1 1 2 3 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS' COURT 4 Regular Session 5 Monday, March 9, 2020 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: ROB KELLY, Kerr County Judge HARLEY BELEW, Commissioner Precinct 1 24 TOM MOSER, Commissioner Precinct 2 JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Precinct 3 25 DON HARRIS, Commissioner Precinct 4 2 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 *** Commissioner's Comments. 7 4 1.1 Report from Emergency Management Coordinator 10 regarding the COVID-19 virus. 5 1.2 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 21 6 action regarding possible Veteran's Court. 7 1.3 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 30 action regarding the liaison appointment 8 responsibilities and schedule for quarterly reports. 9 1.4 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 45 10 action to approve a Proclamation from Dietert Center proclaiming March 2020 as 11 the 18th Annual March for Meals Month. 12 1.5 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 47 action for the Court to approve the 13 contract between Computer Information Concepts, Inc. and Kerr County, and 14 authorize the County Judge to sign. 15 1.6 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 49 action on Order permitting Republic 16 Services to use proceeds from tax-exempt Bonds for their solid waste disposal 17 facility located in Kerr County. 18 1.7 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 53 action on request to approve a Proclamation 19 from the Kerr County Child Services Board declaring April 2020 as Child Abuse 20 Awareness Month, and allow the use of a portion of the courthouse square for a 21 display during the month of April. 22 1.8 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 55 action to approve Official Bond and Oath 23 for Kyle Schneider, Constable Precinct 2. 24 25 3 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 1.9 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 56 action to approve the request for Kerr 4 County to pro rate distribution of proceeds from tobacco sale settlement permanent 5 trust account, and authorize County Judge to sign same. 6 1.10 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 59 7 action regarding the County's participation on AACOG Comprehensive Economic Development 8 Strategy (CEDS) Committee. 9 1.11 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 61 action to approve a $100.00 donation from 10 a citizen for the Sheriff's Equipment Fund: 72-370-53. 11 1.12 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 62 12 action regarding the approval of use of the Kerr County Courthouse parking lot for 13 the South Texas Blood Drive on April 2, 2020. 14 1.13 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 63 action to correct an error in the 15 presentation of Agenda Items 1.12 and 1.13 from the February 24, 2020 Commissioners' 16 Court meeting concerning the former Kerr County Flood Damage Prevention Order, which 17 was incorrectly referred to as Order No. 32024, but is actually Order No. 32034. 18 1.14 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 64 19 action to authorize the Engineering Department to amend a cattle guard 20 installation permit issued to Campbell Creek Ranch, LTD by clarifying that 21 disposal of the old cattle guard is the responsibility of Campbell Creek Ranch, LTD. 22 Location of cattle guard is in Burr Oak Road at a location approximately 3 miles 23 south of FM 1340. 24 25 4 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 1.15 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 64 action to ratify and confirm the Project 4 Completion Report and Self-Monitoring Review Certification for TxCDBG (Texas Community 5 Development Block Grant) Contract 7215045. 6 1.16 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 64 action to ratify and confirm the Contract 7 Amendment/Modification Request for TxCDBG (Texas Community Development Block Grant) 8 Contract 7215045. 9 1.17 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 64 action to ratify and confirm Contract 10 Amendment 1 for TxCDBG (Texas Community Development Block Grant) Contract 7217045 11 CEDAP (Colonia Economically Distressed Area Program) requesting contract extension. 12 1.18 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 64 13 action to approve Amendment 2 for TxCDBG (Texas Community Development Block Grant) 14 Contract 7217045 CEDAP (Colonia Economically Distressed Area Program) requesting contract 15 extension. 16 1.19 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 64 action to approve Amendment 1 for TxCDBG 17 (Texas Community Development Block Grant) Contract 7218045 requesting contract extension. 18 1.20 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 64 19 action to approve Amendment 1 for TxCDBG (Texas Community Development Block Grant) 20 Contract 7218055 requesting contract extension. 21 1.21 Discussion regarding the process for 75 precinct redistricting and the retention 22 of legal counsel. 23 1.22 Presentation from Texas Indigent Defense 84 Commission regarding their Hill Country 24 Public Defender Planning Study. 25 5 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 1.23 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 146 action to approve contracts with Center 4 Point Volunteer Fire Department and the Mountain Home Volunteer Fire Department, 5 and allow County Judge to sign same. 6 1.24 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 147 action regarding Workshop Schedule. 7 1.25 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 153 8 action to reappoint Lee Hall to the Emergency Services District #2 (ESD #2) 9 Board. 10 1.26 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 153 action on offer for settlement of 11 Settlement Agreement with Bonding Companies entered into December 13, 2004, Court 12 Order No. 28932 with Emily Behrens, doing business as Associated Bonding Company. 13 2.1 Pay Bills. 157 14 2.2 Budget Amendments. 157 15 2.3 Late Bills. 157 16 2.5 Accept Monthly Reports. 158 17 2.6 Court Orders. 159 18 3.2 Status reports from Elected Officials. 159 19 3.3 Status reports from Judge and 20 Commissioners. Discussions related to reports may follow. 21 (a) Statement of Grant Award (SGA) for 160 22 FY-20 Formula Grant Program from Texas Indigent Defense Commission (TIDC). 23 Grant amount is $61,559.00. 24 (b) Alcoholic beverage sales in 160 Precinct 2. 25 6 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 (c) Veterans Pathway. 161 4 (d) East Kerr/Center Point Wastewater 163 System. 5 (e) Noise nuisance. 166 6 (f) Update regarding storm damage from 167 7 3/3/20 storm. 8 3.4 Quarterly status reports from Liaison Commissioners on projects and activity 9 of the: 10 (a) OSSF Department. 168 11 (b) Environmental Health Department. 170 12 (c) Animal Services. 170 13 *** Adjournment. 172 14 *** Reporter's Certificate. 173 15 * * * * * * 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 7 1 JUDGE KELLY: Good morning. It is Monday, 2 March 9th, 2020, and it's nine o'clock in the morning 3 and the Kerr County Commissioners' Court is now in 4 session. The first thing I need to do is advise 5 everybody to turn off your phones. If your phones go 6 off, you're going to have give them to me and the 7 Sheriff's going to deliver them to me. 8 (Sheriff shaking in negative manner.) 9 JUDGE KELLY: And that is the policy of the 10 Court so this is how we -- we don't get interrupted. 11 And that includes us. As you notice, I don't have mine 12 here. Okay. If you would, let's stand for the prayer 13 and the pledge by Commissioner Letz. 14 (Prayer and The Pledge of Allegiance.) 15 JUDGE KELLY: Please be seated. The next 16 part of the agenda is our invitation for public input. 17 Commissioner Letz and I learned in Austin this year -- 18 or last year, I guess it was, that a lot of counties 19 don't allow public input. A lot of cities don't allow 20 public input, which is counter-intuitive to being public 21 servants. But nonetheless we do. And so if anybody has 22 any business that they would like to address the Court 23 about that's not on the agenda, this is your opportunity 24 to come forward and address it. If it's on the agenda, 25 we ask that you wait until that agenda item and we'll 8 1 take you at that time. 2 Now, I have here the -- if you're going to 3 speak, there's a speaker information form that you fill 4 out at the back of the room or I can hand you one, hand 5 you this one. But you fill that out and then we'll take 6 you either now or when the agenda item is called. Is 7 there anybody who would like to address the Court? 8 Okay. Thank you. 9 Next part of the agenda is the 10 Commissioners' Comments. This is where you get kind of 11 a -- I guess a scouting report of what's going on in the 12 four different Precincts. So let's start -- let's go 13 the other way today, Commissioner Belew. 4 will go 14 first. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Well, as Commissioner 16 Letz mentioned, we got some rain and -- and as big as 17 Precinct 4 is, we all got a little bit of the rain. 18 And, you know, sometimes we'll get some in Ingram and 19 Divide gets nothing. But everybody got a little bit of 20 it so we're happy with that. That's about all I got 21 today. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Good. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, two things this 24 morning. One, Little League is about to kick up with 25 games, which means traffic will be a lot more congested, 9 1 both on the Holdsworth area and at the County fields on 2 Highway 27. They'll be playing games at both facilities 3 so a lot more traffic. And little kids sometimes don't 4 pay as much attention as they should. 5 And the other item is the -- I don't know, 6 several months ago I guess now, a group led by Judge 7 Pollard came in and talked about a -- developing a 8 statue of Admiral Nimitz to put on the Courthouse 9 square. We said go forward. I just want to report that 10 they're going forward fast. Real fast. And they'll be 11 doing some more information about that and they'll 12 probably be coming to the Court pretty soon, but they 13 have -- are in the process of interviewing sculptors, 14 very renown sculptors. They're looking at a statue to 15 be probably nine feet tall. Anyway. And it's all going 16 to be coming through the Court for us to approve each 17 step of the way, but I just wanted to report that 18 they're -- they hit the ground running when we said go. 19 That's it. 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I'm going to delay some 21 of my information and more detail under Section 3 of the 22 information. But basically I'm going to talk about 23 alcohol beverage sales in Precinct 2, Veterans Pathway 24 in Precinct 2, and the status of the sewer system in 25 Center Point and Neuroscape Earth, East Kerr County, and 10 1 then a noise issue. So I'll -- I'll defer those until a 2 little bit later. 3 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I don't really have 4 anything. 5 JUDGE KELLY: The only thing that I would 6 ask for those of you that don't know, Chester Nimitz 7 family was originally from Gillespie County, 8 Fredericksburg, but he actually grew up here in 9 Kerrville. Went to Tivy High School. Did not graduate. 10 Was tutored and admitted to the United States Naval 11 Academy early. 12 But the reason we're talking about putting a 13 statue on our Courthouse lawn is because he belongs to 14 us; not them. But his family had the hotel over there 15 but that's -- that's about all he had. But that's just 16 for information purposes. 17 Let me move on. We've got a business agenda 18 today so we're going to try to be efficient. Item 1.1 19 is a report from the Emergency Management Coordinator 20 regarding the COVID-19 virus. And as Dub Thomas comes 21 forward, let me say one of the things -- my take away 22 from the meetings that we've attended, and he and I were 23 at a meeting last week on this, anyone in the know is no 24 longer supposed to call this a Corona virus, because 25 there are multiple Corona viruses. Half of us in this 11 1 room probably have a Corona virus, which is a cold or a 2 flu. This is a special type of Corona virus. And so 3 they have told us that the new buzz word is COVID-19. 4 And so when you hear people talk about a Corona virus, 5 they haven't had the briefing you're about to get. 6 Because from now on if you talk about it knowledgeably, 7 it is COVID-19. So with that, Dub Thomas. 8 MR. THOMAS: Thank you, Judge. You just 9 touched on one of the things I wanted to touch on this 10 morning. To try and keep everybody from -- there's a 11 lot of misinformation out there running around. And 12 it's not -- like you said, there's all types of Corona 13 viruses running around, but this one has actually been 14 called the COVID-19 so we're going to continue to 15 address it as that. 16 We're on conference calls every Thursday 17 afternoon, just to kind of give you an update on some of 18 the numbers that are going around. Now, I understand 19 from talking to Jeremy some of these numbers have 20 updated today as well. But the CDC reported 99 21 confirmed and presumptive cases, 10 COVID-19 related 22 deaths, 13 states and New York City reported a case of 23 COVID-19. 24 In the State of Texas this morning on the 25 DSHS website -- again, now these numbers are not 12 1 updated -- there are eight confirmed cases in Texas. 2 Three are in Fort Bend County, five are in Harris 3 County. None of these have been what we call a 4 community spread. Basically they're all folks that have 5 come in, they've been traveling from somewhere. So -- 6 JUDGE KELLY: And that's something you and I 7 learned, too. There's community spread, which is the 8 fearful one, and then there's travel spread. 9 MR. THOMAS: Correct. 10 JUDGE KELLY: And these are all travel 11 spread. 12 MR. THOMAS: And these are all traffic 13 spread. And they're all currently contained, they're 14 being treated or -- they're being either treated in 15 their respective counties or they're at another facility 16 somewhere else. 17 Again, let's see. The 96,000 cases, 3300 18 deaths, 85 countries. There were 45 a week ago. Some 19 of the countermeasures that we've talked about are 20 personal hygiene. Wash your hands. Don't sneeze, cover 21 your face, those types of things. Personal protective 22 equipment. Face masks. But face masks are recommended 23 only for those folks who are actually ill, not those of 24 us who aren't. 25 JUDGE KELLY: And I'm just -- we were at the 13 1 same meeting. 2 MR. THOMAS: Three times. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah, you were there three 4 times; I was there once. My take away on the mask was 5 that it's for the sick. If you're sick, you wear the 6 mask. If you're treating the sick, you wear the mask. 7 But for everyday people, no mask. 8 MR. THOMAS: Yeah, that's correct. And then 9 we've had some other community -- they're talking about 10 quarantine and isolation. Two weeks is basically the 11 isolation period. And then there are some community 12 mitigation activities. Of course, you've already seen 13 the South by Southwest has been cancelled for a year, 14 which is the first time in 30-some odd years. It's 15 never been cancelled before. 16 Currently there are labs in El Paso, Dallas, 17 Lubbock, Tarrant, and Houston. Also, the DSHS lab in 18 Austin will be able to do testing and, according to the 19 last number I had, was they were able to test 10 to 25 20 per day. And there are about 75,000, 78,000 test kits 21 coming out to those particular labs. So the ability to 22 test people and to get results will happen a lot 23 quicker. 24 Right now -- excuse me -- any positives are 25 going to be considered presumptive until they're 14 1 confirmed by the CDC. So all of our labs, whether or 2 not they test positive, they'll still be sent to the CDC 3 for confirmation. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, let me ask a 5 question. 6 MR. THOMAS: Yes, sir. 7 COMMISSIONER BELEW: How accurate are the 8 test kits then if they have to be forwarded? 9 MR. THOMAS: I don't know. They -- they 10 test three times. So, you know, they had a -- the lady 11 in San Antonio before they shut down the mall and 12 everything else tested negative twice and then the third 13 time tested positive, so I don't know. Just me asking a 14 question, how many of those were false negatives and 15 what's maybe a false positive, so I don't know. But 16 they're right now, currently, they're doing three tests. 17 As far as locally, we were on this -- 18 (coughing) excuse me. I do not have -- 19 (Laughter.) 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Don't shake his hand 21 because he coughed in his hand. 22 MR. THOMAS: I might have the Corona virus, 23 but it's not the COVID-19, how about that. We started 24 on this back in January, long before most other people 25 did. The virus actually started out in December. First 15 1 part of January we were on it. We were having meetings 2 between myself, Jeremy with Emergency Management 3 coordinator for the City. By the way, we've got Jeremy 4 Hughes here, he's the Emergency Management Coordinator 5 with the City. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Stand up and show them who you 7 are. 8 MR. THOMAS: And Chief Dannie Smith with the 9 fire department, Head Chief, and then Eric Maloney, EMS 10 Director. So if you have any questions that I can't 11 answer, I'll defer to them. Because they threw me under 12 the bus and they said Dub, we've got your back today. 13 So we started having meetings with myself, 14 Jeremy, Peterson Regional Hospital, and then included 15 Tivy High School at one point, and so we've already come 16 up with protocols and procedures for if somebody should 17 test positive or somebody walks in from the street and 18 tests positive for the Corona -- COVID-ID here in the 19 City of Kerrville. 20 JUDGE KELLY: And again, let me interrupt 21 here just briefly. These are facts that I learned -- 22 you know, as the Judge I get to go sit and listen to all 23 this stuff and they were comforting facts to learn. We 24 have -- and one of the rooms at the emergency room is a 25 no pressure, zero pressure room that's already been 16 1 designated to take any -- anybody suspected of having 2 COVID-19. We have two rooms right now and, if 3 necessary, have the entire wing of the hospital that are 4 zero pressure rooms to handle this. And the zero 5 pressure is so that when you sneeze or whatever it 6 doesn't spread. And believe it or not, we have a zero 7 pressure operating room. So if they have to do a 8 bronchoscopy or something like that, we actually are 9 prepared. These are comforting facts for me and I just 10 wanted to share there. I didn't mean to interrupt you, 11 Dub. 12 MR. THOMAS: Oh, that's fine. Anytime, 13 Judge. 14 So -- now I forgot what I was going to say. 15 Anyway, we've been practicing this for -- and been 16 talking about this for the last two or three months and 17 we have plans for the next couple weeks to have larger 18 stakeholder meetings and include more of the community 19 into this. I've been sending information out to the 20 school districts out in the County. Divide, Ingram, 21 Hunt, and Center Point. And we're going to include 22 them, and we'll probably start including some more folks 23 like Schreiner University, Alamo College, those types of 24 folks. (Coughing.) Excuse me. Again. 25 This is really kind of interesting, because 17 1 at this point we probably activated pretty much two or 2 three of our annexes for the emergency management plan, 3 public information and warning, health and medical. And 4 so, those two for sure. 5 But one of the things that we do every year 6 is that we practice for -- for this type of incident is 7 if they come out with an inoculation where we needed to 8 mass -- inoculate mass numbers of people. Every year we 9 practice our flu clinic. We have it out at the Youth 10 Event Center. Between us, HEB, Peterson Regional, EMS, 11 and the fire department and the 13 members, we're -- 12 we've been able to inoculate several thousand people 13 every year for our flu clinic. So it's something we 14 practice every year and I think we're ready. 15 You guys have anything else you want to say? 16 JUDGE KELLY: Before you sit down, I -- I 17 want to thank the City representatives for coming. I've 18 spent more time with them in the last couple of weeks 19 than I have probably in the last -- ever, I think. We 20 had an emergency management exercise a couple weeks ago. 21 MR. THOMAS: Our point to point. Yes, sir. 22 JUDGE KELLY: A point to point. And it 23 wasn't on -- on COVID-19, it was already something that 24 was preplanned. But just so that you know, they are in 25 -- in regular contact with one another. The City, the 18 1 County, the hospital, the State. This is something that 2 I want to assure all the people, all the citizens of the 3 County that we are prepared, as much as we can be. We 4 don't know what's going to happen with this. There are 5 a lot of unknowns. But we are meeting, we are prepared. 6 We have plans. 7 The County is central to this. The Youth 8 Event Center is kind of the gathering point for all of 9 this. And we all listen to the news. And one f the 10 things they told us at the briefing at Peterson last 11 week was quit getting your news on COVID-19 off the 12 Internet. There's so much misinformation out there. Or 13 some people say the fake news. Get your information 14 from your local people. From the County, from the City. 15 Go to our websites from the State. That's where the 16 accurate information is. And so before we all panic, 17 just know that our people are ready, we're prepared, 18 we're working together with the coordinated effort. And 19 we're going to do the best that we absolutely can. So 20 rest assured that we are on top of what's going on. 21 MR. THOMAS: Thank you, Judge. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. Thank you, Dub. 23 MR. THOMAS: I appreciate it. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: You mentioned website. 25 Is there anything on the County website? 19 1 MR. THOMAS: I've been passing that 2 information on to Lisa Walters and I believe she's been 3 putting it on the website. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Yep. 5 MR. THOMAS: And we're going to continue to 6 put -- 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Good deal. 8 MR. THOMAS: -- public information out on 9 the website. Well, and Facebook. 10 JUDGE KELLY: And Facebook. 11 MR. THOMAS: And I've got some more 12 information, I'm either going to put it out today or 13 tomorrow, whenever I get in touch with her. There's 14 more information coming out about what cleaning products 15 you can use. More information and you can get this off 16 the CDC's website or the Department of State Health 17 Services website. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Good deal. 19 JUDGE KELLY: And -- and just as an 20 interesting footnote, Clorox stock jumped 40 percent 21 already. So it's too late to get in on the profits on 22 Clorox stock. But just throw that in for what it's 23 worth. And thank you very much. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: You got another 25 question out there. 20 1 JUDGE KELLY: Yes, sir. 2 MR. CANTRELL: Bill Cantrell. I've got a 3 question for you. That's a weekly briefing you get? 4 MR. THOMAS: There's -- there is a -- 5 there's one on Thursday afternoon that's more government 6 officials, and then there's one every day for health and 7 medical. 8 MR. CANTRELL: And my question is, how much 9 are you in tune with the people coming into the military 10 establishments in San Antonio. I do believe, you know, 11 we've got thousands of people that are being held 12 quarantined onboard the cruise ships, for example, and I 13 understand that they -- these people, when the 14 government decides, are being brought to military bases, 15 people from the north on these cruise ships are being 16 taken to military bases in the north, and the ones from 17 the south are being taken to military bases in the 18 south. There's at least one that we know of right here. 19 I wonder if they're being straight with you about the 20 sanctity of their quarantine. 21 MR. THOMAS: I don't know. I'm not going to 22 go over there and look at it. Let me put it that way. 23 MR. CANTRELL: But we can ask. 24 MR. THOMAS: Sure. I mean, we -- we can 25 find out from Bexar County's Office of Emergency 21 1 Management in San Antonio as well and find out what 2 they're doing. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Now, bear in mind, we can't 4 stop people from lying to us. And they've been very 5 clear, very explicit as to what our jurisdiction is. 6 And let me tell you, our jurisdiction is on top of it. 7 What's -- what's going on in San Antonio, all we can do 8 is ask questions. And happy to do that. But I don't 9 want anybody here to think that we're going to go down 10 and try to police Lackland Air Force base because we're 11 not. Anything else? Thank you, Dub. 12 MR. THOMAS: Yes, sir. Thank y'all. 13 JUDGE KELLY: And thank y'all for coming. 14 Really appreciate the joint effort. 15 JUDGE KELLY: The next item on the agenda is 16 Item 1.2, which is kind of a house cleaning matter from 17 last week. And that's to consider, discuss and take 18 appropriate action regarding possible Veterans Court. 19 Ms. Mistretta. And I see you got your whole brigade 20 here. 21 What this is, so that everybody knows, is we 22 get semi-annual reports from our Department Heads. And 23 last week was the report from the Veterans Services 24 Office. And she came last week and talked to us about a 25 lot of things that were going on with Veterans Services, 22 1 but not about this Veterans Court consideration. And 2 since that is something that is vital for us to know, 3 especially as a court because there are Commissioners 4 here that have heard nothing about this, I brought her 5 back today, put her on the agenda early, just to give us 6 a helicopter view of generally what she's doing. 7 I think this has been going on about three 8 months. But it's time to bring it to the attention of 9 the Court and let us start doing our feasibility study 10 as to what we can afford and what we can't. 11 So with that, Ms. Mistretta. 12 MS. MISTRETTA: Yes, sir. So just to be 13 clear, we don't have all the facts for this Veterans 14 Treatment Court. Essentially, we were doing a 15 fact-finding mission before we presented it. So we were 16 seeing if our County actually needed it. Is it 17 something that our veterans would like. So that's kind 18 of where we're at with that. 19 Essentially, the Court would be a specialty 20 court for veterans as an alternative to serving time in 21 jail. So it would have -- work with the prosecution and 22 see if that individual meets the criteria to have a 23 special treatment, and then be implemented to this 24 program. So they would basically get treatment through 25 the VA and then -- they would have to plead guilty and 23 1 have treatment through the VA, and then they would go 2 through the particular program, and once it's all done 3 with, it would be expunged off their record. 4 Essentially, it's just trying to help rehabilitate 5 veterans that lost their way. 6 We still don't have all the answers of, you 7 know, the ins and outs of this, but that was something 8 that we've been requested several times and we've looked 9 into it. We went to Hays County and sat through one of 10 their treatment courts, which was a misdemeanor court, 11 and we have a court on the 16th of March to go sit in 12 Bexar County of their treatment court for felonies and 13 misdemeanors. So that's what I have where we're at at 14 this point. 15 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Let me -- let me say 16 something if I may. Jenna and Marty brought this as the 17 liaison to my attention last December, I think, after 18 they had seen the benefits of veterans court in Hays 19 County. And I had some personal knowledge of a Veteran 20 that, had he been able to have his case heard in 21 veterans court, probably would have made a total 22 difference in the thing. There are veterans courts -- 23 how many, 20 in the State, something like that? 24 MS. MISTRETTA: Uh-huh. 25 COMMISSIONER MOSER: El Paso. But there's 24 1 none in this region. So -- so Marty and Jenna have been 2 -- this is still in its very, very infancy. It's a 3 concept. Whether or not there's any benefit to having 4 something in the Hill Country, in Kerr County, is to be 5 determined. 6 So where they are today, and -- and there 7 really was not much information last week on what -- 8 what could -- how many people could benefit from this, 9 what are the benefits for this area. Have no idea what 10 it would cost. Not there yet. And -- and so it's what 11 is it, how would we do it. 12 And they found a couple of potential grants 13 that could help in this. So on a scale of one to ten, 14 if ten is a complete story, they're probably at about 15 Step 1 in this thing. So the advisory committee has 16 been cognizant of this, so I think it could be good. It 17 may not be anything that -- that this Court or this 18 County would ever want to pursue. So anyway. Thank 19 you, ladies. 20 MS. MISTRETTA: Hays County does have a 21 99 percent success rate with theirs. And we are -- 22 when we crunched the numbers, the preliminary numbers, 23 we are right on board with the same number of Veterans 24 that have been through the judicial system here. So 25 that was just something we looked at. And -- and it 25 1 helps us for the VA as well. So when we pulled the 2 numbers and went by birthdays of folks that have been 3 arrested in Kerr County, millennials are the biggest 4 number by a long shot. So that's telling us not only 5 are we not reaching the younger folks here, but also the 6 VA probably needs to do a little more outreach to make 7 sure those folks are getting taken care of. 8 COMMISSIONER MOSER: And what you're looking 9 at is a misdemeanor type court but -- 10 MS. MISTRETTA: Yes, sir. 11 COMMISSIONER MOSER: -- there are also 12 felony Veterans courts too, I understand. 13 MS. MISTRETTA: Yes. 14 COMMISSIONER MOSER: There are probably not 15 too many of those. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What -- I guess I don't 17 understand the purpose or the reason. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I -- I do. Let me weigh 19 in. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 21 JUDGE KELLY: For those of you that don't 22 know, the Veterans Services Office is a department of 23 the County, but it is not a mandated department. This 24 -- we're not required by the Texas Constitution, the 25 United States Constitution, Federal Law or State Law to 26 1 have one. And we're very proud of what y'all are doing. 2 Very, very proud. And they've completely turned this 3 program around, and we have nothing but praise for what 4 you've done. 5 What we're talking about with this Veterans 6 Court is a very elaborate program and very manpower 7 intensive. It requires a great deal of manpower at the 8 prosecutorial level, at the judicial level, and even at 9 the counseling level. It involves our probation 10 department. It's kind of -- if we're going to do this, 11 we have to coordinate it with the other departments that 12 are affected. 13 And one of the things that we're fighting 14 right now and we -- the benefits of the veterans court, 15 I think, are undisputed. But there are a lot of things 16 that are being done right now for the Veterans that have 17 not been explained to the public, that need to be 18 coordinated with how we do this. 19 And one of the things that we need to do as 20 a court, in my opinion, is since the Veterans Services 21 Department reports to the Court, works for the 22 Commissioners' Court, everybody on the Court needs to 23 know what's going on here. 24 And so we're talking about a huge outlay of 25 money here. Now, there are some grants available. I 27 1 understand. But we haven't coordinated anything with 2 the county departments that are affected. Such as, I've 3 been trying to touch base with the prosecutors, been 4 trying to touch base with the judges, the probation 5 departments, the Adult Probation -- Probation Department 6 on this. Because all of this we're going to have to sit 7 down at one big table at some point and -- and cuss and 8 discuss this, to figure out where we want to go with it. 9 But we certainly commend the effort and we're proud that 10 -- of what you do. 11 But the way it's going to work is we would 12 have to pull -- we'd have to delegate the 13 responsibilities to one of our own judges, a felony 14 judge at the district court level, to our County Court 15 at Law Judge for the misdemeanors. It's going to have 16 to be part -- we'll have to involve the prosecutors. 17 Both the two District Attorneys as well as the County 18 Attorney. We're go to have to involve Adult Probation. 19 And that's just -- that's just the tip of the iceberg. 20 We haven't even gotten to the rest of it. 21 It -- it's a massive effort. And I commend 22 you for doing it, but at this point it's something that 23 we need to take into consideration because we are 24 struggling with a deficit budget. How much is it? 25 About three million dollars? 28 1 MS. SHELTON: 3.5. 2 JUDGE KELLY: So -- yeah, we're struggling. 3 MS. MISTRETTA: Yes, sir. 4 JUDGE KELLY: And so what we want to do is 5 bring all the stakeholders to the table and, as I say, 6 cuss and discuss and we'll take it from there. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I still don't 8 understand, you know, the logic behind it really. I 9 mean, if there -- there's some mental health issues, 10 that -- that makes sense. But how big is the problem, I 11 guess, first? I mean, how many -- is it -- you know, 12 does it even warrant having a special court just for 13 Veterans? And then if a Veteran commits some sort of a 14 crime, why should they get different treatment than the 15 rest of the public? 16 MS. MISTRETTA: Well, that's -- 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Now, unless it's a 18 mental health issue. That's a little bit different. 19 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Let me give you an 20 example, if I may. These, I think, and correct me if 21 I'm wrong here. But I think the Courts have recognized 22 that Veterans sometimes have issues that -- that those 23 -- recognizing that those issues are unique to them 24 justifies having a separate court. Give you a case in 25 point. And the personal knowledge that I have -- 29 1 JUDGE KELLY: I'm going to interrupt you. 2 COMMISSIONER MOSER: No, let -- 3 JUDGE KELLY: No, I'm going to interrupt. 4 Excuse me. We've got a busy docket today and we're not 5 here to debate the merits. 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. 7 JUDGE KELLY: This is a huge issue. And we 8 appreciate what you're trying to do. And we appreciate 9 the fact finding. But -- but I don't want us to have a 10 debate about the issue here today until they finish 11 their work, we've talked to the stakeholders, and we 12 have this reported back to us. There's no need to -- 13 it's premature. 14 MS. MISTRETTA: So are you giving us 15 permission to continue to get more information on this? 16 JUDGE KELLY: I'm giving you permission to 17 coordinate with the other stakeholders. That's what I'm 18 giving you permission to do. 19 MS. MISTRETTA: Okay. 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Judge, if I may just 21 have 30 seconds on this. 30 seconds is all. 22 JUDGE KELLY: You've always got the last 23 word, Commissioner. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay, 30 seconds. This 25 particular individual had PTSD, could have gone to a 30 1 jury trial, probably would have been found innocent, but 2 he could not withstand the emotion of going through a 3 jury trial through the normal procedure. So that -- 4 that's an example. Okay. That's all. 5 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. Thank you very 6 much. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Thanks, ladies. Thank 8 you. 9 JUDGE KELLY: And thank the advisory 10 committee for being here. We appreciate your support. 11 Item 1.3 consider, discuss and take 12 appropriate action regarding the liaison appointment 13 responsibilities and schedule for quarterly reports. 14 This is a follow-up to what we just heard on 15 the agenda, the Departments report to us semi-annually. 16 The Commissioners, Liaison Commissioners are supposed to 17 report to us quarterly. We had -- we had this issue 18 come before the court last week, and we didn't find out 19 any of this, which upsets me. And so I went back and 20 pulled our liaison responsibilities. And if you take a 21 look at what our responsibilities are, we're supposed to 22 meet with our Departments monthly, we're supposed to 23 report back to the Court quarterly, we're supposed to 24 prepare year-end performance evaluations and bring them 25 to the Court. We haven't been doing any of this. And 31 1 so I put it on the agenda to see do we want to change 2 what our policy is with regard to Liaison Commissioners, 3 or do we want to enforce the policies we have? It's 4 that simple. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Judge, I have a -- I 6 read through them again and I think the -- what I see it 7 really -- to me the only lack is on the performance 8 reviews and we did do a pretty good job last year. This 9 year I don't know if we've done them. 10 But going to the last item on there. I mean 11 it says the liaison positions are not intended to hinder 12 any communication or contact between any Commissioners 13 or County Judge and any department head. Just because 14 there's a liaison -- that I'm liaison for Animal Control 15 doesn't mean that everyone else up here isn't supposed 16 to be communicating with Reagan and every other 17 department. It means that in the reasons, you know, 18 with the Open Meetings Act, everyone should be talking 19 to Reagan, we just can't talk amongst ourselves about 20 Reagan or his department. 21 JUDGE KELLY: And we talk about him behind 22 his back all the time. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, I mean, I think that 24 it's a -- and it's -- and the reason for the liaison, 25 which kind of helped the Department Heads rather than -- 32 1 you know, to have a lead person to talk to, but it's not 2 really to prevent us from talking to them. So I think 3 there's a responsibility for the members of the Court to 4 also communicate with all the Department Heads. And the 5 liaison gives the Department Head someone to contact if 6 they have a concern and say the simple things that we 7 can give guidance on. 8 So I think that it's a -- you know, to me 9 we're kind of -- I like the fact that we put the 10 quarterly reports back on there and I think we need to 11 do the evaluations, but I think it's working pretty 12 well. 13 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Let me say this. Some 14 of what the meetings might -- I don't think we need face 15 to face meetings. We can communicate via e-mail. If 16 there's an issue, if there's something coming up. Most 17 of what I reported last meeting on the historical 18 commission, I got via e-mail from Julie Leonard. So we 19 don't necessarily have to sit down, and to Commissioner 20 Letz's point about all of us having to have contact with 21 the various Department Heads. If somebody in Precinct 1 22 contacts me via e-mail or calls me or whatever and asks 23 me a question about Animal Control -- we're going to 24 pick on Reagan again -- then I -- I deal with Reagan. I 25 ask him the question. If I mention it at all to any of 33 1 the other County Commissioners I'm tapped out. So I'd 2 prefer to talk directly to him. If there's an issue 3 that needs to come up in Commissioners' Court then, you 4 know, it's still open. If something really did happen 5 then my point then at that juncture would be 6 Commissioner Letz. 7 And in this particular case, I'm talking 8 about it with the County Attorney and Reagan Givens, and 9 it'll eventually go back to Commissioner Letz without me 10 being involved or having to tap out of the thing. So 11 just as -- as something to consider, I think it's 12 working okay the way it is. 13 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I don't think we're 14 confined to any specific way of communication. Whatever 15 works. And just like Tanya and I and the County 16 Attorney and the Judge have been trying to get a meeting 17 together and it's just -- it's hard to do. So sometimes 18 you have to do it via e-mail or telephone or whatever. 19 You might not be able to get that face-to-face meeting. 20 But whatever works. 21 COMMISSIONER MOSER: There's a couple 22 things. I think in general our liaison responsibility 23 is very good. One of them is liaison should -- should 24 keep written notes from meetings. And we probably don't 25 do that. I don't -- you know, maybe we should. But 34 1 anyway, that's what our responsibility says we should 2 do. I think we probably oughta think about that if we 3 want to keep that as a requirement. 4 The other thing is on performance reviews, I 5 think we -- we've probably not a hundred percent covered 6 it in time with our performance reviews of our liaison 7 departments last year. I think we need to do probably a 8 better job on that. But a question is on -- on 9 performance reviews for some departments that we do not 10 have the liaison for, like engineering, or Road & 11 Bridge. What -- what is our process for that? Do we do 12 it as a court? That's the only way to do it, I guess, 13 unless we identify liaisons for -- make sure we've got a 14 liaison for every department. So, I'm not saying that 15 we need to resolve that today, but something that it's a 16 -- should be a consideration and look at 17 responsibilities. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I think on the 19 department that we don't have specific liaisons, such as 20 the Sheriff's Office, the Jail, Engineering, Road & 21 Bridge, because we all deal with them. Obviously, any 22 evaluation should come from the Court as a whole, with 23 each one of us being able to, I guess, submit our own 24 evaluation or share it, whatever, to come to some sort 25 of consensus to be able to present them some sort of 35 1 unified consensual evaluation. 2 One of the concerns that I have in the 3 liaison situation was one we had a few weeks back. And 4 it was the Airport Board. And was trying to find some 5 information out about capital proposals from the Airport 6 Board, and we didn't get that information, but we have 7 -- on the Airport Board, we have two Commissioners that 8 sit on that Board. And that's an automatic tap out 9 right there. 10 And when we talk about tap out, that means 11 we can't talk to somebody else until we're in this room. 12 If I talk to Commission Harris about something, I can't 13 go and talk to Commissioner Belew about it until we get 14 in here. And -- and one of the things that concerns me 15 is the tap out. That we tap out at KEDC. We'll talk 16 about them today. We've got two Commissioners on KEDC. 17 And if another one of us wants to go and find out what's 18 going on, we have to post it for a public meeting to be 19 able to attend the KEDC meeting or an Airport Board 20 meeting. Because we're tapped out. And those are just 21 concerns that I have. And it gets back to -- I'm 22 thinking -- I think maybe one liaison per department or 23 per office, and maybe even go pick up and start putting 24 liaisons on Engineering or Road & Bridge or Sheriff's 25 Department like we used to have. I know he's shaking 36 1 his head back there. He doesn't like it, I know. 2 But -- but the point being is we need to 3 have somebody come to this Court and talk to us about 4 what's going on. I mean -- 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah, like our 6 responsibility says commissioners as a liaison should 7 prepare performance evaluation of all department heads 8 and Commissioners' Court shall approve it. Well, you 9 know, that -- that's the way -- I think that's a good 10 way to do it. So if there's, you know, any Department 11 Heads there is a single liaison and that liaison will 12 prepare and present it to the Court for review. But for 13 the Sheriff's Department, which is really -- okay. Now, 14 the Sheriff's Department there is -- there isn't one or 15 -- or for -- let's just use Engineering, you know. So I 16 guess the entire court would prepare -- would be the way 17 it is right now since there's not a liaison. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Well, we can all talk. 19 There's no prohibition against talking to these offices 20 or departments. But the point being is somebody needs 21 to have the fiduciary responsibility to come back into 22 this courtroom and advise the other four of us what's 23 going on. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: But mechanically, 25 somebody's gotta prepare the performance evaluation. 37 1 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah. 2 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So do all five of us 3 prepare -- 4 JUDGE KELLY: The liaison prepares it, 5 brings it to the Court, the Court comes up with their 6 consensus and then presents it to the Court. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: But there's not a 8 liaison for Engineering. 9 JUDGE KELLY: That's my point. 10 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So who prepares it? 11 Who prepares the first draft? That would be a liaison. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, to me, on 13 Engineering we all do it. We don't evaluate the 14 Sheriff. The Sheriff's probably happy. 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, I think the 16 difference there is you're talking elected official and 17 a department. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. I know, Sheriff. 19 But I just -- 20 JUDGE KELLY: And we don't evaluate elected 21 officials; we only evaluate department heads. That's 22 the -- 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. So -- but I think 24 that we -- you know, with some of the departments we all 25 evaluate them. Even those that -- like, say, Animal 38 1 Control. I do the initial one for Animal Services. The 2 whole Court weighs in on it. And you all can do your 3 own. And I think they really -- they should be done. 4 And it's not necessary that we all are in total 5 agreement on each one. What's important is that there's 6 feedback from the employees so they understand what 7 they're doing. And these go into the personnel file. 8 Commissioner, you had a comment about the 9 written notes. I think the -- I think it's kind of 10 ambiguous, maybe need to clean up that language. The 11 reason we had that in there was I think primarily when 12 there's -- I don't want to use the word disciplinary, 13 but that's probably what it kind of is. That type of a 14 thing is so that we have, I consider the counseling 15 session, that those need to be in writing and get to 16 their personnel file. That's kind of what the intent of 17 that wording is. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, we need to change 19 that a little bit. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah, change it a little 21 bit. It's not making -- 22 COMMISSIONER BELEW: If we do keep them, we 23 have to really keep them. You have to keep them always. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Right. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, they go to the 39 1 personnel file. We don't keep the -- they're -- 2 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Yeah. That's what I'm 3 saying. They have to really be kept correctly. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I think the -- you 5 know, and it's a -- a fine line. And I'll go back since 6 the Judge brought up the Airport and capital budget. In 7 my mind, there is no reason for that to come to the 8 Court at this time because the Airport Board hasn't 9 decided what their budget was. It was like a -- a wish 10 list. It was a whole bunch of different things. 11 And if we start bringing every wish list 12 item from each department in here, we're going to be in 13 here all 24 hours a day. There's too much information. 14 There was no reason in my mind to bring that to the 15 Court until there's a budget proposed by the Airport. 16 Once that gets in place, yes, it needs to be discussed. 17 And I think once they do it -- but I think 18 this airport one in particular, they were talking about 19 a lot of long-term needs but it -- and it was -- what I 20 heard was that it was -- we have all this money and they 21 want to propose all this money in the budget. That 22 wasn't accurate. That's not what they were going to do. 23 They were trying to run through a bunch of different 24 projects and then they were going to prioritize them. 25 So once there's a priority list, that's when 40 1 it comes in and I think that we're going to really get 2 bogged down if we talk about, you know, our -- a lot of 3 issues like the CID here. I mean, we would be here 4 hours if we -- if the Judge and I submitted to -- 5 explained to the Court everything we talk about every 6 two weeks when we meet. I mean, there has to be some 7 discretion. 8 COMMISSIONER BELEW: It's worth noting also 9 that we're kind of mixing apples and oranges here. 10 Because some of these are external and some of them are 11 in-house. So I don't want -- I don't want people to get 12 the wrong impression. When you guys go to the KEDC 13 meeting or the airport or whatever, that's a lot 14 different than talking to the County Clerk or somebody 15 -- whoever you have a liaison position with. So just 16 keeping in mind, we're really mixing apples and oranges. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I agree. We are. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Well, and let me -- let me 19 just kind of -- we gotta wrap this up. We've got a busy 20 agenda. I respectfully disagree about the Airport Board 21 issue. Just like I did with the Veterans Court. I 22 learned about the Veterans Court without it being 23 presented in open court. And had I not learned about 24 it, I wouldn't even know what they were doing. And 25 they're three months into a very exhaustive undertaking. 41 1 With regard to the Airport Board, I learned 2 about that because there was a handout at their budget 3 workshop that had a $1.75 million ask for the County. 4 When that was brought to my attention, I'm looking 5 around going, like, why didn't somebody tell me about 6 that? Even if it's in the embryonic stages, I don't 7 like -- as everybody knows, I don't like surprises. And 8 I don't like hearing from other people the County's 9 business that's going on and we don't even have a whiff 10 of it. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But that's not an ask. 12 It's not going to be an ask. 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: After I looked at it, 14 that 1.7 went to $500,000. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. I mean, it's -- 16 it's not an ask. I mean, do -- are you going to let the 17 whole Court know every budget request that comes in from 18 every department? 19 JUDGE KELLY: Absolutely not. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. That's exactly 21 it, Judge. And I don't want you to. I'll expect you to 22 have your discretion and weed out a lot of the stuff so 23 that we can focus on the things that you think are more 24 important. 25 JUDGE KELLY: I went and sat down with 42 1 Mary Rohrer and Bill Wood personally -- 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Good. 3 JUDGE KELLY: -- for an hour and a half -- 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Good. 5 JUDGE KELLY: -- and talked about that 6 budget workshop handout. And then it went to $500,000. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, that's not accurate. 8 But you went and talked to them. 9 JUDGE KELLY: That's what -- that's what 10 they said to me that day. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: They had three items on 13 there coming up. I sat there after you were there, 14 looked at it and I said there's -- you know, we went 15 through each one of those things and there was one of 16 them that probably should be considered in next year's 17 budget. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I'm just trying to have 19 complete and total transparency for this Court. And 20 there's a whole lot of stuff going on behind the scenes 21 that this Court does not know about, and I object. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I disagree on that 23 one. I -- the -- 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I disagree also. 25 COMMISSIONER BELEW: We all are elected 43 1 officials. And we want to be able to answer our 2 constituents. But we can't let that drive what's 3 actually necessary for the Court to -- to function 4 properly. I understand occasionally being asked a 5 question I can't answer, because -- well, what was the 6 last issue that came up in here that I was the last guy 7 to know about it. So I found out in court. Had 8 somebody asked me that week, I would have had to say I 9 don't know. If I'm going to be honest, I can either 10 say -- 11 (Talking over). 12 COMMISSIONER BELEW: What? 13 JUDGE KELLY: The road at Vintage Heights. 14 COMMISSIONER BELEW: The road at Vintage 15 Heights, that's right. And so, I found out in this room 16 the same as everybody else did and -- because we had all 17 -- everybody had tapped out in every different 18 direction. So while I like to be able to get an answer 19 to my constituents, it's certainly not going to drive 20 how I function in this Court. And I think that I'm 21 hearing a little of that, if I'm not mistaken. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I think -- and I 23 agree with the Judge, but I think we need to be a lot -- 24 or the liaison line items in our agenda now, I like 25 that. Those are very good. But I think there are 44 1 times, as an example today, I talked to public comment a 2 little bit about the statue. I would have talked more 3 about it, but it wasn't an agenda item and I didn't know 4 it was going to be an agenda item because we didn't meet 5 until Friday and I couldn't talk about it. 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: And the County Attorney 7 starts staring at you. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. So that's why I 9 just made the real personal comment but -- 10 COMMISSIONER BELEW: That's what happens. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- I think there's a lot 12 more that needs to be addressed on the Court on that but 13 I just want to say, hey, this is working out here. 14 JUDGE KELLY: And for those of you that 15 can't see the County Attorney's eyes, she does stare at 16 me. 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Daggers. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. We've -- 19 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Avoid eye contact. 20 JUDGE KELLY: -- we've cussed and discussed. 21 But I am an advocate for transparency. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I agree. 23 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I agree also. 24 JUDGE KELLY: Let's try to move on a little 25 bit more quickly as we go forward. The next item on the 45 1 agenda is 1.4, which in my opinion is a no-brainer. 2 Consider, discuss and take appropriate action to approve 3 a Proclamation from the Dietert Center proclaiming March 4 2020 as the 18th Annual March for Meals Month. 5 Ms. Thompson. 6 MS. THOMPSON: Good morning. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Sorry to have to put you 8 through all this. 9 MS. THOMPSON: Well, that's okay. I -- I 10 did learn a lot about the COVID -- whatever they call 11 it. 12 JUDGE KELLY: 19. 13 MS. THOMPSON: Yeah. I'm not going to use 14 that other word. But, you know, it did make me realize 15 we are in the talks about that. We have over probably 16 200 of our senior citizens that come in our building 17 every day. And so we are -- have done things around -- 18 across our building, all the -- everything sanitized -- 19 every sanitizer bottle we have in the building is out in 20 the building now. And we're trying to find more, but 21 you know how hard that is right now. But anyway, I 22 appreciate that update because that gives me some 23 information to go back to our Dietert Center community. 24 So the Meals on Wheels March for Meals. In 25 January we delivered 6,000 meals in Kerr County. And it 46 1 is just continuing to grow. It is a wonderful service 2 that we're providing in our community. And so your 3 approval of this proclamation helps just build up and 4 support our volunteers and our staff who do this every 5 day. So I really appreciate the opportunity. 6 Commissioner Harris is coming to do a 7 ride-along with us this week. I welcome any -- any -- 8 anyone in the County that would like to come and do a 9 ride-along with us. You will find out things that you 10 didn't really know about. And I've lived here 30 years 11 and I found parts of town I didn't know existed. So we 12 welcome you anytime to come and go on a ride-along just 13 to kind of see what we're doing and providing services 14 to our homebound seniors. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I look forward to it. 16 I think Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. 17 MS. THOMPSON: Yes. 18 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 19 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Oh, I'll second it 20 then. Go ahead. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Motion's been made by 22 Commissioner Harris, seconded by Commissioner Belew to 23 approve the Proclamation declaring March 2020 as the 24 18th Annual March for Meals Month. And we're proud to 25 do that. Is there any further debate about this? Those 47 1 in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 2 MS. THOMPSON: Thank you so much. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you, Brenda. 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Thanks, Brenda. 5 MS. THOMPSON: I appreciate it. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Next item on the agenda is 7 item 1.5 consider, discuss and take appropriate action 8 for the Court to approve the contract between Computer 9 Information Concepts, Inc. and Kerr County and authorize 10 me to sign it. Mr. Reeves. 11 MR. REEVES: Good morning, gentlemen. 12 JUDGE KELLY: And by the way, 13 congratulations on your election. 14 MR. REEVES: Thank you very much. 15 Computer Information Concepts, or as it's 16 known CIC, is the software that we use for the 17 accounting system of the tax collection department. 18 Among other things, it provides -- is a method to 19 disburse the funds to the various taxing entities. The 20 annual cost for this year for the software and support 21 is $5,220, which is $230 less than last year. The cost, 22 as in the past, will be paid out of the IT budget. The 23 contract is set to be renewed on -- on or before 24 April 1st, 2020. 25 The contract has been reviewed and approved 48 1 by the County Attorney, and I respectfully request the 2 Court to approve the contract and authorize the County 3 Judge to sign the same. 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Move for approval. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 7 Commissioner Moser, seconded by Commissioner Letz to 8 approve the contract with Computer Information Concepts, 9 Inc. Any further discussion? 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Bob, how did we get 11 the price to go down? 12 MR. REEVES: The price came down because of 13 the methods that my staff is initializing the trouble 14 calls, and by doing that it brought the cost down. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Very good. 16 JUDGE KELLY: And the only thing I would add 17 to the discussion is, we're really proud of the way you 18 guys handled the elections this year. Your office is 19 doing great. 20 MR. REEVES: Thank you. I'm very proud of 21 them. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Any further discussion about 23 the contract? Those in favor raise your hand. 24 Unanimous, five zero. 25 MR. REEVES: Thank you. 49 1 JUDGE KELLY: Thanks. 2 Next item on the agenda, which is no 3 stranger to us now, item 1.6 consider, discuss and take 4 appropriate action on an Order permitting Republic 5 Services to use proceeds from tax-exempt Bonds for their 6 solid waste disposal facility in Kerr County. 7 This is Mr. Lee McCormick. I've had the 8 pleasure of visiting with him on the phone last week and 9 meeting him and talking with him this morning. Welcome. 10 MR. MCCORMICK: Thank you. 11 COMMISSIONER BELEW: They sent the big guns, 12 huh? 13 JUDGE KELLY: They did. 14 MR. MCCORMICK: I don't know about that. 15 JUDGE KELLY: We asked for it and they said, 16 well, we got a pretty big gun sitting in the back, too. 17 We've had a lot of questions, and you've 18 answered those questions. I want to commend you on your 19 ability to articulate to someone that did not understand 20 why we needed to do this. 21 MR. MCCORMICK: Thank you. 22 JUDGE KELLY: And I think part of my mantra 23 was, I have to explain it to a neighbor that I can shout 24 out across my fence, and I want to be able to tell her 25 why we did it because she's opposed to all private 50 1 activity bonds, just as a matter of principal. 2 And just to what Mr. McCormick has shared 3 with me is all this really is, is asking Kerr County to 4 approve allowing an economic development entity in 5 Hidalgo County to include in a bond refinance, that 6 finances some of the assets out at our solid waste 7 facility. 8 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Which Kerr County will 9 ultimately benefit from. 10 JUDGE KELLY: They're there. We're 11 benefiting from them right now. But Hidalgo County does 12 not have authority to authorize this $12.6 million worth 13 of bond; Kerr County does. And so what this motion is, 14 is asking us to approve delegating to Hidalgo County the 15 ability to issue that $12.6 million worth of bonds to 16 Republic Services in order for it to be legal beagle. 17 MR. MCCORMICK: Correct. 18 JUDGE KELLY: And -- and -- 19 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Still doesn't make 20 sense. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Well, but we have exclusive 22 authority. If we don't let them do it, they can't do 23 it. 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: That's the part that 25 doesn't make sense. 51 1 COMMISSIONER MOSER: We've got to -- yeah. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Anyway -- all right. 3 I'll make a motion -- Judge, I'll make a motion that we 4 approve the Order permitting Republic Services to use 5 the proceeds of tax-exempt bonds for their solid waste 6 disposal facility located in Kerr County. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Second. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 9 Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Moser to 10 approve the request from Republic Services for the 11 tax-exempt bonds for the solid waste disposal facility. 12 Any other discussion? 13 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: That does make a 14 little bit more sense. 15 MR. McCORMICK: Thank you. 16 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I -- I can tell you, 17 it wasn't articulated quite right. 18 MR. MCCORMICK: I apologize. Because 19 ultimately it's my responsibility as the municipal 20 advisor to the Mission Economic Development Corporation, 21 and I apologize for not being at these meetings in the 22 past. We have 29 counties that we were getting done in 23 that 10-week period, so we were stretched thin on 24 people. 25 JUDGE KELLY: And we apologize. We don't 52 1 mean to be that special. We just -- maybe that slow. 2 MR. McCORMICK: I appreciate the opportunity 3 to come out here to the beautiful Hill Country. I'm 4 coming from Dallas out here, the spring is out here, 5 there's a lot to be said about coming out here. 6 JUDGE KELLY: And the other thing I'll share 7 that Mr. McCormick shared with me is the Federal 8 statute, because there are multiple counties involved. 9 Not only Kerr County, but Bexar County and some of the 10 other surrounding counties. The Federal statute allows 11 the public hearing to take place within a 100-mile 12 radius of those counties and that's why it was in Bexar 13 County. And so if that's what the Federal law says, I'm 14 okay with it. 15 MR. McCORMICK: That was something else that 16 I was -- 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: And they -- they 18 mentioned that last week. 19 MR. MCCORMICK: Yeah. We did consolidated 20 public hearings. There's 29 facilities but we were able 21 to consolidate it down to nine public hearings using the 22 hundred miles rule so it was real easy to be efficient 23 in that process. 24 JUDGE KELLY: So with that, let's take a 25 vote. All those in favor raise your hand. What? Okay 53 1 all those opposed? 2 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I'm not opposed, I 3 abstain. 4 JUDGE KELLY: So it's four, zero, one. 5 Commissioner Belew abstains. 6 MR. MCCORMICK: Thank you, Judge and 7 Commissioners' Court. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Thank you. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Thanks for coming. Thank you 11 for your patience. 12 MR. MCCORMICK: Absolutely. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Item 1.7 consider, discuss and 14 take appropriate action on a request to approve a 15 Proclamation from the Kerr County Child Services Board 16 declaring April 2020 as Child Abuse Awareness Month, and 17 allow the use of a portion of the courthouse square for 18 a display during the month of April. And again, I think 19 this is a no-brainer, Kellie. 20 MS. EARLY: Right. And this is my friend 21 Brenda Hugg. She's on the Kerr County Child Services 22 Board with me, and so we just have three things today. 23 One is to ask that we can put the signs out on 24 April 1st, and we will take them up on April 30th. 25 That's the blue signs that we put out on the courthouse 54 1 to represent how many children have been affected in our 2 County by child abuse. 3 And then also, we just ask that you approve 4 the Proclamation from our Board declaring April 2020 as 5 Child Abuse Awareness Month. 6 And then I wanted to tell you about our 7 awareness event that we're having. It's on April 23rd 8 at 11:30 at Light on the Hill. We're going to have an 9 awareness event where we're trying to bring in the 10 churches and a lot of others from the community so that 11 we can begin to tell people about the process that we 12 have in Texas, in foster care, and how we really need to 13 build capacity in our County. And we also need to 14 support those foster parents that we do have in our 15 County. 16 The way that DSPS is changing over the next 17 few months and years, it's going to a community-based 18 care system, which means that they're looking at our 19 community to build the capacity for foster families and 20 to find a place for our Kerr County children to go so 21 that they stay in our County. 22 And so, we have a lady coming who's really 23 good and has a program in Bexar County that does this 24 and we're working with her through Texas Orphans -- I'm 25 not sure exactly what the name of it is. We're working 55 1 with her because she's already developed a program in 2 Bexar County and we're trying to replicate that in Kerr 3 County and so we're going to have her come and speak, 4 and we invite all of y'all to come so you can find out 5 more about what's going on in the foster care system in 6 Kerr County on April 23rd. 7 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Where is that again, 8 Kellie? 9 MS. EARLY: It's at Light on the Hill, 10 Mount Wesley, the First United Methodist Church event. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I move for approval of 12 the Proclamation to declare April Child Abuse Prevention 13 Month and authorize the use of the courthouse square for 14 display. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 16 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 17 Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Harris to 18 approve the Proclamation for Child Abuse Awareness Month 19 and use of the courthouse. Any further discussion? 20 Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 21 Thank you very much. 22 MS. EARLY: Thank you. 23 MS. HUGG: Thank you, gentlemen. 24 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you for coming. 25 Item 1.8 consider, discuss and take 56 1 appropriate action to approve the Official Bond and Oath 2 for Kyle Schneider, Constable Precinct 2. I think this 3 is pro forma. We've already got the bond and taken the 4 oath, we just need to ratify it. 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Move for approval. 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 7 JUDGE KELLY: All right. Motion's been made 8 by Commissioner Moser, seconded by Commissioner Belew to 9 approve the bond and oath for Constable Precinct 2. All 10 in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 11 Item 1.9 consider, discuss and take 12 appropriate action to approve the request for Kerr 13 County to pro rate distribution of proceeds from the 14 tobacco sale settlement permanent trust account. 15 Mr. Robles. 16 MR. ROBLES: Good morning. This is 17 something we've done for the last many, many years. We 18 request through the Department of State Health Services 19 our expenses for indigent health care services. In the 20 past we've received anywhere from 25 to 30,000 in 21 reimbursements. That money will go into Fund 50, our 22 indigent defense services. And we just need the Court 23 to approve these reports so that we can request 24 reimbursement for some of those. 25 COMMISSIONER BELEW: James, what percentage 57 1 of what we spend is this? 2 MR. ROBLES: Pretty small. 3 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Doesn't cover it? 4 MR. ROBLES: It's a pretty small amount. 5 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Yeah. 6 MR. ROBLES: Unreimbursed expenses for this 7 year is about 225,000. We hope to get about ten percent 8 of that. 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So this is -- what? 10 Help me understand this. 1.8 million in here, so that's 11 for the whole state, or what is that? 12 MR. ROBLES: No, that is for all of -- all 13 of the qualifying costs, so for example indigent health 14 care services, expenditures at the jail, behavioral and 15 psychiatric health services. And also includes the EMS 16 portion. 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So that's all of our 18 budgeted costs? 19 MR. ROBLES: Yes. 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So we get $30,000 of 21 it, did you say? 22 MR. ROBLES: Hopefully. 23 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Now that gets spread 24 around, like different entities pay for part of that? 25 MR. ROBLES: No, most of these expenses, 58 1 they all come from us. So we include the portion of the 2 EMS contract that we pay to the City. A lot of expenses 3 out at the jail. A lot of expenses that are indigent 4 defense our indigent service department provides. We 5 put all those expenses together and multiply that by 6 1.15, which is part of their -- 7 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Formula? 8 MR. ROBLES: -- formula. And however much 9 that the State allocates to this, they give us a 10 percentage. 11 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So $30,000.00 is what 12 we would hopefully be getting. Is that ballpark? 13 MR. ROBLES: Yeah, we got $27,000 last 14 year -- 15 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. 16 MR. ROBLES: -- and 30,000 the year before. 17 It just depends on how much money they have. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So what we need to do 19 is submit this? 20 MR. ROBLES: Yes. The Court needs to 21 approve this so we can submit it and hopefully get -- 22 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Move for approval. 23 MR. ROBLES: -- money back. 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: And I'll second. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 59 1 Commissioner Moser, seconded by Commissioner Belew to 2 prorate the distribution of proceeds from the tobacco 3 settlement permanent trust account. Any other 4 discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, 5 five zero. 6 Thanks, James. 7 Item 1.10 consider, discuss and take 8 appropriate action regarding the County's participation 9 on AACOG Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy, or 10 CEDS Committee. Commissioner Moser. 11 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yes. Thank you, Judge. 12 We have a letter requesting the County have a 13 representative on the -- I'm just going to use the 14 acronym CEDS, Comprehensive Economic Development 15 Strategy Committee. 16 I looked at that committee and looked at 17 what their mission was. Looked at what the membership 18 was or is. Okay. It's made up a majority of people 19 from economic development corporations around. There 20 aren't any other County Commissioners on that committee. 21 KEDC has -- is a member of AACOG. They have said that 22 they will participate in the CEDS and represent and 23 bring information back to the County. I don't know if 24 the City wants to do the same thing. City used to have 25 a representative on it. I don't think they do now. 60 1 So I would make the motion that we allow 2 KEDC to represent the County on this CEDS Committee and 3 represent us, which they're willing to do. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. With a comment. 5 Do we need to appoint the two individuals, that will be 6 possible. Will it be Gil Salinas and Teresa Metcalf, or 7 does the -- 8 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, I think -- yeah. 9 What they've done is they -- they have said that they 10 would be members of it. I guess in response to the 11 letter, that would be a good thing to do. Send a 12 response back from the Court saying we -- we thank you 13 for the invitation, and we're going to have KEDC be our 14 -- and put people's names in there. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. So put Gil 16 Salinas and -- 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Is that a primary and an 19 alternate? What are we doing? 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, except for one can 21 attend or -- yeah, I'd make Gil Salinas primary and 22 Teresa Metcalf as an alternate. 23 COMMISSIONER MOSER: There you go. 24 JUDGE KELLY: That's what we do on CJAC 25 because we have a primary and an alternate. 61 1 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Right. Okay. 2 JUDGE KELLY: And then, I just want to make 3 sure if we -- if we appoint them, KEDC to do this, 4 they'll come report to us? 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. Yeah. 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Correct. Okay. So 7 I'll draft that letter back, if that's okay? 8 JUDGE KELLY: So there's a motion by 9 Commissioner Moser, and seconded by Commissioner Letz to 10 approve the appointment of the primary and an alternate 11 member from KEDC, Gil Salinas and Teresa Metcalf, to 12 serve on the CEDS committee for AACOG. Any further 13 discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, 14 five zero. 15 Sheriff, we got a quick donation you need to 16 get approved? 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah, it's just one of 18 those where it's the time of year some of y'all probably 19 got the letter, the State Sheriff's Association where 20 they -- membership drive and donation. Some people 21 around the County would rather just send us a hundred 22 dollar check or something like that and have it donated 23 to the equipment fund. That's all I'm asking this time. 24 We got one. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I move we accept the 62 1 donation of $100 from a citizen for the Sheriff's 2 Equipment Fund. 3 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 5 Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Belew to 6 approve the donation of $100 for the Sheriff -- to the 7 Sheriff's Department. Any further discussion? Those in 8 favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 9 Last item before the break, item 1.12 10 consider, discuss and take appropriate action regarding 11 the approval of use of the Kerr County Courthouse 12 parking lot for the South Texas Blood Drive on April 13 the 2nd. 14 MRS. DOSS: Yes, sir. They would like to 15 use our parking lot for the blood drive. 16 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I move for approval. 17 JUDGE KELLY: I second. 18 Commissioner Belew made the motion, I 19 seconded it. Any further discussion? Those in favor 20 raise your hand. Five zero, unanimous. 21 MRS. DOSS: Thank you. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Made that easy. 23 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Somebody needs a 24 break. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Let's take a five-minute 63 1 break. And Charlie, if I could, can I have a word with 2 you during the break? 3 (Break.) 4 JUDGE KELLY: Item 1.13 Consider, discuss 5 and take appropriate action to correct an error in the 6 presentation of Agenda Items 1.12 and 1.13 from the 7 February 24, 2020 Commissioners' Court meeting 8 concerning the former Kerr County Flood Damage 9 Prevention Order, which was incorrectly referred to as 10 Order No. 32024 but is actually Order No. 32034. 11 Mr. Hastings. 12 I -- I understand what you're doing. Is 13 there any reason we don't want to fix this? 14 MR. HASTINGS: The County Engineer requests 15 that the error be noted and corrected in the Official 16 Kerr County records as appropriate. Precincts 1, 2, 3, 17 4. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move for approval. 19 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 20 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Motion's been made by 21 Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Harris to 22 approve correcting the record from the February 24th 23 Commissioners' Court meeting. Any further discussion? 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And Judge, just for the 25 record on this, just see if I -- Charlie asked me about 64 1 this and I said that normally I think we could probably 2 just correct it through the Court Orders. But since 3 this was FEMA and does have consequences and is a 4 Federal thing, I thought we should -- it should be 5 officially done through the Court. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Any other discussion? Those 7 in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 8 Item 1.14 consider, discuss and take 9 appropriate action to authorize the Engineering 10 Department to amend a cattle guard installation permit 11 issued to Campbell Creek Ranch, Ltd. 12 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Judge, we're going to 13 pass on this today. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 15 1.15 consider, discuss and take appropriate 16 action to ratify and confirm the Project Completion -- 17 well, I tell you what. Mr. Acosta? 18 MR. ACOSTA: Yes, sir. 19 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Here's what we're going 20 to do. Let me call -- we've got Item 1.15, 16, 17, 18, 21 19, and 20. I'm going to read these and we'll call them 22 all at the same time. If that's okay with you. Because 23 this is pretty much housekeeping. And I think 24 Commissioner Letz has prepared an explanation on how you 25 all of these fit together. 65 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Cesar prepared it, I 2 just edited. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Mr. Acosta prepared it 4 and you edited that we -- that has been provided to us 5 and that way I think we can discuss this more quickly 6 and be a little bit more efficient in how we do it. 7 MR. ACOSTA: Yes, sir. 8 JUDGE KELLY: So be patient with me while I 9 call these. I've already called 1.15. Let me call 1.16 10 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to ratify 11 and confirm the Contract Amendment/Modification Request 12 for Texas Community Development Block Grant Contract 13 7215045. 14 Then I'll also call 1.17, which is to 15 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to ratify 16 and confirm Contract Amendment 1 for the Texas Community 17 Development Block Grant Contract 7217045, Colonia 18 Economically Distressed Area Program requesting contract 19 extension. 20 And we're also going to call 1.18, which is 21 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to approve 22 Amendment 2 for the Texas Community Development Block 23 Grant Contract 7217045, Colonia Economically Distressed 24 Area Program requesting contract extension. 25 And 1.19, which is to consider, discuss and 66 1 take appropriate action to approve Amendment 1 for the 2 Texas Community Development Block Grant Contract 3 7218045, requesting contract extension. 4 And then finally, consider, discuss and take 5 appropriate action to approve Amendment 1 for the Texas 6 Community Development Block Grant Contract 7218055, 7 requesting contract extension. 8 Mr. Acosta and Commissioner Letz. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll get us started on 10 this and then Commissioner Moser may have some comments 11 and Cesar as well. All of these are related to the East 12 Kerr Center Point Wastewater Project and all of these 13 are Texas Department of Agricultural grants. I've 14 handed out a sheet, and it kind of helps a little bit to 15 summarize them. Because they go to different phases. 16 We have a total of three community block grants and one 17 CEDAP grant, which is an economically distressed area. 18 We had a conference call with the Texas Department of 19 Agriculture, what, ten days ago or so, two weeks. 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And explained exactly 22 where we are on the project, and went over each of these 23 grants individually, and asked kind of the -- and said 24 that we wanted some extensions. Their feedback to us 25 was -- and we requested, I guess, and they agreed, that 67 1 we would like to extend them all to the same time so 2 that we can kind of -- because as you can see, some of 3 them work on Phase 1, some Phase 1, 2, and 3, and then 4 some of them are just Phase 2 and 3. Phase 2 and 3 have 5 not started yet. Phase 1 is what we're working on right 6 now. 7 So to try to get everything in order, it 8 makes it simpler to have all of them expire at the same 9 time. Generally they don't give more than a one-year 10 extension in time. They have agreed to go beyond that 11 to do this. 12 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Beyond a year? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Beyond a year. Yeah. 14 So what we're doing, we're extending all of 15 them -- all the extension ones are extending them to 16 April 22nd of 2022, which is basically a little over two 17 years. And I'll go down the agenda items one by one 18 quickly and then kind of -- the Self-Monitoring Review, 19 that is something that's already been submitted. This 20 is the one I think the Judge mentioned before. 21 Basically, it's a -- we reviewed that grant and then a 22 submission form was submitted. Cesar primarily did 23 prepare it and then the Judge has already signed that 24 one. 25 On the second one, 1.16, it's the same 68 1 grant. We already -- we have an amendment. I'm not 2 sure of the details but -- I wasn't going to get that 3 critical. We -- there's a couple of modifications to 4 that amendment or to that grant. That has already been 5 submitted and signed by the Judge. 6 1.17 is to extend grant 7217045 to 12/31/20. 7 But they have now -- because of 1.18, they requested 8 that we -- the Department of Agriculture requests that 9 we extend that beyond the 20th of December, which is the 10 one above it, to 4/22/22. Because they want it -- 11 they're trying to get them all in the same cycle. So 12 it's once we get one extension, the other one gets 13 another extension. 14 And then the last two, 1.19 and 1.20 are 15 extending those two -- last two grants that are listed 16 on the page to April 22nd of 2022. 17 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Now, if -- if 18 everything's completed prior to the extended date, the 19 project closes out, everybody gets paid, everything's 20 finalized, right? 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. Yeah. 22 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Okay. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And we're pretty, you 24 know, comfortable. And we've gone through it, Charlie, 25 Cesar, and other staff from GrantWorks, Tetra Tech gone 69 1 through it, and they think this is realistic. So, you 2 know, I think we're ready to proceed. Any questions? 3 COMMISSIONER MOSER: You want to move for 4 approval? 5 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, let me ask one 6 more question. Was some of this extended because of 7 weather delays or were there other -- 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: There were -- the 9 reason -- 10 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yes to all that. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes, there are some 12 weather delays. Yes, the project is probably -- well, 13 it's bigger than they probably ever tackled at the 14 Department of Agriculture. 15 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Oh, okay. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's certainly bigger 17 than we've ever tackled. And that combination, their 18 timeline was just too tight. We couldn't make it. And 19 then the other part of it is there were some easement 20 delays that we could -- so we have not been able to 21 start Phase 2 and 3 yet. Those are almost finalized, we 22 believe. And that's the reason also that there's an 23 extension request. 24 So it was a combination of project bigger 25 than everyone really thought and it took a little bit 70 1 longer to get going than everyone thought, and then 2 there's some of the -- two phases have not started yet 3 due to a -- you know, some easements that we still need 4 to acquire. 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: And just -- just for 6 clarification, too, what these grants are for are 7 connecting from the main sewer line to individual 8 properties and getting rid of the septic tanks. So 9 that's what Texas Department of Agriculture is doing for 10 us. So that -- 11 MR. ACOSTA: This is specifically for 12 low to moderate income, right? 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah, that's right. 14 Yeah. Not for all of them but for low and moderate 15 income families. So it was the same thing they did for 16 us in Kerrville South. This kind of came in at the 17 beginning of -- of the East Kerr County/Center Point 18 Wastewater System, to see if TDA will do that and they 19 stepped up to do it, so it's been great. And I'll talk 20 more about it later, too, in the total project. 21 COMMISSIONER BELEW: But residents that can 22 afford to tie in do that on their own? 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. It's under a 24 different grant. Everyone gets hooked up at no cost. 25 COMMISSIONER BELEW: That's what I -- what 71 1 I'm getting at is that every -- this is not just for 2 people that are -- have low income. 3 COMMISSIONER MOSER: TDA is. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Everybody -- 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: These -- 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: -- everybody get -- 7 well, but ultimately the Wastewater Project in East Kerr 8 County was for all residents. 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Correct. Right. 10 COMMISSIONER BELEW: But we have different 11 grants for different levels of income. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Correct. 13 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Okay. 14 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Right. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. Did I summarize 16 it, Cesar? 17 MR. ACOSTA: Yes, sir. Just to add on to 18 that, the three extensions for the 2017 grant and the 19 two 2018 grants, we're going to submit those to TDA, and 20 as we said in the conference call, they'll probably have 21 some additional conditions to go along with progress. 22 So we're going to check in with the Texas Water 23 Development Board to make sure that they are okay with 24 the timeline as well. We don't anticipate any problems 25 with that because in the Texas Water Development Board's 72 1 Contract there's no end date specific. It's just 2 whenever there's substantial completion of the project. 3 The other things are probably just status 4 check-ins on where we're at because it's likely that we 5 won't start the connections for sewer and the demos for 6 another year. But construction on Phase 2 and 3 will 7 likely start in September of this year. 8 COMMISSIONER MOSER: September. Right. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. I think we 10 probably -- just for the record, we probably need to go 11 through these, I know there's a lot of things, one by 12 one or -- 13 JUDGE KELLY: Well, why don't I make the 14 motions and reading the agenda and that way we'll just 15 get a second? 16 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Good deal. 17 JUDGE KELLY: But before I do, I'm looking 18 at my Auditor. Is there any reason in the world that we 19 would not want to do this and simplify this process? 20 MRS. SHELTON: We need to do it. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. I want -- just wanted 22 to get her -- I wanted to get the head nod on the 23 record. 24 Okay. So I'm going to make the motion, 25 we'll do them one at a time. And we'll have brief 73 1 moments for discussion after each one if somebody wants 2 to weigh in. 3 First one I'm going to call is 1.15, and 4 that's a motion to approve the Project Completion Report 5 and Self-Monitoring Review Certification on Contract 6 No. 7215045. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 8 JUDGE KELLY: I made the motion, seconded by 9 Commissioner Letz. Any discussion? Those in favor 10 raise your hand. Five zero. 11 Now I'm going to call 1.16, a motion to 12 approve the Contract Amendment/Modification for Contract 13 7215045. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Any discussion? Okay. I made 16 the motion. Seconded by Commissioner Letz. Those in 17 favor raise your hand. Five zero. 18 Next one is 1.17, and I move that we approve 19 the Contract Amendment 1 for Contract No. 7217045. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 21 JUDGE KELLY: I made the motion, seconded by 22 Commissioner Letz to approve that. Any other 23 discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, 24 five zero. 25 Now item 1.18. I move that we approve 74 1 Amendment 2 on Contract 7217045. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 3 JUDGE KELLY: I made the motion, seconded by 4 Commissioner Letz. Any discussion? Those in favor 5 raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 6 I now call item 1.19 and I move to approve 7 Amendment No 1 on Contract 7218045. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 9 JUDGE KELLY: I've moved, seconded by 10 Commissioner Letz to approve. Any other discussion? 11 Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 12 We go to item 1.20. I move that we approve 13 Amendment No. 1 to Contract No. 7218055. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 15 JUDGE KELLY: I made the motion, seconded by 16 Commissioner Letz to approve that. Any other 17 discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. Don? You 18 up? Five zero. It's all good. 19 COMMISSIONER BELEW: The boss was talking to 20 him. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Thank you, Mr. Acosta. 22 MR. ACOSTA: Thank you, sir. 23 JUDGE KELLY: And for those in the audience, 24 we have very efficiently dealt with some very complex 25 issues very expeditiously. 75 1 MR. ACOSTA: Also, if I may take time out to 2 introduce Rosie Daily. She will be working with me and 3 coordinating with Phases 2 and 3 of the project so you 4 might see more of her. 5 JUDGE KELLY: And her last name is Daily? 6 MS. DAILY: Daily. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Okay, Rosie Daily. Welcome. 8 MR. ACOSTA: Yeah. Thank you all. 9 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Next item on the agenda 10 before our timed item is 1.21 discussion regarding the 11 process for precinct redistricting and the retention of 12 legal counsel. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This is on the -- I put 14 it on the agenda after the Court discussion last time, 15 as to those that were not on the Court last time we did 16 redistricting, what we did. Not that we have to do it 17 the same way. There are basically two firms that do a 18 lot of this. Bickerstaff Heath is one that -- we've 19 used them in the past. And then James Allison. 20 JUDGE KELLY: Allison & Bass. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Allison, Bass & 22 Associates. We've used Bickerstaff Heath both times 23 I've been on the court when we did redistricting, but I 24 -- you know, I think both of them are qualified. That's 25 another decision on how we do it. But the process is a 76 1 couple of key things that, one, Precinct 3 is a minority 2 precinct. So Precinct 3 gets drawn first. And as many 3 of the minority communities in the County that can be 4 pulled into one precinct, into mine, which is why my 5 precinct is pretty odd-shaped. 6 JUDGE KELLY: It's a big crescent moon, 7 right? 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. So that's the 9 first thing. And then the rest of them -- and then they 10 all have to be done by population. The other key thing, 11 we can't break a census track. And the census -- we 12 have no control over those. We've tried to change some 13 of them but we've had very little success in doing that. 14 So the census department divides up the County into I 15 don't know how many different tracts and we have to 16 follow those lines for our precinct boundaries. 17 JUDGE KELLY: Hundreds. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. There's hundreds 19 of them. I mean, so those are kind of the two big -- 20 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Is this a grid you're 21 talking about? 22 JUDGE KELLY: It's not really a grid. 23 There's -- 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's not a grid. It's 25 erratic. 77 1 JUDGE KELLY: They're crazy shapes. 2 Remember when the census people were here and he was 3 talking about all this stuff. There are -- are they 4 tracts, is that what they called them? 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. Parcels. 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: They kind of mark out a 7 parcel and then they go -- 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But they're not -- 9 JUDGE KELLY: Once the census is 10 established, we're stuck with that. And we either take 11 that whole block or -- or none. And that's how we have 12 to move them around, by blocks. 13 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I didn't realize that. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Like Lego pieces. You've got 15 to put that whole Lego piece over there. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. But that's it. 17 The other thing that you have to use a permanent 18 physical feature on our boundaries, which is -- we have 19 interpreted it as mostly it's roads, streams, you can 20 use power lines, things -- things that are recognizable 21 to the public that are physical barriers. From 22 experience, rivers and creeks are really good because it 23 tends to not split neighborhoods. But, unfortunately, 24 we can't do that a lot. 25 And I know that between 2 and 3 the power 78 1 line is part of it. So roads are great, but they do -- 2 you have to be careful how you use the roads, in my 3 mind. I mean, it's -- sometimes you just can't fix it. 4 I mean, one side of the street. And I think that 5 probably Precinct 1 has the most issues here because 6 you're dividing up out in Kerrville South and one side 7 of the street is here, the other side is a different 8 precinct. And I think there was one situation, I was 9 talking to Bob Reeves that there's -- on Upper Turtle 10 Creek there's a resident that has to drive by five 11 different polling locations to get to where they vote, 12 because their house is over towards Ingram, but they 13 have to drive all the way out. 14 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, if you live up 15 there, you're in the Ingram School District. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. So those are 17 some of the general things and I'd recommend that we ask 18 both of the law firms to come down and give a 19 presentation, and just from my collection, I think 20 that -- 21 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Now, what -- now, you 22 told us the process. What exactly is their -- their 23 part in this? 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, they will then -- 25 after the census data comes in, they take it all and 79 1 they come back with us with a recommendation and will 2 draw them. They draw the maps essentially. And they 3 make sure that we're in compliance with the -- all the 4 Federal rules about, you know -- 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I think they sent you a 6 letter -- 7 COMMISSIONER BELEW: We're literally not 8 qualified. 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: They sent you a letter 10 that has all that detail in there. 11 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Right. But -- 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And then we make 13 adjustments. We say like, you know, because you know 14 your precinct looks like -- 15 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Yeah, I saw it. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- yeah, but we need to 17 move this road. And you go, you know -- and there has 18 to be relatively close to population and I think there's 19 a ten percent variance, I think is what I recall. 20 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yes. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But there's a little bit 22 of discretion, especially out in the far rural areas, as 23 to how you draw it -- 24 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: You can tweak it a 25 little bit. 80 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You can tweak it at that 2 point. And any big changes you want to make, you know, 3 you can -- 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, that's -- the 5 census also, when you said Precinct 3 has the largest 6 minority, they will determine that same thing again. 7 Not the same answer, but they'll see which -- which 8 precinct has the most minority representation. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think -- my 10 recollection is Precinct 3 has to be it. 11 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Oh, is that right? 12 Even before -- 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It was designated -- it 14 was picked at some point. 15 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Even before they did 16 the census? 17 JUDGE KELLY: Because of the existing 18 neighborhoods where minorities live right now, 19 predominantly. 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Oh, I see. Okay. 21 JUDGE KELLY: And -- and we are 22 Constitutionally prohibited from diluting those voting 23 strengths. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I see. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So -- and it's not that 81 1 -- you know, it's not that -- you know, and obviously, 2 you can't with the nature of, you know -- as many as 3 they reasonably can. 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And there are certain 6 other areas of, you know, pockets of minority 7 neighborhoods that are not in Precinct 3 but that's just 8 the way it works. But that's one of the rules that they 9 have to sign off and we have to sign off of that we 10 tried to do it, and they have to try to do it. 11 And then, of course, the other thing that 12 limits a little bit, that we have to live in our 13 precinct. So unless one of the Commissioners wants or 14 Judge wants -- well, the Judge is in County, he can live 15 anywhere in the County, but if one of the Commissioners 16 wants to resign, they've gotta be drawn and pull you 17 into your Precinct. 18 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Now say that again. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Each Commissioner has to 20 live in the Precinct. So when you redraw them, you've 21 got to make sure you don't draw a boundary that puts you 22 outside your own Precinct, right. 23 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Right. I'm pretty 24 close to the edge actually. 25 COMMISSIONER MOSER: In a lot of ways. 82 1 COMMISSIONER BELEW: You're -- well -- 2 (Laughter.) 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So am I, yeah. So -- 4 but it's something that they have to be aware of. But 5 it's -- I mean, it's a -- we'll have a couple meetings 6 with whichever attorneys and they'll kind of -- we'll 7 give them some guidelines and some parameters and 8 things, hey, we'd like to -- there was a problem here. 9 We'd like to try to move this area into a different 10 Precinct. Things of that nature. 11 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: You've been involved 12 in two of them? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. 14 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: How big of changes 15 were involved, anything major? 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Not major. I mean, you 17 know, you're basically -- you know, you're out west, I'm 18 from the east and the other two are in the middle. 19 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I'm running from south 20 to north. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. So I will say 22 that last time we felt that it would be -- that maybe 23 some advantage to using Bickerstaff Heath because we 24 used them before. I don't really think that's the case. 25 I think we just pick the one we like because I don't 83 1 think there's any advantage to using the same firm we 2 used before because it's a pretty -- it's like making 3 sauce, there's a certain way that you do it. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: But we have input into 5 this. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And we'll have input 7 either way. And like I said, there's two firms that 8 primarily do it that I'm aware of. There may be some 9 others. 10 JUDGE KELLY: But just to give the 11 helicopter overview, because I like the big picture to 12 start it and then we can get down in the weeds. The 13 first thing that has to happen is we complete the census 14 and they tell us what our population is. We take that 15 number, we divide it basically in quarters. Once we 16 have the number, we then go through and start taking 17 these little census tracts in the general areas. 18 Precinct 3 is established first. 19 Once it's done, the big issue is going to be 20 how much of East Kerr County did 3 take. And then we -- 21 the next difficult one is 1. 2 gets everything between 22 what 1 and 3 don't take. And 4 gets everything that's 23 left. And that's pretty much how it works. So I think 24 it's a good information item. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. And there was -- 84 1 I will say that -- you asked about the changes. There 2 was a pretty large change last time between 1 and 3. 3 There was a neighborhood over there by Steven -- kind 4 of -- I don't know. Lewis, up in that neighborhood over 5 there, used to be in my precinct, and the area over 6 there near the Dietert Center, and it was in Precinct 1. 7 And Commissioner Baldwin and I thought that it made more 8 sense to flip those two. And the minority population 9 measured about the same. 10 So this -- it's the time that, you know -- 11 and that's a pretty significant change. 12 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah. It would be. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So you can -- some big 14 things can be done. It just depends a lot on where 15 these big growth is and what will drive where the 16 changes are. 17 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Right. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. The next item on the 19 agenda is our timed item, and that's item 1.22, which 20 will be a presentation from the Texas Indigent Defense 21 Commission regarding the Hill Country Public Defender 22 Planning Study. But before they come up, I want y'all 23 to see who everybody is because you don't know everybody 24 in this room like we do. 25 Let me first of all have Geoff Burkhart and 85 1 Scott Ehlers stand. They're going to be giving the 2 presentation, but I'm not dragging them to the podium 3 just yet. Behind you, if you turn around and look at 4 the back, on -- on -- is our Sheriff, Sheriff Rusty 5 Hierholzer. You know Judge Evans, I hope. He sits on 6 your board, I hope you know him. You know Judge 7 Schuchart from Medina County. 8 Judge Harris is County Court at Law Judge 9 beside him. Over on this side of the room on the back 10 is our District Attorney-elect for the 198th District, 11 Steve Harpold. In front of him is our District Attorney 12 for the 216th, Lucy Wilke. 13 To her right, my left, is Judge Keith 14 Williams, who is our Judge of the 216th, who 15 unfortunately will be retiring and we'll miss him. And 16 next to him, to his right, is the District Judge-elect 17 for the 216th, Pat Pattillo. 18 You have Heather Stebbins, our County 19 Attorney, so we've got all our prosecutors here. We 20 have one of our District Court -- well, one District 21 Court represented here with two people, and I'm trying 22 to think. Is there anybody else that I need to 23 introduce to y'all so you know who you're talking to? 24 MR. BURKHART: Yeah, actually, we have with 25 us Kathleen Casey-Gamez from our office. 86 1 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Welcome. Okay. And 2 this is Bruce Motheral, our IT Director. He'll help you 3 with your PowerPoint. 4 MR. BURKHART: And I apologize, I'm raising 5 my hand not because I have a question, but I -- to prove 6 that I'm a better attorney than I am at mechanics. So a 7 small injury this weekend, so thanks for your patience 8 with me. 9 Good morning. My name is Geoff Burkhart, 10 I'm the Director of the Texas Indigent Defense 11 Commission. And thank you, Judge Kelly, for inviting us 12 here today. 13 JUDGE KELLY: And just coming into the room 14 is Joe Soane, who is our First Assistant County 15 Prosecutor. 16 MR. SOANE: Good morning. 17 MR. BURKHART: So we're here today to talk 18 about a Hill Country Public Defender Office, so and 19 thanks for having us. Before I start, I'm just going to 20 say a few words about TIDC and what we do, and then I'm 21 going to hand it over to Scott who works on the study 22 for you all. 23 You should have two things in your packet. 24 One is just the slides and we'll have it up here so if 25 you want to flip through you're welcome to take a look 87 1 at that. And the other thing we have in there is a 2 planning study, so a copy of that. 3 The one thing I'd say about the planning 4 study, this is not the State coming in and mandating 5 this is the office you build. This is a jumping off 6 point. So we do a couple of things in this planning 7 stage and Scott will talk about it in more detail. 8 But the first part really just talks about 9 decision points. What kind of decisions y'all have to 10 make in order to build something like this. The second 11 part models what an office could look like. And again, 12 that's not a prescription, it's not us coming in and -- 13 we don't -- we never come into a County and say, Hey, 14 this is the office you're building. But we like to give 15 folks an idea of what an office could look like, what it 16 would cost, how many people you'll be talking about and 17 things like this. 18 Before we jump into that -- 19 JUDGE KELLY: And just let me interrupt -- 20 MR. BURKHART: Yes, sir. 21 JUDGE KELLY: -- a little bit. And the 22 salaries and everything that you have listed in there, 23 they're -- that's not binding. That's just suggested. 24 MR. BURKHART: Yeah, that's right. 25 Everything that's in there, we -- we do based on, kind 88 1 of, data that we try to get from y'all and some of this 2 will be imperfect and need tempering, but most of this 3 should be pretty recent and you should have a good sense 4 of kind of what it would look like. 5 But as far as salaries in particular, we try 6 to base that off of what prosecutors make. We try to 7 have some clarity built in between prosecution and 8 defense function. 9 So again, my name is Geoff. I'm very 10 thankful to be out here. We have a lot of folks and we 11 have a 13 member Board, and a lot of folks on our Board 12 have been from the Hill Country area. 13 And we have with us today Judge Evans, as 14 you mentioned. We've been glad to have him on the Board 15 for the past couple years. We actually have Judge 16 Vivian Torres on our Board, who is married to Judge 17 Schuchart. She's been on the Board for the past two 18 years. 19 JUDGE KELLY: I wasn't going to disclose 20 that. 21 MR. BURKHART: Yeah. 22 JUDGE SCHUCHART: Thank you. 23 MR. BURKHART: We've also had Representative 24 Andy Murr on our Board for the past, gosh, I don't know, 25 about four or five years or so. He's just now rolling 89 1 off the Board, which is unfortunate for us because we 2 enjoy working with him. TIDC, I don't know if there's a 3 clicker or if you -- 4 MR. MOTHERAL: Right there. 5 MR. BURKHART: So basically what we do, 6 really just three things. We don't provided direct 7 representation but we are the State entity that does 8 oversight funding and improvement for public defense in 9 the State. 10 We've been around for about 20 years. On 11 the oversight part of this, basically if you -- and I 12 don't know if we have any auditors in the room from Kerr 13 County. 14 JUDGE KELLY: She's right there. 15 MS. SHELTON: Right here. 16 MR. BURKHART: Oh, good. Okay, yeah. So 17 you're probably used to reporting to us and you're 18 familiar with TIDC. So we try to suck up data from all 19 254 counties and put it on our website. You can drill 20 down to every county in Texas and you can see what their 21 expenditures are for indigent defense. You can see what 22 their appointment rates look like for indigent defense. 23 You can see all the, kind of, spending data and all 24 that. So there's -- that's what we do in terms of 25 oversight. 90 1 We also have monitors that go boots on the 2 ground to every county in Texas. So far we've been to 3 about half of them. And they're doing interviews, 4 they're doing court observation, they look at the 5 records. 6 And then, finally, we take complaints from 7 folks. And Kathleen actually is the one who appeals all 8 those complaints that come from across the State. We do 9 funding. The formula grant funding goes to all 254 10 counties. We fund a very -- too little of what county's 11 are able to spend in terms of indigent defense. We only 12 fund about 12 or 13 percent of most county's budgets in 13 terms of indigent defense. 14 JUDGE KELLY: A later item on our agenda 15 today is a grant -- a grant we got from TIDC. 16 MR. BURKHART: Oh, good. Okay, yeah. 17 JUDGE KELLY: And if -- and that -- I don't 18 -- didn't know exactly the formula that was used but 19 that's what it is. 20 MR. BURKHART: Yeah. Basically -- the 21 formula is just based on a couple things. One is just 22 the County population, and then the second thing is vast 23 expenditures. So it combines those two and then based 24 on that we set up some sort of number. 25 Basically, the larger the County is the less 91 1 money it's going to get. So we actually only 2 reimbursed, say, Harris County about 8 percent of its 3 indigent defense cost. Kerr County, we can look it up 4 and everything, but it should be around 12 to 13 5 percent. Somewhere in that ballpark. 6 We have improvement grants that you see up 7 there. That's what we'd be talking about today in terms 8 of the public defender office. It would fall under the 9 improvement grant kind of bucket. So what we'd be 10 talking about for the public defender office is instead 11 of the state spending or reimbursing about 12 or 13 12 percent of the indigent defense costs, we'd be moving 13 that up to about 66 percent of the indigent defense 14 cost. And that would be through the improvement grants. 15 And then, finally, we fund an Innocence 16 Project that's mandated by the State legislature. 17 The improvement bucket, that's where Scott 18 and Kathleen work. So we do some trainings. We have a 19 bunch of publications. We do presentations like this 20 one. We bring in technical assistance. We just try to 21 help out counties in any way that we can. 22 We do have a relatively limited budget but 23 our focus, if you could go to the next slide, our focus 24 really has been on rural counties lately. And actually, 25 we have Judge Evans to thank for a lot of that drive. 92 1 We've been pushed in that direction a lot more. 2 Here are a few things that we did. We were 3 successful this past legislative session in getting some 4 additional funding. A lot of it is going to rural areas 5 and this is the three ways that you see that. 6 One is just increase sustainability funding 7 for two-thirds for rural regional public defender 8 offices. So that's what we're talking about today, that 9 two-thirds. So, again, instead of us reimbursing 12 to 10 13 percent, this would bring it up to closer to 66 11 percent if you built a public defender office. 12 The formula grants we were talking about, 13 our baseline used to be about $5,000. We actually 14 increased that up to $15,000. And again, Judge Evans is 15 one of the big drivers of that, as was Representative 16 Murr. So we start reimbursing small counties at 17 $15,000. We don't really go below that, unless their 18 expenditures are below that. 19 And then, I don't know if y'all are familiar 20 with the RPDO, the Regional Public Defender's Office? 21 JUDGE KELLY: We are a member. 22 MR. BURKHART: Oh, good. So RPDO now, that 23 covers public defense for death penalty trials in 185 24 counties in Texas. And we fund two-thirds of that 25 office. I'm fortunate to sit on the Board for that 93 1 office. So we upped our sustainability funding for that 2 two-thirds. 3 The largest 14 counties in Texas are not 4 eligible for RPDO. This primarily benefits rural and 5 midsize counties. 6 So those are a few ways that we've invested 7 money recently into the rural counties. So if I can 8 follow up just for a second, I don't know if y'all have 9 any questions or thoughts about all that. 10 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, you mentioned 11 that your organization funds things. Where does your 12 organization get its funding? 13 MR. BURKHART: It's all legislatively 14 funded. So we're already -- that's right. Yes, sir. 15 And it's generally -- you know, it was -- the 16 legislature are usually looking at either general 17 revenue or general revenue dedicated. We have no 18 general revenue whatsoever. We are -- it's all general 19 revenue dedicated. Most of that's coming from court 20 costs right now. So that's one of our big challenges 21 and we're actually okay for the next several years. I 22 mean okay in the sense that our -- our -- the pot of 23 money won't be going down. 24 But long term, one of the things we're -- as 25 a side note looking for this legislative session is 94 1 trying to get some general revenue or other forms of 2 general revenue dedicated as those court costs are going 3 down. So that's one of our big challenges. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Working yourself out of 5 a job. 6 MR. BURKHART: Yeah, that's right. We -- 7 we've got a little bit of work to do yet. Other 8 questions about the rural funding? 9 If you could go to the next slide. These 10 are some of the bumps we've heard about. This is not 11 too unusual. We hear about this in a lot of places. 12 One is just to increase the number of qualified 13 attorneys. The Office of Court Administration is 14 starting to map this statewide now, because we're seeing 15 more and more places where attorneys are aging out, 16 they're dying off. We don't have the number of 17 attorneys, especially in rural communities, that we used 18 to. So that's been a big problem. 19 JUDGE KELLY: I resemble that remark. 20 MR. BURKHART: So this is a big -- big issue 21 in a lot of places. Part of it's been improving 22 representation and, you know, in our -- there are some 23 very good attorneys in this area. I don't know if y'all 24 know like a Clay Steadman or other folks -- 25 JUDGE KELLY: Sure. 95 1 MR. BURKHART: -- You know, we work with a 2 lot of those attorneys. Actually, Clay is like -- I 3 believe he's one of our mentors right now, yeah, for our 4 future indigent defense leaders programs. So we -- 5 there's some great attorneys out here. But especially 6 when you have attorneys that are aging out, dying off, 7 it's hard to attract new attorneys. One of the ways and 8 one of the best ways we've found is to create these 9 sorts of offices. And frankly, if you're -- part of it 10 is to take attorneys who know what they're doing, folks 11 -- I don't know if Clay would be part of this office or 12 not. I don't want to -- I'm not -- I don't mean to say 13 that. But, you know, taking attorneys who are in that 14 area, who know what they've been doing for a long time, 15 and putting those attorneys in an office like this. But 16 also attracting new attorneys, so that over time you 17 keep on grow -- you know, basically making sure you have 18 a stream of attorneys so you don't face the problem that 19 -- that you face now in terms of attorneys aging out or 20 not at all. 21 JUDGE KELLY: And let me say, just for full 22 disclosure here, I had been approached by one of our 23 prominent criminal defense lawyers here in town who 24 would be interested in working with this program. 25 MR. BURKHART: Oh, good. Okay. 96 1 JUDGE KELLY: Harold Danford, so -- 2 MR. BURKHART: Yeah. And our hope would be 3 to supplement that with younger attorneys. And one of 4 the things that -- and, Judge, I don't know when you -- 5 when you graduated from law school but I know definitely 6 when I graduated from law school, you know, we -- we 7 didn't have as big of a problem in terms of law school 8 debt. And now, you know, we -- we have a lot of young 9 attorneys who are getting out with 150,000, $180,000 10 worth of debt and when I graduated and when you 11 graduated, it was not unusual for people to go and hang 12 a shingle. And it was a lot more doable then and it's 13 getting a lot harder these days to do that. 14 So it's -- for the folks who want to do 15 criminal defense, they tend to want to go to these sorts 16 of offices because they're getting salaries, they're 17 getting benefits. There's a Federal loan forgiveness 18 program that helps ease the burden with their loans. 19 They still have to pay loans back but it eases the 20 burden a little bit. They get a little bit of 21 mentoring. You certainly don't graduate law school 22 nowadays knowing how to practice law right out of the 23 gate so it's good to have some attorneys who know what 24 they're doing. 25 And then the last thing is controlling 97 1 indigent defense cost. You know, we -- we hit a -- to 2 get the money in the last legislative session, I think, 3 you know, you'd asked the question about our funding 4 sources and all that. I mean, one of the big messages 5 that we got was, you know, TIDC, we'll give you 6 additional funding if you can show us that you're 7 spending it on stuff that makes a difference. That you 8 can come back and show that you have improved the 9 quality. You've improved the accountability for the 10 offices. And that's when -- I'm sorry, let me turn my 11 phone off, I got a phone call. 12 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah, that phone was almost 13 mine. 14 MR. BURKHART: Yeah. I know better than to, 15 you know, in court to have that on. 16 But that's one of our big goals, is to make 17 sure that we're putting this money into stuff that 18 really makes a difference. And the rural areas, 19 especially this public center office building has made a 20 big difference. 21 And frankly for us, just to kind of put our 22 cards on the table, it puts us in a good spot to go back 23 to the legislature and say, hey look, look what we've 24 built. And look at the difference that it's made for a 25 lot of rural communities. So actually Scott and 98 1 Kathleen will talk about this in a minute. But we're 2 talking to about 20 different counties right now about 3 the possibility of building offices. So we're doing 4 that in a lot of different places. 5 And, again, by upping that amount to 66 6 percent, that helps with cost locally too. So that will 7 drive down what you all spend out of pocket and I think 8 the planning study models some of that. 9 So if you don't mind going to the next 10 slide. And go to the one after that. So this shows 11 just some of the things we found in the study and one of 12 the reasons that we know that public defender offices 13 work it's been studied a lot over the past 50 years. 14 We have shown that there's a reduced 15 likelihood of conviction, reduced sentence lengths, 16 reduced costs. All of that without negative affects to 17 public safety. And that -- that's real the balance that 18 we're trying to strike. 19 If you'll go to the next one. Reduced jail 20 time and costs. Reduced case time and cost. Reduced 21 number of convictions. Reduce recidivism. So we're 22 seeing this in study after study. Both here in Texas 23 and across the United States. So these offices 24 definitely make a difference. 25 And, in fact, we're doing another study 99 1 right now with Texas A&M of rural public defense in 2 Texas. It's just to document a little bit better just 3 what that does look like. So we definitely see some 4 jail bed savings which, again, helps the counties a lot. 5 On the State end, we see some prison bed 6 savings, which helps the State quite a bit. Something 7 that we're going to be messaging a lot this next 8 legislative session. 9 And then if you'd go to the next slide. And 10 then this is getting into the public defender office, so 11 I'm going to hand it off to Scott Ehlers. And let me 12 pause for a second and see if y'all have any questions. 13 He can speak to the planning state a lot 14 more knowledgeably than I can and the details of it. 15 But I'm happy to answer any questions you might have 16 about TIDC, what we're doing in the legislature or what 17 we're -- why we're building public defender offices and 18 things like that. 19 COMMISSIONER BELEW: For the sake of all 20 here, how do reduced jail sentences benefit the county? 21 MR. BURKHART: Yeah. Well, they -- they do 22 for a few different reasons. I think one is that if you 23 have a shorter sentence, you know, jail bed savings, you 24 see some prison bed savings for the State. But also, 25 we're not talking about -- you know, a lot of these 100 1 savings that we're talking about, we're not talking 2 about getting somebody out on the streets who is accused 3 of murder or something like that. What we're talking 4 about is getting people back with their families. So 5 we're talking more about issues with liberty for folks 6 who may be caught up in a low level thing. 7 And before they -- you know, we've shown -- 8 there are really good studies on this, nationally but 9 also here in Texas, that show if you're in jail for 10 three days, even just three days, you have -- your 11 chance of losing your job, losing your family, you know, 12 losing your car or truck, that kind of stuff shoot up 13 drastically. If you're in jail for just even three 14 days, your chances of recidivism go up drastically. 15 Whereas, if somebody's actually not dangerous, you know, 16 and they're in good shape to put them back on the 17 street, they don't pose a danger to society, if you know 18 that they're going to show back up to Court because 19 that's our other big concern. We want to make sure 20 people are showing up. We don't want failures to 21 appear. 22 But if somebody is not a risk, a flight risk 23 and, you know, this is somebody who ran into trouble but 24 you can get their life back on track, these are good 25 people to have on the street. Because then it creates 101 1 stability in the community, you're not losing jobs, 2 you're not losing families, you're not tearing apart 3 families, you're not losing homes, you're not losing 4 vehicles. Things like that. 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Two questions. What's 6 the definition of indigent? 7 MR. BURKHART: Oh, that's a good question. 8 That's -- I could talk about it for a long time. I'll 9 give you a short answer, though. You know, it's funny. 10 The -- when you look at the case law it actually -- most 11 of it doesn't say indigent. It just says whether or not 12 you can afford an attorney. 13 The definition of indigent, Texas is one of 14 four states that doesn't have a state-wide indigent 15 standard. So in Texas it's actually defined county by 16 county. Usually throughout Texas we -- most counties 17 will look at some percentage in the Federal poverty 18 guidelines. So 125 percent, 150 percent, usually 19 somewhere in that ballpark is what we're looking at, 20 what most counties are looking at for indigent. 21 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Is that number 22 decreasing now with the increase in wages and jobs and 23 things like that? 24 MR. BURKHART: Well, it -- it varies quite a 25 bit. You know, it's interesting the -- the number of 102 1 people who are indigent. We actually track that on our 2 website so it's interesting. And you can actually drill 3 down now -- you didn't used to be able to do this. But 4 you can drill down to every county in Texas and see what 5 the appointment rates are. Nationally, it's really 6 high. Texas, we tend to be a little bit lower. But 7 it's still pretty high. Nationally, the average is 8 somewhere around 80 percent. For felonies in Texas -- 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: 80 percent of what? 10 MR. BURKHART: 80 percent of criminal 11 defendants who would be appointed counsel. 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I see. 13 MR. BURKHART: Yeah. So it's a pretty high 14 number. In Texas, we're looking a little bit more -- 15 somewhere in the ballpark of about 73 percent for 16 felonies, somewhere in the ballpark of about 46 percent 17 for misdemeanors. When I say misdemeanors, I mean A and 18 B misdemeanors, just the jailable ones, not -- not the 19 C misdemeanors. 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: And one other question. 21 Indigent defense expense, how does it track for the last 22 five years? Going up? 23 MR. BURKHART: Going up. It's -- it's 24 definitely going up. And if -- we track this too on our 25 website so you can see it's going up, but it's not going 103 1 up as drastically as, say, child protective services 2 costs. CPS cases. 3 So if you look, the -- collectively 4 statewide we're spending somewhere in the ballpark -- 5 just after the first time in 2019, we just went over 6 that $300,000,000.00 mark for the State. So 7 collectively, that's State and County spending total, 8 we're over $300,000,000.00 in spending. And it is going 9 up, but it's going up kind of like -- I'm sorry, my 10 messed up hand. It's going up a little bit like that. 11 CPS cases collectively across the State -- 12 we actually don't have good data on CPS yet. The best 13 numbers we have is we think statewide we're spending 14 somewhere in the ballpark of 50 to 60 million dollars on 15 CPS cases. But unlike indigent defense was kind of 16 going up like this, CPS cases are going up like that. 17 I bring up the CPS cases. We actually don't 18 fund those right now. But I bring it up in part 19 because, you know, you asked about the legislature 20 previously. One of the bills that Senator Lois 21 Kolkhorst had last session would have created a TIDC 22 analog for CPS cases. So that's something we're 23 definitely looking into. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Thanks. 25 JUDGE WILLIAMS: I have one question. You 104 1 may have covered it partly with Judge Kelly. We're 2 talking about who might lead this, the Public Defender's 3 Office for these five counties. Would the decision to 4 hire the lead public defender be locally based amongst 5 the five counties or is -- do y'all have some control 6 over that? 7 MR. BURKHART: No, it will be locally based 8 among the five counties, but we're happy to advise on 9 it. And usually the counties will ask us kind of our 10 two cents on it. 11 12 JUDGE WILLIAMS: Bottom line, the counties 13 get to decide. 14 MR. BURKHART: That's right. That's right. 15 JUDGE WILLIAMS: Okay. 16 MR. BURKHART: Yeah. Same thing. We -- we 17 never come into the State and say, you know, y'all have 18 to hire this person and build this office. We don't do 19 that, but we advise on it. But we advise on it, you 20 know. 21 JUDGE WILLIAMS: Yeah, okay. Thank you. 22 MRS. STEBBINS: I have another question. 23 MR. BURKHART: Yes, ma'am. 24 MRS. STEBBINS: Then are the five counties 25 then supervisors of all of the employees in the office 105 1 together? 2 MR. BURKHART: They usually have some -- and 3 Scott can speak to this probably better than I can. 4 Usually you have like a host county. Some even can't 5 afford that. You know, we have -- there are ten 6 counties in South Texas and there are about five in far 7 West Texas that have the usual funds. Usually one 8 County serves as the host County. So that our funding 9 would go to the host County. In this case, you know, we 10 think Kerr County would be a pretty good host County. 11 And we do -- I mean, basically we set up so 12 that there are no -- I mean, we cover the overhead and 13 all that kind of stuff so there's not an additional 14 burden on the County to do that. So basically the 15 funding flows through a single County and is 16 administered from there. 17 MRS. STEBBINS: But the supervision of the 18 actual employees would then be the host County and not 19 the five counties together? 20 MR. BURKHART: Well, the -- it would be -- 21 well, we try to build some sort of oversight. So some 22 -- as a matter of fact, in the planning stage now, so 23 some sort of governing structure. And how that's made 24 and who would be in that and everything, that's 25 something we work with the County to figure out. 106 1 But we try to have a group of folks who 2 understand that indigents, but also don't have a direct 3 conflict with the office. And so that's something, 4 again, that kind of -- we don't come in and dictate and 5 say here's who's going to be your oversight board and 6 things like that, but we help advise them. 7 Any other questions before I hand it over to 8 Scott? All right. Thank you. 9 And my -- my business card is in there. If 10 you all -- and don't ever hesitate to call me. And 11 thank y'all again for having us. We appreciate it. 12 JUDGE KELLY: So the helicopter has landed 13 and we're getting ready to get into the weeds, right? 14 MR. EHLERS: Yeah. We can get in the weeds 15 if y'all want to. I'm happy to. I've spent a good 16 number of weeks putting this together, so I hope you 17 like it. My name, once again, is Scott Ehlers. I'm the 18 Director of Public Defense Improvement with the Texas 19 Indigent Defense Commission. 20 So this study that we put together, as we 21 mentioned, that the counties that would be included in 22 this proposed public defender office would be Bandera, 23 Gillespie, Kendall, Kerr and Medina Counties. As we at 24 least envision it and, you know, this is really up to 25 you all on how you want to structure it in terms of the 107 1 offices, but we were thinking that an office in Kerr 2 County and Medina County would be helpful just in terms 3 of population and like where the different counties are 4 in terms of proximity to each other. Kerr obviously is 5 centrally located as well as the most popular, so we 6 thought it would make sense to have an office here. And 7 the office would handle 85 percent of the cases, felony, 8 misdemeanor, juvenile, and appeals. A hundred percent 9 of the appeals or, you know, thereabouts. 10 In terms of the staffing levels that we came 11 up with, across all five counties, we're looking at 12 suggesting 30 employees, which would be 20 attorneys, 13 three investigators, two case workers, and five support 14 staff for all of them. Next. 15 And then in terms of cost in savings, in 16 year one, we cover 80 percent of the cost of the office 17 for startup costs. And year two and beyond we cover 18 two-thirds of the cost of the office. So across all the 19 counties we projected $750,000 in savings across all 20 those counties if the office is fully operational. And 21 I think that's a very important caveat because we 22 anticipate that there will be a startup transitional 23 phase, and so I would not, you know, bank on all of 24 those savings, quite frankly, because there is going to 25 be time that's needed for the office to start up, and 108 1 while the office is starting up and cases are not being 2 handled by that office, they're still going to be 3 appointed in the traditional manner. And we do not 4 cover, you know, those costs of that traditional 5 appointment to private counsel beyond the formula grants 6 that we have. 7 We -- you know, we'll still have formula 8 grants but won't be covering 80 percent of those costs. 9 It's just 80 percent of the cost of the office, setting 10 it up as well as any cases that go through that office. 11 In year two and beyond, collectively 12 $300,000 in savings. I think those are safer savings 13 because at that point most of those older cases should 14 have, you know, filtered through the process, that 15 transition should be over with. 16 But in year one as well, you have cases that 17 were started in the previous fiscal year, and those are 18 going to have to be paid, you know, once the case is 19 settled in the next fiscal year. Next. 20 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, before you move 21 on -- 22 MR. EHLERS: Yes, sir. 23 COMMISSIONER BELEW: -- you'll have 24 something that lingers -- 25 MR. EHLERS: Yes. 109 1 COMMISSIONER BELEW: -- from before this is 2 established? 3 MR. EHLERS: Exactly. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: And this has been going 5 on for 20 years, so what's the average lag time or -- 6 MR. EHLERS: That -- that is a good 7 question. And if -- if y'all decide you want to move 8 forward with this, I think we're happy to work with your 9 Auditor. We can look at OCA data. I don't have any 10 good -- and it depends on -- it's County by County. So 11 for these five counties, I did not get into that lag 12 time issue, but -- 13 COMMISSIONER BELEW: So you're saying it 14 would depend on the docket in that particular County? 15 MR. EHLERS: Exactly. Like certain 16 counties, you know, they'll -- they take longer to move 17 the dockets, they take, you know, longer than others to 18 -- you know, for an indictment to come down. So all of 19 those things are obviously going to impact how long it 20 takes. 21 And the felonies is, you know, is really the 22 biggest issue, but for some of the smaller, you know, 23 rural counties as well, it can take a long time for even 24 misdemeanors for an information to be filed, and you 25 know, so we can look -- try to get a better handle on 110 1 that for you for, you know, to -- to make those 2 determinations for year one, in particular. 3 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Do those come under the 4 heading then of the -- the new office? Everything's 5 cleared that way, or -- 6 MR. EHLERS: Well, if it had not already 7 been appointed to another attorney, then yes. But say 8 someone got -- you know, they could have gotten arrested 9 and an indictment has not -- has not come down yet. 10 That may have all occurred before the -- and an attorney 11 was not appointed. 12 COMMISSIONER BELEW: So this happens 13 24-hours before the new office is established. It's 14 still -- it's still sort of out there, and a felony -- 15 MR. EHLERS: It just depends. It really 16 depends on when the appointment comes down. So as long 17 as a lawyer had not been appointed on the case, and then 18 the office starts up, and then at that point, someone 19 asks for a lawyer, and then at that point the -- the 20 office is available for appointments, then the office 21 could get the case. But if someone had been appointed 22 prior to the establishment of the office, then that -- 23 that case will continue with that lawyer who was 24 appointed. 25 COMMISSIONER MOSER: How did you decide on 111 1 the five counties? And is there a reason to limit it to 2 five or -- 3 MR. EHLERS: Well, this is actually the -- 4 the second study we had done for three of these 5 counties. So Kerr, Gillespie, and Bandera, they share 6 two different District Courts. And so to us, that -- it 7 made a lot of sense to keep those three together. And 8 then -- 9 JUDGE KELLY: Let me help you out -- 10 MR. EHLERS: Okay. 11 JUDGE KELLY: -- because Chris and I had a 12 lot to do with it. Judge Schuchart from Medina County 13 approached me about wanting to get in a public defenders 14 office. And Medina County is down on US 90. And he 15 discussed it with Judge Evans. He discussed it with -- 16 we all got together and talked about it. And in our 17 discussions one of things we realized is, there's -- 18 there's another PDO, another public defenders office 19 beginning in Blanco County, Burnet County, moving on up. 20 And so Kendall County would have been left out. So I 21 contacted Judge Lux to say, we're look -- we're talking 22 about this. If you want to get in, you need to talk to 23 us now, because if we form it then they'd be isolated. 24 And so that's how we got to five. 25 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Thank you. 112 1 JUDGE KELLY: I mean that -- Scott didn't do 2 that; we did that. 3 MR. EHLERS: Yeah. They came to us and they 4 expressed interest. 5 MR. BURKHART: You asked about whether it 6 needed to be limited to five? It doesn't. You know, as 7 long as we have funding, if there were additional 8 counties that wanted to join down the road, that would 9 be okay. 10 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So down the road they 11 could even participate, could join? 12 MR. BURKHART: Uh-huh. Yes. 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. 14 MR. EHLERS: So Judge Kelly had mentioned 15 Burnet County. So right now Burnet County has their 16 stand-alone office. And there's talk of we're going to 17 do a planning study for them to expand the Burnet County 18 Public Defender Office for those other counties. 19 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Thank you. 20 MR. EHLERS: Sure. So in terms of our -- 21 the cost in savings projections, this is just a summary 22 of it. The 1.6 million is about what is the average 23 that these five counties are spending every year right 24 now. And net expenses after that would, like I said, 25 year one is not absolutely solid at 915, but if the 113 1 office was fully functional, taking all of those cases, 2 it would cost about 900 -- a little over 900,000 in year 3 one to operate the office in all of your indigent 4 defense expenses. 5 In year two it would be about 1.3 million 6 for all of your indigent defense expenditures. 7 Including, you know, the grant funding that we provide. 8 And so you'll see the cost savings there projected at 9 750,000 for year one, and about 310 for year two. 10 Next. 11 MRS. WILKE: Can I ask a quick question? 12 Did you break down the cost savings per County? 13 MR. EHLERS: Yes. I'm going to get to that. 14 Next. Here's the grant funding that we are 15 projecting. So in year one, about $2.6 million dollars 16 invested by TIDC. Year two and beyond, just over 17 $2,000,000 a year is what we're projecting. Next. 18 So this is the County by County breakdown in 19 terms of the cost in savings. And if you look at the 20 full study, we get into that on page 21 of the full 21 study. So yeah, this is a breakdown of current costs 22 and projected savings for year one and year two. 23 So Kerr, of all the five counties, is the 24 County that has the highest projected savings. Year 25 one, about 340,000. Year two and beyond, just over 114 1 173,000. Next. 2 So in the -- in the report you'll see the 3 various decision points that the County needs to be 4 made -- that needs to be made, and the various 5 assumptions that we made to build the model staffing 6 levels, etc. And so these are the various decision 7 points that the County needs to be make -- needs to make 8 in order to establish the office. As it was mentioned 9 by Geoff earlier, there's an oversight board that needs 10 to be established. We're modeling this as a government 11 department. We have caseload standards that the model 12 is based on. We've gone over case composition. 13 Staffing and salaries is based on what the 14 prosecutors -- the two District Attorney's Offices were 15 making, as well as County Attorney employee salaries. 16 And then there various operational costs as well. 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Talk about government 18 or private entity. 19 MR. EHLERS: So right now in Texas and under 20 State Law, an office could be established either as a 21 government entity or a private non-profit. And so, we 22 have rural regional public defender offices that are set 23 up in both ways. In far West Texas, there's far West 24 Texas Public Defender Office, and that office covers 25 five very large West Texas counties. 115 1 And then Texas Rio Grande Legal Aid, they 2 are currently serving as the public defender office in 3 ten South Texas counties. And so, an office can be 4 established ether as a government entity, as a 5 department, or you could contract with a non-profit like 6 Texas Rio Grande Legal Aid to run the office as well. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Thank you. 8 MR. EHLERS: Uh-huh. Next. 9 So, once again, basically this office would 10 cover all types of criminal cases. We're projecting 11 about -- a little over 3100 cases would be handled by 12 this office every year. This is based on historical 13 appointment levels in these three counties, as well as 14 an increase in appointments in some counties that had 15 lower levels of appointments. 16 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Before you move on. 17 While you're talking about the numbers of cases, is 18 there something built into this that in the event that 19 the population changes in one of the Counties where they 20 have an inordinate amount of cases, that their 21 participation or financial participation automatically 22 changes? 23 MR. EHLERS: Yes. So, I mean, that will 24 really get in the weeds in terms of once y'all decide 25 you want to move forward and -- 116 1 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Okay. All right. 2 MR. EHLERS: -- you know, we give you the 3 grant fund. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: But it's there. 5 MR. EHLERS: But yeah, I think every year 6 you should -- you should reevaluate the caseloads. As 7 you said, you know, some of y'all's counties are growing 8 more than others. So -- 9 JUDGE KELLY: It will be similar to what we 10 have with our multi-county districts right now. Judge 11 Evans is sitting at the back. He -- he knows. I saw 12 his head nod. And the way we do it with the Courts 13 right now is we -- we changed -- we reallocate every 14 census. 15 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, as long as -- 16 JUDGE KELLY: We could do it sooner than 17 that if we wanted to. 18 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I just wouldn't want to 19 see something that leads to friction. If there's 20 something built in automatically that it's just every 21 year it's -- 22 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I can guarantee you that 23 Medina County is growing a lot faster and -- and 24 Gillespie County is growing faster. And Bandera County 25 down around the lake is growing foster. And Kendall 117 1 County has blown up. 2 MR. BURKHART: And we do those adjustments 3 right now about every year or two with the public 4 defender's office, and others we have. 5 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Okay. 6 MR. BURKHART: And we see that in other 7 places, too. 8 MR. EHLERS: Okay. And if you looked at 9 Appendix A of the report, we get into a lot more detail 10 in terms of the case levels and staffing levels and how 11 we made those calculations. Next. 12 Conflict cases. So there's going to be a 13 certain percentage of cases that private assigned 14 counsel will need to continue to represent. And we're 15 estimating those at about 15 percent and that's based on 16 Burnet County, their public defender office. They are 17 basically representing all indigent defendants except 18 for conflicts in Burnet. And so we based that conflict 19 rate on what's going on in Burnet County. And so about 20 15 percent of the cases, those would continue to need to 21 go to private assigned counsel. Those would be paid for 22 by the counties, except -- fully, except for the formula 23 grant reimbursements that we get. 24 JUDGE KELLY: I wanted to ask a question 25 about that, Scott. You got these existing PDO's in West 118 1 Texas, South Texas, especially where you've got ten 2 counties. You're talking about us having two offices, 3 one in Hondo and one here in Kerrville. 4 MR. EHLERS: If you -- if you think that 5 makes sense. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Well, the judges have talked. 7 We understand how far it is from one place to the other. 8 MR. EHLERS: Yeah, that's part of the 9 concern. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Is there any way if we have 11 two offices to be able to have what we lawyers call 12 Chinese walls for conflicts of interest, so that if we 13 have a conflict for a case that's in Fredericksburg or 14 Kerrville, we can just say well, that's going to be 15 handled by the Hondo office? 16 MR. EHLERS: Yeah, that's possible. 17 JUDGE KELLY: And -- because they're going 18 to have their own files down there. I'm just wondering, 19 would that reduce the percentage? Fifteen percent is 20 what I've always heard. I think that's probably about 21 right. But I didn't know if the multiple offices would 22 -- it's just an idea. 23 MR. BURKHART: It's a good idea. That might 24 be possible. I think the one thing to think about would 25 be if you -- do you want to handle them totally 119 1 separately in the Hondo office and the Kerrville office 2 where -- you know, basically would they cooperate on 3 other cases in general? And if so, then that kind of 4 wall becomes pretty difficult. I think it's possible. 5 I think it's definitely -- 6 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I think we'll have to 7 delegate to the final decision-making authority. It'd 8 have to be separated, so you'd have the same person 9 making the decision on what plea deals to accept or not. 10 MR. EHLERS: Yeah. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Let's explore it. 12 MR. EHLERS: Okay, next. So this is a 13 further breakdown of the staffing levels and salaries. 14 And, once again, all of these salary levels are based on 15 a combination of the two District Attorney's offices, as 16 well as the County Attorney's Offices. You know, some 17 of these may need to go down. Frankly, I'm anticipating 18 that, you know, folks who work in the DA's office, 19 County Attorney's office, they may have been there 20 awhile. You know, they may have, you know, accrued time 21 with the County and so their salaries are higher. I 22 didn't -- 23 JUDGE KELLY: We've already been asked that 24 question. 25 MRS. WILKE: Yes. You know -- 120 1 JUDGE KELLY: We have -- we have to factor 2 that in. 3 MRS. WILKE: You know, like for the 4 investigator, my investigator has 19 years longevity and 5 that's his salary. And the office manager has 16 years 6 longevity and that's her salary. So -- 7 MR. EHLERS: Yeah. So those were -- these 8 are not set in stone. Obviously, they should follow 9 whatever the county's -- whatever your salary schedule 10 is. And so this was really just to, you know, create 11 some ballpark budget for you. 12 JUDGE KELLY: And I was just trying to 13 reassure the stakeholders out there that there's a lot 14 of flexibility in what our going rate is on some of this 15 stuff. 16 MR. EHLERS: All right. Next. 17 Oh, that's it. I guess in terms of next 18 steps, we -- in terms of who needs to approve this, so 19 obviously any counties that would be interested in 20 participating, we would need a Resolution from the 21 Commissioners' Court. The grant application due date is 22 May 11th for priority consideration. And so -- 23 COMMISSIONER BELEW: With whom? 24 MR. EHLERS: With the Indigent Defense 25 Commission. So as part of that, there's an application 121 1 process that we're happy to help you with, so 2 Resolutions from the Commissioners' Court, as well as 3 the District and County Judges. Did I miss anybody 4 else? 5 MR. BURKHART: Yeah, essentially -- do you 6 mind if I -- 7 MR. EHLERS: Sure. 8 MR. BURKHART: Yeah, I mean, essentially for 9 our Board, I mean, we're looking for a couple of things. 10 One is just a Resolution from the Commissioners' Court 11 that would be involved. If Kerr were to take the lead 12 like we put in the planning study, that yours would be 13 especially important. We just want to make sure that 14 everybody here's on board with it. 15 We could, in the meantime, put you in touch 16 with some of these other rural regional public defender 17 offices so you can talk to Commissioners and County 18 Judges out in some of those areas and get a sense of 19 what -- what that looks like for their counties. 20 And then it's -- the other part of the 21 application, we -- we'd like to get a letter from judges 22 who would be involved in that. Our Board -- basically, 23 we don't want to build something if it's not going to be 24 used. We want to make sure that the judges are on board 25 with it as well. And that's really it. I mean, we can 122 1 help with the -- you know, with any of that drafting or 2 anything like that. 3 And the planning study, again, is kind of a 4 -- we think of it as a jumping off point for the office. 5 So -- and I think we -- you made a good point about the 6 investigator's salaries and things like that. Stuff 7 like that, I think what we do from this point really is 8 take a planning study, adjust kind of given the 9 situation, you know, on the ground and what makes sense 10 after you've had a chance to really read it and digest 11 it. And you all have our cards so we're happy to -- 12 talk to us anytime you like. 13 JUDGE KELLY: If you will remember, we went 14 through this procedure last year. Jody and I actually 15 submitted the letter of intent and we came to the Court 16 with a Resolution and we put it off to this year. We 17 had Judge Evans in Bandera County were on board. We 18 weren't sure where Judge Stroeher was last year. But I 19 can report now that Judge Stroeher and Gillespie County 20 appear to be on track. And I'm sure we'll hear from 21 Judge Schuchart. He can't go to a meeting without 22 talking, I know. 23 So where we are right now, it's -- in terms 24 of the county judges, we've all discussed it and it 25 seems to be something that we've come to our respective 123 1 courts and are recommending you consider. 2 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So May 11th is the 3 application deadline? 4 MR. BURKHART: That's correct. 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Is this a yearly thing? 6 MR. BURKHART: It is. The annual -- 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. 8 MR BURKHART: -- and our Board is -- we may 9 be considering in the next year making it a little bit 10 looser, but right now we have, yeah, kind of a -- 11 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. But it's an 12 annual? 13 MR. BURKHART: It's an annual. 14 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Thank you. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: So where are we? I 16 mean, have you presented -- done this presentation to 17 the other counties? 18 MR. BURKHART: So Scott and Kathleen have 19 spoken with Medina County, I think that was last week. 20 We're going to meet with Kendall County this afternoon. 21 And we have not yet met with Gillespie and Bandera. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Don't take Judge Evans for 23 granted. Trust me. 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: So I -- what I'm 25 understanding from this conflict cases, that above 124 1 whatever happens in the event that we have this -- 2 established this office you're talking about, we can 3 look for about another 15 percent in the indigent 4 defense cost -- 5 MR. BURKHART: That's about right. 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Above and beyond, at 7 least? 8 MR. BURKHART: Yeah. Due to conflicts, 9 yeah. That's right. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Co-Defendants. 11 MR. EHLERS: All the projected costs, 12 though, that are in here, those include your conflict 13 costs too. 14 COMMISSIONER BELEW: That's in there? 15 MR. EHLERS: That is in there. 16 COMMISSIONER BELEW: So that's just kind of 17 broken out to let us know that's there? 18 MR. EHLERS: Right. Yes, sir. That's in 19 there. 20 COMMISSIONER BELEW: And then the other 21 thing is that -- well, that's all right. I don't need 22 to bring that up now. 23 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So one other question. 24 Have the judges that have talked about this, have you 25 talked with other areas that have formed these -- 125 1 JUDGE KELLY: Yes. 2 COMMISSIONER MOSER: -- stations and seeked 3 pros and cons? 4 JUDGE KELLY: In fact, if you'll remember 5 last year, I came back from the new judges' school, 6 where Judge Evans was my mentor, and I -- I started that 7 school dead set against it, and by the time I finished 8 it, I think both of us had been kind of quasi converted 9 or born again and -- and in just visiting with the other 10 judges and commissioners that were there. 11 COMMISSIONER MOSER: That have these 12 indigent -- 13 JUDGE KELLY: Yes. 14 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. And they're -- 15 okay. That would be the question. 16 JUDGE KELLY: I haven't heard a complaint 17 one from the PDO's. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. 19 MR. BURKHART: And we -- actually, we've -- 20 Wesley Shackelford, who is our Deputy Director, I think 21 you've spoken with before, he gives a lot of 22 presentations through Texas Association of Counties and 23 we tend to have a lot of County Commissioners and Judges 24 who, when they have those offices, stand up and, you 25 know, kind of will speak about their office, speak about 126 1 their counties. I always feel that -- they're not paid 2 plants or anything, you know -- 3 JUDGE KELLY: No, we know. He made the 4 presentation and personally walked Judge Evans and I 5 down the hall until we nodded in agreement. We'd look 6 at it. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Very good. 8 MR. BURKHART: And we're always here. 9 Always happy to answer any questions. 10 JUDGE KELLY: We've got a lot of 11 stakeholders here. I want to make sure that you all are 12 -- have an opportunity to ask any questions that you 13 would like. This is a good opportunity to talk it over. 14 Okay. Well, thank you. Thank you very much. 15 Appreciate it. 16 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Good presentation. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Judge, do any of the 18 other judges want to make any comments? 19 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah. We've got everybody 20 here. Judge Schuchart, come talk to us. 21 JUDGE SCHUCHART: I am Chris Schuchart, the 22 Medina County Judge. We had this same presentation two 23 weeks ago and our Court voted unanimously to continue on 24 with it. I think one of the things that you don't see 25 in there, I think the judges could probably tell you 127 1 more about it, and I don't know how Kerr County works. 2 But as someone who calls the docket, a lot of time the 3 indigent appointed counsel don't show up. So you have 4 to reset to the next time. So that's more time that if 5 this person's in jail, they're spending in jail. So -- 6 so my thought is, the whole justice system will move 7 more efficiently because from arraignment on, they will 8 always have a counsel there representing them and odds 9 are if they're in jail, they will get out faster because 10 they'll have an attorney that's paying attention to 11 them, as opposed to -- not to bad mouth indigent 12 appointed attorneys -- sometimes they have other things 13 to do and this isn't their party, and so -- so I think 14 that's probably the intangible that's not in that 15 presentation. How much money you can save in man time 16 or people staying the night in jail. So, thank you. 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Good point. 18 JUDGE SCHUCHART: Thank you very much. 19 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Thank you, Judge. 20 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Does that mean you 21 wouldn't sentence as many guests? 22 JUDGE SCHUCHART: Do what? 23 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Would that mean you 24 wouldn't sentence as many guests? 25 JUDGE SCHUCHART: You know what? We're -- 128 1 we actually are breaking ground on a new jail next month 2 or two so I'm sorry to announce to y'all that those -- 3 those multi-figure checks are going to start slowing 4 down here in about a year but -- but anyway, we're going 5 to be paying our own bills then, so thank you. 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Just remember, less is 7 better when you start sizing. 8 JUDGE SCHUCHART: I understand. And I 9 appreciate the fact that y'all let us keep our prisoners 10 in your jail. So thank you. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Any of the other stakeholders 12 or interested parties? Sheriff. 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The only thing that I'd 14 like to say is that I think just from what I'm hearing 15 is, number one, I think all the counties would benefit 16 by having more defense attorneys. That's what's hurting 17 us the worse, is not having enough defense attorneys. 18 Secondly, is a whole lot of these defense 19 attorneys that are appointed, the only time they see 20 their client is in the courtroom. Because they're not 21 -- they're appointed to that one, but they have paying 22 clients or other cases somewhere else. So it does bog 23 down the entire system. And then I think, hopefully, it 24 would get attorneys involved quicker even. I know 25 there's certain, you know, in the Fair Defense Act. 129 1 But if you've got a group of attorneys 2 already that are part of this, that guy comes to jail 3 today. Literally, he could actually have a defense 4 attorney already with him by tomorrow, which has helped 5 getting his bond reduction if that's what it takes, if 6 it's a non-violent quick one. Where right now we're 7 seeing them set for, you know, weeks before they even 8 get a bond hearing, if they wanted one. And it's just 9 -- things like that is where I think we could save a 10 whole lot of money. 11 JUDGE KELLY: And Sheriff, when I sat in the 12 blue seats with Judge Pollard in this seat, there was a 13 study that he -- anecdotal study that he was conducting 14 and I think he reported it to the Court. And I know we 15 met with the District Attorneys, and I think even the 16 County Attorney, trying to find if -- how we could get 17 cases to trial sooner. And how the -- where the system 18 was -- was bottlenecked or -- and one of the complaints 19 that I heard from -- and the prosecutors talked to us 20 about a public defender's office a few years ago 21 about -- about this. 22 But a lot of times the court-appointed 23 counsel and their clients don't even get serious about 24 the offense and what -- what kind of plea they may 25 accept or not until they've got a trial setting. And we 130 1 have -- each Court has only 11 weeks a year for criminal 2 trial settings. And it was a real bottleneck to try to 3 get the lawyers to go over and work with the clients to 4 find out what they -- what kind of plea they might be 5 able to agree to, until they had a trial setting. And 6 so having more court-appointed attorneys, I think, will 7 speed up the system. 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I think you have that. 9 And I think the judges can definitely, and the DA's can 10 attest to this, that we probably don't have but, what, 11 four or five court-appointed attorneys that really work 12 consistent the year, and with those. The conflict of -- 13 not the conflict of the inmates, so to speak, or the 14 client, but the conflict of they've got court in Kendall 15 County or they've got court in another county at the 16 same time we may have court here, and it causes a whole 17 lot more continuances than what think any of us would 18 like to see where -- and true, they can only try so many 19 cases a year. But. 20 You can get a whole lot more plea offers if 21 the attorneys spent more time with their clients. And 22 that's the biggest problem we have. And that's where 23 you're going to save. We're averaging, you know, 24 between 40 and $50.00 a day, or 35 and $50.00 a day, 25 depending on housing the inmates, okay. 131 1 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Does efficiency on this 2 end, the attorney end, automatically translate to 3 efficiency at the courtroom level? 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. Yes. But the 5 other thing that you have to realize, Kerr County is 6 paying over now $1.2 million a year on inmate medical. 7 That's inmate medical. And believe me, we -- we don't 8 have the healthiest people in the world come into our 9 facility. And the longer they're there, the higher that 10 medical cost goes. And there's no ands, ifs or buts 11 about that. 12 Well, there's so many other costs where just 13 cutting the time down could be major savings that we 14 won't see in any of their figures because they won't 15 show that medical cost and all that kind of stuff. It's 16 a whole lot more. The cost, the lawsuits, you know, 17 everything coming out of your jail is -- is really based 18 off time. The longer that inmate stays in that jail, 19 the more problems you're going to have. That's all 20 there is to it. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Judge Evans? 22 JUDGE EVANS: I'm not a lawyer, but I like 23 to talk. 24 (Laughter.) 25 JUDGE EVANS: Rich Evans, Bandera County 132 1 Judge. Since I've been on the Commission, I have 2 purposely advocated for rural counties, and this grant 3 now is 66 and 2/3 percent sustainability, which is a big 4 deal. It makes it more affordable. The Commission 5 fails at times and if -- I'll say something you have to 6 take credit for. But they fail to realize we have 254 7 counties in the State sometimes, about sustainability, 8 indigent defense, things like that. So the formula 9 grade has gone up, has helped us, we have 10 sustainability, that's going to help us. 11 Yeah, I think now is the best time we're 12 going to have to probably -- if you look at the stock 13 market today, the oil prices, there's a good chance at 14 next session they -- there may be a shortfall, so we 15 need to take action now. 16 My County benefits the least monetarily from 17 this Public Defender's Office. I don't have any 18 attorneys. So they all come basically out of town, 19 which travel time, plus the conflict, as Rusty said. I 20 may be in the 216th, okay, well now I'm going to be in 21 Medina County, so we had to put them off. 22 They come to my Court, they -- and I tell 23 them, I said, that's your client over there. I know you 24 haven't talked to them. That's because -- that we do 25 know that, that's not fair to anybody. 133 1 So this is -- it's going to cost some money. 2 There's going to be some hiccups in the process, but you 3 know, I'm -- I'm, you know, timing out. I'm not going 4 to be here next term. But it's time to do something 5 when we have the people in place that have experience, 6 and have the -- have the scars that we have because of 7 what we have in place now. 8 So this is something that's going to be 9 sustainable. I think it's going to be -- the benefits 10 are going to be for years, probably decades. So think 11 about that. Whenever you have -- you can't afford an 12 attorney, so you appoint somebody in San Antonio, and 13 they may not come, they may not show up. They may have 14 four continuances because they have some district court 15 in San Antonio they have to go to. That -- that's -- 16 that clogs up the system. That makes the system cost 17 everybody more. Plus, the Defendant doesn't get a fair 18 shake. 19 So I would encourage that this Court, help 20 us go forward. You have to be the anchor. If you -- if 21 you're not, it's going to be difficult for it to work. 22 And we can work it out. We -- right now we pay for the 23 DA and -- and the -- and the court costs, and we have to 24 do it on the formula but that's just -- that's what -- 25 we have to work that out. 134 1 If things change, we can change the formula. 2 I expect that Medina County is going to pay most of it, 3 they're growing. They have Toyota so -- 4 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I think Kendall is going 5 to pay a chunk. 6 JUDGE EVANS: So that -- I think now is the 7 time. If we get a bunch of new judges, county judges, 8 we -- we're the ones that have to guide this, and the 9 Commissioners' Courts. We have to relearn what the 10 problem is. I've got 24 years. I've learned the 11 problem. So it's time to do something. 12 So like I say, I saved the least amount of 13 money for my taxpayers, but I think I have the greatest 14 benefit for my taxpayers as far as. So, any questions? 15 COMMISSIONER MOSER: What percentage of the 16 counties have a PDO or part of a PDO? 17 MR. BURKHART: Right now, we have somewhere 18 in the ballpark of 40 counties that have a public 19 defender office if you don't count the regional public 20 defender office for capital cases. 21 So capital cases, we've got 185 counties 22 that are involved in that. For just kind of mainstream 23 felonies and misdemeanors, we have about 40. And then 24 right now we're talking to about 20 or so additional 25 counties that are in the area that are showing some 135 1 interest in that. 2 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. 3 MR. BURKHART: Part of that has been the 4 change that Judge Evans was really pushing for, moving 5 up to that two-thirds funding has -- has driven a lot 6 more interest. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Good. Thank 8 you. 9 JUDGE EVANS: The reason I say, you know, 10 this is the right time, you know, our PDO bill is going 11 to go down because that sustainability is the 12 two-thirds. This is the two-thirds. So this is the 13 time where you have a little bit of slack in there. 14 It's just going to cost some to do it, but you should 15 have some savings you could implement that into your 16 stuff. But this is a long-term solution to a long-term 17 problem. That's my opinion. 18 COMMISSIONER BELEW: That's not going away 19 anytime -- it's not going to go away ever. It's always 20 going to grow. 21 JUDGE EVANS: No. It's -- you know, we have 22 -- we have more beer joints than we have churches in 23 Bandera, and I don't know if y'all come there, but -- 24 JUDGE KELLY: Well, we may have more 25 churches but I don't think we have less crime. 136 1 JUDGE EVANS: You know, and it's -- as we -- 2 we have people that are moving here that are not from 3 Texas. Different mindset. Different things. And we're 4 dealing with a different class of defendants in a lot of 5 different cases, so -- 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Interesting. 7 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And the one thing, when 8 he's talking about continuances that you have to 9 remember, is a lot of times there may be three or four 10 because of the different conflicts or just different 11 things. Each continuance is another 30 days. Okay. So 12 if you got three continuances, you've already got 90 13 more days in jail before you've done anything. 14 JUDGE EVANS: Well, another thing that 15 happens with a continuance on a A and B misdemeanor, you 16 don't -- you can only stay so many days and then you get 17 a PR bond. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 19 JUDGE EVANS: You're going to get out. So 20 you have -- they're -- they're out without anything 21 being done. So you haven't even -- you haven't done 22 anything. So they get out one way or the other on the 23 A's and B's, misdemeanors. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: For those that don't 25 know Judge Evans well, he's about as tight as they come 137 1 when it comes to squeezing a penny. 2 (Laughter.) 3 So if Judge Evans is getting on board with 4 this, financially is probably a pretty wise move. 5 JUDGE EVANS: And I'm only surpassed by 6 Judge Stroeher. 7 JUDGE KELLY: We'll stipulate to that. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. I'll agree with 9 that. 10 JUDGE EVANS: Okay. Anything else? Thank 11 y'all very much. 12 JUDGE WILLIAMS: Judge Kelly, I -- 13 JUDGE KELLY: Please. 14 JUDGE WILLIAMS: I spoke to you all a few 15 months ago. You know I'm in favor of this and have been 16 for some time. But I'm going to try not to be redundant 17 of what's already being stated. But this is no slam 18 against the appointed attorneys we have right now, but 19 as a practical matter, it is a huge problem because of 20 the things that have already been stated. And we have 21 every month, every pretrial, good lawyers that are -- 22 have to be in multiple counties and different -- on the 23 same day and -- and -- or they have other trial 24 conflicts in other counties that they -- outside of even 25 this region. And there's all kinds of reasons they have 138 1 for continuances. 2 Sheriff Hierholzer just stated something I 3 was going to mention about the cost of continuances. 4 And I'm trying to compare apples and apples. Our 5 District Attorney, Lucy Wilke, has two assistants. And 6 we have a heavy felony docket. And every pretrial we 7 have and every jury trial setting we have, they're 8 prepared and they have -- they split up their caseload 9 and they come to Court and ready to go. And they're not 10 having to be in other counties and have to be a 11 conflict, even for that pretrial. 12 And -- and you're right what you were 13 stating a moment ago. Usually it's at the 11th hour 14 when the defendants and their attorneys get down to the 15 fish or cut bait season and make a decision. And if we 16 have these -- this public defender program, you would 17 have the equivalent but on the other side of these 18 people who are assigned to this, and this is what 19 they're going to do. They're -- they don't have a civil 20 docket, they don't have a juvenile docket, they don't 21 have conflicting dockets and other things that they're 22 attending to. That's their job. And -- and I think it 23 will be very substantive difference in the number of 24 continuances and the ability to move cases on a more 25 effective basis and timely basis, reducing jail time and 139 1 all that. 2 And, of course, on the appointed counsel, a 3 lot of them do a superb job and do get to see their 4 clients. And there are those that do that and there are 5 some that are so busy or for whatever other reason they 6 don't get around to it and the only time they get to see 7 their client is when they're forced to when we set them 8 for pretrials. 9 And that frustrates -- we get letters every 10 single day from inmates that say, I can't get my lawyer 11 to come and see me. I haven't seen him in six months. 12 He's been appointed six months and that's problematic. 13 And then they get to their pretrial and the lawyer says, 14 well, we need to -- you know, this -- this is what you 15 got, you probably ought to plead or whatever, and that 16 -- that causes some issues. 17 And we have requests for -- you know, have 18 them released and appoint another court-appointed 19 attorney. And then we have some attorneys that said -- 20 just natural, it happens, it's happened every year I've 21 been on the bench, some good attorneys say I'm too busy. 22 I won't take anymore appoints. I'll check back with you 23 in another year or so. And they want to get out of all 24 their cases. And then when we have to appoint new cases 25 -- appoint new lawyers to those cases, which adds 140 1 additional cost, even though I ask them to cut their 2 bill or waive their bills when they're getting out. 3 But be that as it may, it just causes more 4 delay and most -- not all of it's going to be alleviated 5 or eliminated from a public defender office, but a lot 6 of it will, and I think it's going to -- I think it'll 7 be a very -- a much more effective way to manage the 8 docket, with both sides being a hundred percent 9 dedicated to -- to those cases. 10 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So as Rusty said it, 11 the benefits are a lot greater than just quantitatively? 12 JUDGE WILLIAMS: Exactly. Absolutely. And 13 I think -- and, of course, it depends -- that's one of 14 the reasons I asked awhile ago, who's going to get to 15 hire the lead public defender? I think that person may 16 have some skills and the people that he gets on board or 17 she gets on board will be very, very important and make 18 sure they directive with and do everything so that 19 everybody stays on top of their docket. That's always 20 an issue. But that can be handled by, you know, picking 21 -- selecting the right person. 22 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Question. If this were 23 approved by all the counties, and targeting 30 people 24 and staffing that, how long -- how long a process is 25 that? And is it feasible to get 30 people in today's 141 1 environment? 2 JUDGE KELLY: Oh yeah. 3 MR. BURKHART: Yeah, we've -- I think a 4 couple different thoughts on that. Yeah, I mean, we've 5 seen this in other offices where they have to staff up, 6 and we think the timeline's pretty reasonable. That 7 within the year you should be there, or about that. 8 You know, as far as attracting people to 9 this, I mean again, young lawyers -- I think as Judge 10 Kelly mentioned before, I mean, young lawyers right now, 11 they're not going out and hanging a shingle. They want 12 to go to a public defender office. 13 And one of the big problems we've seen in 14 Texas -- I spoke at UT, I think it was two, three weeks 15 ago now. I spoke at Texas Tech about six weeks ago. 16 And I talked to both the Deans, I talked to law 17 students, I talked to professors there. And I always 18 ask law students who wants to do criminal defense and 19 out of those I always ask, who wants to hang a shingle, 20 who wants to go to a public defender office. And I -- I 21 have had maybe a couple who want to hang a shingle. It 22 just -- it -- what we haven't seen in the meantime is 23 kind of a brain drain. So we have a lot of students 24 going off from UT, going off from Texas Tech, Texas A&M, 25 and they're going to Louisiana, They're going to New 142 1 Mexico, They're going to Colorado to take public 2 defender jobs because we don't have as many public 3 defender offices here in Texas. 4 So yeah, I -- I think it's -- and I don't 5 want to -- I don't want to paint too rosy a picture. I 6 don't think -- you know, I don't think a public defender 7 office is a panacea. It's not going to fix all your 8 criminal justice problems, but I think when it comes to 9 attracting attorneys it's going to help quite a bit. 10 JUDGE KELLY: And to follow-up on that, when 11 I was in law school a lot of people wanted to go to the 12 D.A.'s offices to learn how to try lawsuits. That's 13 where we started. And from the defense side, we didn't 14 have public defenders' offices in those days and this is 15 the great training. 16 And when you have a caliber of lawyers that 17 leads -- a high quality lawyer that leads your office, 18 like we're talking about possibly having available to 19 us, that becomes a real incentive for those young law 20 students to say I want to go learn from that guy. 21 JUDGE WILLIAMS: By the way, the prices 22 they're recommending, the salaries, depending upon the 23 quality of what you're hiring are a little bit high. 24 JUDGE KELLY: Wait, wait. 25 MRS. WILKE: Maybe if they're fresh out of 143 1 law school. 2 JUDGE WILLIAMS: If they're fresh out of law 3 school you're -- you're over the -- 4 MRS. WILKE: I started working at 29,000 5 when I first got out of law school. 6 MR. BURKHART: Yeah, and I -- I think all of 7 this -- again, we -- you know, I think when it comes to 8 the salary and all that, we -- yeah, we base that on 9 prosecution salaries, and if y'all start people at lower 10 levels and we have people right out of law school, 11 absolutely. 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Seems like a no 13 brainer. 14 JUDGE KELLY: We'll be competitive. 15 JUDGE WILLIAMS: But that won't be your 16 decision, though, that will be the County's decision. 17 MR. BURKHART: Yeah. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Yes. 19 MR. BURKHART: That's right. That's right. 20 And we're happy to advise on it, but that's right, it's 21 the County's decision. And ultimately, you probably 22 want a mix of folks who -- you want that attorney at the 23 helm who has a lot of experience who young attorneys 24 will flock to. And you want to hire some of those young 25 attorneys for a couple of reasons: One, that you get 144 1 some young blood and they'll be around for awhile. But, 2 you know, two, that's -- the salaries are going to be 3 low and you can train them up. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Typically, what is the 5 turnover rate in these offices? 6 MR. BURKHART: Well, for public defender 7 offices, We have -- well, you know, in Texas we don't 8 have a good study of that actually. And I -- I would 9 like to say that, but we don't have a good answer. I 10 can say anecdotally that the turnover is not huge. What 11 we sometimes see in terms of turnover are our attorneys 12 going from one office to another. So, for instance -- 13 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Shift change sort of 14 thing? 15 MR. BURKHART: Yeah, that's right. So we 16 see kind of like the -- you know, the members are -- we 17 recently had a -- 18 JUDGE KELLY: I mean, I -- a fair question. 19 And I think if we -- I am more familiar with DA's 20 offices, but routinely people stay there three, four 21 years, sometimes five. Depends on whether they want to 22 be a career prosecutor or whether they want to go out on 23 their own, or they will go into civil law once they've 24 got -- developed trial skills. 25 But you're talking about bringing new people 145 1 into the community probably for at least, I'd say, 2 three, four, five years. And this is a huge economic 3 development boom for the County. 4 JUDGE WILLIAMS: But there will be 5 experienced lawyers, I know this from speaking to them, 6 that would love not just the salary, but the benefits as 7 well, but have a number of years and jury trials under 8 their belt who won't be coming fresh out and have them 9 be so green and have to be trained and mentored real 10 close, they'll be a number of experienced lawyers 11 signing up for it. 12 One more question I had, Judge Kelly, and 13 all y'all, if all five counties approve of this, what 14 time frame are y'all thinking about as far as it being 15 implemented? 16 JUDGE KELLY: The fall. 17 MR. BURKHART: Yeah. Our event cycle is 18 when we put the solicitation up in January, the 19 application will be due in May. Our Boards will, I 20 think June 18th or 19th, will vote on it. And then 21 basically the funds start. 22 JUDGE KELLY: The fiscal year? 23 MR. BURKHART: The fiscal year. 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: And one other thing. 25 You mentioned about being fully staffed. It wouldn't 146 1 have to launch fully staffed. Even if it weren't you -- 2 you start with more than you had the week before. 3 MR. BURKHART: Yes, that's right. That's 4 right. 5 JUDGE KELLY: I would guess for us the great 6 limiting step will be finding the place where we can 7 house this many people. 8 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Absolutely. 9 JUDGE KELLY: But I have -- I have an idea. 10 I'm just telling you. That -- I've been thinking about 11 this for a long time. 12 COMMISSIONER BELEW: It may involve a tent. 13 JUDGE KELLY: I'm talking about the church 14 building down the street that's for sale. The old 15 Sunday school building there behind the Valero. 16 Any other comments or questions? I want to 17 thank everybody that took the time out to come down and 18 hear the presentation. And encourage you to stay 19 invested in this issue and help us make the wise 20 decision. And all input is welcome, whether it's pro 21 or con. 22 With that we'll move on to the next agenda 23 item, which is item 1.23 consider, discuss and take 24 appropriate action to approve contracts with Center 25 Point Volunteer Fire Department and the Mountain Home 147 1 Volunteer Fire Department and -- 2 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 3 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Second. 5 COMMISSIONER BELEW: That's Tom's. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 7 Commissioner Harris, seconded by Commissioner Moser. 8 Any other discussion on approving the Volunteer Fire 9 Department contracts? Those in favor raise your hand. 10 Unanimous, five zero. 11 1.24 consider, discuss and take appropriate 12 action regarding the workshop schedule. 13 And this is me putting this back on the 14 agenda. We keep talking about the workshop schedule. 15 We haven't done anything on it. And I'm going to keep 16 putting it on until we get a schedule. Not fussing, I'm 17 just reminding. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Does this -- this 19 reflect the budget workshop schedule? Because that was 20 -- to me, that was the big thing is to make sure we put 21 that in and let all these other workshops fit within. 22 MRS. GRINSTEAD: No, this doesn't reflect 23 those. These are just the workshops you've talked about 24 wanting to do. So I don't have any particular dates. 25 But no, it doesn't incorporate all the dates for budget 148 1 workshops. 2 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. I think it's 3 fine. Okay. 4 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: We -- we're already 5 into March and we have no dates. But we have a schedule 6 there. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The March -- the Animal 8 Services -- or animal -- the feral cat thing, that's 9 going to probably be July. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah. You mentioned that 11 already. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just a matter of -- 13 JUDGE KELLY: Well, you mentioned a 14 delaying. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. Just trying to 16 get the people lined up. The other -- you know, maybe I 17 was too grand in my hope. Maybe we should just try to 18 get a park and wildlife person and one other person and 19 kind of hear two sides of it and move on. I mean, I'd 20 like to get more information. But it's -- there's a new 21 group called Alley Cats and then there's American -- or 22 Austin Pets Alive, there's Texas Parks and Wildlife. 23 Just trying to get all of them coordinated has been 24 challenging. And then when we get into June and July 25 then we have budget workshops, so then it really gets 149 1 challenging. So July, maybe even early August. 2 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, the problem's 3 been around a long time. We're not going to fix it with 4 this workshop. So if we have to bump that workshop for 5 something that we absolutely have to do, then that would 6 be my vote. Not that we don't need to address it. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. I mean, I -- I 8 mean, budget is going to take priority over most of the 9 others in my mind as well. 10 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah. That's sort of 11 in concrete. Then we have to fit everything else within 12 there. So sometime after looking at that -- after 13 August 24th or something like that, we're essentially 14 through with a lot of the budget stuff. So -- 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, we had our public 16 defense workshop, sort of. 17 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Yeah. But we're behind 18 by two on here, so -- 19 JUDGE KELLY: Well, but we -- Jody and Bruce 20 and I did a -- did the court recording thing, and went 21 back to the drawing board to find something that's 22 better. That's why we're referring everybody to look at 23 the County's -- I mean the City's website. We're 24 ready -- we can put that back on the -- back on the 25 table anytime you're ready. That's -- that's not a 150 1 problem. And I would update our CIP workshop is not 2 going to be March. 3 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Aprilish? 4 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah. April is the earliest. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is it possible to get 6 the economic development and tax abatement in March, do 7 you think? 8 JUDGE KELLY: All we gotta do is build a 9 fire under Chuck. And get his recommendation. 10 MRS. STEBBINS: We talked to him week before 11 last and he was working on it. 12 JUDGE KELLY: I know what he's waiting on. 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So target in March? 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: End of March, early 15 April. I mean -- 16 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah, that'll work. 17 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: It's almost here. 18 JUDGE KELLY: I know. 19 COMMISSIONER MOSER: March is here. Yeah. 20 JUDGE KELLY: So let's try to -- why don't 21 we follow up with Chuck and see where he is and try to 22 get something so y'all got drafts of what he's proposing 23 and we can get these workshops set up. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I think the other thing 25 is, as reasonable, as soon as possible, GrantWorks, I 151 1 think we've talked about that quite a bit. We could 2 probably -- 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think we could 4 probably postpone that. 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah, that -- 6 JUDGE KELLY: We've made good progress with 7 GrantWorks over the last month or so. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just delete that. 9 JUDGE KELLY: I just put that down for fall. 10 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah. Right. 11 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I'm probably the 12 squeaky wheel, but Environmental Health, I get reminders 13 constantly. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah, you're getting hammered 15 with that. 16 COMMISSIONER BELEW: And we don't have 17 subdivision rules even on here. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And that's what -- I 19 mean environmental -- 20 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Those all go together. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: OSSF partly goes with 22 subdivisions and partly doesn't go with subdivisions. 23 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Yeah. But -- but they 24 need to be present at that one and their own. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah. We can -- we can 152 1 combine those two. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But I think that -- 3 Charlie, do you know where on the re-redraft -- 4 MR. HASTINGS: I think we should be able to 5 do it in April. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: April? 7 MR. HASTINGS: Yes, sir. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So we'll put subdivision 9 rules in April. So do it on the early April or late 10 April? 11 MR. HASTINGS: Early. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So the first Monday of 13 April? 14 MR. HASTINGS: That would work. 15 JUDGE KELLY: So we're looking -- we're 16 trying to go for -- and just recapping. Hopefully late 17 March for the 381 policy and economic development. And 18 then follow it up in April with Environmental Health and 19 subdivision rules. And probably sometime in April or 20 early May would be the CIP. 21 COMMISSIONER BELEW: That's April. What -- 22 what dates? 23 JUDGE KELLY: Well, we're going to come up 24 with dates. 25 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Okay. 153 1 JUDGE KELLY: But I'm trying to -- priority 2 one, we're going to try to -- the first one's going to 3 be 381 policy and economic development. Two is going to 4 be environmental health and subdivision. And three is 5 going to be CIP. 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Right. 7 JUDGE KELLY: And that ought to get us 8 started. That's enough for right now. 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah, good enough. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Good progress. 11 1.25 consider, discuss and take appropriate 12 action to reappoint Lee Hall to the Emergency Services 13 District #2. 14 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yes. This is -- he's 15 just starting another term, agreed to serve another 16 term, and you've already sworn him in. So the -- 17 JUDGE KELLY: We're really ratifying -- I've 18 already sworn him in. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 20 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. So motion's been made 21 by Commissioner Harris, seconded by Commissioner Letz to 22 approve the appointment of Lee Hall to ESD #2. Those in 23 favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 24 The last item on the consideration agenda is 25 1.6(sic) consider, discuss and take appropriate action 154 1 on an offer for settlement of a Settlement Agreement 2 with Bonding Companies entered into December 13, 2004. 3 And Ms. Behrens, Emily Behrens, was here 4 earlier and I -- and she's offered us -- well, I'm going 5 to let you explain it. 6 MRS. STEBBINS: Sure. I'd be glad to. 7 JUDGE KELLY: But I'll report my 8 conversation with her when it's time. 9 MRS. STEBBINS: There was a 2005 Settlement 10 Agreement that this Court had to approve with the Bail 11 Bond Board and Emily Butler and another bonding company, 12 but the other bonding company I believe has paid what 13 they agreed to pay at the time -- well, in the last 14 couple of years, I believe. But Ms. Behrens has a piece 15 of property in -- 16 JUDGE KELLY: Kimble County. 17 MRS. STEBBINS: Thank you. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It's Mason. 19 MRS. STEBBINS: Mason. And she is about to 20 sell it. Initially, she had near $50,000 as part of the 21 Settlement Agreement. She has two pieces of property 22 that we have liens on. And she -- so she's paid some of 23 it, but this $70,000 that she would like to pay from the 24 proceeds of the sale of the last property that we have 25 encumbered would satisfy nearly all of what she owes, 155 1 and she owes more now than she initially did because she 2 stopped making payments on it some time ago. 3 What she owes now with the interest is 4 $76,154, and that's probably a little bit more. That 5 payoff calculation was good through last Thursday. But 6 she would like to pay off anything that she gets from it 7 minus the taxes she owes on it and closing costs and 8 realtor fees, which is about $70,000. Just over. 9 JUDGE KELLY: And to clarify, I'm not sure 10 technically that we have a lien. We certainly have a 11 claim. I don't know if we have a judgment. We've got a 12 Settlement Agreement. Did we get a lien on it? 13 MRS. STEBBINS: Yes. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Oh, she pledged it? 15 MRS. STEBBINS: Yes, she did. 16 JUDGE KELLY: And what this is, she's going 17 to -- she's selling the property and she wants to settle 18 up with us, once and for all, by distributing the entire 19 net proceeds of that sale to the County, which is just a 20 few thousand dollars short of what she technically owes. 21 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Make a deal. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah. But she -- she'll sell 23 the property. And she came and wanted to make the 24 presentation and I released her to go ahead and go back 25 to Junction. But that's probably all we're ever going 156 1 to see from her. And the initial ask went for less than 2 all the net proceeds, and we were kind of cranky and 3 said, no, we'll take it all. Thank you. 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So we need to take 5 action on -- 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We need to -- 7 JUDGE KELLY: We need to approve her 8 accepting the net proceeds from the sale of the Behren 9 property to settle the Settlement Agreement. 10 MRS. STEBBINS: Yes, sir. 11 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Is that your motion? 12 JUDGE KELLY: Yes, that's my motion. 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Second. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. I made the motion, 15 seconded by Commissioner Moser to approve the Settlement 16 Agreement with Ms. Emily Behrens. Any other discussion? 17 Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 18 Okay. Thank you. 19 MRS. STEBBINS: As things come from the 20 title company after the closing, I'll come back to the 21 Court. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Let's take a quick five-minute 23 break and then we're going to move at warp speed through 24 the rest of this. 25 (Recess.) 157 1 JUDGE KELLY: Let's come back to order. 2 We're on the Approval Agenda 2.1 Pay Bills. 3 MRS. SHELTON: Today's invoices include 4 $474,787.80 for Kerr County. The Airport, $249.09. 5 Adult Probation, $839.51. District Clerk fees of 6 $1,080.32. And the Plateau Water Planning for $92.55. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Move we pay the bills 8 as presented by the Auditor. 9 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 11 Commissioner Moser, seconded by Commissioner Harris to 12 pay the bills. Any discussion? Those in favor raise 13 your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 14 2.2 Budget Amendments. 15 MR. ROBLES: Yes, we have three today. All 16 interdepartmental line item transfers. One for CPS 17 Court, one for 216th District Court, and one for the 18 Sheriff's Seizure Fund. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move for approval. 20 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Commissioner Letz made the 22 motion to approve the budget amendments as presented, 23 seconded by Commissioner Harris. Any discussion? Those 24 in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 25 Late bills 2.3. 158 1 MRS. SHELTON: Today for late bills we have 2 Texas Water Development Board, $49,528.95, and Kerr 3 County, $117.60. 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: What were we paying the 5 late bill on Water Development Board? What's that for? 6 MRS. SHELTON: It was the money set to come 7 in, it's outlay four, I believe, on one of the grants. 8 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Oh, okay. All right. 9 Move for approval. 10 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 12 Commissioner Moser, seconded by Commissioner Belew to 13 approve the payment of late bills. Any discussion? 14 Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 15 Auditor reports. 16 MRS. SHELTON: There are not any. 17 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. 18 Monthly reports. 19 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yes. February 2020. 20 Standard monthly report from Constable Precinct 1, Tommy 21 Rodriguez. Constable Precinct 2, Kyle Schneider. 22 Fines, judgments, and jury fees collected for J.P. 1, 23 Mitzi French. J.P. 2, J. R. Hoyne. J.P. 3, Kathy 24 Mitchell. Environmental Health OSSF monthly activity 25 report, Director Ashli Badders. And District Clerk, 159 1 Dawn Lantz. And then County Treasurer's payroll report, 2 Tracy Soldan. And then County Treasurer's investment 3 report for quarter ending 12/31/2019, Tracy Soldan. 4 I move for approval. 5 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 7 Commissioner Harris, seconded by Commissioner Belew to 8 approve the monthly reports as presented. Any 9 discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, 10 five zero. 11 Court orders. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes, we have the court 13 orders from our March 2nd meeting. Court orders 37987 14 through 37990, and I move for approval. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 16 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 17 Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Harris to 18 approve the court orders as presented. Is there any 19 discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, 20 five zero. 21 Item 3.1 status report from Department 22 Heads. I don't see any. 23 3.2 status reports from Elected Officials. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The only thing I have 25 to say, I did notice y'all need to buy a footstool 160 1 because the Auditor was having to stand on her 2 tippy toes while she gave that report. 3 (Laughter.) 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: You need a fold out 5 step. We'll have to talk to maintenance about that. 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: She -- she needs to 7 wear high heels. 8 MRS. SHELTON: No, no. Those days are over. 9 JUDGE KELLY: Agenda item 3.3 status reports 10 from Judges and Commissioners. 11 I believe we've got -- the first one is (a) 12 and I put that on there. We talked about that Formula 13 Grant from TIDC. We received a letter saying we were 14 awarded $61,559 in Formula Grant. So that's just 15 letting you know what happened. 16 (b) Alcoholic beverage sales in Precinct 2. 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yes. A couple things 18 reported on Precinct 2 as I mentioned. The petition 19 drive to get 216 signatures on the petition so it can be 20 on the ballot in November is moving ahead. There's a 21 group that's passing out fliers, sending out 22 announcements to everybody to see who will participate. 23 I think we got 13 individual affiliates that 24 have identified they'll support this in a big time way. 25 There's supposed to be -- the activity is April the 3rd, 161 1 a gravity check April the 4th at Toucan Jim's in Center 2 Point. April 17th at Storyville in Center Point. And 3 April 5th at Los Dos Amigos. So this thing is really 4 rolling quickly. They're -- they're active in the thing 5 and -- 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: What's the Blue Bison? 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: That's -- that's an 8 icon that they have. It's called Precinct 2 Prosperity 9 Program. Don't ask me why they came up with that name, 10 but they did. And I'm just there to help them whenever 11 I can. So just to let you -- everybody know. It -- 12 it's rolling along. I think it'll at least get across 13 the goal line this time. 14 JUDGE KELLY: We appreciate the progress. 15 And we want to get it done before we get to 16 redistricting so it stays in Precinct 2. 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: There you go. There 18 you go. Hopefully. Yeah, it's gotta get through this 19 time. 20 The second thing is on Veterans Pathway. 21 I've mentioned this before. This is a pathway to enable 22 the Veterans from the Veterans Hospital and from the 23 apartment there to get down to Flat Rock Park and 24 hopefully then tie into the river trail, which would 25 just opened up the entire thing for Veterans in their 162 1 motorized wheelchairs or however they want to move down 2 that river trail would be fantastic. 3 First phase though -- it's going to be 4 phased. First thing is just to get them to Flat Rock 5 Park. And that's probably going to be an activity by 6 Veterans Administration improving their pathway over 7 there. Crossing TxDOT, which I think that that's 8 already there. 9 City will put in a sidewalk between Highway 10 27 and Flat Rock Park. County will put in -- these are 11 all conceptual, okay, a pathway then inside the park. 12 Be just probably, you know, not -- not a concrete, but 13 could be, down to the lake. And it's probably going to 14 be in the neighborhood of $75,000, something like that, 15 for Phase 1, for everybody's work to be done. 16 I've talked to a not-for-profit, a 17 philanthropic organization. It looks like we could get 18 the funds to do that. I talked to the -- mentioned it 19 to the County Attorney this morning to think about -- if 20 she would, about if they were to contribute this money, 21 they have to contribute to a not-for-profit, which would 22 -- there's a Veterans Association not-for-profit in 23 existence. They're willing to do it. Then how do -- 24 how do they then disburse the funds to each one of the 25 City, the County, Veterans, etc., etc. 163 1 And there's another possibility if that 2 doesn't work to get a contribution from philanthropic 3 organizations that are not constrained to just donating 4 to not-for-profits. So that's -- that's something -- 5 again, it's in the early phases, the concept. 6 I think everybody's on board and wanting to 7 do it, but we need to go back to the individual entities 8 and get approval by which to do that. 9 JUDGE KELLY: And then we're going to -- you 10 ready for economic development and then wastewater line? 11 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah. Let me -- let me 12 just say something. This thing -- Commissioner Letz and 13 Williams started this, how long ago, Jonathan, 12 years 14 ago, something like that? 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. 16 COMMISSIONER MOSER: A long time ago. There 17 is -- I want to call this the halftime, okay. This is a 18 full game that goes on where we're through with Phase 1 19 now essentially, and so this $63 million project -- 20 we've talked about GrantWorks, what they're doing, but 21 there's a lot of people involved in this. 22 Jonathan and I spent a lot of time on it. 23 Charlie Hastings is the project manager on it. Bobby 24 Gore supports him in that regard. We have a design 25 engineer, Pesado. We have GrantWorks doing the things 164 1 that you heard about today. LAN is L-A-N -- what's that 2 stand for, Jonathan, remember. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Land acquisition -- 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Something. Anyway, 5 there are 82 parcels of land that had to be formally 6 purchased. They've done -- we've completed all that 7 except for the last bit of one, and so it's a -- it's a 8 really complex thing. And then taking all this over and 9 then turning it over to Kendall County WCID is -- a lot 10 of legal work went in, thanks to -- to the County 11 Attorney for enabling a lot of that to happen too. 12 So I just want to take time to go on the 13 record of recognizing that this is big. What it means 14 is there have been 18 and -- almost 19 miles of main 15 sewer lines constructed. They're there. 16 In Phase 2 and 3, which will start hopefully 17 in September the 1st, there's going to be another 15 18 miles of main sewer lines. There have been over -- 19 approximately 350 homes that have been connected to this 20 sewer system and there will be another 400 to go. So 21 it's -- it's a big deal. It's a lot of work. And the 22 County needs to be proud of what's -- what's done is on 23 schedule and within budget. 24 You saw an extension today. Let me give you 25 one other reason that extension is for today over the 165 1 dates for the Water Development Board. You have to 2 eliminate the septic systems there. Some of these 3 septic systems are under homes. Okay. Some of them the 4 sewer lines go under homes. They go under existing 5 buildings. So it is really, really complex, and it's 6 almost hand to hand combat in each one of these things 7 that -- getting them settled. And we've had some 8 interesting -- I'll say it that way, interesting 9 challenges with some of these individuals on connecting. 10 So -- 11 JUDGE KELLY: Robust discussions. 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Robust discussion. And 13 so far we haven't had anybody that it's really been a 14 real problem. It's just a lot of communication. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think just a quick 16 comment on that is on the scope of it, which I didn't 17 really realize, this is the largest one, as I mentioned 18 earlier, that the Department of Agriculture has ever 19 taken. It's probably the largest one in the United 20 States under -- of this type in rural areas under 21 construction right now and maybe one of the largest ever 22 done. It's a -- I didn't realize how massive a project 23 it was when it all -- when Bill Williams kicked this 24 think off many years ago. 25 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Correct. 166 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But it is and -- and the 2 size of it. And really hats off go to Charlie Hastings 3 a lot too, because he's done a lot of coordination. He 4 is being reimbursed partially on his salary for this 5 work. But still, that -- that would -- he saved us a 6 lot of money. The Auditor saved us a huge amount of 7 money by handling this in-house, a lot of it in-house. 8 So it's been a win-win for everyone. 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah. Charlie 10 definitely -- he's the day-to-day. I mean day-to-day, 11 night-to-night go for on this thing. So just wanted to 12 bring this to everybody's attention. 13 The noise nuisance, I mentioned that before. 14 There's a vineyard that -- or it's not a vineyard; it's 15 a grove of olive trees that are -- to protect their 16 plants when they're really cold and they have big fans 17 that do that and it's like helicopter noise. 18 And so, talked to the County Attorney, 19 there's nothing that we can do civilly on that. Talked 20 to the Sheriff, and there's a noise level by the State 21 of 85 DB which is equivalent to a diesel truck going 22 down but it's gotta be at the location. 23 So anyway, it's -- it's a neighbor to 24 neighbor kind of thing with multiples. So that's going 25 on. We -- we love the idea of the olive grove. I think 167 1 it's a really good economic development thing for the 2 County, but having to deal with the fact that you're 3 doing that amongst neighbors is another challenge. If 4 we see more vineyards and all come in be another little 5 challenge. So it's in work, and hopefully it'll all get 6 resolved neighbor to neighbor. That's it. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Good. Storm damage update? 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't know, it wasn't 9 -- kind of snuck in under the radar but that -- when the 10 rains came through, some thunderstorms last week, it 11 wrecked havoc in the Little League field and AG barn 12 area. A large tree fell on top of our big rainwater 13 catchment tank and ruined it. And probably a roof was 14 blown off one of the buildings at the Little League 15 fields. And numerous trees were down in that area. 16 Jennifer has filed an insurance claim. The 17 adjustor should be out this week. I suspect the -- I've 18 already talked to Barry Wall who installed the rainwater 19 tank, and he's gone by to look at it. He thinks it's a 20 total loss. That's probably about a $35,000. 21 MRS. DOSS: I just read his e-mail. He's 22 going to be here tomorrow at 9:30. Would you like to 23 meet with him or -- 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The adjuster? 25 MRS. DOSS: -- would you like me to? Yes. 168 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll try to, yes. I'll 2 probably be here with him, too. But anyway, things have 3 been all filed, or are being filed. Kind of a shock 4 that there was that much damage by that storm because I 5 didn't think it was that serious. But I guess it was 6 like kind of a mini tornado that went right through that 7 area. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah. Good. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's it. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 11 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Too bad it didn't do a 12 little damage to the roof so we could get that replaced. 13 It hurt everything but the darn roof. 14 COMMISSIONER MOSER: It didn't have hail; it 15 was just wind. 16 JUDGE KELLY: Okay, item 3.4 Quarterly 17 Status Reports. (a) OSSF. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: A little bit on that. 19 Just a couple things. I think everyone was probably 20 aware that Ashli Badders will be going on maternity 21 leave in June. And they're -- I think the Department is 22 ready from the standpoint of not needing any additional 23 employees. Gumaro has been -- is a designated 24 representative. He has his license to do that, so which 25 is a good thing. 169 1 The only possible hiccup is he may be called 2 up for Reserve duty while she's on maternity leave, and 3 if that happens, that will cause a bit of an issue on 4 the part-time side. We'll have to find someone to help 5 fill in. 6 That's -- one of the things that department 7 is doing that's a little bit unusual right now, it's 8 kind of a bubble going through, is the East Kerr 9 project. So far they have been at 238 of the tank 10 abandonments. They have to be there at each one as it's 11 being demolished. 12 Most of them don't take too much time, but 13 you can figure the paperwork and a lot of stuff that 14 comes afterwards. But it takes probably two to three 15 hours per tank abandonment out of that staff's office, 16 you know, of their time. So they're a little bit 17 stretched thin now. And then with -- going down one 18 person is going to be going down a little bit more. 19 Fortunately from the scheduling, it'll 20 probably be kind of -- hit in between phases when both 21 of them or one of them will be out of the office. But 22 it's just kind of something to think about. 23 And then when we have our -- I talked with 24 Ashli Badders about some of the ideas she has of 25 possible adjustments to our rules. And I've talked to 170 1 Commissioner Harris about a few of them already. But 2 when we have our workshop on that we can discuss that 3 more. That's really about it. 4 Should I go to Environmental Health? 5 JUDGE KELLY: Yep. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Environmental Health, 7 you know, not much to report. They don't have a whole 8 lot going on. They're working on their things. And 9 that's primarily -- since it's environmental health 10 that's primarily solid waste that we're talking about 11 right here. And they continue to investigate things as 12 needed. 13 Animal Services. One of the things that -- 14 you know, this is just for the Court to remember. 15 There's an animal cruelty case, I think most of us 16 probably were aware of it, that came up. And then 17 people want to know what's going on. 18 That is basically -- whenever those cases 19 come up are like a law enforcement case. Because they 20 are a law enforcement case, and we don't give out 21 anymore information, and people get really frustrated, 22 really mad at us that we don't say, well, what happened 23 to the person or what are we doing? We can't and we're 24 not going to. 25 So that's kind of the word, that people have 171 1 to be -- to get to hear complaints is that we're not 2 doing anything, well, that's not true. We're just not 3 going to report on ongoing investigations. 4 JUDGE KELLY: That's exactly like a regular 5 criminal investigation. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. Sure. So -- but 7 they get a little bit -- you know, it's just something I 8 just wanted to bring up, because people -- I know they 9 -- they don't get a response from one of us they don't 10 like, they'll contact another Commissioner and they kind 11 of go down, so we can all speak with the same voice on 12 that. And the current one is being investigated. 13 A couple of times there's a -- a new 14 Administrative Assistant is working real well out there. 15 It's working, and there's some openings. Reagan's 16 filling things in, he has a couple of openings, 17 part-time spots. He's filling them slowly rather than 18 just rushing out and hiring the first person. He thinks 19 he has a really good part-time person lined up. 20 COMMISSIONER BELEW: By the way, I had a guy 21 call me for something entirely different yesterday. No, 22 he made a point to call and say how great the staff is 23 at -- at the Hill Country Youth Event Center. Had been 24 at the Duck Event. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. Good. 172 1 COMMISSIONER BELEW: So, just out of the 2 blue. Hey, I wanted everybody to know that. 3 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I think the morale out 4 there has vastly improved. 5 JUDGE KELLY: You can say what you will 6 about that Youth Event Center. It is the most used 7 property in Kerr County. Public property. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So anyway, those are the 9 only reports I had. Just wanted to give a little bit of 10 an update on those three. And everything is going 11 smoothly. 12 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. And then on -- from the 13 Executive Session, we have one thing on there, KEDC? 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. So it is now 12:19. Is 16 that about right? And the Court is going to go into 17 Executive Session. And I ask the Sheriff to change the 18 plaque over there and we'll change the plaque over here. 19 I don't think this is going to take very long. But I 20 appreciate everybody coming. It was a long day. 21 (Executive Session.) 22 JUDGE KELLY: There being no further 23 business, Court is adjourned. 24 * * * * * * 25 173 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 Regular Commissioners' Court. 9 Dated this the 21st day of March, A.D. 2020. 10 11 /s/DEBRA ELLEN GIFFORD Certified Shorthand Reporter 12 No. 953 Expiration Date 04/31/2021 13 * * * * * * 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25