1 1 2 3 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS' COURT 4 Special Session 5 Monday, May 18, 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 *** Commissioners' Comments. 4 4 1.1 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 5 action regarding update, facility use and 5 other matters related to COVID-19. 6 1.2 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 19 action to extend the Local State of 7 Disaster Due to a Public Health and Economic Emergency Proclamation that was 8 signed by Judge Kelly on March 24, 2020, and "extended until terminated by 9 order of the Kerr County Commissioners' Court" on March 30, 2020. 10 1.3 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 27 11 action regarding Kerr County Memorial Day ceremonies. 12 1.4 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 31 13 action to surplus and/or dispose of office equipment from District Clerk's Office 14 inventory. 15 1.5 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 32 action to approve the County Judge, on 16 behalf of Kerr County as the lead county of a five county Regional Public Defender 17 Office consisting of Bandera County, Gillespie County, Kendall County, Kerr 18 County and Medina County, to file for an Improvement Grant from the Texas Indigent 19 Defense Commission for fiscal year 2020/2021. 20 1.6 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 39 action to form a committee to review our 21 current longevity policy and make recommendations to the Commissioners' Court. 22 1.7 Update regarding operating hours of County 42 23 Departments. 24 2.1 Pay Bills. 44 25 2.2 Budget Amendments. 46 3 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 2.3 Late Bills. 46 4 2.6 Court Orders. 47 5 3.1 Status reports from Department Heads. 48 6 1.8 Update regarding Office of Court 57 Administration requirements for the courts. 7 *** Adjournment. 85 8 *** Reporter's Certificate. 86 9 * * * * * * 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 4 1 JUDGE KELLY: Good morning. It is Monday, 2 May the 18th, 2020, and the Kerr County Commissioners' 3 Court is now in session for a Special Commissioners' 4 Court meeting. I want to remind everybody to, if you 5 would, turn your phones to vibrate. I'm not asking you 6 to turn them off, but turn them to vibrate. This phone 7 here is the number that's on the agenda to call in. 8 That number is 830-792-6161. And this phone's ringer is 9 on, and it will be up here if you call in. We'll be 10 able to take your call this way. 11 With that, this is the opportunity for 12 public input. Is there anyone here that has any public 13 input for the Court? Then we'll move on to 14 Commissioners' Comments. I want to emphasize that in 15 open court here we are socially distanced. If you see 16 the courtroom here, you'll see people are spaced 17 appropriately, about six feet apart. We have 18 Commissioners Harris and Belew down here at the tables 19 in front. Their turn at the small table. And 20 Commissioners Moser and Letz up here so that we can 21 remain safe distances apart. 22 So with that, let's start with Commissioner 23 for Precinct 1, Commissioner Belew. Anything to report? 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I did not measure the 25 rain but we got rain. So I'm not worried about the burn 5 1 ban and that was what a lot of the Volunteer Fire 2 Department has been asking about. So we're in good 3 shape there. And that's all I have to say. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Inch and a half in 6 Precinct 2. That's all I've got. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Very good. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: About the same. 9 JUDGE KELLY: Good. 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Got 1.4 at my house. 11 And a little bit everywhere. So that was a good 12 helping. We needed it. So -- and I think we got a 13 chance towards the weekend again. So keep our fingers 14 crossed. 15 JUDGE KELLY: All good. 16 Okay, let's go on to agenda item 1.1 17 consider, discuss and take appropriate action regarding 18 the update, facility use and other matters related to 19 COVID-19. Our Emergency Management Coordinator, Dub 20 Thomas. 21 MR. THOMAS: Good morning, Judge, 22 Commissioners, how are y'all today? 23 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Good. 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: You doing all right? 25 MR. THOMAS: I'm making it. Slowly but 6 1 surely. 2 Today's report, I'm not going to go through 3 the entire court report you have in front of you. A lot 4 of it is the redundant stuff that I talk about every 5 week. What I am going to give you is what has happened 6 within the last week. Our EOC activation level. Kerr 7 County, City of Kerrville, City of Ingram Emergency 8 Operations Center is still activated. We're still 9 operating at an increased readiness level. Annex H 10 Health and Medical is still activated as well. 11 The EOC is operating full staff, but we are 12 still working remotely and the call center continues to 13 be open for citizens needing information. 14 The current situation. Kerr County received 15 one positive COVID-19 result last week. And that 16 brought us up to ten for -- ten positive tests total for 17 the entire period so far. The transmission has been 18 classified as travel related out of Kerr County. Within 19 the State of Texas but outside of Kerr County. And the 20 test was also conducted out-of-county. Meaning it was 21 not done at Peterson, and it was not done in one of our 22 mobile testing sites. DSHS was not able to tell me at 23 the time where that test was conducted, but it was 24 out-of-county. 25 Mobile testings. This is something that I 7 1 wanted to touch on specifically this morning. Mobile 2 testing that was being done at Peterson Regional -- I 3 mean, I'm sorry, Peterson was conducting the testing at 4 the Youth Event Center. We've had three testing sites 5 at the AG barn, or Youth Event Center, with the Texas 6 Military Forces. The Texas National Guard has been out 7 there. 8 May 2nd, 2020, we ran 107 tests. May 8th, 9 116 tests. And our latest one was May 14th, this past 10 Thursday, and we ran 71 tests. The totals have been 295 11 tests have been conducted by the Texas Military Forces. 12 And the May 8th testing, they did not give 13 me a breakdown for the May 2nd, but I did get a 14 breakdown for the May 8th testing and it kind of gives 15 you an idea of where the people that are coming to our 16 testing -- what they're calling their county of 17 residence. So you had -- Bandera had two, three from 18 Bexar, two from El Paso, ten from Gillespie, two 19 Kendall, 93 folks from Kerr County, one Kerrville. I 20 don't know why Kerrville's on there twice. One Parker 21 and then another one -- I don't -- it's blank, they left 22 it blank whenever they filled those -- that information 23 out. So we had 116 tests run that particular time. And 24 all of those tests came back negative. 25 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Dub, out of the 300, do 8 1 you know how many -- one group you didn't know the 2 results of. But how many came back positive out of the 3 300 that were tested? 4 MR. THOMAS: Two that I'm aware of. 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: None? 6 MR. THOMAS: Two. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Two. Two. And one 8 other question. Have all the cases in Kerr County been 9 travel related? 10 MR. THOMAS: No. Some have been classified 11 as either undetermined or community spread. 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. How many 13 community spread, do you know? 14 MR. THOMAS: I want to say it's probably two 15 that I can think of off the top of my head. 16 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Two. Okay. Okay. 17 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Within the same 18 household? 19 MR. THOMAS: No. 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: And how many -- how 21 many are active today? 22 MR. THOMAS: Active, we have three. 23 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Three today? 24 MR. THOMAS: Correct. 25 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Good. Thank 9 1 you. 2 MR. THOMAS: I expect that number to drop 3 sometime between today and tomorrow because that 4 two-week period that they were tested and came back 5 positive, their quarantine period should be up and they 6 should have pretty much recovered by now. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Thank you. 8 MR. THOMAS: I should get that later on this 9 week. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Dub, real quick. How 11 many tests were conducted in total prior to the Governor 12 starting to reopen Kerr County, and then how many tests 13 were done after the Governor announced the reopening? 14 Because they say the cases have gone up so much, but I 15 think what we'll see is in Kerr County, the number of 16 tests done prior to reopening was about half the number 17 of tests that have been done since the reopening. 18 MR. THOMAS: It was right at 500 tests prior 19 to opening. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Prior? From the AG 21 barn and that? 22 MR. THOMAS: Uh-huh. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I didn't think we had 24 that many. 25 MR. THOMAS: We had 464 from Peterson 10 1 Regional. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay. 3 MR. THOMAS: And that included the outreach 4 clinic. 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Outreach? 6 MR. THOMAS: Yes, sir. 7 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: So it's close. 8 MR. THOMAS: Total testing conducted in Kerr 9 County up to this point, Peterson Regional Medical 10 Center, 743. Texas Medical -- I'm sorry. Texas 11 Military Forces, 295. We've had COVID positive tests, 12 ten total. 13 Out of all those tests run, there's -- 14 there's your infection rate. It's less than one 15 percent. Way less than one percent for this County. 16 On May the 15th, Governor Abbott and the 17 Texas Emergency Management announced local fire 18 departments in Texas are going to be partnering with 19 local public health authorities to provide testing in 20 nursing homes throughout the state. The partnerships 21 developed is being implemented through an ongoing 22 collaboration between TDEM, the Texas Commission on Fire 23 Protection, Texas Health and Human Service Commission 24 and the Texas Department of State Health Services. 25 Costs associated with providing these tests 11 1 are eligible for reimbursement. So at this time, the 2 Kerrville Fire Department and Peterson Regional Medical 3 Center have partnered up and they're going to be 4 conducting testing on all -- taking samples from every 5 nursing home here in Kerr County, every resident and 6 every employee. And they've only got a limited amount 7 of time to get that done as well, so they're working on 8 that pretty hot and heavy at this time. 9 May the 14th, Governor Abbott announced the 10 Texas Health and Human Services Commission has received 11 more than $3 million in Federal funding to provide 12 shelter and services to survivors pertaining to domestic 13 violence during the COVID-19 pandemic. This Federal 14 funding will support 78 HHSC funded local family 15 violence centers that provide survivors with immediate 16 shelter, supportive services, and access to community 17 based programs. 18 These funds are available through the Corona 19 Aid Relief and Economic Security or CARES Act, and will 20 be administered through the U.S. Department of Health 21 and Human Services. For more information about that and 22 the Family Violence Program, Texas residents can dial 23 2-1-1 and they can get some more information about that 24 Family Violence Program. 25 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Dub, I read someplace 12 1 where the counties with low populations would receive 2 like an equivalent of up to $55 per person, so that 3 would mean two and a half million dollars for Kerr 4 County -- that means eligible. You know, you can make a 5 claim; it's not saying you're going to get it. So is it 6 two and a half million dollars for all of Kerr County, 7 including the City? Do you have any idea where that -- 8 MR. THOMAS: I sat in on that conference 9 call that the Governor did for the Mayors and the County 10 Judges, and I believe it's -- the funds are going to be 11 done on a per capita basis. 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah, that's what I 13 just said. $55 per person per capita. 14 MR. THOMAS: Well, I didn't know what the 15 dollar amount was but -- 16 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, that's -- that's 17 what I read. 18 MR. THOMAS: Okay. 19 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So 55 -- so that would 20 mean two and a half million dollars. But I would assume 21 that that's just for the entire County. So the City 22 would -- Kerrville and Ingram and the County would have 23 their -- their request. But it would be limited to that 24 two and a half million dollars? 25 MR. THOMAS: Right. I don't know what the 13 1 total number is, but my understanding was that the total 2 that Kerr County gets is -- will be minus whatever the 3 City of Kerrville gets per capita. 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Doesn't make sense. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think it was set up by 6 local government entities so we would only be eligible 7 for what is outside the corporate limits of the City of 8 Kerrville. 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. That was my 10 question. All right. Interesting. All right. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And Ingram, I'm not sure 12 how they fall. I mean, I would think they would get 13 their own. 14 MRS. STEBBINS: It's separated out. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's separated out too. 16 Yeah. 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. Thank you. 18 MR. THOMAS: Yes, sir. 19 May 13, the Governor Abbott and the Texas 20 Emergency Management announced that Federal funding has 21 -- or the Federal Government has extended seven 22 community based testing sites in Texas through June the 23 30th. Those are in El Paso, Dallas, Houston, and Harris 24 County. 25 He also announced that the Texas National 14 1 Guard has activated the facilities disinfection teams to 2 support Texas nursing homes and to help limit the spread 3 of COVID-19. So those disinfection teams were formed in 4 coordination with Texas Health and Human Services 5 Commissioner. 6 May 13th, Governor Abbott waived license 7 renewal late fees that accrued between March 13th and 8 June the 15th for occupational licenses issued by the 9 Department of Licensing and Regulation. Basically, that 10 applies for barbers, hair salons, electricians, 11 cosmetologists, speech therapists, those types. 12 Also on May the 12th, Governor Abbott issued 13 a proclamation extending his Disaster Declaration for 14 all Texas counties in response to COVID-19. This was 15 originally issued on March the 13th and it's, again, 16 extended on April the 12th. The Disaster Declaration 17 provides the number of state -- the State a number of 18 resources to effectively serve Texans as the Lone Star 19 State continues to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. 20 The rest of that information is stuff we've 21 covered in the past. If you will go down to the numbers 22 for the week. Again, COVID-19 continues to spread in 23 Texas. These are figures from the DSHS website. 47,784 24 cases in the State of Texas, 1.4 million in the United 25 States, and the world has had 4.71 million. Total 15 1 deaths are 1,336 in the State of Texas. 88,709 in the 2 United States. 315,000 worldwide. 3 Total recovered, again for Texas 25,570. 4 210,000 in the United States. 1.73 million people have 5 recovered worldwide. 6 Testing continues in the State of Texas. 7 Total tests were 693,276. Of that, private labs have 8 done 670,000. Public labs have done nearly 23,000. All 9 our surrounding counties, Kendall County is 21, Medina 10 is 50 with two fatalities, Llano three, Blanco six, 11 Burnet 28. Of course, Kerr County has ten. Gillespie 12 is four, Bandera is six, and Kimble one. 13 Of the 254 counties in the State of Texas, 14 222 have positive cases for COVID-19. Our DSHS Region 8 15 numbers, we have 1,180 active cases. 1,550 have 16 recovered, and 86 deaths. 17 Our operational priorities continue to be 18 the same. Public safety is our top priority. We're 19 going to continue to provide timely and accurate 20 information about COVID-19 and how to avoid becoming 21 infected. Continue to work with the City of Kerrville 22 Emergency Management, Kerrville Fire Department, EMS, as 23 well as Peterson Regional Medical Center. 24 PPE is still coming in but it's coming in a 25 little bit slow. I've ordered and picked up -- last 16 1 week I picked up a lot of PPE that we're going to be 2 able to use for the courthouse and the Sheriff's 3 Department. And I'm going to continue to order more as 4 much as possible. There is a system in San Antonio, 5 it's called the Battelle System, that has the capability 6 to clean N95 masks to where we could collect those masks 7 and send them to San Antonio and they will -- they will 8 clean them. Just the N95s, those are the only ones that 9 can be cleaned, and then they will return them to us. 10 So once I get us registered for that system, we'll be 11 able to order PPE and we'll also be able to send some 12 off to get it cleaned and get it back so we won't -- and 13 the turnaround is supposed to be like three days, so -- 14 and they can do about 80,000 a day. So hopefully we'll 15 be able to participate -- 16 COMMISSIONER BELEW: What's the cost? 17 MR. THOMAS: It's free. 18 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Free. Okay. 19 MR. THOMAS: Publication and outreach. 20 Peterson Regional is still -- the line is still open at 21 896-4200, Extension 1. The Kerr County EOC, Emergency 22 Operations, has the call center in there for the City of 23 Kerrville. That's 258-1111 and it's still operating as 24 well. We had 34 COVID-19 calls for last week. And the 25 website, we continue to update that as well with 17 1 information that may be coming in for how to apply for 2 some type of financial assistance for local businesses, 3 individuals. You can also go to 2-1-1 as well and find 4 that information there. 5 Any questions on anything this morning? No? 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: We've already asked 7 them -- 8 MR. THOMAS: Awesome. 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: -- and you answered. 10 MR. THOMAS: Well, I just want to make sure 11 there's not anymore. 12 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Thanks, Dub. 13 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Dub, let me ask you a 14 question. You were so close. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: He was almost out of 16 here. 17 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Looking at Medina 18 County, and they're right next to San Antonio, there's 19 Highway 90 and also 35. Is there a correlation like, 20 say, on 90 and Uvalde, there on Highway 90. They're not 21 in this -- in this group of counties we monitor, but do 22 you have any idea if there's is also high? 23 MR. THOMAS: I don't remember what Uvalde 24 County's numbers were. The same for Val Verde County. 25 I -- they're right along all that line right there. 18 1 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah. Right. I just 2 wondered if there's correlation along Highway 90 or 3 maybe even further south on 35. 4 MR. THOMAS: It's almost -- if you look at 5 the map, I mean, everything from I-35 to I-35 corridor 6 east is pretty much blowing up. 7 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Okay. 8 MR. THOMAS: And now you've already got 222 9 out of 254 counties, so there's 32 counties left that 10 have no COVID-19, and most of those are between here and 11 El Paso. 12 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Sure. Okay. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I -- I've talked to 14 Judge Schuchart in Medina County and a lot of their 15 problem is they had two -- a lot of their people, 16 residents in Medina County, work in San Antonio. So 17 they're really almost San Antonio. And two of their 18 positives were a couple that were VIA bus drivers in 19 San Antonio. So what happens in San Antonio bleeds over 20 big time in Medina County. 21 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Sure. Escape while 22 you can. 23 MR. THOMAS: Thank y'all. 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Thank you, Dub. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Next item on the agenda is 19 1 1.2. We consider this every week. It's whether to 2 terminate the Disaster Order that I entered back in 3 March. So we'll consider, discuss and take appropriate 4 action regarding the Local State of Disaster Due to 5 Public Health and Economic Emergency Proclamation that I 6 issued back on March 24th and extended on March the 7 30th. 8 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I move to vacate that 9 thing. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 11 COMMISSIONER BELEW: For the -- I guess 12 that's the correct wording for it. 13 JUDGE KELLY: I think terminate. 14 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Terminate. It's run 15 its course. 16 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Motion's been made by 17 Commissioner Belew, is there a second? 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Question. We looked at 19 some of the benefits of having that in terms of budgets 20 and financials and -- and so forth, and it was good to 21 have. It was good to have because of the 9-1-1 services 22 and ensuring the continuity of that. And I guess with 23 -- you know, with -- with those types of things, if we 24 -- if we eliminate it or terminate it, it doesn't say we 25 couldn't go back and re-initiate it if things started 20 1 rising again. 2 So I guess the question is, what are the 3 benefits of having it still in place and what are the 4 disadvantages? 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think that if 6 something happens quickly, it gives the Judge the 7 ability to react. Without it, the Judge has to call the 8 Court together or -- 9 COMMISSIONER BELEW: What's going -- 10 JUDGE KELLY: Well, we have to wait and do 11 the 72-hour posting. One of the major advantages is 12 that we can have a meeting within three hours if we 13 needed it. And I would simply say if you want to vacate 14 it, you can vacate it. But I -- I know a lot of things 15 that are going on in this County that everybody else 16 does not. And let me tell you, it's still a powder keg. 17 It still has potential liabilities out there that 18 frighten me. Keep me awake at night. 19 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I just view it as a 20 tool in our tool pouch. It's there if we need it. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And it doesn't 22 accomplish anything by vacating it because we're still 23 under the Governor's order. 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Or keeping it. Like 25 we've said every time it comes up. 21 1 JUDGE KELLY: But in defense of Commissioner 2 Belew's motion, the public needs to know that the 3 Governor's taken all the emergency powers away from the 4 local officials. So I have technically some powers as 5 long as they're not inconsistent with what the Governor 6 wants. So that's all I got. I think that's right, 7 isn't it, Madam County Attorney? 8 MRS. STEBBINS: Yes, sir. 9 JUDGE KELLY: So as long as we're consistent 10 with what the Governor wants, we're good. And if we're 11 not, we're not. 12 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, it keeps coming 13 up and I just figured we might as well be -- 14 JUDGE KELLY: No, I -- I appreciate the 15 discussion. 16 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Commissioner Moser's 17 point is a good one. But I think that as long as your 18 dates are provable, then whatever mitigation we have and 19 some kind of, I don't know, matching funds or something 20 or emergency funds, you'd still qualify for them. You 21 don't have to have an emergency order in place. 22 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, one -- one of 23 them had to do with the -- the limits on -- help me 24 here, Tanya -- the limits of three and a half percent 25 versus ten percent. If we're in a -- have an emergency 22 1 declaration then we're not restricted for three and a 2 half percent when -- 3 JUDGE KELLY: Are you talking about revenue 4 cap? 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Right. Revenue cap. 6 JUDGE KELLY: It goes up to eight. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Huh? 8 JUDGE KELLY: It goes up to eight. 9 COMMISSIONER MOSER: But -- but if we're in 10 an emergency declaration, it doesn't apply. The three 11 and a half percent doesn't apply. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think the -- 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I don't think we need 14 it, okay? 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. The difficult part 16 to sort through is we're under an emergency by the 17 Governor regardless. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Right. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And what -- I think 20 that, you know to be honest, we need to get rid of it. 21 I don't see a strong reason to keep it. I think one 22 reason to keep it is a perception -- I think there still 23 is a risk, and I think the public perception may be the 24 fact that we don't need to -- that they can relax more. 25 And I think people do need to be careful on 23 1 sanitization, you know, washing their hands and -- 2 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I don't know how you 3 can emphasize that more, in any way. One iota more than 4 it already has been, that there's anything this Court 5 can do. 6 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Well, I keep saying 7 people are doing as much as they'll ever do. And some 8 people are starting to jump off that ship. You know, 9 when -- as we study some of these numbers and stuff. 10 So -- 11 JUDGE KELLY: Well, let -- let me share one 12 other thing. And we talked about this a little bit last 13 week. We're having a meeting this week with Judge 14 Emerson. The OCA, the Office of Court Administration, 15 is fulfilling the Texas Supreme Court's order to open up 16 for in-person hearings and jury trials. And we have no 17 idea what's going to happen once we open this courthouse 18 back up for jury trials. We're working on a plan. 19 Judge Emerson's in charge of that. And we have a 20 meeting scheduled, I think, tomorrow. 21 But I can tell you that once we open the 22 doors to that jail and we start bringing inmates, 23 whether it's here or the Youth Event Center, we don't 24 know what's going to happen and the liability exposures 25 are astronomical. Just saying. So -- 24 1 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Are you saying -- 2 JUDGE KELLY: -- it's not time to let our 3 guard down. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: -- we would be 5 responsible? 6 JUDGE KELLY: Pardon? 7 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Are you saying the 8 County would be held responsible for a pandemic if a -- 9 if a prisoner got somebody sick? 10 JUDGE KELLY: They've got Federal lawsuits 11 filed right now in Colorado. 12 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, they haven't won 13 any. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Huh? 15 COMMISSIONER BELEW: They haven't won any. 16 JUDGE KELLY: They got an injunction. 17 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I don't know how you 18 could do that. I mean anything is possible, I guess. 19 But if a man could be a woman because he puts on a 20 dress, I suppose anything's possible. But I don't see 21 that happening to us realistically. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I don't think that's 23 realistic. And I'll tell you why. When we start taking 24 vulnerable populations in that jail and subjecting them 25 to potentially positive COVID-19 inmates, then yes, we 25 1 can -- we'll be liable for the medical care to take care 2 of those people. And the estimates are, I'm telling 3 you, off the charts. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, are you talking 5 about the jail, or are you talking about courts? 6 JUDGE KELLY: I'm talking about both. When 7 we start moving them. Our jail population has been 8 stagnant. We don't have any positive cases in the jail. 9 And it's because we've been clearing people out and not 10 trying to put people back in. There are a lot of 11 arrests that are going on right now. 12 But if we have an outbreak in that jail when 13 we start moving these people back and forth, it could 14 blow up on us. I'm just saying. We are about to go 15 through a very critical transition when we open the 16 courthouse back up for jury trials. I'm just telling 17 you. Cross your fingers, say your prayers. It's that 18 serious. 19 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I heard some of the 20 things the Sheriff said about this and there's a lot of 21 hoops to jump through. And it's -- it is kind of scary. 22 COMMISSIONER BELEW: We've been jumping 23 through hoops since this started. And it has -- we've 24 -- we've prepared for a tornado and we got high wind. 25 That's where we're at right now. 26 1 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I agree with you. 2 COMMISSIONER BELEW: And if we keep going 3 down this road, folks, we're going to have the 4 government telling us that if it's 55 degrees or below 5 you've got to wear a coat. We're all -- when are they 6 going to stop telling us what we gotta do and wear and 7 where we have to be and get my temperature taken and all 8 that kind of stuff. 9 There has to be -- at some point, you have 10 to put your foot down and say, okay, I've had enough of 11 it. It hasn't panned out. It's not what you said it 12 would -- you advertised a kitten and you gave me a 13 puppy. It's not what you said it was going to be. And 14 it has not been. We were supposed to flatten the curve, 15 we did that. Now they're saying you've got to have 16 testing. Now you've got to have a vaccine. It's just 17 more hysteria. And I don't want us to be seen as 18 playing into that. I'm not going to play into it. I'm 19 not going to be a party to it. 20 And what the -- what the Sheriff does at the 21 jail all the time is to protect those prisoners and he 22 has to make sure that they're healthy. And he's charged 23 by the State of Texas to do that. I don't know how he 24 can do anymore than what he's doing now. He takes care 25 of their dental and their mental and everything else. 27 1 Everything in between. So I don't know how this -- 2 does this pose -- I -- I know it's an inconvenience. 3 But how is this different than anything else you have to 4 take care of? 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It's major. 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: In what way? 7 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And it needs to be 8 discussed in Executive Session. 9 COMMISSIONER BELEW: All right. 10 JUDGE KELLY: And that's what we'll do next 11 week. 12 COMMISSIONER BELEW: All right. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. So the motion fails for 14 the lack of a second. 15 Move on to Item 1.3 consider, discuss and 16 take appropriate action regarding Kerr County Memorial 17 Day ceremonies. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: While Marty is coming 19 in, let me just set the scene for this. Typically, when 20 Veterans Service Officer prepares with the Advisory 21 Committee Memorial Day services, it's usually done over 22 about a two-month period to get the speakers, get the 23 organization, get the commitments from people, to get 24 the wreaths together. 25 So what Marty is going to show you is the 28 1 truncated view of that, something that she and Jenna put 2 together with the Advisory Committee last week to see 3 what we could do next Monday. Truncated reception. 4 Thank you. 5 JUDGE KELLY: Ms. Mistretta. 6 MS. MISTRETTA: Yes, sir. So, yeah, we are 7 trying to keep all the support elements of Memorial Day 8 events, but also keep safety in mind. So we'll still 9 have chairs for folks. It's going to be probably down 10 to 25 chairs about six feet apart, spaced out. 11 We're still contemplating if we're still 12 going to do wreaths because we don't want folks -- 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: You're going to do it 14 out there? 15 MS. MISTRETTA: Yes, sir. Still going to be 16 at the memorial. Wreaths, we're trying to kind of 17 figure that out because we don't want folks closer 18 together, but also we don't want to leave the wreaths 19 out to be damaged in the wind. 20 We're just going to basically, kind of, get 21 right to the point. It's going to be the announcement, 22 posting of the colors, recorded National Anthem, 23 possible invocation speaker, reading of the names and 24 then do our taps. So consolidated but down to maybe 30 25 minutes. And it's kind of on -- on the same level as 29 1 Gillespie County. They're usually done in 30 minutes, 2 so we're trying to do the same thing. So, I mean, we're 3 still trying to do the best we can given the situation. 4 I think it'll still be great, you know. 5 And also, we've got with IT Department to 6 see if we can possibly record it so folks that would 7 like to typically go, if they are not able to we can 8 record it and then they'll have it online. And that 9 might encourage some folks that really wanted to attend 10 to maybe say, hey, I'll stay at home and watch it there. 11 So alternative. So -- 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: And Marty, so this -- 13 looking here it says 60 percent chance of rain on 14 Monday. So if it's raining and it's cancelled, then 15 it's just cancelled? 16 MS. MISTRETTA: Yes. Yes, sir. 17 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. 18 MS. MISTRETTA: Yeah. It will be cancelled 19 if that's the case. 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Good. 21 MS. MISTRETTA: Yeah. I think that's all 22 the high points for that. Did y'all have any questions 23 or any -- 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Only one question. 25 Have you talked to Maintenance? If there's more than 25 30 1 people, will you bring out chairs or they're just going 2 to stand or what? 3 MR. EVANS: They'll -- they'll stand. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Okay. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What time, 12 o'clock? 6 MS. MISTRETTA: Say again? 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What time? 8 MS. MISTRETTA: Oh. Ten o'clock. Because 9 again it's so hot, and we just want to kind of knock it 10 out. And they're not doing one at the Veterans 11 Cemetery. All -- everybody else has kind of shut it 12 down so we kind of took that time slot, that way it's a 13 little cooler for everybody. 14 COMMISSIONER MOSER: And so Kerr County's 15 proposing to do it. Gillespie County is not going to do 16 it, correct? 17 MS. MISTRETTA: Correct. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So do we need to have a 19 motion for this to do it? I think it's just Marty and 20 the VSO's call to do it, along with -- okay. Good. 21 MRS. GRINSTEAD: I believe it's got that 22 courthouse use form that would need to be approved. I 23 don't know if you're going to do that by vote or not. 24 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, I'll make a 25 motion to approve the Memorial Day ceremonies at the 31 1 Courthouse for May the 25th beginning at 10 o'clock, 2 2020. 3 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 5 Commissioner Moser, and seconded by Commissioner Belew 6 to approve the Memorial Day ceremony here at the 7 Courthouse on May the 15th (sic) at 10 a.m. Any other 8 discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, 9 five zero. 10 MS. MISTRETTA: All right. Thank you all. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Thanks, Marty and 13 Jenna. And Byron. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Item 1.4 consider, discuss and 15 take appropriate action to surplus and/or dispose of 16 office equipment from the District Clerk's office. 17 Miss Lantz. 18 MRS. LANTZ: Good morning, Judge, 19 Commissioners. I've provided a list at the back of the 20 agenda and there's some items that I need to surplus or 21 dispose of. There's several items on the list that are 22 broken. And maintenance has already taken a lot of 23 inventory out to their area. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I move we approve the 25 surplus list from the District Clerk's office. 32 1 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 2 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 4 Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Harris to 5 approve the surplus list in the District Clerk's office. 6 Any further discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. 7 Unanimous, five zero. 8 MISS. LANTZ: Thank you. 9 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you, Miss Lantz. 10 Item 1.5 consider, discuss and take 11 appropriate action to approve the County Judge, on 12 behalf of Kerr County as the lead county of the five 13 county Regional Public Defender's Office consisting of 14 Bandera County, Gillespie County, Kendall County, Kerr 15 County and Medina County, to file for an Improvement 16 Grant from the Texas Indigent Defense Commission for 17 fiscal year 2020/2021. 18 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Is there any news 19 about -- 20 JUDGE KELLY: News? 21 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Yeah. I mean, we have 22 heard all the reasons why we need it. Is there anything 23 else? 24 JUDGE KELLY: Well, the developments on it 25 have been that I have talked with Jim Ellison, the 33 1 attorney in Austin, on the pros and cons, whether we do 2 a non-profit arrangement with the Texas Rio Grande 3 Legal Aid. And I've also visited with the TRLA 4 representative on this thing. 5 I visited with the other judges about it. 6 All four of the other judges do not want to do the Legal 7 Aid. They'd rather go and do this ourselves with TIDC. 8 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Is that for control 9 or -- or what? 10 JUDGE KELLY: It's mainly because TRLA does 11 90 percent of its civil work, which can be very 12 controversial and very political that they don't want to 13 be associated with. Their intent, they've stated, they 14 have -- they have a very good program. An excellent 15 program. But their intent is to try to reopen their 16 civil office here in Kerr County with this. The PDO and 17 reopen the civil office, and we're trying to -- it's 18 pretty much criminal defense public defender office. So 19 that's kind of -- that's been the latest development. 20 We are ready to -- we're just about ready to 21 file the grant. That's why it's on the agenda today for 22 a resolution to do that. The one thing that we're 23 looking at that they're asking us for to put in the 24 grant is our build-out cost. And at this point, we've 25 looked at -- there's a couple potential locations that 34 1 we've looked at. I was going to try to run this 2 probably by the CIP this week. We have a meeting 3 Wednesday afternoon to take a look at it. There's a 4 building a couple blocks down the street here on Earl 5 Garrett that -- the old Sunday School building that we 6 might be able to use. 7 COMMISSIONER BELEW: As a shared cost with 8 everybody? 9 JUDGE KELLY: Yes. Yes. Yeah, and it -- 10 and one of the things we're talking about, we have to 11 put together another committee, an operations committee, 12 of how we're going to try to run this office. But the 13 discussions thus far have been to allocate the expenses 14 between the counties on the basis of caseload. And Kerr 15 County has, by far, the heaviest caseload. Mainly 16 because we have two District Courts, and a County Court 17 at Law. But we have a heavy caseload and so we've 18 allocated it on the basis of caseload. 19 And we have agreed to -- we have to come up 20 with an agreement, but we'd want to revisit that every 21 three years is what we've been talking about. The deal 22 that we're in on the 198th and the 216th with Gillespie 23 and Bandera County has been on the basis of population, 24 not caseload, and it's been reviewed after every census 25 every ten years. It hasn't worked out too well for us. 35 1 And Judge Stroeher and Judge Evans would concede that 2 every year they acknowledge that we're paying more than 3 our share in terms of caseload right now. 4 And so we need to put together an 5 operational agreement and how we're going to do that. 6 All we're doing right now is just getting in line for 7 the grant. And the grant cycle is -- I think they're 8 going to meet in June, and they will be awarding grants, 9 I think, by the end of the summer, probably by August. 10 We look pretty promising at this point. 11 Five County Regional Public Defender's Office is held in 12 very high regard at the State level at this point. It's 13 something that they're looking to do to regionalize the 14 State's participation in defending indigents. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, I'm in favor of 16 submitting the application. But I also think -- and I 17 talked to the Judge about this -- that I'm really in 18 favor of a local committee to help me better understand, 19 and probably the whole Court better understand, the 20 whole -- how it's all going to work a little bit better, 21 and that has the budget implications is what concerns 22 me. And the -- you know, and he and I have talked a 23 little bit about it. And County Attorney, someone from 24 the D.A.'s Office, Judge, a member of the Court, you 25 know, needs to really get into how it works for Kerr 36 1 County. 2 And then another step is going to be down 3 the road is how it works with other counties. But I 4 think that, you know, I'm in favor of this step and 5 then -- I don't know if we can do it on this agenda item 6 but -- 7 JUDGE KELLY: I think the process that 8 Commissioner Letz is describing is accurate. That as a 9 microcosm for how we're going to handle it for Kerr 10 County is kind of where we start. Once we've decided 11 how we're going to handle it, then we need to figure out 12 how we're going to interface and handle this with the 13 other four counties. So we go from an inner circle to 14 an outer circle that begins to fold in, representatives 15 from the other counties, and eventually negotiate an 16 Interlocal Agreement that we would all enter into to 17 handle this. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So this is just 19 submitting an application; it's not a commitment. 20 JUDGE KELLY: Right. 21 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah. 22 JUDGE KELLY: No. We -- 23 COMMISSIONER MOSER: If -- if we were 24 approved, still not a commitment. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Even if they -- even if they 37 1 offer us the grant, we don't have to accept it. We have 2 plenty of time to -- 3 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I just want to make 4 sure that that was clear. 5 JUDGE KELLY: Yes, sir. 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, I move for 7 approval. 8 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 9 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Motion's been made by 10 Commissioner Belew, seconded by Commissioner Harris to 11 approve us filing for the Improvement Grant with TIDC. 12 Any other discussion? 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Judge, would you put it 14 on the next agenda to appoint a committee -- 15 JUDGE KELLY: Sure. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- so we can -- because 17 the time is going to be of the essence on this. Because 18 if we're going to -- August. So basically we have two 19 months to get our ducks in a row. 20 JUDGE KELLY: And do budget. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And do budget. 22 COMMISSIONER BELEW: And -- and everybody 23 should know this is mandated that we do something. 24 JUDGE KELLY: Yes. Yeah. 25 COMMISSIONER BELEW: We're not just spending 38 1 money. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, we have to provide 3 indigent defense. We can continue what we're doing or 4 we can provide or do a better system hopefully. Or a 5 different system. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Well, it's -- and so the 7 public fully understand, this is the State actually 8 contributing significant funds for us to pay for 9 indigent defense that they're not doing now. This first 10 year grant is an 80 percent matching grant. So the full 11 five counties would contribute 20 percent and the State 12 is paying 80 percent of it. And it's going to represent 13 for at least the first few years a substantial savings. 14 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Can we estimate that 15 like about 300,000 or something as I recall? 16 JUDGE KELLY: I think it's about 340 is what 17 they had estimated. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah. 19 JUDGE KELLY: But again, we have -- we 20 haven't tweaked the numbers. 21 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Sure. 22 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Right. The numbers 23 were a little high. 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: They were high. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Those in favor raise 39 1 your hand. Five vote, unanimous. 2 Next item on the agenda is 1.6 consider, 3 discuss and take appropriate action to form a committee 4 to review our current longevity policy and make 5 recommendations to the Commissioners' Court. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's on the -- I put it 7 on the agenda because I think we've talked about it off 8 and on for several years. I see problems for longevity 9 policy, a number of them. Everything from it is 10 gradually getting very expensive having automatic 11 increases at two and a half percent and they start 12 compounding. So I think it needs to be looked at. 13 I think the things to look at in my mind 14 are, do we, you know, limit the salaries that are 15 subject to the thing? You get up to some of our higher 16 paid people, two and a half percent increase is a pretty 17 big increase, and you add that on top of the COLA that 18 we do a lot of years and it compounds year to year, it 19 -- some of these salaries are getting pretty high. 20 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Figuring out a tap? 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Possibly. The -- to me, 22 whether three years is the right period, whether we do 23 it one year is another thing. And the other area is the 24 current system is implemented on anniversary dates, and 25 that has become extremely complicated and cumbersome and 40 1 has caused us a lot of problems. 2 I'd like to look at something like maybe 3 doing it on the October 1 after the third year. I mean, 4 doing it so everyone gets it at the same time. 5 COMMISSIONER BELEW: With the budget. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. With the budget. 7 Part of the budget process rather than automatic. 8 Anyway, that's some of the things I think 9 should be looked at. And to me, we're at the right time 10 of the year to do it and I think we ought to do a 11 committee. I think the Auditor should be on it. I 12 think HR Director should be on it. I think probably the 13 Sheriff because of his -- the size of his department and 14 he has lot of impact on this. Or Sheriff's 15 representative. Maybe Road & Bridge, because that's a 16 big department. Someone on the Court. 17 Anyway, I just think it's something we need 18 to look at. And we have this -- a recommendation to the 19 Court by the time we start our June meetings. 20 COMMISSIONER BELEW: You want to put that as 21 part of the motion, the Department Heads or -- 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I -- you know, I think 23 you need to -- how many people you have on it. I mean, 24 it's gotta be workable. I don't -- you know, I'd say 25 five or so. And then it's going to come back to the 41 1 Court for discussion and people can look at it and give 2 input. But you've got to have something to -- for 3 everyone to throw darts at. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: So I'm asking that 5 question again. Does that include the Departments then 6 in the motion? 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. 8 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Those -- those five 9 or -- 10 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I think you gotta keep 11 it small. It's going to come back. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah, it's going to come 13 back. 14 COMMISSIONER MOSER: It's just for a 15 committee to come back for the findings or 16 recommendation. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. And then 18 somebody from the Court. It can be whoever. 19 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I think you'd be the 20 prize one. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Figured. That's fine. 22 So I'll make a motion to -- that a committee 23 be formed to review our longevity policy with the names 24 as listed by the Judge. 25 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 42 1 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 2 Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Belew to 3 appoint a committee consisting of Commissioner Letz, the 4 Auditor, HR, Sheriff, and Road & Bridge. Any other 5 discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous. 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Good. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 1.7 update regarding 8 operating hours of County Departments. 9 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: We have got some 10 updates. We got some feedback in the form of e-mails 11 from a lot of our departments, and we are steadily 12 moving towards normal. And I'll just kind of brush over 13 my notes. Lisa Walters, our PR person, will be putting 14 out a press release. 15 Before I start going over this, I'm not 16 going to read it fully, but I would recommend anybody 17 wanting to come to any of our departments, call first 18 and make sure. Some of them require that you call and 19 make an appointment; others don't. But just to be sure, 20 I'd give them a call. 21 And start with Animal Services. They're not 22 taking strangers yet, but otherwise they're up to normal 23 business. Our Constables are going full scale, just 24 like they always have. Our County Attorney, their 25 office is open. 43 1 And any of y'all here, if I say something 2 wrong, please correct me. County Clerk, they're open 3 from 8:00 to 5:00 by appointment only. You can visit 4 their website for any help you might need. County Court 5 at Law is open 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Monday through 6 Friday. The D.A.'s office, 198th is 8:00 to 5:00, 7 Monday through Friday by appointment. 216th is 7:00 8 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., Monday through Friday. They 9 encourage e-mails or phone calls first. District 10 Clerk's open to the public 8:00 to 4:00. Our District 11 Court and District Judges, Monday through Friday, 8:00 12 to 5:00. Engineering, that's still going full force, 13 7:00 to 4:00. Extension Office, someone's there from 14 8:00 to 5:00 everyday. They're still kind of rotating 15 out staff. The Youth Event Center, 8:00 to 10:00 to the 16 public, Monday through Friday, and then appointments. 17 Human Resources is 8:00 to 5:00, Monday 18 through Friday. J.P. 2, open to the public 8:30 to 19 11:30 everyday. They encourage people call them, Monday 20 through Thursday 7:30 to 5:00, and Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 21 3:00, with lunch 12:00 to 1:00. 22 J.P. 4 is open Monday through Friday, 8:00 23 to 12:00, and then 1:00 to 4:30. Doors are locked but 24 give them a call, set up an appointment. Juvenile 25 Probation is open 8:00 to 5:00 Monday through Friday. 44 1 OSSF is open doing normal business hours. 2 And Treasurer's Office, Monday through 3 Friday 8 to 5, closed 1 to 2. And Victim Rights is open 4 Monday through Friday from 8 to 5. So everything's 5 getting closer and closer to normal. A few offices we 6 haven't heard from, we probably will this week. So -- 7 but I encourage everybody to call first and make sure. 8 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So that all goes under 9 the banner, all departments remained opened with just 10 some restrictions in access. 11 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Exactly. 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay, good report. 13 Thank you. 14 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Okay. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. You'll notice we have a 16 timed item at 11 o'clock, and Judge Emerson is going to 17 come present to us on this Office of Court 18 Administration. 19 We'll skip over 1.8 and move on down to the 20 Approval Agenda. 2.1 pay the bills. Ms. Shelton. 21 MS. SHELTON: Good morning. Today, the 22 invoices for Kerr County, $203,553.17. The Airport, 23 $709.58. County Clerk fees are $322.08. The 198th 24 District Attorney Forfeiture Fund is $346.03. And then 25 the Texas Water Development Board, we have $136,731.68. 45 1 COMMISSIONER BELEW: I move we approve them. 2 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 4 Commissioner Belew, seconded by Commissioner Harris to 5 approve the bills as presented. Any further 6 discussions? 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Question. On the 8 records archival, it's a large bill for $61,000 or so. 9 It just seems like -- is that -- 10 MS. SHELTON: That was the contract -- 11 y'all had approved it earlier this year. And it was for 12 the archival of some of the old records, I believe. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. And we just got 14 billed this all at once? 15 MS. SHELTON: (Shaking head yes.) 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just seemed like a large 17 amount, that's all. 18 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Is it operational? 19 MR. ROBLES: I'm sorry? 20 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Is it operational? 21 MR. ROBLES: Yes. 22 MS. DOWDY: You talking about the archive 23 records? 24 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Yeah. 25 MS. DOWDY: They look great. 46 1 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Good. 2 MS. DOWDY: And I didn't want to pay for 3 anything until we got it all back. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 5 COMMISSIONER BELEW: We don't need to vote? 6 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah. Those in favor raise 7 your hand. Unanimous, five zero to pay the bills. 8 Budget amendments 2.2. 9 MR. ROBLES: Yes. We have three today. The 10 first one is reallocating property insurance for our 11 property insurance renewal package. And number two and 12 three are certifying new revenue for insurance proceeds 13 for Road & Bridge and Juvenile Probation. 14 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Move for approval. 15 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 16 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 17 Commissioner Moser, seconded by Commissioner Belew to 18 approve the budget amendments as presented. Any further 19 discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, 20 five zero. 21 Late bills. 22 MS. SHELTON: We have one late bill, 23 $30,857.00, and this is for an easement. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move for approval. 25 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 47 1 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 2 Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Belew to 3 approve the late bill for the easement. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's a very important 5 easement. 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Yes. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah. Final one. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Any further discussion? Those 9 in favor raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 10 Auditor reports. 11 MS. SHELTON: There are not any. 12 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. Monthly reports, 13 2.5. 14 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I don't have any. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Court Orders 2.6. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Court orders from our 17 May 11th meeting is 38075 to 38086. They all look 18 perfect. So I'll make a motion to approve them. 19 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Second. 20 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Motion's been made by 22 Commissioner Letz, seconded by Commissioner Harris to 23 approve the Court Orders as presented. All in favor 24 raise your hand. Unanimous, five zero. 25 Move on to the Information Agenda. Status 48 1 reports from Department Heads. Shane. 2 MR. EVANS: Good morning, gentlemen. I do 3 have some good news for the fire alarms. He's got his 4 permit. It is approved. He is set up and scheduled for 5 Tuesday of next week to do the installation. And a day 6 or so to do the job. He just sent me a text message 7 before I walked in here. So that's some good news. 8 Also, we had mentioned -- or Commissioner 9 Letz had mentioned something about maybe getting some 10 contractors to clean at night. I did speak with the 11 night crew that comes in here. They -- what they do is 12 like they clean the tax office and then the clerk's 13 office. And as we discussed maybe doing all three 14 floors. 15 Do we -- or maybe we should do this in -- 16 well, anyhow, should we do this where they do it between 17 a floor each night, or try to do all three floors in one 18 night? Because basically there's only two or three of 19 them that come in that do that. 20 So if we're going to do a new contract, 21 maybe we need to maybe discuss what it would take to do 22 the job and to have the contract presented. 23 COMMISSIONER MOSER: This is additional 24 cleaning for virus, is that what it is? 25 MR. EVANS: Yes, sir. 49 1 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. 2 MR. EVANS: For night cleaning. 3 Commissioner Letz had brought something up like this, 4 you know, maybe to discuss or check into to -- you know, 5 for -- to clean and sterilize the building and whatnot. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think that, you know, 7 all countertops really need to be disinfected. And just 8 doing those two offices there, I mean, I think that the 9 District Clerk -- I mean, the courts start opening up -- 10 JUDGE KELLY: It's going to be required of 11 the courts. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. So you have it 13 up there. So I mean, I think it is a new contract. I 14 think it should be a new contract because then we keep 15 track of it. The cost of it. 16 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Uh-huh. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So I think that, you 18 know, really you could get a estimate and one -- I guess 19 also, are these people qualified to do it and what are 20 they going to use? Because I know the Judge and I 21 talked a little bit about some of the stuff that KPD -- 22 or not -- the fire department uses for EMS and all of 23 that stuff, which is -- I forgot the name of it. It 24 comes in gallon jugs. 25 JUDGE KELLY: The Sheriff has it. I forget 50 1 the name of it, too. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I do, too. We have 3 quite a bit of it. It's very expensive. 4 JUDGE KELLY: I know what it costs. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's expensive. 6 JUDGE KELLY: I remember that. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But, you know, I think 8 that we need to keep the courthouse as clean as possible 9 from a disinfected standpoint and I just think we need 10 to address it before we start getting more and more 11 people in here and doorknobs and countertops and all 12 that need to be cleaned daily. 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, let's see. Put 14 it in perspective. Viruses supposedly live on a surface 15 like that for a few hours. Okay. So -- and it's very, 16 very small percentage of people in Kerr County have the 17 virus, so are we -- are we overkilling it? 18 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Well, originally, 19 didn't they offer to do the -- this floor for free? 20 Didn't we have -- 21 COMMISSIONER MOSER: That's a different -- 22 (Talking over.) 23 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So what are we trying 24 to accomplish? If it only lives for a few hours, you 25 know, and you do it at night, and very few people have 51 1 the virus in Kerr County. As a matter of fact, how many 2 cases do we have, three? Three active that we know of? 3 So are we -- are we overreacting is my question. 4 MR. EVANS: Possibly. I'm just addressing 5 your -- 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Come on, Shane. We 7 want an answer. 8 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I'm just asking the 9 question. 10 MR. EVANS: The only reason I brought this 11 up is, you know, if we're going to do a contract, they 12 need to know how to bid it and what's expected of them. 13 Do they want -- or do we want all three floors done in 14 one night, or do we want to do one floor every night? 15 COMMISSIONER MOSER: You're into operation, 16 I'm one step above that. I'm saying, why are we doing 17 this; not how. 18 MR. EVANS: Well, it was brought up and -- 19 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I understand. I'm just 20 asking the Court, okay. Why -- why are we doing it? 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Judge, you just 22 mentioned the Courts are going to require. What -- what 23 are the Courts going to require? Do you know yet? 24 JUDGE KELLY: Well, we're going to see what 25 -- there's an operations plan that Judge Emerson is 52 1 going to talk to us about at 11 o'clock. 2 One of the debates that we've had -- all of 3 the Judges submitted their proposed operation plans to 4 him. I mean, he is going to be the one that's going to 5 adopt the courthouse. But one of the debates that we've 6 had is whether or not we have to clean the courtroom 7 between hearings, or we have to clean the courtroom 8 between hearings, or we just sanitize the courtroom 9 between hearings. There's a huge difference. And we'd 10 have to have a maintenance representative available at 11 every court, all day long, every day. 12 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah. I think we're 13 overreacting. 14 JUDGE KELLY: I'm just saying that -- 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I like your reaction. 16 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Huh? 17 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I like your reaction. 18 We'll see what he has. 19 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, let's consider it 20 this way. It's not a thing that's been mandated. This 21 particular thing has not even been suggested. So I 22 don't -- I think I agree with Commissioner Moser. I 23 don't think we should go to that degree at this point. 24 The CDC guidelines don't even talk about 25 that, so I think it might be a little much for us here, 53 1 considering our -- 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's probably a little 3 more important during the day to do, on the countertops. 4 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I see our -- our 5 people cleaning all day long it seems like. 6 COMMISSIONER BELEW: It goes back to that 7 thing about this -- that there's a saturation of 8 awareness. I don't think any -- one iota will change 9 from anything happening in this Court about people's 10 awareness and what they're doing right now. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, you have -- the 12 question would be -- and I didn't think about the length 13 of life of the virus. That's a good point. But that 14 maintenance should provide to each office that has 15 countertops, you know, they need some cleaning but they 16 can't be cleaning the countertops all the time. 17 You know, at -- at our own business, my own 18 business, we're pretty careful with that. Because we 19 have people coming in from the public all the time, just 20 like the courthouse does, and we sanitize the pens and 21 the countertops after every customer. Is this the job 22 of maintenance or just -- really is it feasible, it's 23 just additional work that we ask each department to do, 24 and we can provide the proper chemicals. 25 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I like the statement 54 1 that one of the doctors in New York City made several 2 weeks ago and said, I'm not going to get the virus. He 3 said because I'm not going to touch my face. And he 4 said, therefore, I'm going to assume everything I touch 5 has the virus on it. And when I get through, I'm going 6 to go home, I really sanitize and make sure that I get 7 in my house and he said -- but I'm not getting it. So 8 just doing it that simple. So -- 9 COMMISSIONER BELEW: You know, we have 10 pretty good hygiene overall. Obviously. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 12 MR. EVANS: And just one other thing. 13 Talking to one of my salesman, we can purchase a fogger, 14 if we ever needed to, you know, to throw that -- or to 15 kill viruses in the courtroom. It's kind of expensive. 16 They're using this -- the product. But it dilutes 17 having the cost of having to go hire somebody to do 18 that, we wouldn't have to. We could actually do it 19 ourselves. So I just wanted to put that out there also. 20 If that -- this product is -- it said it would kill the 21 virus within like 30 seconds, so that's something to -- 22 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Is that a per gallon 23 price, Shane? 24 MR. EVANS: They have -- for two and a half 25 gallons, it's $175.00. And for 12 quarts it's $220.00. 55 1 And the fogger itself is $200.00. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How much is the fogger? 3 MR. EVANS: 200. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 200? 5 MR. EVANS: Uh-huh. And it can probably do 6 about 60 by 60 square area in an hour. Like I said, 7 it's kind of slow but it's something that we could do 8 ourselves if it became necessary. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So that would be 10 something -- when would you do it? I would presume you 11 don't want to breathe the stuff? 12 MR. EVANS: Well -- 13 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Sure you do. You won't 14 get sick. 15 MR. EVANS: Yeah, I asked that question 16 also. I mean, what kind of protective gear do we need 17 to have? And he says well, safety glasses and -- and 18 your mask. So -- because it has a zero health -- zero 19 flammability and zero reactivity. It's non-acidic. So 20 it's pretty safe to use. And after you're done, ten 21 minutes later you can walk in there and you can open 22 your office back up after ten minutes. 23 So -- and it leaves no residual smell behind 24 like, you know, like a bleach smell. It's zero -- no 25 stink. It's got a very neutral smell. 56 1 COMMISSIONER MOSER: See, what I -- what I'm 2 concerned -- if we're on the down slope of this thing, 3 okay, and we haven't done any of that kind of stuff 4 before, and if we start it, we'll never stop it. 5 MR. EVANS: Well, the only purpose of this 6 is to bring this to your attention. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Right. We'll never 8 stop it. 9 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Well, you've done your 10 job. Thank you. 11 MR. EVANS: Okay. All right. That's all I 12 have then. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. Any other 14 Department Heads have status reports? 15 Elected Officials, status reports? 16 Liaison Commissioners, status reports? 17 Okay. Then it is ten o'clock, and we're 18 going to adjourn for an hour. We'll resume back at 19 11:00 with a report from Judge Emerson. 20 MRS. STEBBINS: Judge, there's some -- on 21 Executive Session, under 4.2. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Oh, I'm sorry. Okay, we'll go 23 into Executive Session at 10:00. Do we need to take a 24 recess before we go in? 25 MRS. STEBBINS: I don't think so. 57 1 (Executive Session.) 2 (Recess.) 3 JUDGE KELLY: Let's come back to order. 4 It's 11:00. We have a timed item on the agenda, update 5 regarding the Office of Court Administration 6 requirements for the courts. Judge Emerson. 7 JUDGE EMERSON: It's my understanding the 8 Court had some questions on our proposed operating plan. 9 Judge Kelly, I believe you received it Friday? 10 JUDGE KELLY: Yes. 11 JUDGE EMERSON: I'll be happy to answer 12 questions. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We haven't seen the 14 plan. 15 COMMISSIONER BELEW: We haven't even seen it 16 so we were hoping you'd tell us what's in it. 17 JUDGE EMERSON: It's a secret. 18 (Laughter.) 19 JUDGE EMERSON: It's all at the Governor's 20 office, you know. 21 The Court plan, contrary to what was the 22 information that was distributed last week, the Court 23 plan only applies to the courtrooms; not to the whole 24 building. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 58 1 JUDGE EMERSON: So all the screening 2 procedures will occur at the time of court. We've 3 talked to the courthouse security. Been talking to 4 Rusty quite a bit. We have our staff that will work in 5 conjunction with security staff to screen everybody as 6 they come into the courtroom. 7 There are safety procedures that are 8 implemented inside the courtrooms, such as face masks 9 and hygiene materials, tissues, Plexiglass screens, and 10 social distancing, of course. We've gone through every 11 courtroom in the County and established maximum 12 occupancies for the galleries in the courtrooms. But 13 the social distancing is enforced even up to 14 attorney/client. At their counsel table, pursuant to 15 OCA orders, they cannot get any closer than six feet to 16 their client, which is going to cause some hiccups, 17 because obviously if they need to have a quiet 18 conversation, we're going to have to recess and allow 19 them to step out of the courtroom. 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So this is just 21 following OCA? 22 JUDGE EMERSON: Correct. 23 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So if OCA were to come 24 by and say forget it, we don't need to do any of this 25 social distancing and all that kind of stuff, you would 59 1 then adhere to that -- 2 JUDGE EMERSON: Correct. 3 COMMISSIONER MOSER: -- guideline? 4 JUDGE EMERSON: Yeah. And these operating 5 orders at the end, very end, say that until further 6 orders of the Court or OCA orders. 7 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Okay. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So what -- obviously, 9 you're going to be upstairs in those two courtrooms? 10 JUDGE EMERSON: Right. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Judge Kelly, where -- 12 what courtrooms are you going to use? 13 JUDGE KELLY: I'm going to use Zoom, because 14 they haven't discontinued Zoom, as I understand it, 15 correct? 16 JUDGE EMERSON: Correct. It's encouraged. 17 JUDGE KELLY: My dockets are the probate 18 docket, the juvenile docket, and the mental health 19 docket. And of course, one of them is mental health. 20 We haven't had any juvenile detention hearings because 21 we have no place to detain them. But we will start 22 those back up. 23 And on the probate, I really don't want to 24 bring all those older people into the courthouse. And 25 we got together with members of the Probate Bar, we came 60 1 up with our own Zoom protocol that we -- they can 2 follow. And it works very well. So if I use a 3 courtroom, it'll be the courtroom downstairs, probably. 4 The ones the J.P.'s use. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And then Judge Harris 6 will just use her courtroom? 7 JUDGE EMERSON: Correct. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: As needed. 9 JUDGE EMERSON: And I've talked to Judge 10 Harris, and I've talked to Judge Pattillo, and Judge 11 Kelly, and we've made arrangements for our, for lack of 12 better words, the cattle call docket which is the 13 pretrial arraignment docket for out-of-custody, to 14 actually use the Youth Exhibit Center. That way we can 15 go in there, set the chairs all socially distanced and 16 we can screen everybody as they come in. 17 JUDGE KELLY: And I talked with the Sheriff 18 and that will require additional security to do that. 19 We're talking about, what, three deputies to do it? 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I don't think we should 21 get into it. But yes, what we're talking about for out 22 at the AG barn alone is they're talking about four court 23 days for County Court at Law. This is per month. And 24 two court days, one for each district court. So that's 25 six court days out at the AG Barn. 61 1 Six court days out there and being able to 2 check the temperature of everybody coming in, doing the 3 screening questions of everybody coming in, assuring for 4 the social distancing, and seating of everybody's coming 5 in, is going to take at least three officers. And 6 running a metal detector at the same time that we'll 7 have to set up out there. 8 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Is that just boom, boom 9 one after the other -- 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. At the AG barn. 11 COMMISSIONER BELEW: -- or one is preceding? 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah, but you have to 13 keep them apart, and that's going to put them out in the 14 parking lot, or we're going to have to arrange something 15 to where we can try and get around. But that's the only 16 way I can look at it is three officers to be able to 17 fulfill that. 18 We can attempt to do some of that with -- 19 with regular scheduling that I have now. But the 20 problem is, you know, as you well know here at the 21 courthouse shutdown too, so really the only way that I 22 can do it, to guarantee it, trying to come up with a 23 cost value on it, is doing overtime for officers. 24 Overtime for officers, getting them to volunteer on 25 their off duty time, is what it amounts to. Overtime 62 1 for a patrol deputy, county roll-ups and all the rest of 2 that that has to go in with it, is probably going to be 3 close to $50.00 an hour. Six days, and then we're going 4 to have to start early, which is about ten hour days, 5 because you're going to have that line stacking up to 6 try and get them through the process. 7 Six days, ten hour days, is 180 hours a 8 month, so you're talking over $9,000.00 a month to be 9 able to do this at the AG Barn. 10 COMMISSIONER BELEW: That's one day a month? 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, that's six. 12 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Six. 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Six days a month total 14 for the month is going to run you close to between nine 15 and $10,000.00 for an overtime crew for deputies. Okay. 16 JUDGE KELLY: That's the bad news. The good 17 news is that's pretty clearly a reimbursable expense of 18 the COVID-19 crisis. 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Within the limits of 21 the money that is going to be available, right? 22 JUDGE KELLY: Yes. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Now, I think we need to 24 discuss some of this other as part of it. Because we 25 still have in custody, and Rex and I have talked, the 63 1 Judge and I have talked, and we're going to try and see 2 if we can get the in-custody ones done out at the J.P. 2 3 courtroom, okay, because our medical provider at the 4 jail has come up with their procedures for any inmate 5 leaving that jail. Because of the issues and liability 6 that we have, this is the medical provider we're with, 7 so if we don't follow their guidelines, it could -- and 8 possibly could open us up to some liability. 9 Their guidelines are restrict transports to 10 one inmate per vehicle to comply with social distancing 11 measures as much as possible. 12 Regarding the inmate: Take the temperature 13 and repeat screening questions prior to transport. Put 14 on a mask to be worn at all times during movement in the 15 court proceedings, etcetera. This is even at hospital 16 visits, doctor visits we have going on now. Temperature 17 upon return. 18 Upon return, house at a 14-day separation 19 cell, quarantine immediately upon return. Anybody going 20 to court or going anywhere else is put in separation for 21 a 14-day quarantine. 22 Suggestive alternative to separation cell, 23 if availability is limited or depleted, all inmates 24 attending court on the same day or within the same week 25 can be housed together, in specified separation housing 64 1 unit. Fourteen-day quarantine begins on the day the 2 last inmate returning from court is placed in that 3 separation unit. This approach is known as medical 4 cohorting. 5 The transporting officer: Put on mask and 6 gloves for the duration of transport, court proceedings, 7 etc. Temperature upon return. Decontaminate/sanitize 8 transport vehicle. Wash hands. Keep hand sanitizer 9 available on person. 10 Courthouse staff or the staff at the 11 facility: Take temperature and complete Corona virus 12 screening questions. Upon arrival at courthouse, don a 13 mask at all times for duration of proceedings, 14 accommodate for and adhere to social distance measure of 15 minimum of six feet between individuals at all times. 16 As of this morning, the separation cells I 17 have available is nine. That's it. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Did you say nine? 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Nine. Okay. Since 20 April the 1st to present, City of Kerrville alone has 21 arrested 111 people, okay. Sheriff's office has 22 arrested 64. That's just since April 1. 23 There's a Federal lawsuit been filed against 24 the Colorado, and for those of you wishing to see the 25 temporary injunction, it's right here, the entire thing, 65 1 okay. In which the Federal Court said designated 2 certain inmates with a certain type of illnesses or 3 pre-existing conditions as being the -- the vulnerable 4 group. And that's what the Federal Court has done, 5 okay? 6 In that vulnerable group, as of this morning 7 I've got 14 inmates that should be housed separately 8 right now. 9 COMMISSIONER BELEW: But they can be housed 10 together, right? 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But it will totally do 12 away with any of your classification capabilities that 13 you're required to do by the State. Because some of 14 them are maximum security, some of them are minimal 15 security. So you can't put them together, and now 16 you've added another link into there being the 17 vulnerable group. 18 We currently have over a thousand masks 19 available for inmates. They can put them all on the 20 inmates, okay. And what Dub was relating to here that 21 we've been kind of trying to get ready for all this, N95 22 masks on hand for our jurisdiction and for, you know, 23 like Ingram because Dub does help with the Emergency 24 Management there, but that I have on hand at the 25 Sheriff's office. I have 6,600 N95 masks. I have 5,056 66 1 NK95 masks, and I've got over 300 paper masks. 2 I have two Clorox tubs, which are great big 3 700-piece tubs of wipes. I have 12 containers of 4 residential Clorox wipes that are the bigger -- about 75 5 wipes. The 67.6-ounce bottles of Purell, I have 25 6 bottles. 12-ounce bottles of hand sanitizer, I've got 7 36 bottles. I've got two extra hand-held thermometers. 8 We've got six in use at the facility now. And I've got 9 about 400 or 500 pair of gloves right now. 10 But when we open this up trying to provide 11 everybody with one coming in, and I was glad to hear 12 this morning because I hadn't seen the deal, that it's 13 only going to pertain to the courtrooms and not the 14 whole courthouse. 15 But the courtrooms would pertain to 16 everybody upstairs, including outside the two courtrooms 17 in the common area, wouldn't it? 18 JUDGE EMERSON: Correct. But the notices 19 request people to bring their own masks. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 21 JUDGE EMERSON: And only if they don't show 22 up with one will we have to provide one. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: We'll provide it then. 24 But then it says if they have a cloth one that they wore 25 for more than an hour, it should be a surgical type mask 67 1 and not the cloth. 2 JUDGE EMERSON: Oh. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah. That's what 4 follows the OCA guidelines. 5 JUDGE EMERSON: That's not in the plan. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay. What I'm talking 7 about is some of this stuff that we're being -- I think 8 everybody understands my opinion about this, it doesn't 9 differ from Harley's very much. But one -- 10 COMMISSIONER BELEW: You shouldn't say that 11 publicly. 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: -- one of the other 13 things though, I did have our medical providers, because 14 they have lost doctors, they have lost nurses, okay, 15 they have lost inmates. And so I asked them -- or they 16 were asked by another jail actually, is there any kind 17 of going cost that they've seen if it gets into a 18 facility? The low end of the average of hospitalization 19 of an inmate that gets it, one of the vulnerable ones 20 because they would have to be on the ventilator, they're 21 the ones that normally would be, the low end is 22 $100,000, the high-end is $250,000 per inmate, or if you 23 end up with it in your facility. 24 So what they're looking at, some of their 25 facilities may have, you know, look at the number of 68 1 inmates in the Bexar County Jail and the high-risk ones 2 that they end up in a -- if you have 100 inmates, you're 3 talking about anywhere from ten million to 25 million 4 dollars. Our medical contract only covers the cost of 5 the inmate inside our facility; it does not cover any 6 hospital cost or any off-site cost. And you don't get 7 insurance for inmates. That's my concern. 8 If we have one inmate that gets it that 9 can't go on the indigent program, it could cost this 10 County millions of dollars. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well see, what is the -- 12 if a -- Kerr County has a resident in the Bexar County 13 jail, are we not responsible for those medical costs if 14 that person gets infected in the Bexar County jail? 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, that's why we're 16 not picking up inmates from Bexar County right now. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, no. I'm saying it's 18 a Kerr County resident though. 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I have some in 20 Montgomery. I have some in -- no. I think under the 21 indigency there may be part of that. The jail is not, 22 my office is not. 23 COMMISSIONER BELEW: The current follows 24 wherever they go. 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Under the County 69 1 indigent program, you're talking a whole different deal 2 that's -- that's under her. Under the indigent health 3 program, it's the county of residence, okay, that I 4 believe it goes back to. So yeah, if there's an inmate 5 in the Bexar County jail that is Bexar County's inmate, 6 then he's an indigent inmate, okay, and Kerr County's 7 going to pay the cost of that under the County's 8 Indigent Program, okay. That's what you're -- you're 9 looking at on this stuff. And there's so much that the 10 County has to be out of pocket, and then the State 11 starts picking up some of the indigent costs after that. 12 Now, part of the grant that came out through 13 AACOG covering some of this does list in there that it 14 can help cover the cost of inmates that do get it, okay. 15 But the problem you have in the jail is it's the 16 ventilation system. We're even worse than a nursing 17 home, to be honest, because we don't have windows or 18 anything else. 19 If we get it in that facility, it's going to 20 do what it's done in Bexar County and Houston and those 21 -- it's going to spread like wildfire. So we have to be 22 extra cautious, and that's what we're trying to do. 23 Nobody walks into my office, admin part, jail part or 24 whatever without having their temperature taken. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, is -- is the 70 1 temperature that -- I mean, I know everyone's taking 2 temperatures, but is that accurate? Because we hear a 3 lot of reports of people that don't show any signs. 4 COMMISSIONER BELEW: Yeah, is it reliable? 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's a good question. 6 But all I can do is try and do the best we can through 7 CDC guidelines and say our prayers at night. 8 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Rusty, there's -- 9 there's some ventilation -- I mean air-conditioning 10 system where you can purify the air that's being 11 circulated. I don't know how effective those are. Is 12 that anything that you've looked at in the jail itself? 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No. We have maybe two 14 negative pressure cells that we keep -- 15 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Yeah, but I'm talking 16 about -- 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: -- or whatever it is 18 out there. 19 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Right. Some ozone 20 system or something like that that, quote, purifies the 21 air. Again, I don't know how effective they are. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah, but the thing is, 23 what -- what we're facing, to be honest, I think most of 24 y'all know, so far I have had -- 25 (Commissioner Belew exiting courtroom.) 71 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: -- ten employees that 2 have had to be tested, okay, that actually got tested. 3 And we've got one positive out of that. Thank goodness 4 that employee hadn't been around the office for quite 5 awhile due to other issues and that, but you know, 6 that's the issue you have is how far are we going to go 7 with this, and we're looking at employees, and we're 8 looking at inmates. And I'm looking at the County 9 Attorney, and the liability issues that we as a County 10 have. 11 We've got some very dedicated people. But 12 if we just open it back up and we get it in the jail, 13 it's going to affect every one of our people. And it's 14 going to affect every resident in this County because of 15 the cost. And that's what I think people need to -- to 16 understand is, you know, we've got a 328 bed jail, but 17 I've got 38 separation cells. Three of those I can't 18 use because one's a violent cell and one's a -- two of 19 them are negative pressure. So we have to save those 20 for the extremely -- so that leaves me 35, okay, and 21 I've got 26 of them with inmates right now. 22 And then you've got the deal of, you know, 23 just the supervision of those. Because once you put 24 them in separation, you're having to watch constantly. 25 Not just for checking temperature, I'm talking about for 72 1 suicide watch and everything else. But I think what OCA 2 is, you know, asking us to do is fine, and it's going to 3 protect a lot of people, but it not going to be cheap to 4 this County. Not going to be cheap to law enforcement 5 at all. 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Well, the jail is one 7 thing, courtrooms are another, so -- 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Except it's jail 9 personnel and Sheriff's Office personnel that is trying 10 to deal with it. And if we can get it into -- and the 11 whole thing we're hoping, and I've got to get back with 12 our medical today, if we can use the courtroom out at 13 the jail since we're still under one roof and we do 14 sanitize and have the masks of all the participants, 15 including attorneys and judges and everybody else in 16 there, and we bring them out directly out of their cell 17 into that courtroom one at a time and put them directly 18 back in the cell so that they're not commingled with 19 other cells, that's been our other issue, then -- then 20 maybe we can do it under that guideline to where I don't 21 have to put them all in cells. Because if we have to 22 put them all in isolation or separation for 14 days, 23 we're going to have an issue. 24 This lawsuit out of Colorado, you know, one 25 thing they were having to do, and they were checking 73 1 temperatures, they were doing everything, but they were 2 having to cohort those -- those inmates because they 3 didn't have enough separation cells. 4 COMMISSIONER MOSER: What does it take to do 5 -- follow the procedure that you just said from using 6 that courtroom out at the jail facility itself? 7 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It's making sure that 8 the courtroom's available on the days that they need it, 9 which I think is pretty well can be worked out with the 10 J.P. out there. I don't think the judges have a problem 11 doing that. But then just making sure the social 12 distancing is kept, the same as here -- 13 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Sure. 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: -- and all the 15 guidelines are kept and that all our medical is 16 provided. And would also say, yeah, I think we can do 17 that. 18 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Is that kind of like an 19 ideal procedure? 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, the out-of-county 21 or the out -- for the in-custody ones, I think that is. 22 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Right. All right. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Now, the out-of-custody 24 ones, the thing you have to realize, it's not unusual on 25 a court date, even those that are not in custody tend to 74 1 have to make several arrests. Now, if we start going 2 through, you know, monitoring, ankle monitoring or 3 whatever, you know, maybe that will help some things. 4 But there's going to be some changes that have to be 5 done that are not going to be cheap. 6 And, you know, y'all were looking at doing 7 away with the Emergency Declaration by the County Judge, 8 and I agree with Letz and them, once the Governor did it 9 that's fine, but we're fixing to hit the threshold where 10 it's going to start costing this County a whole lot of 11 real dollars out of our pocket. And if we do away with 12 that order, does that weaken our ability to recoup that 13 in these grants? That's my only concern. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You had mentioned 15 earlier that the city's arrested 168 or something, or a 16 hundred -- whatever the number was. It was like three 17 times what the number that the Sheriff's Department has 18 arrested. 19 JUDGE KELLY: No. About double. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Double. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: About double? 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Hopefully, you're 24 working with the Police Chief hopefully on trying to 25 limit arrests where appropriate? 75 1 JUDGE KELLY: Wishing we could. 2 COMMISSIONER MOSER: They're supposed to 3 turn them loose, right? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I mean, there are 5 certain things that you can -- 6 JUDGE KELLY: That's one of the ones you're 7 speaking about. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So anyway -- 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The only thing I hope 10 is nobody starts getting arrested for violating an 11 order, because I have no place for it. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, anyway. 13 Hopefully, during the -- the Thursday meetings that can 14 be stressed. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Well, and I talked to the 16 Sheriff about possibly attending the stakeholders 17 briefings that we do. I don't know so much about the 18 public announcement part of it. But I think that the 19 other stakeholders in the County need to be aware of the 20 delicate precarious position we are with the jail right 21 now. 22 And Sheriff, before you leave, for the 23 benefit of the public explain a little bit more about 24 what cohorting is, because they need to understand what 25 we're talking about because that's where the danger lies 76 1 right now. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Cohorting is I have a 3 ten-person cell block, okay, that's empty. And I have 4 several of those right now, okay. So what cohorting is, 5 is you get a new inmate coming in, all your separation 6 cells are done so that new inmate gets screened the best 7 you can, of course, and they go into that cell. Okay? 8 Tonight we get three more brought in, three more 9 arrests. So those three, same thing, they go into that 10 cell. 11 During the rest of this week we get, you 12 know, four -- six more or whatever, and that fills up 13 that cell, so on Friday it's full. So that's when your 14 14-day quarantine starts is Friday. 15 Now, the problem you have is if you have any 16 of those vulnerable ones that are classified to that by 17 the definition of what CDC and everybody has come up 18 with, and you put a vulnerable one in that same cell, 19 and how you brought in one on Thursday that ended up 20 having it but didn't test right away, now you exposed 21 that vulnerable one to it. 22 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So 40 percent of the 23 people are vulnerable? 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, there's a certain 25 definition and I'm not going to go into it. 77 1 COMMISSIONER MOSER: No. No. I'm looking 2 at this right here. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, I'm looking at 4 the lawsuit out of Colorado. 5 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I'm looking at what the 6 definition of vulnerable is. You know, listen to the 7 doctors in the nation. They say 40 percent of the 8 people in the nation are vulnerable. Based on 9 overweight, diabetes -- 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Unfortunately, when you 11 get into jail clientele, the 40 percent is not accurate 12 because of jail inmates are not the healthiest in the 13 world a lot of times anyhow, okay? But some of the 14 conditions are over 65, high blood pressure, chronic 15 lung disease, diabetes, obesity, asthma, immune system 16 deficiencies, whatever, okay. Some of that in Colorado 17 even tried to define them as substance abusers and 18 smokers. Now, can you imagine if that definition goes 19 through what that will do to our -- 20 COMMISSIONER MOSER: I said 40 percent in 21 your -- from your customers quote/unquote is higher than 22 40 percent. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's where we're at. 24 JUDGE KELLY: I appreciate it Sheriff. 25 Thank you. 78 1 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Keep up the good work. 2 JUDGE KELLY: Anything else from the 3 operation plan for the Courthouse? 4 JUDGE EMERSON: Not unless y'all have some 5 questions for me. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Just so that everybody knows, 7 I think we have a meeting tomorrow morning at ten with 8 all the judges. And we'll roll this plan out and be 9 implemented. And we'll get our specific marching orders 10 and report back on that. 11 COMMISSIONER MOSER: Good deal. 12 JUDGE EMERSON: If I didn't mention it 13 earlier, I did meet with all the J.P.'s and they've all 14 been incorporated in this plan. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This is -- will take 16 place June 1st? 17 JUDGE EMERSON: Yes. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Effective June 1st? 19 JUDGE EMERSON: Correct. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Are the J.P.'s going to 21 still do court at their courtrooms, or are those going 22 to be upstairs here, too? 23 JUDGE EMERSON: No, they're going to be in 24 their courtrooms, but they have occupancy limits. 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And the same 79 1 guidelines, the masks and -- 2 JUDGE EMERSON: Correct. The Plexiglass, 3 the whole -- 4 JUDGE KELLY: For example, I think the 5 occupancy limits for the little courtroom downstairs at 6 the lower level, is five, I think. 7 JUDGE EMERSON: I believe that's correct. 8 District Courtroom No. 1, I think, is 20 and District 9 Courtroom No. 2 is 21. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You get a jury in there 11 you're not going to have many -- 12 JUDGE EMERSON: No. You can't do it. 13 That's -- that's why we're having to go out to the AG 14 Barn to impanel the jury and then flip the trial back to 15 the courthouse, and then we can accommodate by 16 staggering our jury into three rows instead of two and 17 rearranging the tables. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But you are limiting it 19 to the tables assuming that they're out of custody, 20 right, and their attorneys and them? 21 JUDGE EMERSON: You're talking about in the 22 out of custody? 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Right. 24 JUDGE EMERSON: Correct. 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Family members and all 80 1 friends are not part of it? 2 JUDGE EMERSON: Correct. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah, and for those that 4 haven't looked -- or had a chance to look at the plan, 5 the jury selection will be done out at the Youth Event 6 Center. 7 JUDGE EMERSON: Correct. 8 JUDGE KELLY: That's what he was referring 9 to. And everybody will be socially distanced spaced 10 apart. And then once the jury is impanelled, they bring 11 the jury back here to try it all. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I presume that 13 there's no conflict with any other events at the Event 14 Center? 15 JUDGE EMERSON: We're coordinating on that. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, pretty much 17 everything is postponed. 18 JUDGE EMERSON: I know the 198th days are 19 clear. I'm still waiting on clarification on the 216th. 20 And then as soon as we receive those, we'll confirm. 21 JUDGE KELLY: We're in the process of 22 working on that. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And real quick. The 24 only final thing that you do need to know is that, like 25 Grand Jury was today. And I believe they are holding it 81 1 up there, social distancing and doing all that. And we 2 all know what happens after Grand Jury. A lot of times, 3 you know, you'll get 20 or 30 new indictments and those 4 people need to be arrested and go to jail. Okay. And a 5 lot of those are dealing with the felony cases where you 6 would normally be at the court process is getting to 7 send them to the penitentiary. 8 The issue we have right now -- well, is -- 9 this is last week for TDC. TDC, as of last week, had 10 1,427 inmates test positive. They got 582 staff members 11 tested positive. They've got 27 confirmed deaths and 12 43,185 inmates on lockdown. TDC is closed, okay? 13 The problem we have is as of Friday -- I 14 don't know where I have all my paperwork stuff here. As 15 of Friday, I have 12 inmates waiting to go to TDC. I 16 have three inmates waiting to go to State Jail, which is 17 part of TDC. I have one waiting to go to SAFP, which is 18 another punishment facility. They're all closed, okay. 19 And I have another one on a bench warrant that we're 20 waiting to return to TDC. So that's 17 just in that 21 part alone. Okay. 22 I've got two other ones waiting to go to 23 Community Corrections Facility, which you can't get them 24 in. I've got five waiting to go to Customs and ICE. I 25 have three parole violators that are just straight 82 1 parole. No new charges, no anything else. And one of 2 those has been revoked, two we're waiting on hearings 3 but they're not doing hearings, either, okay? And so 4 they're stuck. And you have to understand, the law says 5 if they're on parole I can't turn them loose, period. 6 No bond, no nothing. They sit unless the State decides 7 something different on that parole. 8 I have 18 parole violators with new charges, 9 so it doesn't matter if we give bonds on those new 10 charges, they're still there on no bonds because of 11 their parole. And parole is not doing anything. So 12 we're stuck with those for the foreseeable future, okay? 13 To give you an idea of one thing that 14 happened. We had an inmate a few weeks ago that had 15 some serious health issues, and that inmate ended up a 16 week in ICU here out of parole hold. So that's a week 17 of ICU that we're going to pay. That inmate got 18 transferred to Bexar County, a hospital in Bexar County; 19 not the jail. So that's jailers that have to go to -- 20 actually it's deputies because they're going out of 21 county, that had to go down there and pull guard duty in 22 a San Antonio hospital, 24-hours a day while he was 23 there. Parole finally released the hold. 24 One night in Bexar County in that hospital 25 cost us over $7,000. I don't know what it's going to 83 1 cost us in Sid Pete for a week in ICU, okay? 2 MRS. DOSS: Indigent health, it's maxed out 3 at 30,000 Per Chapter 51. And we -- they bill at 4 Medicaid rates. So after 30,000, it just gets written 5 off. 6 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So why has parole taken 7 the action -- why have they gone to sleep? 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Because what are they 9 going to do with them? 10 JUDGE KELLY: It's been shut down. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It's the State. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Why don't they release 13 if they're nonviolent or something like that? 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: You know, it's kind of 15 like -- you know, the other thing is, these inmates that 16 are TDC paper-ready, okay, normally after 45 days of 17 being paper-ready in our facility, we get reimbursed. 18 The State waived that too, they're not reimbursing. 19 COMMISSIONER MOSER: So it's just all being 20 held down at the lowest level not -- not letting in -- 21 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah. It's a mess. 22 COMMISSIONER MOSER: You're right, Judge. 23 JUDGE KELLY: Well, and so the public 24 understands, this is all mandated. We are mandated to 25 do this, we have no choice. And we are not being 84 1 funded. And that's why we're having such a budget 2 crunch with what's mandated and what's not mandated is 3 because we're having to pick up the check on all these 4 expenses. 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: You know, it's probably 6 unnecessary, but one thing I'll say in my notice of all 7 this stuff is you notice the ones that are shut down and 8 can't move are all the things that the State controls 9 their licenses. Whether it's bars, whether it's hair 10 salons, whether it's going to be -- you know, nursing 11 homes getting tested. And what I was told is the next 12 step is all jails will end up having to be tested. 13 Every inmate. And we'll see. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah. Don't get me off on 15 that. Because if we test everybody in the jail and we 16 start moving them around back and forth to the hearings 17 and the trials and they get re-exposed, how good is the 18 test results that we got a week ago? 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Exactly. And they 20 control your licenses. 21 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Rusty, hold on. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I think I've said 23 enough. 24 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: You gave us a number. 25 I believe it was 27 TDC deaths? 85 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. 2 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Is there any kind of 3 numbers that you could find or tell me what the regular 4 seasonal flu? What kind of -- 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I have -- I could ask 6 but I don't know. The thing is, you know, what -- what 7 bothers me is a number of those deaths are staff. 8 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah. Of course. 9 Yeah. Okay, they're exposed. Okay. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Any other business 11 before the Court today? If not, we're adjourned. 12 * * * * * * 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 86 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 Court Reporter in and for Kerr County, do hereby certify 6 that the above and foregoing pages contain and comprise 7 a true and correct transcription of the proceedings had 8 in the above-entitled Special Commissioners' Court. 9 Dated this the 22nd day of May, 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