1 1 2 3 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS' COURT 4 Special Session 5 Thursday, May 9, 2019 6 9:00 a.m. 7 Commissioners' Courtroom 8 Kerr County Courthouse 9 Kerrville, Texas 78028 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 PRESENT: TOM MOSER, Commissioner Precinct 2 JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Precinct 3 24 DON HARRIS, Commissioner Precinct 4 25 2 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 *** APPROVAL AGENDA: 4 1.1 Pay Bills. 3 5 1.5 Court Orders. 4 6 1.6 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 4 action regarding the County Hog Bounty 7 Program. 8 1.7 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 6 action to improve incentive for Kerr 9 County employees who participate in the Healthy County challenges. 10 *** Reporter's Certificate. 21 11 * * * * * * 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 3 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. Good 2 morning. Let's go ahead and call the special 3 Commissioners' Court of May the 9th to order. It's a 4 rather short agenda. I think the Judge will be showing 5 up late, and I'm not sure about Commissioner Precinct 1. 6 Approval agenda 1.1 pay the bills. 7 MRS. JOHNSON: Good morning. For Kerr 8 County $96,434.16. For other funds for the Treasurer to 9 disburse, we have Airport, $2,275.12. Juvenile 10 Probation, $28,760.37. Fund 75, which is the 216th D.A. 11 forfeiture fund, $1,274.59. And fund 95, 198th DA 12 forfeiture fund is $797.13. 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Move for approval for 14 disbursement. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: A motion from 17 Commissioner Moser, second from Commissioner Harris to 18 approve the disbursements as presented. Any further 19 discussion? All in favor raise your right hands. 20 Unanimous, three zero. 21 I don't believe -- there's no budget 22 amendments? 23 MRS. JOHNSON: No budget amendments. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No late bills? 25 MRS. JOHNSON: No, Sir, no late bills. 4 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No payroll? 2 MRS. JOHNSON: No payroll. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Court orders. We do 4 have court orders from our May second meeting. Court 5 order 37448, 37449, 37450 and 37451. I reviewed them. 6 They're all pretty standard from our last special 7 meeting last Thursday. 8 I'll make a motion to approve court orders 9 from our May 2nd meeting. 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Motion from myself, 12 second from Commissioner Harris to approve the court 13 orders from our May 2nd meeting. Any discussion? All 14 in favor raise your right hand. Unanimous, three zero. 15 Item 1.6 consider, discuss and take 16 appropriate action regarding the County Hog Bounty 17 Program. Commissioner Harris. 18 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: All right. As of 19 right now, we are over $70.00. I have had discussions 20 with UGRA, and I'm planning on attending their next 21 board meeting, and they're going to decide what they 22 want to do, whether they want to amend the budget for 23 this year and go forward. And I think as we discussed 24 last Thursday that they'd like to see us have a little 25 bit more skin in the game is the way it was put. And I 5 1 think we have decided we could do that through the -- I 2 think Reagan found some money that we could use for 3 that. So I think that's probably where we're going to 4 go, but we find out more the 22nd of this month after 5 that meeting, so -- 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So you know, we don't 7 really need to take action today on this. 8 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: No. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: If Reagan can come up 10 with the money, I'd recommend we put together a budget 11 amendment, and I think it needs to be approved or not 12 approved based on Court discussion, but I think it would 13 be good to have the whole Court in on that discussion, 14 and also good to have input from UGRA. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: You bet. You bet. So 16 that's where we're at on that. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is this on Monday's 18 agenda? 19 MRS. GRINSTEAD: No. You want it added? 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You might want to add it 21 so we can commit to the monies without having to get 22 help from UGRA. 23 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: You're right, you're 24 right. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That way they can say we 6 1 committed. Or we could vote today, either way. But I 2 think it would good to probably have the whole Court on 3 that. 4 Anything further on 1.6? 5 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: No. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 1.7 consider, 7 discuss and take appropriate action to improve incentive 8 for Kerr County employees to participate in the Healthy 9 County challenges. Tracy. 10 MRS. SOLDAN: Good morning. I wanted to 11 remind y'all that the Healthy County Committee here is 12 Dawn Lantz, and Jennifer Doss, and I, and we work with 13 TAC with the Sonic Boom Program, which is currently 14 going on for the year, and that's to get our employees 15 healthy. And hopefully in the long run help our 16 insurance premiums. 17 What I'm here today to ask of the Court is 18 to approve a County incentive that's tied to TAC, and I 19 have Ashley here from TAC. She's a wellness consultant 20 that she can explain a little bit more to you about they 21 have a new program, and it's not really new, but the 22 incentive part of it is new. If we have an incentive 23 program here for the employees to do something healthy, 24 and we reward them for that, then TAC pays us a little 25 bit more at the end of the year for our Healthy County 7 1 Program like they already do for the Sonic Boom Program. 2 So what we would like to do as a committee 3 is to offer an extra paid day off to any employee who 4 completes the Sonic Boom Challenge, earns the $50.00, 5 plus gets an annual physical, just has a little note 6 written from their doctor. Actually we have a form that 7 they can sign off on that says they completed their 8 annual physical, turn it into HR, we track that, and 9 then in 2020 they would get an extra paid day off, which 10 doesn't affect the budget. They're paid whether they're 11 sitting in their seat working, or they're off because 12 they did something healthy. 13 By doing that, we have the opportunity to 14 earn from TAC for implementing that; not this year, but 15 in following years, we have the opportunity to earn 27 16 hundred dollars in addition to what we get for the 17 Healthy County Program that they already paid for 18 employer -- employer incentive. 19 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So 27 hundred dollars 20 total? 21 MRS. SOLDAN: Just for that county specific. 22 We would also still get a percentage of money, and 23 that's where Ashley can come in and kind of explain that 24 to you. I have a little handout that breaks out the 25 incentive program. 8 1 So as you see from that chart up there, TAC 2 gives rewards based on your county size, and because we 3 have approximately 280 people on our county insurance, 4 we fall in that largest group. So we have the ability 5 to earn $9,000.00 per year based on their rewards 6 program. 7 And the reason for tying that Sonic Boom 8 completion, the TAC Healthy County completion of getting 9 that $50.00 to this program is to boost that 10 participation. We've kind of dwindled down a little 11 bit. So projecting what we're going to get this year 12 from that program is a lot less than what we've gotten 13 in past years. 14 There's also an on-site training class. I 15 did one in February, where I had Mark from TAC come out 16 and talk about -- was it sleep depravation? No. It was 17 stress. How stress affects your health. And because 18 I've done -- because we've already had that, we will 19 receive $900.00 from TAC just for having a class here. 20 And then based on participation, we get a percentage. 21 So right now we're probably looking at $1,080.00 just 22 from that, and then whatever we get from Healthy County. 23 And this -- all these dollars goes towards 24 our Christmas party. It's how we help fund the meal or 25 the prizes, or you know, however we work that out with 9 1 that. But so what I am looking at doing is increasing 2 the amount of money we can get from TAC to help with 3 that. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can you explain the 9000 5 is the max, and we would get 4,410 projected of that 6 9000? 7 MRS. SOLDAN: Uh-huh. But not this year, 8 because we have to have the county-specific incentive in 9 place for a year before we qualify for that extra money. 10 But this is showing what we could get, and this is based 11 on current level participation. If we can boost that 12 participation by having that county-specific incentive 13 then we would get more than that. We could get 14 $9,000.00 ultimately. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is there any impact on 16 our insurance rate based on our participation or 17 anything? 18 MS. CURETON: Yeah. Okay, sorry, I'm going 19 to step in now. So the whole goal is that long term 20 we're going to be able to see rates decrease over time. 21 Because the healthier you are, the less likely you need 22 to go to the doctor. So it doesn't matter what the 23 doctor is costing, or the facilities are costing if 24 you're not having to utilize it, then your rates are 25 going to go down with those claim dollars. 10 1 So that's where we're wanting to implement 2 these programs and getting our members more active, more 3 engaged into the program. And that's kind of why we 4 changed the employer rewards program to add in those 5 other facets, or component, to allow counties to earn 6 more funds by being more engaged in that. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How many -- is there an 8 estimate on how many -- well, you having a physical is 9 part of this program, correct? You have to get a 10 physical? 11 MRS. SOLDAN: That's the suggestion that 12 we're making to the Court. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What percent of our 14 employees, do you have any idea, have annual physicals 15 now? 16 MRS. SOLDAN: I don't know. 17 MS. CURETON: That was the one stat I did 18 not look up yesterday. Yeah, so we can definitely, and 19 I can -- Mark will -- Mark's my counterpart. I serve 20 the east territory. But Mark can definitely provide 21 with you that percentage of employees that currently get 22 their annual exam. 23 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So, fundamental 24 question, Tracy. For an employee that works out 25 regularly, and has a physical exam, do they have -- how 11 1 do become part of this pool? And I don't know what ASO 2 means, stands for. What's ASO stand for? 3 MS. CURETON: ASO is our Administrative 4 Services Only. And so that's our self-funded groups. 5 You guys are part of our fully-pooled groups. 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Independent of ASO? 7 MS. CURETON: Don't worry about the ASO. 8 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So what -- we probably 9 have a lot of employees that do that, that work out 10 regularly, that have physical exams. How do we -- 11 should they be a part of the program, or they have to do 12 something special? What do they need to do? 13 MS. CURETON: We just turn on the tracking. 14 And so for our -- 15 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, what do you mean 16 when you say turn on the tracking? 17 MS. CURETON: For the claims to get their 18 annual exams. So we'll just turn that on, and then also 19 you guys are going to be reporting that through the 20 form, too. And so that'll just be the additional thing, 21 I guess that employees would need to do just take that 22 form to their doctors. And that's just kind of a backup 23 plan, because if a doctor is managing them for a chronic 24 condition, blood pressure, diabetes or whatever, the 25 doctor's going to file the claim under that. And if 12 1 they do that, then we're unable to get that claim, 2 because doctors get more money if they're treating a 3 chronic condition. 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So do you think our 5 employees know about this then? 6 MRS. SOLDAN: Well, they know that -- 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I'm going to plead 8 guilty, okay? I'm not part of your program. 9 MRS. SOLDAN: The Sonic Boom Program? 10 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I don't know what the 11 Sonic Boom is. 12 MRS. SOLDAN: That's the program where if 13 you walk 6000 steps per day for a total of 30 days over 14 the program, you qualify for that. There's four 15 challenges per year. If you complete three of them, you 16 get a $50.00 gift card at the end of the year. That's 17 been in place for years. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. All right. 19 So -- 20 MRS. SOLDAN: This new thing -- 21 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So people like myself 22 need to sign up for that? 23 MRS. SOLDAN: Yes. And if you have a 24 tracker -- 25 MS. CURETON: It doesn't look like you have 13 1 one. 2 MRS. SOLDAN: -- then, yeah. And you have 3 an app on your phone, and you know where you stand 4 and -- 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: You just record how 6 many steps you take? 7 MRS. SOLDAN: -- it records it for you 8 and -- 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: A piece of cake. Okay, 10 good. 11 MRS. SOLDAN: And so the new part -- 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I'm bad. Am I bad for 13 not being part of it, because I know Rusty works out at 14 his facility ALL the time. 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Not yet. I do; but not 16 there, and I have the tracker. 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Are you part of this 18 program? 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, I did not get 20 signed up on this latest one, but I have been for years. 21 MRS. SOLDAN: But you still can. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I didn't know what the 23 deadline was. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Maybe there's a lot of 25 people like bad me, okay, that are not part of the 14 1 program that could be that could be benefitting. 2 MRS. SOLDAN: Dawn just brought up, too, you 3 have to be on the county's health insurance to be able 4 to participate. 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, I'm not. Why is 6 that? 7 MS. CURETON: Going back to the long-term 8 strategy of just reducing cost. 9 MRS. SOLDAN: And having a healthy county 10 population. 11 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, I can be healthy, 12 but I don't need health insurance through the County, 13 because I've got it two other ways. 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Health insurance is 15 providing the benefits. 16 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay, that's the reason 17 I'm not bad after all. 18 (Laughter.) 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But I am, so you know -- 20 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: When's the deadline to 22 sign up? 23 MRS. SOLDAN: I don't know that there is. 24 MS. CURETON: For the Sonic Boom, there is 25 no deadline honestly. Well, if you want to earn the 15 1 incentive the next challenge starts Monday. So that's 2 three more concepts that you have that you would need to 3 complete in order to earn that incentive. So I guess 4 essentially if you can sign up before the end of the 5 second challenge then you would be eligible to earn the 6 incentive for to complete all three of those. But 7 that's not technically like a hard deadline. 8 MRS. SOLDAN: You can sign up at any time, 9 but in order to get that reward you have to complete 10 three of the four challenges. There are three 11 challenges left. 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That reward, real 13 quick, is also the fifty dollars, VISA card or whatever, 14 I mean that the employee get. And I've gotten it for 15 most of the years since the County started it. And it 16 really does make it nice, so you can use it when your 17 Amazon shopping, you can use it anywhere you pretty well 18 want to. That's a 50 just for doing those incentives. 19 But the problem we had is as department 20 heads, is really getting good active participation from 21 all the employees. I got quite a few that do do it, but 22 I think an incentive program locally would really help 23 get them jump started to do it. I get the physical 24 every year, just had it a couple days ago, and I try and 25 do those. But you know, I mean, I'll be honest and 16 1 y'all know it, I've got some employees in my division 2 that need it, okay, you know, and -- 3 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Need to be 4 incentivized. 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And anything that we 6 can do to incentivize. And you start talking, yeah, 7 it's a cost, it's a cost on the County giving that extra 8 day off, and in some ways my clerical that don't have 9 that opportunity, it would be real nice for all them. 10 Deputies, it's hard to give them that extra day because 11 they're already working so much comp and that, but 12 really, we would save it in the end of the year by the 13 fewer number days of sick leave that are being used. 14 You know, the healthier we get them, they don't use the 15 sick leave, which also in that term, because if somebody 16 calls in sick in my department, I gotta call in somebody 17 that's off, so we're going to pay that extra for all 18 that for every time there's somebody sick. So the more 19 we can cut down on the sick leave the better production 20 we have, so I think it would be a great program. 21 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Tracy, on the 22 challenges and what have you, is it the honor system? 23 How do you -- on like the 6000 steps or whatever? 24 MRS. SOLDAN: It's all done through your 25 tracker. And it goes to a company called Sonic Boom, 17 1 and they're the ones that -- so it's not on the honor 2 system. I mean it's actually a track. 3 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: All right, thank you. 4 MRS. SOLDAN: And with the annual physical, 5 because we're starting this in May, we would like for it 6 to be retroactive, so if anybody went from January 1 7 this year through December 31st, they would be able to 8 qualify for that, and then receive -- and by that time, 9 we should know who completed the Sonic Boom and then we 10 can -- with both of those pieces, can tell the 11 Department Head and the employee, okay, you qualified 12 for this extra day off and then that way the supervisors 13 know how to work that schedule. 14 COMMISSIONER MOSER: How many other counties 15 give an incentive of a day off? 16 MS. CURETON: Of a day off, maybe five to 17 eight. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Five to eight counties 19 out of 254? 20 MS. CURETON: No. So within who offers an 21 additional incentive program county-specific one, we 22 have about 16 counties that do that right now. And so 23 within that about half of them offer like a half day off 24 for each activity, and some offer a full day like you 25 guys are talking about. 18 1 COMMISSIONER MOSER: A very small number out 2 of all the counties in the state. 3 MRS. SOLDAN: Which is why TAC's trying to 4 sweeten the pot by giving us money for coming up with an 5 incentive. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think the programming 7 that I haven't participated in it, though I should, 8 because I certainly walk more than that on a daily basis 9 doing other things. But I think that the more we can 10 encourage our employees to be healthy, it's a good 11 thing. And you know, getting an annual physical is a 12 good thing, so I mean -- you know, I think it's a good 13 program. I think indirectly it helps us -- we do get 14 money back, and I haven't done the math. How many 15 employees are in the program now? 16 MRS. SOLDAN: Right now we have -- 17 MS. CURETON: 43. 18 MRS. SOLDAN: -- 43 are actively 19 participating, which is why I would like to boost 20 participation. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So I mean the cost 22 probably if we get this 27 hundred dollars or some 23 amount, if we get a rebate on it, the cost is not that 24 substantial. 25 MRS. LANTZ: And I just want to say one year 19 1 that we had the largest participation, Tracy and I were 2 able to do a luncheon for all of those that did 3 participate, so we invited everybody to lunch, and we 4 had it catered. And it was one of the really popular 5 things everybody liked, too. So that's another 6 incentive we can encourage them if you participate in it 7 and you did X, Y, Z, you will get -- you will be 8 included in this luncheon. 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Good. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And you can also when 11 you pull that up online, on the program, you can see 12 where you can -- and this gets them when you get 13 deputies competing against each other, because they can 14 see well, this deputy has got 20 thousand steps, and 15 this one's got 18, I better walk a lot more. So as long 16 as they don't throw this thing in the dryer, they're not 17 cheating; but if they do it that way, they're cheating. 18 MS. CURETON: Man, y'all, I've heard it all. 19 (Laughter.) 20 MRS. SOLDAN: In the past, we generally get 21 about $4,000.00 per year. I don't -- unless we can get 22 more participation, I don't see us getting that this 23 year because of the low number of participants. And 24 that one year that Dawn was talking about, we got 75 25 hundred dollars, that was our biggest year, and which is 20 1 why we could do a luncheon. 2 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Good objective. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Then anybody make a 4 motion? 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I'm not against it, but 6 what -- help me word the motion, and I'll be happy to. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I'll make motion 8 that we improve the incentive benefit for Kerr County 9 employees to participate in Healthy County Challenges by 10 providing an additional day off in the following year, 11 and part of that is requiring an annual physical, which 12 would be retroactive to January 1st, 2019. 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: And being part of the 14 program. I'll second that. 15 MRS. SOLDAN: Including the participation of 16 the Sonic Boom Program. 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Right. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. We have a motion, 19 and we have a second. I'm not going to try to re read 20 that. I think we understand the motion. Any further 21 discussion? All in favor raise your right hand. It's 22 unanimous, three zero. 23 MRS. SOLDAN: Thank you. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Thank you, ladies. 25 * * * * * 21 1 STATE OF TEXAS * 2 COUNTY OF KERR * 3 I, DEBRA ELLEN GIFFORD, Certified Shorthand 4 Reporter in and for the State of Texas, and Official 5 Reporter in and for Kerr County, do hereby certify that 6 the above and foregoing pages contain and comprise a 7 true and correct transcription of the proceedings had in 8 the above-entitled Commissioners' Court Approval Agenda. 9 Dated this the 3rd day of June, A.D. 2019. 10 11 /s/DEBRA ELLEN GIFFORD Certified Shorthand Reporter 12 No. 953 Expiration Date 04/31/2020 13 * * * * * * 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25