of the states that -- that 6 this initiative has been showing some results. We can all go 7 back and look and see whether or not, a few years from now, 8 whether these results are from the population expansion that 9 we have in the state, which has turned our criminal justice 10 system upside down, whether it has been the diversions to 11 different places, whether it's been continued use or more use 12 of pressure on the local probation or C.S.C.D., or if there's 13 been an increase in parole rates, but I'll go through some of 14 these slides and just make some comments here as to what they 15 provided. One of the things is the incarceration rates and 16 the number of inmates from 1985 to 2005, which gets us up to 17 pretty much where the prison capacity is today, the 150 -- 18 152,000, basically, upwards of the 155,000 that we are 19 looking at today in Texas state prison. They -- 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Does that include state jail? 21 MR. GONDECK: I believe that does include the state 22 jail, Judge. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 24 MR. GONDECK: Now, the second thing I wanted to 25 talk about was there -- there have been a lot of discussions 2-7-12 42 1 and presentations on where they should be at on parole 2 releases. And they've broken down -- and I don't have all 3 the information to present to y'all today, but just as an 4 overview, there's about seven or eight categories of parole 5 releases or parolees, and there's a percentage assigned to 6 each of those categories as to what percentage of those 7 should be voted out on parole release. But they are looking 8 at a minimum 31 percent as their minimum guidelines as an 9 average of those that would be released. As y'all can 10 remember -- and this even shows -- this is their slides, not 11 mine. 78 percent was back in the 1990's when we were 12 releasing everybody that couldn't -- that could be released 13 out of the prison, and that continued on for several years 14 until everything was an absolute madhouse. 15 We all know about the revolving door syndrome, but 16 then it came about as a total shutdown of that prison -- or 17 parole rank. They're saying that that went down to about 17 18 percent. There's some numbers that come out and say that it 19 went even down lower than that. But since it went down to 20 that 17 percent, you know, down somewhere between '98 and 21 2000, that that has grown back up to right around 25 to 30 22 percent presently. There was some statement in there about 23 the eligibility of the inmates, and their percentage of being 24 eligible for parole, but that was not really the point that I 25 was trying to make here. See, they use all these transitions 2-7-12 43 1 to come in and out of their Power Point presentations. I 2 don't do that any more, because I get chastised about which 3 direction they're coming from, and so I don't do that in my 4 presentation. 5 One of the things that also showed up as the parole 6 rates went down, that blue warrants and parole violators 7 started going back up, because there was pressure on both the 8 front side and the back side on parole, and we saw that. It 9 is only recently that we have seen those actual parole 10 violators and blue warrants actually start taking a little 11 bit of a decrease. And -- and so one of the things I do want 12 to show in this is that there is always a time lag between 13 when these state policies go into effect as to when we see 14 that, you know, the effects hit the actual county jail and 15 their impact. The other thing, as far as getting back into 16 this justice initiative or reinvestment initiative, is that 17 they -- there in 2009, and again in 2011, it was presented 18 that, you know, the big funding should come more in the 19 mental health, substance abuse funding to deal with those 20 that are mentally ill or -- and homeless, and then the 21 medical services to be provided within the prison 22 populations. And that -- trying to get more funding in 23 those, and that -- that could also help reduce the impact on 24 the jails. 25 The last slide that I wanted to present was one 2-7-12 44 1 part of a presentation that was presented at this -- to both 2 the Criminal Justice and Corrections Committees in 2011. 3 That was showing the reduction in the trend of the prison 4 population that was projected in 2007. That shows a 5 difference, you know, between where it was projected in 2007 6 to actually what happened in 2009, where it did drop, and 7 where they were promoting or showing that their justice 8 reinvestment initiative had been accomplished, or had 9 accomplished what they were looking for. The real problem 10 that -- that I wanted to present here was that the -- the 11 Legislature has been presented with certain initiatives and 12 certain programs, but y'all are all aware that in 2011, when 13 these initiatives were the last time presented -- and you 14 know how the Criminal Justice Committee and Corrections 15 Committee are the leaders in how those funds are appropriated 16 through the appropriations process, that that was the 17 direction it was going, you know, continuing to fund, you 18 know, more -- more SAFP, more ISF facilities. 19 But with the budget crisis that we had, a large 20 portion of those initiative programs were cut. Even prior to 21 that, you know, we saw facilities that were contracted with 22 the state on RFQ's or RFP's that were built by counties for 23 the state. Jones County is a prime example; that they 24 answered the RFP for the state and built the facility, and 25 then the state did not fund that facility and did not fulfill 2-7-12 45 1 that contract because of the change in the funding, and what 2 fundings were cut out of these initiatives. So, we -- we 3 have a policy of certain things, of not building prisons and 4 going forward with other initiatives. However, those 5 policies have not been fully funded. So, in looking at 6 that -- and I've written down a few things on y'all's thing 7 here, but to not overindulge in this, what is sort of the 8 major concern is to be cognizant or aware that it appears 9 that we're on the cusp of a new cycle that we were in in the 10 early '90's, to where the prison population or the parole 11 releases were trending back upwards, and that the recidivism 12 rates may tend to go higher, that our county jail populations 13 may be continuing to be affected. 14 Although, you know, what has been shown and 15 demonstrated by most of the people that are -- are filing and 16 collecting this data, our crime rate is down right now in the 17 state. All the crime indexes and everything look great. 18 However, I think most of the -- the areas and departments 19 don't do -- still show that the criminal activity has not 20 subsided. But the way that the crime rate is reported is the 21 number of crimes per 100,000 population. So, as our 22 population has increased so rapidly, and the number of crimes 23 has not increased as rapidly as the population increased, our 24 crime rate has come down. Texas has been in a population 25 boom, so therefore, even though crime has continued to 2-7-12 46 1 increase, based on the population, the crime rate has come 2 down. So, when we talk about certain things or when we hear 3 certain things in the -- the media or other things, or even 4 reports or data, we have to look at the totality of the 5 information that we're being presented as planners and 6 decision makers in this to make sure that we're making 7 appropriate decisions that are based on -- on, you know, 8 truth or fact, and not what we -- not what we really want to 9 hear to feel good about things. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Wayne, let me make sure I 11 understand what you're saying right there. So, you're saying 12 that our population's increasing at 8 percent, and -- say 13 it's 8. Two percent of the population are criminals. That 14 criminal percentage is getting diluted because the overall 15 number's getting bigger? 16 MR. GONDECK: Yes, sir. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think I got it. 18 MR. GONDECK: I was hoping that I -- I probably 19 don't need to find a -- 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's why I'm laughing. 21 MR. GONDECK: -- chart for you here, but there 22 was -- 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sounds good on paper, but it 24 doesn't lower the number of people that are incarcerated. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Texas population is 1,000, 2-7-12 47 1 you know, people per day moving in. 2 MR. GONDECK: Right here, it shows by the 3 population going up and the crime rate coming down, it looks 4 real nice, but when you look at the numbers, the -- you have 5 to look at it as far as the actual number of crimes has gone 6 up. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: So, incarceration rate's 8 coming down. It's just the number of people being 9 incarcerated -- 10 MR. GONDECK: The crime index has gone down, but 11 it's still -- the number of crimes is still going up. So, 12 the -- so, the trend is going down on the crime rate, but the 13 number of crimes is still going up. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Looks kind of like we're 16 headed back to the '80's or early '90's, whenever there 17 was -- where there was state prisons running -- running out 18 of room, and they're backing up in county jails, and then 19 suddenly everybody's building a jail. Everybody's got their 20 own jail. Are we going that -- it looks like we're headed 21 that way, but I don't think we're there yet. 22 MR. GONDECK: No. No. And, Commissioner, I think 23 we're probably 5 to 10 years away from that. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's good news. 25 MR. GONDECK: Just based on the -- you know, if 2-7-12 48 1 economics changed and, you know, if the State continued to 2 fund adequately the programs or the policies that they have 3 chosen -- 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, that's not going to 5 happen. 6 MR. GONDECK: -- to fund, -- 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: We all know that. 8 MR. GONDECK: -- then we would see something 9 different. They have chosen to do certain -- certain things 10 as far as policies. They've made certain policy decisions. 11 The problem is -- is that, as with anything else, is that the 12 funding criteria, the funding requirement for that has not 13 necessarily been met. And we saw it in the last legislative 14 session as to -- 15 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Cuts. 16 MR. GONDECK: -- what happened to everything on the 17 funding. And I don't know about y'all, but I don't see a 18 change in that, you know, in 2013, in the next legislative 19 session being any more -- 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Could be worse. 21 MR. GONDECK: Let's hope that all this drilling and 22 oil and gas and everything has done tremendous things to the 23 state. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, the unfunded mandate 25 war is -- that's a real war. That's a real deal. And the 2-7-12 49 1 State tends to balance their budget as they're required to 2 do, and -- but they balance it on us. 3 MR. GONDECK: Commissioner, I'm not trying to 4 divert the -- this analysis or anything into that debate. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I understand. 6 MR. GONDECK: What I'm trying to do is bring to 7 light that it is -- as we move forward in the planning 8 process, there is a lot of information that is brought 9 forward as to this is what the State is doing, this is what 10 we can see in the future. Everything's getting better. The 11 -- you know, the prison population is still stagnant. There 12 are reasons for certain things to be happening, you know, 13 going back -- there's a reason for that dipping down there. 14 Yes, there were certain funds put into -- to diversions. 15 Some of those inmates may still be there on that red part of 16 the line, but they're other places, or they're accounted for 17 other ways. And that has historically been true also as to 18 where they're accounted for. So, I don't want the County to 19 have a false sense of hope that, oh, things are just peachy 20 up here in the state level, when it does affect y'all; maybe 21 not immediately, but sometime in the future. 22 So that whatever decisions are made today or within 23 this program, that you keep an open mind. What -- the 24 question is, no matter what you resolve on your jail issues 25 today or any building program, you're going to have to 2-7-12 50 1 consider, what are we going to do next? And when may that 2 occur? That has to be part of the equation. And what I'm 3 trying to present here is probably part of that answer to 4 that equation. You know, when and what may you need to do 5 next? And we have to keep that door open in the planning 6 process as to, how do you address that to where you don't 7 lock yourself in down the road where you make it very 8 expensive for, you know, doing something now and not taking 9 care of something in the future. Let's get back to your 10 needs. I always know that I'm treading on thin ice when I'm 11 talking about what the state is doing, anyway. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I apologize for taking it 13 down that road, too. 14 MR. GONDECK: What we identified as what we see the 15 current facility needs right now is to increase the number of 16 cells for female housing, to add separation cells that will 17 provide for female housing. On the male housing, consider a 18 minimal addition for maximum security capacity, which may 19 also free up some space for the female housing. In other 20 words, add males and backfill with females, mainly because 21 that's how your facility is designed. Add some separation 22 cells that will continue to -- to provide for that 23 administrative/disciplinary segregation. On your support 24 areas, you probably -- you do need some additional program 25 space as that inmate population, you know, grows. We looked 2-7-12 51 1 at the other support areas. As far as the kitchen, the 2 kitchen is being well managed, I understand under contract 3 right now, and serving your population. If it needs anything 4 more, it probably can be done with looking at specific types 5 of equipment, whether that be changing out an oven, griddle, 6 stoves, very minor items. So, it really doesn't come into a 7 building program. The facility works well. 8 The laundry, on the other hand, probably needs some 9 expansion within the surrounding space to give you enough 10 area to work that in. And then we need to probably go into a 11 little bit more of an examination of the -- how far to go in 12 mechanical and electrical upgrades. If you decide to go into 13 a building program, that's always a good time to -- to 14 evaluate, are there some other things that may have been 15 deferred maintenance items that didn't fall in your 16 preventive maintenance items, that need to be dealt with. We 17 haven't gone into those, and it really is not reflected in 18 here, but those are always things, if you do go into a 19 building program, that you need to keep in mind. And being 20 very specific about that, you know, I want to put up the 21 other board here. Y'all do have a copy of this in the back 22 of your booklets that I told you not to look at. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Told us not to look at? 24 MR. GONDECK: Being sort of horsey about that. You 25 do have a copy of this. The last page is the one, if you 2-7-12 52 1 can't see it from there. The first section here is what 2 we're talking about, the initial portion, and then the two 3 other portions here. And the first portion -- initial jail 4 addition of four 8-capacity multi-occupancy cells for male 5 inmates. Adding 16 separation cells, which is basically a 6 48-capacity addition, for providing additional multi-purpose 7 room for program space, and then expand the laundry issue and 8 inmate property areas. Now, with that, that also allows you, 9 you know, as you provide more male housing down here, it goes 10 back to the original concept of utilizing at least two of the 11 male -- these are the female housing right now. One, two, 12 three, four -- utilizing two more of the M.O.'s, the 13 males, -- 14 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: For female. 15 MR. GONDECK: -- for female housing. We open those 16 up from this side over here, off this corridor. I would 17 still recommend to allow those to be what we call flex beds. 18 When you need them for females, use them for females. 19 Maintain this -- all of this area to where you can still use 20 them for male housing on the other side. If need be, you can 21 go ahead and do that for all four of those, and that at any 22 time you could use them for either males or females, which 23 will give you the greatest flexibility. What that would do 24 is that that would then be utilization of this entire area, 25 both now and in the future. You could continue to utilize 2-7-12 53 1 this for your female beds. In other words, we wouldn't have 2 to actually physically build female beds on that area. So, 3 when we're looking here at building four new 8-capacity 4 cells, we'd really be only gaining two for the males right 5 now, because we're transferring two of those to the females. 6 While this provides a substantial amount of additional 7 capacity for females, and maybe even more than what we've 8 seen or utilized initially, it would probably take care of 9 your female growth way -- farther into the future. 10 There are probably multiple other ways that we 11 could solve the female housing issue. We could come on the 12 end of the building and build a whole new female housing area 13 with smaller compartmentation, you know, smaller cells that 14 they could better utilize with a higher efficiency. But it 15 will cost more money to do that, and secondly, it places the 16 female population on the other end of the male population, to 17 where you have all that cross traffic on a regular basis. It 18 makes more sense that -- even though there's an inefficiency 19 built in right now, that as your population grows in the 20 future, the more female population you have, the more 21 efficient your -- your bed capacity becomes in the future. 22 As these beds -- as you, you know, expand in the future, your 23 female population, your female beds don't have to expand with 24 you; you've already got them. 25 The second thing that we looked at was the work or 2-7-12 54 1 day release program option, and that's, you know, down here 2 on the bottom. It's a great program, very supportive of it. 3 But with the number of inmates that you have that are minimum 4 security that could be released out in the public based on 5 your classifications, we do not see where, in and of itself, 6 the Sheriff's Office can support an ongoing program of a 7 steady number of inmates without a modified program being 8 developed, and in cooperation with the court system and with 9 Probation Department that is going to help sustain that 10 through sentencing or use of probation. So, whether it's a 11 condition of probation or whether it's another type of 12 sentencing, unless there's a cooperative effort done, and 13 more of a community corrections arrangement, that that area 14 would probably not be utilized on a regular basis to its 15 maximum capacity. So, if that option is entertained, it 16 would need to be looked at more from a programmatic 17 standpoint; more of an intended program, rather than just 18 based on the population that's within the jail. Now, that's 19 not saying that that area couldn't be used for other 20 minimum-medium inmates within the jail as far as future 21 capacity if the classification worked out or you had that 22 number of inmates, but any of the outside people would have 23 to be kept separate from the people that are housed within 24 the jail. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Question. In the lower left of the 2-7-12 55 1 existing facility, you've got, looks like, 168 individual 2 cells. 3 MR. GONDECK: Yes, sir. 4 JUDGE TINLEY: Can those be used for seg and 5 administrative? 6 MR. GONDECK: Yes, sir. Those are the -- and I 7 think they are -- there are 12 there, and they had some for 8 the females up on top. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 10 MR. GONDECK: We're -- this is not fully developed 11 as a conceptual plan, and if we can work them out to where 12 they're all up on top and that's one housing unit, that would 13 be good. Right now, the square footage may not work out 14 perfect on that. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Well -- 16 MR. GONDECK: But those are used -- would be 17 utilized for administrative and disciplinary segregation. 18 Now, are you talking about the existing ones or the new ones? 19 JUDGE TINLEY: No, I'm talking about the existing 20 ones down there in the lower left right there, yeah. 21 MR. GONDECK: Again, we go back to the same issue 22 of the efficiency of staffing of those, as to how you want to 23 utilize them. They could always be used for an 24 administrative or disciplinary segregation. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 2-7-12 56 1 MR. GONDECK: But you always have that issue of the 2 intensity of staffing of moving inmates in those areas. 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Let me ask a question. 4 Rusty, you say you're using that for the trustee area now; is 5 that correct? 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's correct. 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Those are individual cells? 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They have a common dayroom and 9 shower. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Right. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay, that is where they watch 12 TV or anything like that. This is a -- a hallway, and this 13 is the catwalk where you can go in, and it's one bed in each 14 one, okay? We run 12 trustees inside the jail for kitchen, 15 laundry, you know, floor cleaning, all that. Those have to 16 be kept separate from other inmates, housing-wise, all right? 17 The only other way I currently have to do it would be to put 18 them in two of these. If I put them in two of those, I've 19 used up 16 beds for 12 inmates. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, I guess my question -- 21 what I'm leading up to is, can -- can that area be 22 reconfigured to where you could -- do the trustees need to be 23 in individual -- 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They could be -- you could 2-7-12 57 1 have a space designed for, say, 12. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I could actually have, you 3 know, the dormitory style. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Dormitory situation, where 5 you wouldn't have individual cells for your trustees any 6 more. 7 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's true. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Could that be done somewhere 9 else? 10 MR. GONDECK: Yes, sir. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: I think you're coming kind of where 12 I'm coming from. Was any consideration given to putting in a 13 minimum-medium unit for housing only, say, 48, reconfiguring 14 the individual cells where you now have the trustees into 15 male seg space, converting the ones up at the top totally to 16 female, and then increasing the female general population by 17 accessing from the hallway -- there you go, that hallway 18 right there. 19 MR. GONDECK: Where these arrows are right now, 20 we're coming across here. Yes, sir. What we're looking at 21 is taking up, potentially, these separation cells here for 22 female. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Yes. 24 MR. GONDECK: Separation here. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: And you got two more, of course. 2-7-12 58 1 MR. GONDECK: This area here, and then future 2 expansion of these areas -- these are actually off the same 3 corridor. These are not off the same corridor. 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 5 MR. GONDECK: So that would be, initially, you 6 know, mostly female. What we're looking at here on this one 7 is to continue that as, you know, additional female 8 separation so that we can pick up all these as females, and 9 keep these as the male separation. The one concept that 10 we're looking at is to try to place all the separation up 11 here and develop this into a special housing unit to where 12 they can staff that as all the people in this area are a 13 special housing unit, so that may take a little bit more -- 14 and that way, you know, you have your separation, exercise 15 areas all separate for that, and you can have less movement 16 through the facility for your -- your separation or 17 administrative/disciplinary type inmates. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Ideally, what you want to try 19 and do -- this is true separation. This is your -- your real 20 violent, your real disciplinary. Each one of these cells has 21 their own shower and toilet inside the cell. It's very 22 minimal contact with the -- you know, physical contact with 23 the jail staff, on a minimum staff. This area here is -- is 24 really designed for your -- your maximum security, but to 25 where you can -- ideally, you can open up all of these at one 2-7-12 59 1 time during the daytime, let them into their dayroom and 2 watch the TV together and all that, and then at night they 3 individually get locked back down. 4 MR. GONDECK: Those are bar front. 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah, they're bar front. 6 MR. GONDECK: That's one of the issues with it 7 right now. 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They're not really designed 9 for a separation cell; they're designed for, like, a group 10 separation type deal, where they can still get along with 11 each other, but because of their classification and issues, 12 that may be separate gang-type deals. They don't really fit 13 in that you can put them anywhere else, but they're still 14 max. So that you can open these up all at one time and let 15 them into the dayroom during the day, and then lock them back 16 up at night. This hallway goes all the way around, you know. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I've been around there. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay. These two -- these are 19 all bars, so there is no sight exclusion from these. They 20 can see right across. Only ones that can't is right here, 21 and that's where you have that issue. It's really the design 22 of the current jail, back -- I don't know how many were on 23 this Court. You know, Buster was when it occurred, and you 24 were. It's a good design, 'cause you do have a lot of 25 flexibility in trying to be able to stay in compliance with 2-7-12 60 1 classification. It's just we're out. You know, I just can't 2 do it any more. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: I guess where I'm coming from is, 4 you make modifications to the existing facility to convert 5 those seg cells up at the very top, those six of them that 6 are up there all to female, correct? Make the modifications 7 across from the existing female cells so that you can 8 increase the female general population capacity there. All 9 of those are going to be medium-maximum space, correct? 10 MR. GONDECK: Yes, sir. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: So, you're -- and with those 12 modifications, and plus utilizing the -- utilizing the 18 13 cells which are down in the lower left-hand corner for male 14 segregation, would it be possible to add a minimum-medium 15 unit, dormitory-style housing for 48 beds to the rear? 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: To house your trustees and 17 your medium-medium -- medium-minimum. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'll tell you why not, okay? 19 MR. GONDECK: Trustees -- trustees and minimum, 20 you're going to have separate -- once they go to trustee 21 status, they need to be separated. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I'm saying you can separate 24 them. 25 MR. GONDECK: I mean, it would be housing 2-7-12 61 1 separation. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: You can use one of your dorms -- one 3 of your dorm areas there and move those minimums back to the 4 48-unit. 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I will say no, because what 6 happened this summer when we got so high on females, we had 7 -- you have to convert both of these, 'cause these are 8 barred. You're using up 16 beds. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay? When I used up 16 beds 11 in here for females, most of that time until we could get 12 them switched back, I only had one to two maximum security 13 beds open. I lost my maximum security ability with the males 14 because of this. If you go and add a minimum-medium, you 15 haven't helped anything with the maximum security males. We 16 lost our ability. We were down to two open beds. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, if you put the maximum 18 down there in that bottom where the 18 is, put them in, 19 reconfigure that for the maximum security males, you're 20 moving those trustees over to the minimum security. Just -- 21 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: You know, where am I going to 22 put my addition? Because the minimum -- the trustees have to 23 be separated from everybody. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: They can be separated. 25 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Put a wall between them. 2-7-12 62 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And minimum -- the trustees? 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right now they're in the same 3 area as everybody else. 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They're closed in. They're 5 not -- I mean, it's separated. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But can't you close -- I mean, 7 you can put a -- I mean, you can close an area over in the 8 minimum same as you -- that's enclosed or closed off. I 9 mean, it's just -- 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The only other issue that I 11 have, and Wayne can probably talk to this more, these 18 12 beds -- it's more than 18, 'cause we've got these across the 13 top -- are full. 14 MR. GONDECK: There's 18 there; there's two over 15 there. 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay. Are full 99.9 percent 17 of the time because of the classification, okay? If we move 18 some of these into this type, we're going to endanger more 19 staff, because they have -- these people have to be pulled 20 out for an hour at a time. This separation is kept where 21 there locked in; they can't go. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Sheriff, I think what we're 23 trying to say is change those into the same type of cells; 24 redo that section. 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: You do not have room in there 2-7-12 63 1 design-wise, 'cause you have to put toilets -- well, it's 2 got -- you have to put showers. 3 MR. GONDECK: I believe the renovation costs are 4 going to be -- 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: You have to put showers. 6 MR. GONDECK: We did look at do we have room in 7 there to make those into separation cells, and -- 8 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: You don't. 9 MR. GONDECK: -- we have tried in the past. We've 10 actually done that in the past, and the cost of doing it 11 becomes infeasible. Now, the other issue is -- is that 12 they're barred fronts. And with the barred fronts, you know, 13 you have everything from inmates passing things down -- you 14 know, separation needs to be separation, so we can't come 15 back in there and steel plate -- if we do the steel plate, it 16 changes the smoking exhaust system; we have to do something 17 with that, so it just starts compounding on where the costs 18 are, and all of a sudden, the -- the costs, you know, change. 19 So -- 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: If you -- go ahead. 21 MR. GONDECK: I was just going to say -- 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Go to the next one. 23 MR. GONDECK: I was just going to finish with, on 24 those cells, we can utilize them in multiple ways, but we 25 need to use them intact of what they are currently. 2-7-12 64 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 2 MR. GONDECK: You know, to be the most 3 cost-beneficial to the county. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 5 MR. GONDECK: To go in there and start modifying 6 them, it's a money pit to start putting money into them. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. In the new 48, initial 8 phase, is it possible to construct, like, maybe that top half 9 as maximum security construction and the bottom part of it, 10 reconfigure so that it's -- we're not having to construct the 11 full part maximum security, just part of it maximum security? 12 MR. GONDECK: Actually, you can do -- that amount 13 -- the only thing that you're probably mandated -- let's talk 14 about what you have to do, and then we can talk about does 15 that meet your needs. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Okay. 17 MR. GONDECK: When you're at capacity, you have to 18 provide at least 10 percent separation cells. Now, in this 19 situation, we have to have at least 20 of the -- or we have 20 to have 10 percent single occupancy cells. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Mm-hmm. 22 MR. GONDECK: Twenty of those have to be bona fide 23 separation cells, as we have in the facility right now. So, 24 we could add them all as those single cells that we have down 25 there, and have some -- move inmates in and out, or we can 2-7-12 65 1 provide more separation cells as we need to, but we have to 2 have 10 percent in those single occupancy cells. So, as we 3 add capacity, we have to look at, do we have enough? Right 4 now, we could add just capacity without having to add more 5 separation cells. Now, you've heard from the Sheriff this 6 morning whether or not those single cells really do provide 7 more efficient, effective use for administrative/disciplinary 8 segregation. But the fact is, yes, you can add capacity 9 without additional separation cells. So, if you do add 10 capacity, the question is, can you add minimum security or 11 minimum-medium security? 12 When you're building minimum-medium security, 13 you're building medium security, 'cause you have to build the 14 highest classification. There really is no difference, or 15 very minimal difference between medium and maximum security 16 as far as construction goes. The only thing that may change 17 is whether or not you can convince the Jail Commission to use 18 a plaster ceiling in a facility rather than a concrete 19 ceiling. But you have to have a safety vestibule; you have 20 to have, you know, secure walls. Everything has to go along 21 that direction. If you were going to go anything other than 22 direct supervision, having an officer stationed inside the 23 living unit, you have to go with something other than 24 commercial toilet/lavatory fixtures. 25 So, if we really get into that medium security 2-7-12 66 1 cost-wise, dollar-wise, it really comes down to basically the 2 same cost. So, what you really look at is, do we build those 3 in 8-person cells, 12-person cells? 12-person do count as 4 dormitories, so we can't exceed 40 percent of the population. 5 That's really the only thing that we're looking at. And then 6 we have to look at, is that cost beneficial to have the 7 larger areas that you've got to make sure that those 12 8 people all are classified the same and all can get along the 9 same, and provide the best, you know, operational scenario 10 for the Sheriff. 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Approximately, what's the 12 dimension on that addition you're talking about, the -- 13 between the -- 14 MR. GONDECK: I was hoping you weren't going to ask 15 that, Commissioner. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Just curious. About 100 feet 17 by 200, or what is it? 18 MR. GONDECK: I think it's the width of the jail, 19 and I don't -- 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I can't remember what it is. 21 MR. GONDECK: I don't remember exactly what that 22 is. I thought it was about -- 50, 50, 32 -- about 180. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah, I think that's right. 24 MR. GONDECK: 180. So, I think it was, like, 60 by 25 180. 2-7-12 67 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Judge, that's going to make 2 sparks come out of your calculator when you put that in 3 there. Is that -- 4 JUDGE TINLEY: 10,8. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: $400 a square foot? 250, 6 300. 7 MR. GONDECK: Just want to go to the last page and 8 look at the dollars? 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I've been looking at that for 10 a while. 11 MR. GONDECK: I figured you turned to that. That 12 was really the reason why I wanted to keep y'all from looking 13 at the last page there, so that we could actually work 14 through the rest of this. Otherwise, we'd be sitting here 15 talking the whole time about the dollars. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Little over 300. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It's 300. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: 311. 19 MR. GONDECK: Actually, I think that we could 20 probably work those -- the spaces that we were looking at 21 there down to -- to between 6,000 and 8,000 square feet for 22 that Phase 1, is probably what we could get to. What is 23 shown there is probably larger than what is needed. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's encouraging. 25 MR. GONDECK: Conceptual-wise. But what we were 2-7-12 68 1 looking at is somewhere between 6,000 and 8,000 square feet, 2 is what is going to be needed. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Better than 8.2 as it was, you 4 know. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, get it down. If he 6 drops the size down, we could even drop it below what he's 7 got projected here. 8 MR. GONDECK: No, I'm going on -- I'm going on the 9 spaces that I was thinking of originally. That's what those 10 prices are for. 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Okay. 12 MR. GONDECK: Yeah, we could save some money if you 13 didn't put separation cells in. But -- 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Seems like that's -- you need 15 separation cells as much as anything. 16 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: You have to. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You're wasting money if you 18 don't do separation. 19 MR. GONDECK: If you're going to do something now 20 -- if you're going to do something now, provide some capacity 21 expansion, but then give the Sheriff the tools that he really 22 needs to best utilize everything you've got out there right 23 now. 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's probably going to take 25 at least two or three years to get the plan well enough to 2-7-12 69 1 build it. 2 MR. GONDECK: No, it won't do that. It -- it'll 3 take less time to do the drawings than it will take time for 4 y'all to get money in the bank. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I was afraid you were going 6 to say that. 7 MR. GONDECK: Just going on -- on, you know, the 8 typical county progress and how things work. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. 10 MR. GONDECK: Actually, I can't say that. Mitchell 11 County's waiting on us right now. They want to move. All of 12 a sudden, they pass their bond election; they -- okay, we're 13 ready to go. They're waiting on us to finish the drawings, 14 went and hired a construction manager, ready to go. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: I guess the question in my mind, Mr. 16 Gondeck, is, is there any way that we can build a lower-cost 17 housing unit to take on these 48 -- to give us 48 beds new 18 capacity? 19 MR. GONDECK: Yes, sir. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: To address the needs we have for 21 additional segregation cells and female capacity, and still 22 give us any flexibility going into the future, -- 23 MR. GONDECK: Judge, the answer to your question -- 24 JUDGE TINLEY: -- fifteen years out? 25 MR. GONDECK: The answer to your question is yes. 2-7-12 70 1 And -- and, really, it goes back to refocusing on utilization 2 of those existing separation cells as taking care of your 3 administrative segregation, which is -- can be done. Is it a 4 good solution for administrative or disciplinary segregation? 5 The answer to that is no. Is it less costly? The answer is 6 yes. Can you build more capacity or whatever with less 7 dollars that way? The answer is yes. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What -- if you go with the 9 straight minimum, what's the cost come down to? 10 MR. GONDECK: I'm sorry? 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: If you just go with a minimum 12 security facility, what's the cost per square foot? 13 MR. GONDECK: How minimum do you want it? I mean, 14 that's the issue when you go to a minimum security. And 15 minimum security, you can go to the point of, you know, even 16 having a security perimeter. You can have panic hardware on 17 the door. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We've got a fence already. 19 MR. GONDECK: So you -- in all honesty, I mean, 20 downtown San Antonio across from the jail at the annex, we 21 have a facility down there that has panic hardware on the 22 doors. Now, can you -- do you want to build, you know, 48 23 beds out there and say that that's what you want to -- who is 24 going to go in it? That's the question. And do you -- do 25 you want to spend, you know, a few hundred thousand dollars 2-7-12 71 1 and do that? Is someone going to be housed there? Do you 2 have the people to be housed there? And once you put 3 somebody in there, you've got the staff that's got to be in 4 it. You got to get food to them. I mean, everything -- 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: All the services have to be 6 provided. The one thing I would say, Bruce, on that is we 7 don't have people in jail that don't need to be there. When 8 you get to the minimum security, you know, we don't have them 9 there. They're giving all those probations; that's why we 10 have so many on probation. That's why we have so much other 11 stuff. Our issues are people that need to be where they are, 12 okay? A minimum security panic door where they just push 13 their way out and walk out any time they want to, which is 14 kind of what they had over at Bastrop and that, we don't have 15 that type of inmate. We're not just housing the theft by 16 checks that forgot to pay their fines. Those people, this 17 county has always had a policy on Class C misdemeanors, which 18 is what you're talking about. They come in at night; they're 19 gone in the morning. It's an automatic $500 P.R. bond. We 20 don't house any of those. We never have. And so the minimum 21 security, you can build it and we can say it's a whole lot 22 cheaper, but it's not going to solve one issue with our jail. 23 MR. GONDECK: If you want to build a low-risk 24 minimum security -- secure, can you do that less expensive 25 than a jail? Yes, sir. You know, probably for half the 2-7-12 72 1 cost. But -- 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Minimum-medium dormitory-style 3 housing. 4 MR. GONDECK: Minimum-medium is going to be 5 basically the same cost -- 6 JUDGE TINLEY: As maximum. 7 MR. GONDECK: -- as maximum security. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 9 MR. GONDECK: Because your -- your minimum-medium 10 is going to be medium security. 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Right. 12 MR. GONDECK: Medium security versus maximum 13 security is basically the same, except, you know, the walls 14 have to be the same. Everything is the same, except 15 sometimes we can relook at what the ceiling material is. The 16 Jail Commission gives us a little bit of latitude on that. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 18 MR. GONDECK: So, somewhere in there, we've got 19 some latitude in about 10 percent of the costs there. 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's not much. 21 MR. GONDECK: So -- 22 JUDGE TINLEY: That clears it up a lot. 23 MR. GONDECK: So if you're going to go minimum, we 24 got some areas that we can explore. Once you go back to 25 medium, we're back in the same ballgame as we're designing a 2-7-12 73 1 jail. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Judge, I'm ready for the money 3 man. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think we talk to him before 5 we do anything else. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, we got to talk to the money 7 man. You want to take a whack at this, Tom? 8 MR. SPURGEON: I'm not the money man. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You're just the -- 10 JUDGE TINLEY: You're the road to the money man. 11 MR. SPURGEON: Okay. All right. Well, I'm sort of 12 the first step of getting to the money man, yeah. 13 MR. GONDECK: Are y'all tired of listening to me 14 for a while? 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: You're costing too much money, 17 Wayne. 18 MR. GONDECK: And, again, I didn't low-ball these, 19 and y'all know that. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: I know. 21 MR. GONDECK: 'Cause I know that you're going to 22 hammer on me, and I'm going to go back and evaluate. But 23 we've got -- 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I appreciate it. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Oh, yeah. It helps a lot. 2-7-12 74 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Very educational. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I think I know where the -- 4 I understand the problem better. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. Yeah, it wasn't very 6 clear before you made your presentation, but you're pretty 7 polished. You've done it a time or two. 8 MR. GONDECK: Do y'all want me to leave this up to 9 come back? 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You can leave the number up 11 there. 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: The rest of it, you can kind 13 of -- 14 MR. GONDECK: I'll just leave this here, if it 15 doesn't bother you. 16 MS. HARGIS: We need one more for him, for the 17 attorney. 18 (Low-voice discussion off the record.) 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Let's -- let's leave that one 20 on the shelf for just a moment, and let's go to Item 4; 21 consider, discuss, take appropriate action to approve order 22 authorizing publication of notice of intention to issue 23 certificates of obligation, finance acquisition of equipment 24 and construction or improvement of facilities in the county. 25 Mr. Tom Spurgeon's here with us, our bond attorney, and he 2-7-12 75 1 has provided us with the proposed format of the order. I 2 think probably the most -- most critical thing that we have 3 is the number that gets inserted there. 4 MR. SPURGEON: Judge, you're right. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: That is a not-to-exceed number. 6 MR. SPURGEON: Right. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: My concern is whether or not the -- 8 we went through the wish list of various departments at a 9 prior meeting, and we -- we did some, I think, fairly prompt 10 reductions. I'm not sure that any of the folks that had 11 their wish list reduced have really had an appropriate 12 opportunity to try and make a case for the reductions -- 13 reinstatement of any reductions, and I think we need to give 14 them that opportunity. We will be meeting again next Monday. 15 But there are a number of them that got reduced, and I think 16 we need to at least listen to them if they have any 17 particular concerns about what got pared out of their 18 particular wish list. 19 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Have you got one more? 20 JUDGE TINLEY: The other option would be to -- to 21 set a number that -- in the publication notice of 22 not-to-exceed which is high enough that's going to, without 23 any question, cover all the needs that we might want to put 24 in this C.O. issue. So -- 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Including reworking of the 2-7-12 76 1 ones that we've cut in the past, possibly. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm, yeah. Well, I mean, if 3 you -- if you set the number where, without any question, 4 that will include whatever you may come down to, why, you can 5 always -- you can always land on a lesser number, but you 6 can't exceed the number. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, I had a request for -- 9 you know, we'd cut both out of Environmental Health, and he'd 10 asked that one be reinstated, and I would ask the same thing 11 for Animal Control. Over that period of time, they're 12 probably going to need to replace one. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. Well, we're basically 14 talking five years demand here, and Mr. Odom, our Road and 15 Bridge Administrator, hasn't had an opportunity to really 16 carry us through his individual requirements. I know 17 Maintenance, there was a significant amount cut through 18 there. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: He needed to be cut. 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: He's not here today to defend 21 himself. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's why we're not going to 23 listen to him. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: But, you know, what's the pleasure 25 of the Court? 2-7-12 77 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Question. If we were -- and I 2 don't know if, since Bob isn't here, the Auditor can answer 3 it. If we were to go up, like, say to 9 million and finance 4 the jail and the Ag Barn basically over 20 years, and 5 incorporate into the debt structure paying off the rest of it 6 in five, what does that do? 7 MS. HARGIS: Well, we basically have a 2013 to 2016 8 problem, so we have to smooth that situation out. Then -- 9 then we have a million, four that we can immediately start to 10 put on, plus whatever difference we have to put on the 11 short-term items. And if we leave the ag facility and the 12 jail on the -- as we talked about, that's a fixed asset that 13 we can depreciate over a 20-year frame; leave those on, I 14 think we could pay off those short-term items rather quickly. 15 I would -- 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I guess the next step is, then, 17 what does that then do for us in 2016 or '17, the ability to 18 issue any other short-term? So, I guess -- I mean, my 19 concern is that that's where the -- I mean, and in five 20 years, we're probably going to need to do another short-term. 21 MS. HARGIS: Well, you should be able to do 22 short-term, because you've got a long-term here. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Right. 24 MS. HARGIS: It just depends on how much you want 25 to refund. And when you set these up for refunding, you 2-7-12 78 1 don't refund all of them. You refund a certain amount of the 2 coupons. So, when we -- when we design this program, it's 3 going to be a little bit more complicated. We also probably 4 want to put shorter call dates in the beginning than we might 5 have in another type of issue. That's going to cause you a 6 little bit of an interest increase, but at least it's going 7 to open the door up for us to have other sales. Because if 8 you drop off a million, four, that should leave us the 9 ability to come back in there, refund what we have, and have, 10 say, a two and a half million dollar issue. So, I think 11 there is room there. And that's the reason why, when we 12 design it, it's going to cost us a little bit more, because 13 of that. But because the interest rates are so low, we're 14 still going to be at the bottom of the market. Now, Tom and 15 I were visiting a little bit earlier, and I'd like for him to 16 go over the fact that you could do two different kinds of 17 C.O.'s, and so I'd like for him to explain that, since the 18 C.O.'s are a little bit -- you know, this is my first rodeo 19 with those, so let him kind of tell you how you could do a 20 long-term/short-term C.O. on that. 21 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 22 MR. SPURGEON: Yeah, it's actually two different 23 types of instruments. The C.O. you're familiar with goes 24 through this notice process where you put the notice in the 25 newspaper and you set the maximum amount, Judge, that you 2-7-12 79 1 were talking about, can't exceed that amount. If you find 2 that you've maybe undershot a little bit and you need another 3 million dollars or whatever, you -- you can issue what we 4 call a public property finance contractual obligation, and 5 it's only for personal property. But you could take, for 6 example, some equipment that you were planning to finance, 7 even with the C.O.'s, even if it was part of the notice of 8 the C.O.'s, and essentially finance that with P.P.F.C.O.'s. 9 The same -- you can go 20 years if you want, or if it's 10 equipment, you want to go less and things like that. But I 11 guess if I -- the point is -- is that even if you find that 12 you want to go forward with the C.O.'s, and a few months from 13 now or whatever, you find that you have other needs, that 14 instead of going with the C.O. issue that requires notice and 15 those type of things, you can do another type of instrument 16 that doesn't require the same type of 31-day notice and 17 things like that. 18 So, you have some flexibility. You can also issue 19 a tax note. That can be for real property improvements. The 20 only down side of that is that it can't have a maturity 21 longer than seven years. So, again, you have a couple 22 different types of instruments that you could issue in 23 addition to a C.O. and satisfy some needs that may not have 24 gotten taken care of, or again, you might find that you need 25 more money than you first thought, something like that. 2-7-12 80 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: From a cost of issuance 2 standpoint, does it cost more if we start issuing multiple 3 types -- 4 MR. SPURGEON: It does a little bit, yes, 5 Commissioner. That's exactly right. You're better off to do 6 all in one, economies of scale. No question about it. If 7 you did a small issue with a P.F.F.C.O., likely Bob would 8 probably try to do it on a private placement basis, so you 9 would probably save some costs of issuance that you wouldn't 10 be repeating. In other words, you wouldn't have another 11 official statement and underwriter's discount cost and things 12 like that. A smaller issue lends itself more to being able 13 to do a private placement, and again, you can avoid some cost 14 of issuance. But if you could put it all into one 15 transaction -- 16 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: You're better off. 17 MR. SPURGEON: Probably better off. You really 18 are. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Structure your maturity, whereas 20 your short-term-life assets are -- you structure those as 21 earlier payoff. 22 MR. SPURGEON: Yes, sir. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: And the longer term, your permanent 24 improvements, -- 25 MR. SPURGEON: Right. 2-7-12 81 1 JUDGE TINLEY: -- out towards the end. 2 MR. SPURGEON: That's exactly what Bob would -- 3 would do for you, is to examine your -- the useful life of 4 the asset that you are financing, and put as much of that so 5 that you're not long-term financing short-term assets, right. 6 And, Judge, if this is -- there's no -- I'm not trying to 7 tell you when and when not to approve this order, but if 8 there is something that you all want to wait and do another 9 meeting, this is not something that has to be done today. It 10 depends on when you need the money, 'cause, as you know, 11 there's a -- a 31-day notice period when notice has to be in 12 the newspaper. So, as a practical matter, even if you did 13 this today, the very earliest that you could approve the 14 actual issuance of the C.O.'s would be March the 12th. Now, 15 that's probably earlier than Bob would be -- want to go do 16 that. I think at the very least, he'd probably want to be at 17 the end of March at the very earliest. And you could only do 18 this during a regular meeting, because you're setting a tax. 19 So, if you needed to wait till next Monday, or even a later 20 date, just -- that can certainly be done. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. Well, the good news is, we 22 have a meeting next Monday, which is just a few days away. 23 If we need additional time for any of these individuals 24 who -- 25 MR. SPURGEON: Right. 2-7-12 82 1 JUDGE TINLEY: -- want to discuss further their -- 2 their requirements. 3 MR. SPURGEON: Right, exactly. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Tom, one more question. 5 MR. SPURGEON: Oh, sure. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is there -- from a -- from your 7 standpoint, is there any benefit to delaying the jail for 8 three years, four years, and issuing debt then for that? 9 Or -- I mean, is there any -- I guess a "benefit" is the best 10 word for it. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah, there's a benefit. 12 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: You're not doing it. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Rusty, don't clear your 14 throat. 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I didn't say a word. 16 MR. SPURGEON: I'd really watch my speed coming out 17 of the county if -- no, I'd be honest with you. Because 18 we're in such a low-interest environment, -- 19 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Right. 20 MR. SPURGEON: -- and because you have a real 21 demonstrated need to do something to provide relief to the 22 jail, there's probably not a better time, frankly, to debt 23 finance than there is right now. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I was kind of -- I'm leaning 25 that way, just from my thinking, and partially because if 2-7-12 83 1 you're going for a 20-year period, then three years doesn't 2 buy you much. I mean, if -- 3 MR. SPURGEON: No. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This debt -- the amount of the 5 repayment's going to be the same, -- 6 MR. SPURGEON: Right. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- you know, as 20 years. You 8 got to pay it back. 9 MR. SPURGEON: Right. And no one can predict the 10 interest rates, but it's sort of hard to imagine that the 11 rates, as low as they are right now, will be that low three 12 years from now. No one could frankly imagine we'd be as low 13 as we are right now. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Well, they've been that way 15 for two. What was our last one, 2.29? 16 JUDGE TINLEY: I believe that's right. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Of course, we hope things 19 take an upturn at some point in time, but we don't want to 20 pay more interest. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, and you want the projection to 22 be continued low interest rates so that the -- the folks that 23 are bidding to purchase will -- will be in that mode where 24 they'll bid at a lower rate. So -- 25 MS. HARGIS: Keep in mind, if we do it on Monday, 2-7-12 84 1 the paper that we're going to use is only -- only out on 2 Wednesday, so we need to be able to give them the article by 3 Monday afternoon, the intent. So, that's the only thing. 4 'Cause they're -- they print every Wednesday, so there's 5 nobody here -- 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't -- I don't see a real 7 reason to wait till Monday. I mean, we can make some 8 adjustments. If you went to 9 million -- in fact, the 9 numbers, if I add them up right, is 8.138. 10 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Right. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So if you go to nine, that 12 gives you flexibility to work with the other departments. 13 MS. HARGIS: I'd go to 10, just so that you have -- 14 remember, you can go less, but you can't go more. So, 10 15 million's what we've got -- we've got 12 printed in here. If 16 you cut it short, then we got a problem. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, we can do the other thing 18 that Tom said we can do. 19 MS. HARGIS: Well, yeah -- well, I don't think you 20 want to do that. Then you got cost of issuance again and 21 everything else. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I have a hard time 23 envisioning -- if Wayne's pretty comfortable with his 24 numbers, and we're pretty comfortable with the ag numbers, 25 and we -- I mean, I don't mind -- I mean, going to nine gives 2-7-12 85 1 you -- it's almost $800,000 -- 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Flexibility. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- flexibility. 4 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's a lot. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The higher you go, the more 6 chance you're going to get push-back. 7 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Right. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Especially if it's unnecessary. 9 MS. HARGIS: Well, the only thing is, you don't 10 have the exact numbers from Peter as to -- 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 12 MS. HARGIS: -- his fees and some of the other. I 13 mean, I'm sure they're not going to be -- 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We don't know Peter's exact 15 numbers right now, -- 16 MS. HARGIS: Right. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: -- no. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: One other issue that you will 19 look at is the -- that I handed out earlier is I told y'all 20 I'd also come back with the radio issues and everything. And 21 if you look at the third page on that first handout that I 22 gave you, you'll see those numbers that they were able to do 23 it to be able to get us through without having to change 24 the -- 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can you summarize? 2-7-12 86 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Is that the $280,000 figure? 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, the bottom of it, the 374, 3 380. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Okay. That's a hell of a lot 5 better than a million, five. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: One, five. 7 MS. HARGIS: Keep in mind, you do not have cost of 8 issuance on here, Jonathan. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You don't have what? 10 MS. HARGIS: Cost of issuance on the four, seven -- 11 or on these numbers. So, when we're doing the 9 million, we 12 want to be sure that we have the cost of issuance in those 13 numbers. Can we go 9 million, five? Cut it in the middle? 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I don't know -- we're 15 rushing here. I don't -- I don't know why we can't wait till 16 Monday. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: I would agree with you, 18 Commissioner. I think we need to let those folks have an 19 opportunity to state their case on some of the items, and 20 that may affect what we're doing here. And we may have some 21 more numbers from Peter, and, you know, I -- my thinking is 22 you're going to get push-back for 8 as much -- for 12 as much 23 as you get for 8. 24 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's right. 25 JUDGE TINLEY: You know, and it's going to be 2-7-12 87 1 from -- probably from the ones that are not going to be 2 affected by one nickel that you get the push-back from. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 4 MS. HARGIS: We have enough money to do -- I'm sure 5 to take care of Peter's fees and to probably bid the 6 demolition on that 300,000 we still have left, but that's 7 all. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We don't need much for Peter 9 and demolition. 10 MS. HARGIS: Just keep in mind, we -- well, we got 11 money there. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We're in good shape on that. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Not to worry on that one. 14 MS. HARGIS: Okay. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Do we defer? 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's fine. 17 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah, that's good. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Wait till Monday. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. What else we got, gentlemen? 20 Anything else? Buster's hungry? 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Little bit. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. All right. Anything else to 23 come before us today? We're adjourned. 24 (Court was adjourned at 12:10 p.m.) 25 - - - - - - - - - - 2-7-12 88 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 9th day of February, 8 2012. 9 10 JANNETT PIEPER, Kerr County Clerk 11 BY: _________________________________ Kathy Banik, Deputy County Clerk 12 Certified Shorthand Reporter 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 2-7-12