1 1 2 3 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS' COURT 4 Regular Session 5 Monday, March 11, 2024 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 ANNE OVERBY, Commissioner Precinct 1 24 RICH PACES, 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 *** Public Input. 7 4 *** Commissioner's Comments. 9 5 1.6 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 16 action to extend the Declaration of Local 6 State of Disaster Relating to the April 8, 2024 Solar Eclipse, and authorize the County 7 Judge to sign the same. 8 1.1 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 33 action on request to approve Resolution to 9 raise awareness of Dietert Center's Meals on Wheels initiative celebrating 52 years 10 of Older Americans Act Nutrition Program. 11 1.2 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 36 action on request from the Kerr County 12 Republican Party(KCRP) to use the Hill Country Youth Event Center free of charge 13 for two events, March 11, 2024 for the KCRP Precinct Conventions, and March 23, 2024 for 14 the KCRP County Convention. 15 1.3 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 39 action on request from Upper Guadalupe River 16 Authority(UGRA) to allow the Kerr County Maintenance Department to replace two 17 educational signs (24" by 36") at Flat Rock Park regarding the impact pet waste can have 18 on water quality. UGRA will purchase the signs. 19 1.4 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 40 action to accept donations to Kerr County 20 Animal Services totaling $14.00 for the month of February, 2024 to be added to the Operating 21 Expense line litem 10-642-330. 22 1.5 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 41 action to amend Resolution approved in Court 23 Order #40384, for the Rifle-Resistant Body Armor Grant Program FY 2025, to replace words 24 "Texas Public Safety Officer" with "Office of the Governor" in the third paragraph. 25 3 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 1.7 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 42 action to authorize courthouse closure and 4 provide eclipse administrative day for employees for April 8, 2024, unless required 5 to work, in which case an eclipse administrative day will be provided as 6 approved by department head or elected official, and must be used by the end of 7 the fiscal year. 8 1.8 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 45 action to rescind Court Order #40068 and 9 approve a revised County Payroll Schedule for FY 2023-24 to move the date times sheets 10 are due based upon the April 8, 2024 Total Eclipse. 11 1.9 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 46 12 action regarding a plan for Flat Rock Park during the April 8th Solar Eclipse. 13 1.10 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 55 14 action on request from Kerrville Police Department to use the County-owned parking 15 lots located on the northwest and southwest corners of Earl Garret Street and North 16 Street on April the 8, 2024 due to the Solar Eclipse. Request is to restrict parking, 17 using cones, to their staff only. 18 1.11 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 56 action to rescind Court Order #40502, 19 accepting a $50.00 donation to the Kerr County Sheriff's Office. The donation had 20 already been accepted with Court Order #40473. 21 1.16 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 56 action to accept quarterly report from the 22 Veteran Services Advisory Committee. 23 1.17 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 64 action regarding an amending plat for Ingram 24 Hills, Lots 45, 47 and 48, Volume 3, Page 149. 25 4 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 1.18 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 66 action regarding a revision of plat for 4 Kerrville Country Estates Section 2, Lots 35A and 35B, Plat File #22-08493. 5 1.12 Passed. 6 1.13 Passed. 7 1.14 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 67 8 action to approve job descriptions for Senate Bill 22. 9 1.15 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 70 10 action to ratify and confirm Grant Agreement for the Rural Law Enforcement Salary 11 Assistance Program, Award #IA00000001780, for Senate Bill 22(SB22). 12 1.19 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 71 13 action for the Commissioners' Court approval to surplus a 1999 BendPak BP-18 truck lift. 14 1.20 Consider, discuss, and take appropriate 73 15 action for the Commissioners' Court approval to purchase a new equipment lift for the 16 Mechanic Shop at Road & Bridge. 17 1.21 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 79 action to approve Budget Calendar for 18 FY 24-25. 19 1.22 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 88 action to surplus a chair, a computer tower, 20 a table, two desks, and five filing cabinets from various departments. 21 1.23 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 88 22 action to decrease up to $258,547.00 of IT projects approved for debt and related debt 23 proceeds, or increase R&B equipment expense. 24 25 5 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 1.24 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 97 action to approve request for Kerr County 4 pro rate distribution of proceeds from Tobacco Settlement Permanent Trust Fund. 5 1.25 Recognition of Information Technology 98 6 Director, Bruce Motheral, for his dedication and service to the citizens of Kerr County, 7 and congratulate him on his retirement. 8 1.26 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 99 action regarding modifications needed for 9 the Information Technology Department office space located in the courthouse. 10 2.1 Budget Amendments. 106 11 2.2 Pay Bills. 107 12 2.4 Auditor Reports. 107 13 2.5 Accept Monthly Reports. 108 14 2.6 Court Orders. 108 15 3.1 Status Reports from Department Heads. 109 16 3.2 Status Reports from Elected Officials. 118 17 3.3 Status Reports from Liaison Commissioners. 123 18 4.2(b) Consider, discuss and take appropriate 126 19 action on request to hire a temporary part-time person, up to 160 hours, to cover 20 for an employee due to unforeseen medical emergency. 21 4.2(a) Consider, discuss and take appropriate 127 22 action to approve SB22 supplements for the Assistant County Attorneys and Investigator 23 in the County Attorney's Office, to begin the first full pay period after receipt of 24 the grant funds. 25 6 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 *** Adjournment. 128 4 *** Reporter's Certificate. 129 5 * * * * * * 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 7 1 JUDGE KELLY: Court will come to order. 2 Today's date is Monday, March 11th, 2024, 9 o'clock in 3 the morning, and the Kerr County Commissioners' Court is 4 now in session. If you would, please rise and join me 5 in the prayer and the pledge. 6 (Prayer and Pledge) 7 JUDGE KELLY: Please be seated. First item 8 of business, those of you that carry a phone around like 9 I do, please turn it to vibrate or off so that it does 10 not disrupt the proceedings. 11 And as in every regular Commissioners' Court 12 meeting we have, we begin with -- it is our tradition to 13 begin with input from the public. And this is our 14 opportunity to hear from what the people have to say to 15 us. Unfortunately, it does not provide output. So we 16 don't get to answer whatever you want to tell us. It 17 gives us the opportunity to be aware of it and then have 18 the opportunity to address it. 19 So with that, I'm going to call -- we've got 20 one person that's signed up for public input and that's 21 George Baroody. 22 MR. BAROODY: George Baroody, 1616 Glen 23 Road. So yeah, we've been up here to speak before and 24 don't need answers, but I guess everybody paid attention 25 to the election and so I just wanted to come in and 8 1 recap a little bit of what Precinct 1 voters saw in 2 that. And anything I say may or may not come out wrong. 3 But Miss Overby, nothing that I say has anything to do 4 with you or -- in that. It's really all about the 5 Judge, of course, right? 6 We hope -- in your prayers, you ask to 7 rededicate to the service of the people and I would hope 8 that you take that to heart. As Precinct 1 voters 9 clearly stated my judgment of it, that they were not 10 appreciating your stance on their previous votes nor do 11 they expect that you will do the same thing again. 12 Ideally, they -- you'll stay in your lane. Okay. Your 13 lane is not Precinct 1. It's not actually 2, 3, or 4; 14 it's the Judge's duties, which don't involve seeking out 15 ways to remove public officials, or knowing full well 16 you'll be the one appointing the vacant spot that comes 17 open. The voters greatly saw through all that and have 18 re-established their right to vote for their candidate. 19 I'm hoping that don't have to come out and do it again 20 in order to have that state -- that stand for the full 21 term of what it is that they're elected to do. 22 Like I say, I just reiterate, please just 23 stay in your lane. If you feel the need to remove 24 another public official, or even seek out a way to do 25 that, let us know what you found out because the next 9 1 one might be the one who's sitting there. So please, 2 just listen to the voters as they have spoken and stay 3 in your lane. Thank you. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Any other public input? 5 With that, we'll move on to Commissioners' 6 Comments. Precinct 1. 7 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Pretty quiet. I got a 8 half inch rain last Friday. And that's it. 9 JUDGE KELLY: It's all good. Precinct 2. 10 COMMISSIONER PACES: Got a little bit more 11 to say. So starting with the burn ban remains lifted 12 for Precinct 2. Again, we are in Drought Stage. 13 Aquifer's not looking very good. We need a heck of a 14 lot more rain to turn that around. 15 I want to congratulate all the winners of 16 last Tuesday's primary elections from both parties. We 17 had a strong turnout. Perhaps driven by the fact that 18 we had some really excellent candidates. So I 19 congratulate Lynette Wedig, who was elected Democratic 20 County Chair, and Helen Herd, who was elected Republican 21 County Chair. I understand that Helen is going to be 22 taking office a little bit sooner since the previous 23 County Chair, Paul Zolen, resigned last Thursday. 24 But I especially want to congratulate in my 25 view, Commissioner Elect Precinct 1, Thomas -- Tom 10 1 Jones. Sorry. And Commissioner Elect Precinct 3, Jeff 2 Holt, for their impressive wins. Both of these highly 3 qualified candidates worked really hard and just shows 4 what hard work -- how it pays dividends. So I look 5 forward to their leadership when they join this Court. 6 I do want to point out that we had one 7 voting equipment failure on election date. The ballot 8 scanner in Precinct 312 failed and was unable to scan 9 the paper ballots that were provided by Hart InterCivic. 10 As a result, the election told -- the Judge told voters 11 that they had to use the DRE touchscreen machines to 12 cast their votes. This was clearly the wrong solution. 13 The right solution would have been simply to place the 14 marked paper ballots in another ballot box for later 15 tabulation via another scanner or by hand count; 16 however, our County Clerk, Ian Collum, responded quickly 17 to the problem and was able to resolve the issue. So 18 thank you, Ian. 19 You know, look, to ensure voter confidence I 20 think voters should always have the ability to use a 21 paper ballot. And the use of the DRE touchscreen voting 22 machines should only be offered if requested. 23 In other election news I'm happy to report 24 that the Republican Party of Gillespie County 25 successfully hand-counted their ballots, approximately 11 1 8,000. They were delayed by their County Elections 2 Administrator, and probably lost about three to four 3 hours on the front end of that, which delayed their 4 overall reporting, but they all got it done well within 5 the time frame allowed under the Election Code. 6 All right. Moving on. Center Point sewer 7 project. Basically, we -- we got a couple reports from 8 D Guerra trying to justify why they had so many delays 9 in Phase 2 and 3, so we'll be reviewing that and, no 10 doubt, meeting with them here shortly and trying to 11 negotiate on the liquidated damages. 12 I just want to inform the public that I will 13 be holding two town hall meetings on what's going on in 14 the County, specifically Precinct 2. There will be some 15 broader topics of interest. Residents and other 16 precincts, so all are welcome to attend. 17 The first meeting is on March 19th, 6:00 18 p.m. at the Center Point Elementary school cafeteria. 19 And a second town hall meeting will be held on March 20 26th at 6:00 p.m. at the Hosannah Lutheran Church. And 21 you can see details and the actual agendas either on my 22 website, RichPaces.com, or my Facebook page. That's it. 23 JUDGE KELLY: That's a lot of activity for 24 Precinct 2. 25 COMMISSIONER PACES: Yes, sir. 12 1 JUDGE KELLY: Precinct 3. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Be a lot shorter. This 3 is Spring Break week. I hope that everyone who is 4 planning to go out on Spring Break have a good, safe 5 trip. I know I'll be out of town part of the time. I 6 know the County Attorney's going to be out of town part 7 of the time. So just everyone have a good time and hope 8 we get some rain this week. 9 The last -- the eastern part of the County 10 got very little last time and hopefully we'll get a 11 little bit more this weekend. 12 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: All right. One of our 13 appointees to Appraisal Board, Larry Priour, brought 14 something to my attention, and there's an agricultural 15 youth questionnaire that goes out to landowners. And he 16 feels like it's kind of -- sometimes people don't know 17 exactly how to fill it out or got questions, and so him 18 and I have decided to put on a town hall/workshop the 19 end of this month. And I'll put it on the next agenda 20 and everything. But -- so if you're out there and 21 listening, pump the brakes if you have questions about 22 this questionnaire, and we'll have a -- one evening at 23 the end of this month, we will have a workshop for that. 24 And we'll get it out to the news media, and I'm sure 25 Lisa will do a press release on it so you can get it 13 1 filled out properly and not have questions. 2 And also another thing, I see that we first 3 got our -- got our first rabies case. A skunk was got 4 the other day. So it is the season. Watch out for 5 funny acting animals, okay? 6 COMMISSIONER PACES: There were a couple 7 more in Kendall County. 8 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah, I've heard some 9 others had multiple. Well, those rabies shots aren't 10 fun. I got them when I was seven years old. So be 11 careful. That's it. 12 JUDGE KELLY: At the County level, since I 13 do represent all four precincts, I did declare a 14 declaration of disaster a couple weeks ago at the 15 specific request of Governor Abbott and Nim Kidd with 16 TDEM, that if we did not do that, we would not be put in 17 a priority position on the list of services for the 18 eclipse. 19 And so I assure everybody that there's 20 nothing to be afraid about now, but we're going to have 21 a very crowded situation. And it's going to be 22 difficult. And there will be short tempers. And if we 23 need outside help, we wanted to be higher on that list 24 to have a priority position. That was the reason I did 25 that. 14 1 And then this morning we -- we had assigned 2 Commissioner Overby to investigate two mass gathering 3 event permit requests, application, and we had two 4 evidentiary hearings. And for those of you that don't 5 know, if there's going to be a gathering of more than 6 5,000 people we have to have a Mass Gathering Permit 7 request and it has to be -- have an evidentiary hearing, 8 which we had. And I think it was a new experience with 9 you, but there will be -- the Easterfest event on March 10 the 30th, we've approved that one. And also, the -- 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: KerrClipse. 12 JUDGE KELLY: KerrClipse. KerrClipse. We 13 have a clever word for it. The KerrClipse, which the 14 Kerrville Folk Festival folks is approved and that's 15 going to be for the day of the ellipse, which is the 16 8th, and the day after -- 17 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: And several weeks 18 before. 19 JUDGE KELLY: -- yeah, and two days before. 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 21 JUDGE KELLY: And they're trying to get 22 their people in early to relieve some of that traffic 23 congestion. And for anyone thinking about traveling to 24 Kerr County wherever you are on YouTube, buy your 25 supplies, buy your water, buy your gas before you get 15 1 here. Because we're pretty sure we're going to run out. 2 So if you can bring it with you it would be a whole lot 3 better. That's all I have. 4 MR. FITCH: May I ask a question? 5 JUDGE KELLY: Go on to the podium. 6 MR. FITCH: Bill Fitch, with the City. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Yes, sir. 8 MR. FITCH: Just will there be any kind of 9 way -- or Sheriff Leitha is the one who ought to answer 10 this question, for traffic monitoring so that -- 11 respectfully, I've got people -- a brother coming in 12 town and I want to know if he's going to be able to get 13 in and what his routing should be. 14 JUDGE KELLY: We've been working on that for 15 over a year, Bill -- 16 MR. FITCH: Yep. 17 JUDGE KELLY: -- and Dub Thomas, sitting 18 right behind you, knows all about it. When I had 19 Deb Rouse in here from Quiet Valley Ranch, which is the 20 Executive Director for the Kerrville Folk Festival, 21 they've been working on it for over a year and 22 practicing moving traffic. There will be one-way 23 streets. Some of the streets that are currently two-way 24 will be made one-way so that we can move traffic. And 25 there will be a great deal of monitoring of traffic. 16 1 Trying to keep it going. Because our concern is that 2 people are just going to stop. And when -- once one 3 stops, then it creates a chain reaction. And so we're 4 trying to keep it moving. And so, yes, we're very happy 5 to be involved in that, Bill. 6 MR. FITCH: Will there been a radio station 7 or something that says that I-10 is backed up or -- 8 or -- 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We need an agenda item 10 so we can talk about it. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah, we need an agenda item 12 to talk about it, but the man standing up at the podium 13 right now is a wealth of knowledge. But he can't talk 14 about it right now because it's not on the agenda. 15 MRS. STEBBINS: Item 1.6, if you want to 16 call that, y'all can engage in conversation related to 17 the disaster. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Well, let's do that. Let's 19 just go ahead and call Item 1.6 first. I know we've got 20 somebody that wants to speak on that. And let's get -- 21 Jerry. I saw you. Jerry Wolff. 22 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Did you call 1.6? 23 JUDGE KELLY: Let me read 1.6 and then you 24 can talk. 1.6 is to consider, discuss and take 25 appropriate action to extend the Declaration of Local 17 1 State of Disaster Relating to the April 8, 2024 Solar 2 Eclipse, and authorize the County Judge to sign same. 3 Now, by way of explanation before you start 4 your comments, I can only issue a disaster declaration, 5 my emergency powers, are for seven days. And that's 6 what we did to get us to today. And at that point, the 7 Court, the full Court, can extend it. And if they don't 8 extend it, it goes away. That's all I -- that's the 9 only power I have. 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: And when we extend it, 11 it could be for how long? 12 JUDGE KELLY: I think until you rescind it. 13 MRS. STEBBINS: That's right. 14 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Okay. 15 JUDGE KELLY: That's what we did with COVID 16 if you remember. 17 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Right. Right. I just 18 want to make sure. 19 JUDGE KELLY: And we got weekly COVID 20 reports. But we didn't have to redo the disaster 21 declaration until the end when we were ready to get rid 22 of it. So, Jerry. 23 MR. WOLFF: Well, I guess a little bit more 24 into the mechanics and things are going to be going on 25 with the eclipse, is the City able to receive funding, 18 1 as far as this disaster request, the disaster funding 2 request? 3 JUDGE KELLY: I'm sorry. Your question is 4 what? 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: He means the City of 6 Kerrville. 7 MR. WOLFF: The City of Kerrville? 8 JUDGE KELLY: Able to what? 9 COMMISSIONER PACES: Receive funding. 10 MR. WOLFF: Have ability to receive funds as 11 part of this disaster relief? 12 JUDGE KELLY: I really don't know. They 13 haven't told us. I don't know. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't think there's 15 any funds out there. There's no funding coming under 16 the disaster declaration. 17 MR. WOLFF: Oh, okay. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's just assistance. 19 MR. WOLFF: Well, let me -- let me tell you. 20 I got an e-mail from the President of HOA over the 21 weekend and they're having -- there's a Board meeting 22 tomorrow, which I intend to be there and find out more. 23 But in this e-mail, the HOA President stated that the 24 City -- they used the term -- she used the term City, 25 although we are in the extraterritorial jurisdiction of 19 1 Kerrville, we're just outside. I'm a County resident. 2 We're just outside the City limits of Kerrville. 3 Anyway, that the City informed her that 4 there would be many backpackers and people living in 5 tents and that cause a violation of property rights. In 6 other words these people who come in and squat on 7 private property, that those calls will not be answered 8 by the City Police Department. 9 And also, they were asking for people that 10 live within the subdivision if you have a land line to 11 let her know and she'll just give you the list later and 12 distribute to everyone in the subdivision which, to me, 13 implies obviously that the cell tower is going to be 14 totally saturated. 15 And I guess the problem I'm having with all 16 this is, how come none of us have been informed of this? 17 How come a public official -- and for all intents and 18 purposes the City, the first -- I went to the City's 19 website yesterday morning, and the first thing that's on 20 that website is the City of Kerrville welcomes you to 21 come to Kerrville to attend the eclipse. Celebrate the 22 eclipse. And they're selling parking places at Tivy 23 Stadium and at the baseball and soccer complex on 24 Holdsworth for 75 to 100 dollars a parking place for the 25 eclipse. 20 1 There's some sort of disconnect here to me 2 and common sense of what's going on. So anyway, 3 that's -- that's my comment. 4 And I wanted to inform everyone that there's 5 going to be competing going in two different directions 6 here. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you, Jerry. But just by 8 way of clarification, we are not the City. 9 MR. WOLFF: I understand that. 10 JUDGE KELLY: And number two, I'm going to 11 call Dub to the podium, because Dub Thomas has been 12 working on this really tirelessly for over a year, two 13 years. So I'll let you address the concerns, Dub. 14 MR. THOMAS: All right. So, yeah, so 15 there's a lot of questions about the traffic plans. The 16 City and the County have both been working together 17 for -- 18 JUDGE KELLY: And TxDOT. 19 MR. THOMAS: I'm sorry? 20 JUDGE KELLY: And TxDOT. 21 MR. THOMAS: And TxDOT. And a lot of the 22 players that you see in here, the Sheriff's Department, 23 the Police Department, Ingram Police Department, the 24 Constables, and we're all working together, volunteer 25 fire departments, for a traffic plan. The traffic plan 21 1 for the County is not finalized. We're having our 2 final -- probably our final meeting next Wednesday. 3 We're going to go over what we have for the traffic plan 4 at that time and we're seeing if we can basically make 5 any changes based on what the City has done. And from 6 then, at some point, we will publish or put out that 7 traffic plan so local folks will know what -- what their 8 issues are going to be if they decide to travel around 9 through town. 10 JUDGE KELLY: And would you clarify some of 11 the additional services that we want to be on standby 12 with TDEM to receive? That's why we did this 13 declaration. 14 MR. THOMAS: Well, the disaster declaration, 15 what that does is open us up for -- to request resources 16 through the State of Texas, assistance request. Star 17 request. That goes straight to the SOC, State Operation 18 Center, for resources that we may not have here or that 19 we need available in the event that we need it. So 20 it's -- 21 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Can you give some 22 examples? I think that would help us. 23 MR. THOMAS: Yes. Yeah, so I've already 24 requested some pallets of water for us to carry around 25 in our patrol cars if folks get stuck and traffic gets 22 1 backed up and they can't move. And I've requested 500 2 gallons of diesel, 500 gallons of gasoline for the same 3 purpose. I think the City or the EMS is going to 4 request medical access, probably two ambulance strike 5 teams, maybe a medical incident support team, some of 6 those type of access that we don't have here, to be able 7 to have them in place for request. I felt like the -- 8 JUDGE KELLY: We'd be calling them into Kerr 9 County. They're not here now. 10 MR. THOMAS: Yes, sir. I would like to have 11 those pre-positioned here, that way we can deploy them 12 rather than try to wait on them to get here and either 13 they can't get here or all the resources have all been 14 used up. 15 And at some point we'll have our traffic 16 plan, like I said, published for local folks to see. So 17 they'll be able to plan their travel. The thing is 18 we've been talking about this for two years and we've 19 been telling everybody cell phone service is probably 20 not going to work very well. You'll need to go to the 21 grocery store, go to get your fuel, prescriptions, pet 22 supplies, all that stuff. I'd start about two weeks in 23 advance. 24 Walmart, HEB, all the fuel distributors here 25 in town are going to be increasing their deliveries. So 23 1 I don't think we'll have issue. We just hope that the 2 folks that come down here that are here to visit will 3 bring a lot of their own supplies. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. 5 COMMISSIONER PACES: Let me get a little bit 6 more to this just for the public. I've been the liaison 7 to the eclipse planning. So we're expecting close to 8 150,000 visitors descending on Kerr County. And for the 9 most part, all the hotels, campgrounds, everything's 10 booked up. 11 And the good news is, most of those bookings 12 are like a four-day minimum. So you won't necessarily 13 have everybody descending on April 8th, for the day of 14 the eclipse. But there is no doubt that that day will 15 be the worst. And most of the traffic plan deals with 16 April 8th, particularly getting people out of town. 17 Because you know how it is, after a football game or 18 something as soon as it's over, people are done, they've 19 had enough, they want to get home. We will have 20 gridlock Monday afternoon. 21 So, again, if you can avoid being on the 22 roads Monday in particular, please do. 23 Let's see. Yeah, again the cell service is 24 going to be overloaded, so expect that to be blocked 25 out. We will have eight ambulances, which is twice our 24 1 normal for the County, all coordinated through 2 Kerrville. And there will be additional support in 3 Comfort. They've got five down there. The real problem 4 is whether they can get anywhere on Monday because of 5 the gridlock. But they'll have the best opportunity. 6 So if nothing else, avoid any risky activities, 7 particularly on Monday. 8 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Rich, I assume they 9 will be spread out across the County? 10 COMMISSIONER PACES: Yes. They will be 11 spread out. 12 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Maybe at the VFDs -- 13 COMMISSIONER PACES: And the other thing is 14 we'll have -- 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: -- or something? 16 COMMISSIONER PACES: Not necessarily at the 17 VFDs but -- but they will be spread out. All right. 18 The other thing is we have four public 19 safety flights for minor medical service. That will be 20 at the Hill Country Youth Event Center and at three 21 churches, City West Church, Kerrville Bible Church, and 22 Kerrville First United Methodist Church. So if you have 23 a minor injury or need treatment, head there. Okay? 24 Let's see. You know, look. All critical 25 medical needs will be taken to Peterson Regional 25 1 Hospital. You know, they're on standby there 2 eliminating any kind of discretionary services. So 3 they're going to be equipped to handle any kind of 4 medical emergency. And, of course, we still have the 5 air flight that will take people to San Antonio. I 6 believe the University Hospital. And they're trying to 7 got another helicopter. Dub, correct me if I'm wrong 8 there. But so far they only have one. 9 MR. THOMAS: Yeah, they're still trying to 10 get one. 11 COMMISSIONER PACES: Yeah. Now, Hill 12 Country Telephone has remote cell phone service 13 available, but it's for first responders. So they're 14 going to have a bunch of hot spots across the County 15 where at least emergency internet calls can be made, but 16 the public won't have access to that. So if you have an 17 emergency and can't call for help, try to get to one of 18 our fire stations, VFD or otherwise. Everybody's got 19 radios there and we're on First Net. So that would be 20 your best plan and -- I mean, whatever's closest. 21 Whether it's one of those, what did I call them, public 22 safety sites or any VFD or any of the Kerrville fire 23 stations. 24 Let's see. And, of course, the VFDs will 25 have working radios, First Net phones, and they are 26 1 going to be equipped with AEDs and Stop The Bleed kits. 2 So otherwise, I think we've covered all the other stuff. 3 Avoid travel, especially on Monday. Dub? 4 MR. THOMAS: Yeah. So we're going to have 5 four safety sites for police, fire, EMS scattered around 6 like Commissioner Paces talked about to allow us to 7 better respond. And hopefully, we won't have anything 8 we have to respond to, but our VFDs all will be open. 9 We've asked to man them with -- we're probably going to 10 put a County first responder in each one of those and 11 have a couple of volunteer firemen, have a couple first 12 responders, and the Hill Country Amateur Radio Club, our 13 ham operators will be there as well. So a lot of moving 14 parts. 15 JUDGE KELLY: And so just ask the public to 16 visualize for a minute. North/south is 16 and Sidney 17 Baker. And it is our hope to be able to keep two-way 18 traffic open on those thoroughfares. East/west, would 19 be Junction Highway and Holdsworth. You've got 173 20 headed towards Bandera and 27 headed back towards 21 Comfort. We're trying to keep those open. A lot of the 22 feeder streets onto those major arterials may be closed 23 or one way. And the purpose there is making them double 24 back and try to keep those arterials moving and not 25 shutdown. 27 1 COMMISSIONER PACES: Most will be one way, I 2 don't think too many will be closed. But they will be 3 one way. 4 JUDGE KELLY: They'll be one way. But 5 remember, when one vehicle stops for whatever reason, an 6 accident, to look at a map, to make a call, it stops all 7 the cars behind it. All the vehicles behind it. And 8 that's why we've been working on this traffic plan so 9 diligently. And it's about ready to be publicized to 10 the public. But trust me, there's been a lot of man 11 hours to try to get this thing right. 12 And we're concerned about I-10. Y'all may 13 remember, I-10 closed for the first time in my lifetime, 14 in Winter Storm Uri. And it was not because of a wreck. 15 It was because the freeway iced over, and a tractor 16 trailer rig couldn't get over that hill going out west. 17 And when one stopped, they all stopped behind it. And 18 some of them, some of the truckers timed out on there 19 hours. You know, they're regulated by federal 20 government as to how many hours and they just stopped. 21 Right where they were. And so they're not moving 22 because legally they're breaking the law. We don't want 23 to see that happen again. 24 That's why we're bringing -- trying to get 25 all these resources to keep things moving. We don't 28 1 want I-10 to close. We don't want Sidney Baker to 2 close. We don't want Junction Highway to close. You 3 know, we don't want 16 or 173 to close. 4 So the moral of the story is encourage 5 people to trickle in early. That's the best thing for 6 us. And as far as the day of the eclipse itself, if at 7 all possible, find a way to stay overnight and leave the 8 next morning. That is the best advice I could give 9 anybody. 10 Now I don't know -- and remember we talked 11 about making 39 one way during the eclipse? 12 MR. THOMAS: No, sir. 13 JUDGE KELLY: So we'll try to keep 39 open, 14 too. And by the way, I have gotten calls from volunteer 15 fire departments wives, mad at me because their husbands 16 are going to have to work on the day of the eclipse to 17 manage traffic. But that's our volunteers and we 18 appreciate their dedication. So thank you, Dub. 19 MR. THOMAS: Yes, sir. 20 JUDGE KELLY: Anything else? 21 COMMISSIONER PACES: The only other comment 22 is, look, this is a short-lived event. It's not like 23 Uri or something else. Yes, top off your fuel tanks. 24 Get your groceries, you know, four or five days ahead of 25 time enough to get you through. But come Tuesday, 29 1 things are going to be close to normal, and Wednesday 2 for sure. So you don't have to hoard. You know, don't 3 go rip everything off of the shelves in HEB or Walmart. 4 This is a short-term event and people are going to 5 quickly dissipate and leave. 6 JUDGE KELLY: And hopefully the planning 7 gives us a little more confidence. I look out here and 8 I see Jeff Holt, Commissioner elect. In the military we 9 had after-action assessments. And we had to talk about 10 what went good and what went bad. We have talked to 11 every other community that has had an eclipse event in 12 preparation trying to put this plan together. This is 13 not just pulling it out of thin air. 14 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I have one follow-up 15 question to this constituent's question about private 16 property rights. And I don't know if the Sheriff or 17 somebody can answer. If somebody does have somebody 18 that comes and camps out on their land, which if they 19 live within the County, they don't have anybody really 20 to call, do they, because they're going to be doing more 21 important work? 22 SHERIFF LEITHA: Correct. They can call us. 23 I mean, we're going to get to every call, I just can't 24 tell you how quickly we're going to get to it obviously. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 30 1 SHERIFF LEITHA: Is it going to be 150,000 2 people or is it going to be 500,000? That's kind of out 3 of control. 4 JUDGE KELLY: But a little levity here. 5 Don't pull a gun to get them off your property. My wife 6 was teasing me, she says, do we need to go get more 7 ammo? I said, No, we're not going to shoot anybody. 8 But I told her, we would lock the gate. 9 COMMISSIONER PACES: -- too much ammo. 10 JUDGE KELLY: But I mean seriously -- 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I think that -- 12 JUDGE KELLY: -- I can imagine the 13 frustration if somebody is squatting on your property, 14 you're going to want to get them off. And if they don't 15 go, what we don't need is a violent confrontation out on 16 the yard because now we have something we have to 17 respond to. Now we have an event. This is just 18 something we're going to have to do the best we can. 19 Negotiate with them to move them to where you can get 20 them as best you can. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just one other comment. 22 The airport, they're expecting a lot of traffic. I 23 believe they're going to try to cap it at about 80 24 planes coming in. And they're going to close one of -- 25 the smaller runway or I guess the north/south runway and 31 1 keep our main east/west runway open. And they're going 2 to use the smaller runway for parking all the aircraft. 3 But they are booking -- people have time slots to get 4 here. Because we don't have air traffic control or 5 control tower here. 6 So it's a little bit dangerous but they're 7 trying to give people actual slots when they can come 8 in. And they're, you know, coordinating that the best 9 they can and they are, I believe, capping it at -- I 10 believe it's 80 aircraft, something like that, will be 11 allowed to come into the airport. 12 JUDGE KELLY: But it's important for the 13 public to know that we've been putting attention to this 14 for a long time and we're ready. We can't promise you 15 there's not going to be a gridlock, but we can promise 16 you that we put every effort to try to keep things 17 flowing right. 18 So now, with that, the item that -- action 19 item before the Court is I issued that disaster to try 20 to get a priority position on the TDEM's list, wait 21 list, waiting list. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make a motion to 23 extend the -- or to -- is it extend or -- 24 MRS. STEBBINS: Extend. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Extend. 32 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- extend the disaster 2 declaration -- 3 JUDGE KELLY: Until rescinded. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- until rescinded. 5 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 6 COMMISSIONER PACES: Is that a -- what now? 7 JUDGE KELLY: Until rescinded by this Court. 8 COMMISSIONER PACES: Oh. Why don't -- why 9 don't we just set it until April 9th? 10 JUDGE KELLY: That's his call. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's fine. I was 12 just -- 13 MRS. STEBBINS: Well, we're going to be here 14 April 9th. 15 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 16 MRS. STEBBINS: So we'll be able to assess 17 it on April 9th. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I wouldn't want to do it 19 on the 9th. I'd put -- I take it back. I'll do it on 20 the 11th. Give it a couple days. 21 COMMISSIONER PACES: It's your motion. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Declaration to -- 23 until -- now until April 11th. 24 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. We have a motion and a 25 second to extend the declaration of local state disaster 33 1 relating to the April 8th eclipse, through April -- 2 March the 11th? 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: April 11th. 4 COMMISSIONER PACES: April 11th. 5 JUDGE KELLY: April 11th. Any discussion? 6 Those in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Thank 7 you. Always welcome a lively discussion. 8 Let's go back to Item 1.1 consider, discuss 9 and take appropriate action on request to approve 10 Resolution to raise awareness of Dietert Center's Meals 11 on Wheels initiative celebrating 52 years of Older 12 Americans Act Nutrition Program. Brenda Thompson. 13 You thought you were first up, didn't you? 14 MS. THOMPSON: Hey, that's okay. I will 15 give you a report because we -- we support the County so 16 much, this is what we're doing for Meals on Wheels. We 17 are providing the week before, two extra meals so that 18 none of our driver's will be -- we're going to be closed 19 on Monday. We're not going to be delivering meals on 20 Monday or Tuesday. We even added Tuesday. So our 21 drivers aren't coming in, our volunteers are not coming 22 in to deliver so we'll keep them off the road. And 23 we're keeping our dining room -- everybody at home. 24 All of our seniors, we have 80 to 90 people 25 every day coming for lunch. And so we're telling them 34 1 that we're going to be closed on Monday. We'll be open 2 for Tuesday, just in case they need meals, but we're 3 trying to do our part to help make sure that our seniors 4 are staying safe, too. So -- 5 JUDGE KELLY: Very good. We appreciate the 6 cooperation. 7 MS. THOMPSON: Yeah. Well, Dub -- we've 8 worked with Dub in the very beginning. And in the very 9 beginning I thought, oh, this will be fun. We'll have 10 our seniors, we'll have a party on the back patio and 11 have hot dogs. No, we're not doing that. Yeah. But in 12 the very beginning we kind of thought that would be fun. 13 But not anymore. So anyway. 14 We appreciate everything the County does to 15 help us with our funding. We have to have some matching 16 grant money through our TDA, Texas Department of 17 Agriculture. Meals on Wheels, this month is March for 18 Meals Month, and it's to bring awareness to the program. 19 We delivered last year over 67,000 meals in Kerr County. 20 And we have about 200 volunteers that did over 21,000 21 hours of service for our community. So not only are we 22 providing great food, but we're providing a visit, a 23 home check on our seniors at -- our homebound seniors. 24 So we appreciate the help and everything 25 that we get from the County and the resources that we 35 1 have to have to help. 2 We are doing March for Meals campaign next 3 week. So if you haven't signed up yet and would like 4 to, just to do something different than eclipse related 5 stuff and you want to come, and do a ride-along with us, 6 we certainly welcome any of you to come and sign up for 7 a ride-along. 8 I know several of you have done it with us 9 before and sometimes Commissioner Harris came one time 10 twice in the week because he thought he came one day but 11 he went ahead and came on his other day. So we got two. 12 You know, so if you haven't ever done that 13 before, if you've never been on a route, come do it 14 because you're going to see something that -- it's 15 amazing and it's a great opportunity to see how our 16 homebound seniors are cared for in our community. 17 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Worthwhile. I enjoy 18 it. I know a couple Commissioners elect that probably 19 oughta visit with you on that, too. 20 JUDGE KELLY: Well, if you wanted to look up 21 the definition of gratitude in Webster's Dictionary, 22 you'd need to see the faces of these people. And it's 23 really something. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I make a motion the we 25 approve the Resolution as presented. 36 1 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 2 JUDGE KELLY: We have a motion and a second 3 to approve the Resolution as presented for on Meals on 4 Wheels. Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. 5 Opposed? Unanimous. 6 Item 1.2 consider, discuss and take 7 appropriate action on a request from the Kerr County 8 Republican Party to use the Hill Country Youth Event 9 Center free of charge for two events. First one is 10 March 11, which is today, this evening, for a Precinct 11 Convention, and again on March the 23rd for the County 12 convention. 13 And Paul Zohlen brought this request to me 14 and this goes to show him people don't always 15 understand, he wanted me to approve it. But I said I 16 have no problem with it whatsoever but I can't approve 17 anything; it's a Court approval. And that's why it's on 18 the agenda for the Court to discuss this. 19 And by the way, we did get a request this 20 morning from the Democratic party to be afforded the 21 same opportunity. So Jack Cremin. 22 MR. CREMON: I'm John Cremin. If it has to 23 be legal. But I go by Jack, everybody knows me by Jack. 24 I'm the Vice Chair of the Kerr County Republican Party, 25 but I'm the acting chair of the Republican Party because 37 1 Paul Zohlen resigned last week. And I just ask that 2 you -- and I'm the acting chair until Helen Herd 3 officially comes in and becomes the Elected Chair of the 4 Republican Party, which hopefully will be soon. 5 And I'm asking that you take this up so that 6 we can use the AG barn on two separate dates. And I 7 think it's appropriate that if the Democrats want it, 8 they should also. 9 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. And by the way of 10 history, I attended my first Republican County 11 convention here in this courthouse. And traditionally 12 it's been here. And then a few years back we moved it 13 over to the Event Center because it's larger and I 14 apologize, I haven't been to a Democratic County 15 convention so I don't know if they did it here or not. 16 I think they did. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The only question I have 18 is Jake, is there availability on these dates? 19 MR. WILLIAMSON: Yes, sir. There's 20 availability on those evenings. They've requested those 21 from us and they are clear on the schedule. It's just a 22 matter of support for us on it. 23 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I'm viewing it as a 24 public service. 25 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah. I move for 38 1 approval. 2 COMMISSIONER PACES: A motion has to be made 3 first, though. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: He read it. It's a 5 second. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and -- 7 COMMISSIONER PACES: He did? Where was I? 8 JUDGE KELLY: -- a second to approve the use 9 of the Youth Event Center for the Republican Party 10 precinct convention and County convention. 11 COMMISSIONER PACES: Do we need to modify 12 the motion to include the Democrat Party should they 13 choose to hold that event, in fairness? 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think we -- I would 15 agree we should do it but we can't do it under this 16 agenda item, I don't think. But -- 17 COMMISSIONER PACES: I see. Okay. 18 JUDGE KELLY: But what they need to know is 19 that it's available for the Democratic Party, too. 20 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Right. That's right. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We can approve it after 22 the fact. 23 JUDGE KELLY: After the fact. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. But Jake knows 25 they can use it. We can waive the fees after. 39 1 JUDGE KELLY: So the public understands what 2 we're talking about, sometimes we have to split hairs. 3 We can only talk about what is in the written agenda 4 item. No more, no less. And when we get outside the -- 5 those parameters, I get nasty looks from our County 6 Attorney. So this -- this -- sometimes I get that kind 7 of panic look like you gotta stop them. Because we get 8 in trouble for that. 9 But this is something that would be a 10 bipartisan issue. We can only vote on the GOP's request 11 today. So with that, those in favor say aye. Opposed? 12 Unanimous. Thank you. 13 Item 1.3 consider, discuss and take 14 appropriate action on a request from Upper Guadalupe 15 River Authority to allow Kerr County maintenance 16 department to replace two educational signs (24" by 36") 17 at Flat Rock Park regarding the impact of pet waste can 18 have on water quality. UGRA will purchase the signs. 19 Miss Bushnoe. 20 MS. BUSHNOE: Good morning, Judge. 21 Commissioners. Tara Bushnoe, Upper Guadalupe River 22 Authority. We originally worked with the support of 23 Commissioner Bill Williams back in 2010 to install those 24 signs and so much time has gone by and they've degraded. 25 I asked my staff to update the info a little bit and I 40 1 just ask help from maintenance to put them up and kind 2 of affirm that y'all still want that information at Flat 3 Rock Park. 4 COMMISSIONER PACES: I'll move that we 5 approve and allow Upper Guadalupe River Authority to put 6 up two educational signs at Flat Rock Park regarding the 7 impact on pet waste, and our Maintenance Department, 8 Shane has said that's no problem. He would be happy to 9 do that. So on that basis I move to approve the motion. 10 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second that 11 motion. 12 JUDGE KELLY: We got a motion and a second 13 to approve our Maintenance Department to put up new 14 signs at Flat Rock Park. Any discussion? Those in 15 favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Thank you, Tara. 16 MS. BUSHNOE: Thank y'all. 17 JUDGE KELLY: 1.4 consider, discuss and take 18 appropriate action to accept donations to Kerr County 19 Animal Services totaling $14.00 for the month of 20 February to be added to the operating expense line litem 21 10-642-330. Reagan Givens. 22 MR. GIVENS: Good morning. These are our 23 donations for the month of February. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move for approval. 25 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 41 1 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Second. 2 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 3 approve the donations to the Animal Services as 4 presented. Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. 5 Opposed? There being none, it's unanimous. 6 1.5 consider, discuss and take appropriate 7 action to amend the Resolution approved in Court Order 8 No. 40384 for the Rifle-Resistant Body Armor Program for 9 FY 2025, to replace word "Texas Public Safety Officer" 10 with "Office of the Governor" in the third paragraph. 11 Miss Putnam. Oh, Mr. Gage. 12 MR. GAGE: Yeah, Ms. Putnam's not here 13 today. She asked me to bring this before the Court. 14 Basically the Governor's Office sent back just a little 15 bit of a change from Texas Public Safety Officer to the 16 Office of the Governor on that date. So the Court 17 passed that Resolution previously, it's just applying 18 that adjustment here. 19 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: What was the 20 reasoning? 21 MR. GAGE: State of Texas. They just -- 22 there was -- there was -- 23 JUDGE KELLY: There was nothing else you 24 could do. 25 MR. GAGE: Yeah. There was an update also 42 1 on the insurance form. Basically every year they just 2 do it. I don't know what reason they had, they just 3 sent us an e-mail and said -- 4 COMMISSIONER PACES: Sure. Minor change. 5 Yeah, I move to approve. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 8 approve the change from -- 9 COMMISSIONER PACES: From the "Texas Public 10 Safety Officer" to the "Office of the Governor." 11 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Any discussion? 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The question is, do they 13 just want a new Court Order or do they want a new 14 Resolution? 15 MR. GAGE: Jody, I think it's -- 16 MRS. GRINSTEAD: We've already given a Court 17 Order with the -- we'll have Judge Kelly initial the 18 change and then do a Court Order amending that. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. That should 20 be good. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Those in favor say aye. 22 Opposed? There being none, unanimous. 23 Moving down to Item 1.7 consider, discuss 24 and take appropriate action to authorize courthouse 25 closure and provide eclipse administrative date for 43 1 employees for April 8, 2024, unless required to work, in 2 which case an eclipse administrative day will be 3 provided as approved by the department head or elected 4 official and must be used by the end of the fiscal year. 5 Is Sylvia out there? There she is. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We talked about this the 7 other day, I think Commissioner Paces and I and Sylvia, 8 and tried to figure out the best way to handle it. And 9 this was the best way in our mind, to give an 10 administrative day for everyone that -- other than those 11 that have to work. 12 Basically it's closing the courthouse; 13 however, obviously the Sheriff's Department, probably 14 maintenance or some of the maintenance staff, some of 15 Road & Bridge staff are going to be required to work. 16 And those that do have to work, they just get an 17 administrative day added to their pay schedule and it 18 will be coded as a separate day as I recall, isn't that 19 right, Tracy. 20 MRS. SOLDAN: Yes. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So it can be kept track 22 of as opposed to the other admin -- other paid time off 23 days. Anyway, Sylvia, does that kind of -- 24 MS. ZAPATA: That pretty much summarizes it. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Well, and to clarify, April 44 1 the 8th when the eclipse occurs is not a holiday, we're 2 not making it a holiday. But the school districts, the 3 City, we at the County think that it's better for people 4 not to come down to the courthouse. We don't need to 5 bring people in that day, it's just going to make things 6 worse. So we give everybody an administrative day off, 7 except for those that are required to work. And you've 8 identified most of the departments that will proceed and 9 are required to work and then they would get that added 10 on to that pay. 11 MS. ZAPATA: It's just a day off. We're 12 doing them separately. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Right. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And by doing it this 15 way, there shouldn't be a budget impact, 'cuz they have 16 to use it by the end of the fiscal year. And it will be 17 difficult for some departments, Road & Bridge and 18 Sheriff primarily, to give another day off. But that's 19 the only way we could see to make it work. So I'll make 20 a motion to approve the agenda item. 21 COMMISSIONER PACES: I'll second. 22 JUDGE KELLY: There's a motion and a second 23 to approve the additional administrative day for the 24 courthouse closure for the eclipse administrative day as 25 presented. Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. 45 1 Those opposed? None. Unanimous. 2 Moving down to Item 1.8 consider, discuss 3 and take appropriate action to rescind Court Order No. 4 40068 and approve a revised County Payroll Schedule for 5 FY 23-24 to move the date times sheets are due based 6 upon the April 8th total eclipse. We're all working 7 around the eclipse. Now we've got our Treasurer. 8 MRS. SOLDAN: So April 8th is a payroll 9 cutoff day where time sheets are due for us to process 10 payroll. If the courthouse and the Departments are not 11 going to be in, I would like for that payroll cutoff to 12 be the Friday before, which is shown on the schedule 13 that you are provided in your backup, so that we can 14 start processing payroll timely. 15 COMMISSIONER PACES: That's what, April -- 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 5th. 17 COMMISSIONER PACES: -- 5? 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I make a motion to 19 approve the new payroll date schedule as presented. 20 COMMISSIONER PACES: Do we rescind the old 21 Court Order and approve the new one? 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. Rescind the 23 previous Court Order. 24 COMMISSIONER PACES: That sounds good. 25 Second. 46 1 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second that. 2 He's got it. 3 COMMISSIONER PACES: It doesn't matter. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Got a motion and got a 5 second and those in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 6 1.9 consider, discuss and take appropriate 7 action regarding a plan for Flat Rock Park during the 8 April 8th Solar Eclipse. Shane. 9 MR. EVANS: Yes, sir. As far as we know 10 right now, we really don't have a real plan for the Flat 11 Rock Park, the Dog Park, or the Center Point Lions Park. 12 So what I was kind of planning to do is try to get more 13 port-a-johns down there, roll offs, at least at Flat 14 Rock and maybe a roll off at the Center Point Lions 15 Park. I've already started checking in on the 16 port-a-potties, and they're pretty much booked up. The 17 City already -- 18 JUDGE KELLY: We had those booked up two 19 years ago. 20 MR. EVANS: Yeah. So I'm -- I think I'm 21 going to have to try to find something outside of town, 22 Bandera maybe, but I've heard some of those guys out 23 that way are -- 24 JUDGE KELLY: We scoured statewide, Shane. 25 There are no more port-a-potties to be had. 47 1 MR. EVANS: Okay. 2 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Jake, do you mind 3 going up -- let's get a little input from Jake. Because 4 we got things going on up above and -- what's your 5 thoughts, Jake? 6 MR. WILLIAMSON: I come to the Court today 7 to offer an alternative. Knowing that there is no 8 port-a-potties and services available to rent at this 9 time, per the Court's authorization we are a charged 10 parking lot at the Event Center on April 8th. The 11 reason for that is just to give access to the restrooms 12 without relying on the port-a-potties. We have the 13 facilities. 14 If the Court would wish, we could include 15 Flat Rock Park into that paid parking area. Number one, 16 to help get cars off the road to help prevent gridlock. 17 Yes, there's a paved surface that would open up the 18 availability of the restrooms in River Star park and the 19 Event Center for those folks who park down there, which 20 would help also alleviate the need for trying to find 21 any more equipment. I believe a roll off would still be 22 part of that plan just for the waste areas. 23 But you know, we know that these people are 24 coming. They have discretion to come at a time where -- 25 it's usually a one-hour walk to downtown, so these 48 1 people can park in the lots beforehand and walk 2 downtown, enjoy the festival and walk back. So I would 3 proposed that the Court change Flat Rock Park into a 4 paid parking lot in essence to alleviate that and offer 5 the restrooms. 6 COMMISSIONER PACES: So Jake, how would that 7 work? If -- I mean, is there a maximum number of 8 spaces? Would you start turning people away at some 9 point? 10 MR. WILLIAMSON: Of course, if we fill. So 11 we would start our prepaid parking. We'll go wide in 12 the street so we can have prepaid so people know they'll 13 be coming. With that it will be the press release and 14 programs to help direct people to that lot the day of. 15 We'll start at the Event Center. Flat Rock would be an 16 overflow area since those facilities aren't permanent. 17 You get down there and people would have to walk up the 18 hill. But between Flat Rock Park and the Dog Park area, 19 if needed, that's easily 2500 vehicles down there. 20 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: How many? 21 MR. WILLIAMSON: 2500, including the Dog 22 Park. There's -- you could probably park every car in 23 town in between our place and Flat Rock Park right now. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Jake, on your website, 25 whatever it is, make sure you put on there that there's 49 1 no camping. No overnight camping in Flat Rock Park. 2 MR. WILLIAMSON: We can do whatever the 3 Court wishes. If you want to have us envelope that 4 in -- 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's just part of our 6 current policy and we just need to make sure that 7 everyone is aware that there's no camping in that park 8 overnight. 9 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: The event is over with 10 early enough in the day and people can vacate the -- 11 MR. WILLIAMSON: And the gate does get 12 locked the night before. 13 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Right. 14 MR. WILLIAMSON: So we can sure -- 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So probably just keep it 16 locked. 17 MR. WILLIAMSON: Right. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And you can bring in 19 some additional people to man the gate down there to 20 keep people from -- 21 MR. WILLIAMSON: That's correct. So with 22 y'all authorizing me the paid lot, we did get -- 23 hopefully we'll have the parking spots and we'll have 24 professional parkers and we have engaged with them to 25 run the Event Center parking lot to free us up for any 50 1 issues and trying to keep the restrooms stocked. We can 2 just add Flat Rock park to that. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Jake, what I like about it is 5 the unified management of the whole Flat Rock Park. 6 We're just -- our plan for Flat Rock Park would be to 7 put it under your supervision and incorporate that into 8 the plan that you have for the paid parking places up 9 top. That would be the easiest way for us to do it, I 10 think. 11 MR. WILLIAMSON: Yeah. 12 JUDGE KELLY: Is there any availability of 13 additional roll offs? 14 MR. WILLIAMSON: Right now we have one 15 already scheduled and -- but I believe that if I called 16 them today he can reserve another one easily. Most 17 people haven't been going the role off route. They 18 don't have enough parking and they haven't really 19 thought through that but -- 20 JUDGE KELLY: But we've been through it with 21 the port-a-potties. But there's going to be a lot of 22 trash. There's going to be a lot of trash. And if we 23 get some additional roll offs out there I think that 24 would be beneficial. 25 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: What are you 51 1 advertising the parking as, how much? 2 MR. WILLIAMSON: We're going to go live with 3 the prepaid at $75.00, and then day of we will have an 4 up charge. 5 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Is that what they did 6 at Tivy? 7 MR. WILLIAMSON: Correct, they -- I believe 8 they started at 60, or that might have been by the 9 baseball field, and I believe they're up to 75. 10 COMMISSIONER PACES: Day of they're going to 11 do 100. 12 MR. WILLIAMSON: So it's also revenue for 13 the County. 14 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: No doubt. 15 MR. WILLIAMSON: We know it's a one-off. We 16 know these are great people coming to town. Being as an 17 event person, I'm completely biased, but I want to 18 welcome them with open arms. 19 JUDGE KELLY: And the thing I like the best 20 about it, it's structured. We got somebody in charge 21 and it's organized, rather than just willy nilly, people 22 stopping in the middle of the street or getting out on 23 somebody's lawn or something. You've got a plan. 24 MR. WILLIAMSON: Right. 25 JUDGE KELLY: And someone's in charge. 52 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Shane, probably should 2 visit with the Little League President also, and almost 3 advise them that -- I think that there's -- this is not 4 a youth baseball event, I think we oughta padlock those 5 gates, all of them, with a new lock; otherwise, those 6 gates are going to be left open by people that know the 7 code, which is most of the community. So I think we 8 oughta put -- and just advise them that we will be 9 padlocking those facilities for the event. 10 MR. EVANS: Yes. I will do so. 11 JUDGE KELLY: So -- 12 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I don't know the Code, 13 but everybody does. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Don't say that. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Do we have a consensus then 16 that we can just make the motion to include Flat Rock 17 Park in the plan that Jake has? 18 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: If you just made that 19 motion, I'll second it. 20 JUDGE KELLY: I made that motion. 21 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Okay. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 23 fold Flat Rock Park in the plan at the Event Center with 24 Jake. Any discussion? 25 COMMISSIONER PACES: Only question from my 53 1 side, Jake, is what -- what are you doing to ensure your 2 parking staff are going to get in? If you wait until 3 Monday, they won't. 4 MR. WILLIAMSON: Correct. Early arrival. 5 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Jake will get it done. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. All those in favor say 7 aye. Opposed? 8 MS. DEWELL: Can I just add a quick comment? 9 Since we are using the Ag Center for -- 10 JUDGE KELLY: Come on up to the podium. 11 We're on YouTube. People have to hear you and see you. 12 MS. FERGUSON: Okay. Barbara Dewell 13 Ferguson, here in the City. Since we are using the 14 Ag barn as a stopping place and utilizing the restrooms 15 there, I have a spelling request. And I've spoken to a 16 lot of different County Commissioners about this. I 17 would love for the staff to pop off the signs that are 18 in our bathrooms behind the toilets. 19 I'm going to read this sign behind the 20 toilets and the urinals that says, "Conserve water. 21 This building uses reclaimed water to flush toilets and 22 urinals. Reclaimed water. Do not drink." 23 JUDGE KELLY: Now read it in Spanish. 24 MS. FERGUSON: We're representing our 25 community. I find that sign insulting to our community. 54 1 I'd love to have those signs taken off before we invite 2 the world to come and see what Kerr County's about. 3 JUDGE KELLY: And we can put that on an 4 agenda item and discuss it. 5 MS. FERGUSON: Thank you very much. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You know, I think there 7 may be a State Law requirement. 8 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I think they have to 9 go up. 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: That's probably it. 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Originally. I mean -- 13 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Bobby Balters one time 14 complained about signs on -- in the barn about no feed 15 and stuff in the drain, and he says nobody pays 16 attention to signs. I said I've never seen anybody 17 drink in the restroom, so I think they do. 18 COMMISSIONER PACES: Well, I don't know if 19 we really need a sign over every urinal and toilet. 20 Maybe one in there. 21 JUDGE KELLY: We understand the issue. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Jake, so on that, can 23 you check on State law and see if we're required to have 24 those? 25 MR. WILLIAMSON: Correct. I'll see if 55 1 there's any health code changes that requires it there. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. Thank you. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Thank you. 4 Moving on to Item 1.10 -- and this gets back 5 to people think that as the County Judge I can just 6 authorize you to park in the parking lot. I can't. And 7 this is to consider, discuss and take appropriate action 8 on request from Kerrville Police Department to use the 9 County owned parking lots located at the northwest and 10 southwest corners of Earl Garret Street and North Street 11 on April the 8th due to Solar Eclipse. The request is 12 to restrict parking, using cones, to their staff only. 13 We have the parking lot -- we bought the 14 parking lot right behind the police station. And they 15 need it as well as any places that we have over at 550 16 across the street to house their people because they're 17 going to be out on the road protecting us. It seems 18 like a pretty reasonable request to me. 19 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah. I move for 20 approval. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move for -- second. 22 JUDGE KELLY: We got a motion and a second 23 to approve the Police Department using our parking lot 24 for the eclipse. Any discussion? 25 COMMISSIONER PACES: Are we charging $75.00? 56 1 JUDGE KELLY: Nope. There are some things 2 that we can do but -- 3 COMMISSIONER PACES: Okay. I'm just asking. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Those in favor say aye. 5 Opposed? Unanimous. 6 1.11 -- this will be the last one before the 7 break. Consider, discuss and take appropriate action to 8 rescind the Court Order No. 40502, accepting a $50.00 9 donation to the Kerr County Sheriff's Office. The 10 donation had already been accepted with Court Order No. 11 40473. Sheriff Leitha. 12 SHERIFF LEITHA: Yeah. This donation 13 accidentally got sent to y'all twice. 14 COMMISSIONER PACES: Move to approve. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 16 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 17 approve rescinding the prior Order as presented. Any 18 discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? None. 19 Okay. Let's take a five-minute break and 20 come back at five after 10:00. 21 (Break) 22 JUDGE KELLY: Court will come back to order. 23 Everybody, I apologize. We need to go to the timed 24 items. We'll do our timed items at 10 o'clock. 1.16 25 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to accept 57 1 quarterly report from the Veteran Services Advisory 2 Committee. Gary Noller. 3 MR. NOLLER: Good morning. I'm Gary Noller, 4 140 Ray Drive, Precinct 3. Veterans Services Advisory 5 did want to extend its appreciation to the 6 Commissioners' Court for all the support that you have 7 for veterans in the County, in particular to the 8 appointment of the two service officers to help with 9 veterans who are looking for benefits from the Federal 10 Government, State Government and elsewhere. And today 11 we have Jeff Harris and Vicki Marsh here, who are 12 members of the committee, and Chase also is here, he's 13 the Assistant Veterans County Service Officer. 14 We have met with Jenna and Chase over the 15 past couple months. A few little things I want to bring 16 up today for the record, is Jenna prepared an annual 17 report for the calendar year 2023. A couple of 18 highlights on that is that financially everybody is 19 interested in how much money that could mean to the 20 veterans. 21 Tax free benefits for disability pension and 22 other things, 2.8 million dollars. That includes the 23 retroactive amount, which is a lump sum paid to veterans 24 one time, back pay to the time that they started their 25 claim, as well as whatever they may get in 12 months of 58 1 the monthly payments. I think that 2.8 million is a 2 rather impressive number. But also impressive is she 3 had 245 new clients through the year. And I just did a 4 quick math. If you sat down and figured typically 5 working year is 2000 hours, this is about four hours per 6 veteran. If that's all you did was work on veterans, 7 four hours per veteran in the year, no vacation, no sick 8 days, no going to training, no doing Memorial Day stuff, 9 no doing outreach. 10 So just trying to give you some idea as to 11 what the volume is in that office, what the need is, how 12 many veterans in this County are looking for help and 13 getting help when you get 245 new clients in there in 14 that period. To me, it's a huge number. 15 During that period, also, back in December, 16 Jenna and Chase were able to move into the new offices 17 over -- up the street here. 18 JUDGE KELLY: We call that 550 Earl Garrett. 19 MR. NOLLER: What? 20 JUDGE KELLY: 550 Earl Garrett. 21 MR. NOLLER: 550 Earl Garrett. It's very 22 nice. All of us have been over and looked at them. 23 They're much more roomier. A little bit more modern. 24 The big thing is just privacy. Because sometimes when 25 you're dealing with veterans issues you have to ask them 59 1 very personal questions and you don't want eavesdroppers 2 in there listening to you and also some of the 3 distractions and doors slamming and people talking 4 outside the door and stuff like that. So it's -- it's 5 an improvement. Everybody likes it. 6 There's no steps to climb, no ramps to go 7 up. They've got a couple parking lots that are 8 designated for veterans only so appreciate all the work 9 that the County maintenance staff, Shane and his people, 10 have done for us there. 11 And also moving forward on the Veterans 12 Pathway, which is going to help connect the VA Medical 13 Center to Flat Rock Lake and Flat Rock Park and also 14 hopefully connect to the City River Trail system. The 15 State of Texas was over there and they have pretty much 16 got the implements done on the traffic signaling there, 17 just bringing that up to modern standards where you 18 don't have the wires going across the road anymore. 19 They're putting the cantilever beams out and also new 20 pedestrian -- I think they're going to get the things 21 where the -- it gives you the timer so you know how fast 22 you have to run to get across the street. 23 And I'd like to extend some appreciation to 24 Charlie Hastings because I know he's worked on that a 25 lot on behalf of the County and kind of pushed that 60 1 along, along with Commissioner Paces. And this goes 2 back to Commissioner Moser, probably four years ago now. 3 So I think coming up here we have yet to 4 hear a little bit about it but we're getting pretty 5 short on is the 101st Anniversary of the VA in charge of 6 the Medical Facility out here. Last year was a hundred. 7 But VA wants to do a real good job so it wants to take 8 an extra year, I guess. And so, on April 12th at noon, 9 and some people are getting invitations, and my 10 understanding is talking to people out there it's going 11 to be open to the public but it's yet to be put out, 12 let's say advertising. But that's a notable 13 achievement. 14 It's the oldest VA medical facility in the 15 State of Texas. And just by comparison 1923. Audie 16 Murphy, San Antonio, opened 50 years later in 1973. 17 Last Thursday night, March 7th, there was a 18 public hearing out at the VA for the proposed Freedom's 19 Path 2 housing project. I appreciate Jeff Holt was out 20 there to ask questions. It was about 30 people in all 21 and about half of those were VA employees and the other 22 half was citizens to ask questions. It was a very brief 23 outline on what the enhanced use lease projects are 24 where the VA turns -- leases land to people. They got 25 excess land and so we got all this land we need to do 61 1 something with it and so they lease it to somebody and 2 then whoever they lease it to comes up with projects and 3 one of the projects that the VA favors very heavily is 4 housing for veterans. 5 And so Freedoms Path Phase 1 was completed 6 eight years ago. And hopefully, if this goes through, 7 all the steps that it has to go through, I tell people 8 it's a hundred steps you have to climb and right now 9 you're on step 12. And if you don't make it to step 13, 10 you're not going to go. So there's a lot of things that 11 can stop these projects and we certainly hope that 12 everybody has got to do something to get this done. And 13 get it done because there's a need for housing for 14 everybody in Kerr County. 15 The Governor keeps telling people to move to 16 Texas. Here they come. Well, where are they going to 17 stay when they get here? So that's it. 50 units. It's 18 a plan for 50 units. Starting to get us efficiency, 19 studio types. It's not one bedroom or two bedrooms, 20 it's studio. But, you know, 50 of them in there and 21 they're going to be geared to affordable. But some of 22 them -- a few of them are going to be market, which the 23 first phase didn't have. So that's the one big change. 24 Last thing to talk about is the workload 25 that goes on and the Veteran Service officer is -- 62 1 doesn't seem like it ever slows down. There's always 2 something that's happening out there, that the veterans 3 find out about it and they want to participate in it 4 and we can always say go talk to the Veteran Service 5 officer. 6 And on March 5th the VA accelerated the 7 backpack to open up a healthcare to they said millions 8 but at least hundreds of thousands of veterans that have 9 never had access to VA healthcare before. So you have 10 to apply for that. You just can't walk out and say, hi, 11 I'm a veteran. You have to fill out paperwork and give 12 it to the VA. And so we expected some veterans who have 13 never been eligible for VA healthcare in the past that 14 will now be contacting Jenna and Chase saying, I need 15 some paperwork to get that going. And that's the 16 report. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Gary, question for you. 18 Do you recall when we -- when the County established the 19 Veteran Service office? 20 MR. NOLLER: When? 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What year? 22 MR. NOLLER: 2010? About. 23 MS. MARSH: 2013. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 2013? 25 MS. MARSH: You approved it for funding in 63 1 2012 for 2013. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 2013. I bring it up 3 because it's something that is not required. A lot of 4 counties don't do it and we decided to do it as a 5 Commissioners' Court. I think it was Judge Tinley at 6 the time. And it has proven to be a huge success. 7 Thank you for the service committee and obviously the -- 8 our staff in the department and there's three people 9 that really -- General Bill Bacon, General Schellhase, 10 Sherry Cunningham. She's not in the military, she 11 was -- but Sherry really was the driving force way back 12 then to get it off the ground. 13 JUDGE KELLY: I think she's passed away. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All three of them have 15 passed away. That's why I bring it up for the next -- 16 but anyway, it was -- you know, I was a little unsure at 17 the time when it was approved whether it was really 18 going to help, whether it was going to do what, you 19 know, we had hoped to do, and it's far exceeded and many 20 thanks to you all for the advisory committee because you 21 really keep it going. And Chase and Jenna, you're doing 22 a great job, so I want to thank y'all. 23 JUDGE KELLY: And I might remind you, my 24 first year in office when it came budget time, I went 25 through and identified all the things that were required 64 1 to do by law and then the services that we provided that 2 were not required to do, and one of them was Veteran 3 Services. And I want you to know as a public 4 overwhelmingly responded that they wanted to keep that 5 office. Remember that? And so we got a mandate and 6 we're answering it. And thank y'all for your service. 7 MR. NOLLER: Thank you very much. 8 JUDGE KELLY: I saw Mark Del Toro this 9 morning. He came in. He just didn't stay. 10 COMMISSIONER PACES: Do we need a motion to 11 approve that report? 12 JUDGE KELLY: If we can. 13 COMMISSIONER PACES: Then I'll move that we 14 approve the quarterly report from the Veteran Services 15 advisory committee. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 17 JUDGE KELLY: We got a motion and a second 18 to approve the report as presented. Any discussion? 19 Those in favor say aye. Unanimous. Thank you. 20 Moving on to Item 1.17 consider, discuss and 21 take appropriate action regarding an amending plat for 22 Ingram Hills, Lots 45, 47 and 48. Bobby. 23 MR. GORE: Good morning, Judge. Good 24 morning, Commissioners. 25 JUDGE KELLY: In fact, Bobby, if you would 65 1 identify yourself so the public knows who you are. You 2 haven't been up there that much. 3 MR. GORE: Yeah, right. Charlie is not 4 here. So I'm Bobby Gore with the Engineering 5 Department. 6 This proposal adjusts the lot lines between 7 three existing lots. Lots 45, 47, and 48 will be 8 amended into Lots 45R, 47R, and 48R. Each lot is 9 currently over five acres and each lot will remain over 10 five acres. Lot 47 frontage is currently on Ramona 11 Drive, which is an unbuilt road. With this amending 12 plat, each lot will now have frontage on Ingram Hills 13 Road. 14 The County Engineer requests the Court 15 consider, discuss and take appropriate action regarding 16 amending plat for Ingram Hills, Lots 45, 47, and 48. 17 Volume 3, Page 149, Precinct 4. 18 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 20 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and second to 21 approve amending the plat for Ingram Hills, Lots 45, 47, 22 and 48 as presented. Any discussion? Those in favor 23 say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 24 Item 1.19 Consider, discuss and take 25 appropriate action for the Commissioners' Court approval 66 1 to surplus a 1999 BendPak -- 2 MR. GORE: 1.18, Your Honor. 3 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Do you want to do 1.18 4 first? 5 JUDGE KELLY: Did I skip 1.18? 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Oh. 1.18 is consider, discuss 8 and take appropriate action regarding a revision of plat 9 for Kerrville Country Estates Section 2, Lots 35A and 10 35B. Mr. Gore. 11 MR. GORE: This proposal revises and 12 combines Lots 35A and 35B (5.002 acres each) returning 13 them to a single lot. Lot 35R will be 10.004 acres with 14 road frontage on Kerrville Country Drive and Solar Hill. 15 A public hearing was conducted on October 16 23rd, 2023. These lots are located Kerrville's ETJ. 17 Since both lots are over five acres, this proposal will 18 likely be exempted from platting through the City of 19 Kerrville. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I move for approval. 21 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I second that one. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and second to 23 approve the Kerrville Country Estates Section 2, Lots 35 24 A and B and the revision of plat. Any discussion? 25 Those in favor say aye. Opposed? 67 1 Now on 1.19 -- 2 MS. HOFFER: Did you call 1.19? 3 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah, but we're -- I'm not 4 going to call it now. 5 MS. HOFFER: Okay. 6 JUDGE KELLY: And what that is is that's an 7 un-timed item, and so we skipped some un-timed items 8 that we need to finish before we get to that one. 9 MS. HOFFER: Okay. 10 JUDGE KELLY: So that's between Road & 11 Bridge and the Sheriff's Office. 12 Item 1.12 consider, discuss and take 13 appropriate action to use contingency funds due to the 14 increase number of inmates in the Kerr County 15 correctional facility who are receiving medication for 16 the immunodeficiency caused by AIDS and their costs. 17 Sheriff. 18 SHERIFF LEITHA: Judge, 1.12 and 1.13, I'd 19 like to pass. We had to sit down with the Auditor and 20 we were able to find another line item to deal with 21 these so we're good. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. So we'll drop 1.12 and 23 1.13. 24 SHERIFF LEITHA: Yes, sir. 25 JUDGE KELLY: And we'll move on to Item 1.14 68 1 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to approve 2 job descriptions for Senate Bill 22. 3 SHERIFF LEITHA: Yes. I'm looking for the 4 Court's approval to be able to pass these job 5 descriptions. These job descriptions are the ones we've 6 identified that qualify for Senate Bill 22. So I'm just 7 looking for y'all's approval. If you have any 8 questions? 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Are there changes to any 10 of them? 11 SHERIFF LEITHA: No. No, there's no change 12 to any of them. Just need y'all's approval so the 13 funds -- we'll be able to get the funds to these guys. 14 The whole Sheriff's Office is not qualified for it. 15 These are the specific ones that do qualify and meet the 16 requirements for Senate Bill 22. So there's no changes, 17 I just need to bring these in front of y'all for your 18 approval so that way they can be paid out of that line 19 item. 20 COMMISSIONER PACES: So as a result of this, 21 Sheriff, you know, will you expend the full, what, 22 $500,000 or how's this work? 23 SHERIFF LEITHA: Absolutely. Yeah. 24 Absolutely. 25 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: He's not going to 69 1 leave any money on the table. 2 SHERIFF LEITHA: No. 3 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 5 COMMISSIONER PACES: And does it pay their 6 entire salary or just a portion? 7 SHERIFF LEITHA: No, no, just a portion of 8 it. We kind of divide it up between all the people that 9 do qualify. 10 JUDGE KELLY: But the Auditor needs this 11 done, right? 12 MRS. SHELTON: This was suggested. I just 13 came back from a training at the end of February. And 14 this was a suggestion that was made by the Texas 15 Comptroller's Office in order to ensure just a backup 16 who is receiving the funds. 17 JUDGE KELLY: Well, whatever it takes. 18 Belts and suspenders. 19 COMMISSIONER PACES: It gets well spent but 20 it will complicate the HR process for payroll and so 21 forth. 22 JUDGE KELLY: It's already done. 23 MRS. SHELTON: So this has been being paid 24 since October the 1st. We did have a few employees that 25 were in there receiving it that were not qualified once 70 1 the final rules came out. So before we moved forward 2 with all the journal entries that it's going to take in 3 order to straighten it out, we wanted to just come and 4 say these are the job descriptions that are qualified. 5 COMMISSIONER PACES: That's fine. 6 MRS. SHELTON: So there's not any changes 7 because of this that weren't already here. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This is good 9 documentation and it'll -- it will be real clear for 10 both the HR and Treasurer as to who gets that SB 22 11 when they -- 12 JUDGE KELLY: Any other comments? 13 Observations? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? 14 Unanimous. 15 Okay. Item 1.15 -- I'm here asking for 16 forgiveness again. Consider, discuss and take 17 appropriate action to ratify and confirm the grant 18 agreement for the Rural Law Enforcement Salary 19 Assistance Program award for Senate Bill 22. We had a 20 deadline to get it in, I signed it. 21 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 23 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 24 ratify and confirm the grant agreement for the Rural Law 25 Enforcement Salary Assistance Program as presented. Any 71 1 discussion? 2 COMMISSIONER PACES: Yeah. What happens if 3 we don't ratify it? 4 JUDGE KELLY: Then we've gotta give the 5 money back. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Then we don't get SB22 7 money. 8 JUDGE KELLY: So we had those deadlines and 9 it's a matter of we could just keep the money or send it 10 back. I just sign them and come to you guys and say 11 what do you want to do. 12 COMMISSIONER PACES: All right. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Those in favor say aye. 14 Opposed? Unanimous. 15 Okay. Kelly, I'm sorry. 16 Well, I explained what the rules are and I 17 got called on my own rules, you know? 18 MS. HOFFER: Right. I did submit on both of 19 these items for 10 o'clock. I promise. I don't know 20 if -- how you want to do this. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Let me call it again so the 22 public knows what we're talking about. 23 MS. HOFFER: Okay. 24 JUDGE KELLY: Consider, discuss and take 25 appropriate action for the Commissioners' Court approval 72 1 to surplus a 1999 BendPak BP-18 truck lift. And then 2 we're going to talk about another replacement down 3 below, right? 4 MS. HOFFER: Yes. The Road & Bridge 5 Department has a 1999 BendPak BP-18 truck lift that 6 needs to be surplused. At this time I ask the 7 Commissioners' Court for their approval to surplus one 8 1999 BendPak BP-1800 truck lift from the Kerr County 9 Road & Bridge mechanics shop. Precincts 1, 2, 3 and 4. 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 12 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second. 13 Robert, do you think that needs to be surplused? 14 ROBERT: I believe so. I don't feel 15 comfortable getting underneath it as much as I used to. 16 JUDGE KELLY: We got a motion and a second 17 to surplus the truck lift. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Are you going to put it 19 on Gov Deals or something? 20 MS. HOFFER: That -- that's -- 21 JUDGE KELLY: That's the next one. 22 MS. HOFFER: That is probably what we will 23 do, but we did want to have a talk with the County 24 Attorney on that. If we -- in the future when we do 25 another equipment auction. Just don't know if there's 73 1 any liability if somebody were to buy it. There are 2 some issues with it. 3 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: As-is. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: As-is. But it's 5 something that I can see if somebody wanted -- 6 MS. HOFFER: Correct. Oh, absolutely. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Any other discussion? 8 Those in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 9 Item 1.20 consider, discuss, and take 10 appropriate action for the Commissioners' Court approval 11 to purchase a new equipment lift for the mechanic shop 12 at Road & Bridge. Ms. Hoffer. 13 MS. HOFFER: The proposed BendPak HDS-27X 14 lift will replace the existing lift in the mechanics 15 shop. Like I said, it's a 1999 model. They've made a 16 lot of changes. It's starting to show its age. And a 17 lot of the parts are not replaceable anymore. The 18 chains on it are stretched, which makes it uneven when 19 lifting up whatever's on the lift. And it's usually by 20 a difference of three and a half inches lower in the 21 back when you go to lift the dump truck or water truck 22 on it. A lot of parts, like I said, are not available 23 anymore. We want to get it replaced before someone 24 gets hurt. 25 The mechanic in the shop, he won't let the 74 1 assistant get up underneath it. He gets up underneath 2 it. But I think all of us are like nope, I don't think 3 I want to go under there. You know, we do have annual 4 inspections, and we're a little disappointed with the 5 company that we hired to do an inspection probably 6 should not have approved the lift, because it was 7 stretched chains. 8 This new lift that we would like to purchase 9 has a lifting capacity of 27,000 as opposed to the 10 current lift, which is 18,000 pounds. It's a longer 11 lift. The new one would be 26.458 feet. The current 12 one is 21.416 feet. The extra length and capacity would 13 allow for additional equipment that we have at Road & 14 Bridge that we have never been able to put up on the 15 lift. 16 We would like to take a -- I listed three 17 things, that there is money, and it doesn't really 18 matter to me which one we would take it from. I'd like 19 to take that money from the line item, it was 20 16-684-565, which is the capital, but it was not on the 21 proposed five-year plan list. So we also do have 22 $266,000 from a property surplus that we made in October 23 from the equipment auction, and I have spoke with Tanya 24 about it. You know, if the Court would approve that, 25 that money has to be used and specified in the budget 75 1 year that you made the money. So we have that, or we 2 also do have equipment repairs, which is the mechanic's 3 budget that he said, if worse came to worse, he would 4 pay for it out of that. 5 I do have some videos that I wanted to share 6 with you. It'll show you our actual lift in our shop 7 that I shot the videos of it. I believe it was on 8 Friday. And then Crystal found one of how a properly 9 operating lift should sound when the locks come down as 10 it -- as you're raising it. 11 (Video Playing.) 12 MS. HOFFER: This is our lift in our 13 mechanics shop, with a truck on it. Pretty slow going 14 up. You just heard that. 15 And what it does, it has these locks and it 16 gets to a certain point where the locks come down. Well 17 because of the chain stretch, you hear one lock go down 18 then you hear the one on the passenger front side go 19 down quite a few seconds later, and then you hear the 20 back ones both go at the same time. 21 And then we have a video of a lift, of a 22 brand new lift, what it should sound like when those 23 locks go down and you'll notice that they go down pretty 24 much at the same time. Very quickly. 25 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: You brought your own 76 1 tech person I see. 2 MS. HOFFER: I did. 3 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I see her down there 4 now. 5 MS. HOFFER: You can see how much quicker it 6 lifts. Granted, it's a car, but it does lift a lot 7 faster. Did you hear the locks? It does one, and five 8 eight seconds later the other lock finally goes down. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But you don't get the 10 car? 11 MS. HOFFER: No. 12 JUDGE KELLY: I noticed that better lift had 13 a Cadillac on it. 14 MS. HOFFER: I think it's time. And it's 15 getting to a point that just that I think it's a safety 16 issue. And they use that lift a lot. So they're not on 17 their backs, on a creeper. So -- 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Question, this is really 19 probably to the Auditor. The proceeds that we get from 20 sales and Road & Bridge, do those proceeds have to be 21 used in Road & Bridge, or do they go to the general 22 fund? 23 MRS. SHELTON: They're deposited into the 24 Road & Bridge fund. And there's an egress balance, I 25 believe. We did not project any revenue. I'd have to 77 1 go back and clarify that, but I'm pretty sure there was 2 zero revenue projected for those sales at budget time. 3 So we would have to increase the budget for the revenue 4 and then increase the corresponding expense. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: To me, it makes sense to 6 use it out of that line item, which is from old 7 equipment that we sold. This is replacing equipment. 8 So that's would be my preference that we use that line 9 item and not have to come back with a budget amendment. 10 MS. HOFFER: There will be, and you'll see 11 if your packet, the one quote is just for the actual 12 unit and then BendPak recommended, they're out of I 13 think Kaufman, Texas near Dallas/Fort Worth, the lift 14 guys, and their estimate to install that lift is 15 $4,675.00. And when we get ready to do that, I would 16 bring it back and have the County Attorney draw up a 17 general contract for the installation. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. So we can kind of 19 approve it now but it would be on the next agenda we'd 20 do the budget amendment? 21 MRS. SHELTON: (Shakes head yes.) 22 JUDGE KELLY: True. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So that's kind of the 24 process we use. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Quite frankly, you had me at 78 1 Robert's uncomfortable getting underneath it. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah, exactly. I 3 wouldn't get under it. 4 JUDGE KELLY: I appreciate the long detailed 5 explanation and how we're going to do it, but I really 6 respect the way you're cobbling this thing together to 7 be able to do it. But the bottom line is, I trust the 8 man. 9 ROBERT: Yeah, I used to be six foot tall; 10 now I'm not. 11 (Laughter) 12 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: How quickly could we 13 pull the trigger on this thing? 14 ROBERT: It's pretty much ready to go, just 15 waiting on you guys -- 16 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Okay. 17 ROBERT: -- as far as that goes. 18 MS. HOFFER: We could get it ordered. 19 ROBERT: We can have it ordered and it will 20 be delivered to our yard. And as soon as it gets there, 21 the other company there will be coming down to install 22 it. And they will be taking the other one down, crating 23 it up for us -- 24 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah, I see that. 25 ROBERT: -- and we're good to go. 79 1 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Good deal. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Can you order -- do they 3 require a payment at the time of order or payment -- 4 MS. HOFFER: I don't think so. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. So you can go 6 ahead and order it and then at the next Commissioners 7 Court we'll do a budget amendment. 8 MS. HOFFER: Yeah. 9 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Got a motion and a 10 second? 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make a motion to 12 authorize Road & Bridge to place an order for the RB -- 13 what is it? 14 MS. HOFFER: It's a BendPak -- yeah. Let me 15 get to it, we've got it in here. BendPak 27. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: BendPak HDS-27X. 17 JUDGE KELLY: We've got a motion and a 18 second to approve the first new equipment list for the 19 mechanics shop at Road & Bridge. Any other discussion? 20 Those in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 21 MS. HOFFER: Thank you. 22 ROBERT: Thank you. 23 JUDGE KELLY: The next item on the agenda is 24 1.21 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to 25 approve the budget calendar for FY 24-25. 80 1 The Auditor and I met and discussed this 2 extensively. Last year, we had a lot of last minute 3 surprises and the budget season was a little chaotic 4 towards the end. And we wanted to get it more regulated 5 and predictable as scheduled. 6 And if you look at this schedule, one of the 7 things that we're doing is we're going to open up Incode 8 to the Department Heads and the Elected Officials to 9 work on their proposed budget asks a month earlier than 10 we used to. We used to do it mid May, now we do it mid 11 April. So that will be coming up soon. Give them more 12 time to figure out what it is they think they really 13 need so that they can articulate their ask. Then that 14 would be due by about mid May. Maybe turn in the asks. 15 And that's when it goes in the Incode and we 16 get to see what they're -- what they want their part of 17 the budget to be. And we aggregate that and it'll come 18 out -- that's when we start the notebook and 19 spreadsheets, once we see what they've submitted. 20 And then, we're going to -- we have 21 scheduled three separate budget workshops. So listen, 22 and one of the things about budget workshops is the 23 public is invited to listen, but they don't get to have 24 any input. So you can see, we kind of staggered this 25 such that we're going to have the budget workshops and 81 1 then we're going to start having input from the public 2 at Commissioners' Court meetings. And so you can see 3 that we've got a budget workshop scheduled for May 23rd, 4 May 30, and June 3rd. But on May 28th, we start 5 receiving input from the public about the budget, which 6 will be an agenda item so that we can hear it. And 7 then -- 8 COMMISSIONER PACES: The only comment is it 9 looks redacted. Most of the public won't have seen 10 quite a bit of the information. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Well, we'll put the schedule 12 together without the color coding on it. That was just 13 to try to demonstrate to you. 14 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Right. Right. 15 COMMISSIONER PACES: I understand. 16 JUDGE KELLY: But you can see, we then have 17 two more opportunities -- or three more opportunities 18 for -- well, the public input would be again on May the 19 28th and June the 10th. And at that point, as the chief 20 budget officer for the County, I think I will have heard 21 from the Departments and the Elected Officials as to 22 what they think they need. I will have heard from the 23 public as to what they want and don't want. And really 24 get -- this calendar gives the public a lot better input 25 to let us know what they think about what we're doing. 82 1 And then that's when I would put together my proposed 2 budget. And we would have opportunities to continue to 3 hear from the public. 4 I have a deadline. I put a deadline on here 5 for July 15 to get my proposed budget and then we sit 6 down and work as to how we're going to finalize this 7 thing. And still get more public input right up to the 8 hearing date. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That seems -- on July 10 15th to present your final budget, which is really late 11 for us to -- 12 JUDGE KELLY: I didn't say final budget. 13 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Proposed. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Proposed budget. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, even your proposed 16 budget though. I mean, it's pretty late in the process. 17 JUDGE KELLY: Well, okay. This is my 6th 18 budget. I prepared five proposed budgets that the 19 Department Heads and Elected Officials have completely 20 ignored. Every single time. And we end up sitting -- 21 the time in the workshops sitting there talking among 22 ourselves, trying to renegotiate what it is. And so I 23 want to hear all of that before I submit the proposed 24 budget. They're not listening to my budget, you know, 25 because we're not going to be -- we all know they're 83 1 going to ask for more than we're going to be able to 2 approve. Right? It happens every year. That is 3 just -- what did Commissioner Belew used to call it? 4 Budget culture. That is the budget culture. 5 And so what I'm trying to do is get that 6 input from all the Department Heads and offices and the 7 public before I put together that proposed budget. 8 Because if the public doesn't like it, it's not going to 9 work, right? And it gives -- it gives the public and 10 the Department Heads and Elected Officials more time to 11 work with the Commissioners on the Court to see where we 12 can land this plane and try to make this a little bit 13 more constructive process instead of, you know, wait and 14 see and then we have this day of reckoning and we're all 15 shell shocked when we walk out of here. Trying to make 16 this a little bit more -- well, am I wrong, guys? 17 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: No. 18 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I like the idea of the 19 input from the public. I think that helps a bunch 20 because they've kind of felt neglected, I think 21 sometimes in the past. So I think it's -- one -- one 22 thing I want to point out right now, and just make sure 23 we have quorums for all of this. On June 24th I've 24 already scheduled a conference that I have to attend. 25 So just so we can make sure of that. 84 1 JUDGE KELLY: That's a Commissioners' Court 2 meeting, which you can watch it on YouTube. 3 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Right. I know. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. We're trying to get 5 this out early enough so that everybody can plan around 6 it. 7 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah, exactly. And I 8 just wanted to bring that out. 9 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'm going to be at the 10 TAC deal in Georgetown on May 23rd. 11 JUDGE KELLY: But you can still make it up 12 and watch it on YouTube. 13 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 14 JUDGE KELLY: What we're trying to do -- we 15 can't accommodate everybody's schedule. 16 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: 100 percent, yeah. 17 No. 18 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Right. 19 JUDGE KELLY: We'll stagger it out to make 20 sure that the thing goes long enough for everybody to 21 be able to have their say before we have to start to 22 decision make. 23 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Well, we just want to 24 make sure we can get a quorum if, you know, she's got 25 something, I've got something. 85 1 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. We're good. 2 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: And we both need to 3 point it out. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I still recommend if you 5 try to have your proposed budget prior to that. I mean, 6 I don't know if it's possible or not because -- 7 JUDGE KELLY: Well, frankly I don't know. I 8 may have it out in a week. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 10 JUDGE KELLY: I may have it -- I mean, you 11 don't know. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. 13 JUDGE KELLY: But -- but I need to have 14 adequate time. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. The other thing 16 is that seems to me that traditionally we look at 17 salaries and new employees at the end, and all of a 18 sudden we start adjusting based on -- we're trying to 19 make the adjustments based on salaries as opposed to 20 doing salaries in the beginning and get that fixed and 21 then make some of the other decisions kept for later. 22 It's just the opposite way that we've been doing it. 23 And I think we need to have that worked out early. 24 And I also -- I said it last time and we 25 didn't do it, again, and it wasn't no one's fault 86 1 because I could have done it as well. On salary hires 2 and changes, we have got to have court orders to track 3 those. It causes lots of problems with HR when we make 4 changes in here, and then the Auditor makes what she 5 hears and it's never -- and HR is totally out of that 6 loop. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Well, and -- and -- 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So we need to have the 9 court orders for any salary adjustments and new hires. 10 JUDGE KELLY: I agree. And I'm trying to 11 get to facilitate that a little better because the way 12 things worked before, is I would propose a budget, and 13 everybody went in and changed it up. And that's okay. 14 You need to let us know what you think you need. And 15 then we would have the workshops and we'd have this 16 chaotic thing of trying to go through it. And we would 17 change salaries, we've got new hires and what have you, 18 and we didn't have any of the documents. 19 I'm trying to get all of that out of the 20 way. If we would make those decisions before we receive 21 any public input. What I'm trying to do is make those 22 decisions by this Court, make those decisions. I'll 23 make my recommendations, y'all have to follow me there. 24 But the point being is make the recommendations and make 25 those decisions after we've received the public input, 87 1 not just from the Department Heads and Officials. And I 2 think that was part of what the public was upset about 3 at the last budget, in my opinion. And so, I'm trying 4 to reserve it to give them that opportunity. 5 COMMISSIONER PACES: And my only 6 observations, having only been through it one cycle, is 7 just that if each Department Head or Elected Official 8 came in, presented what they wanted, and we sat here and 9 listened and at that point in time we didn't necessarily 10 have the rationale or basis to say no, and then it all 11 got kind of compiled and it kept going and going and 12 growing and we never really, in my opinion, had an 13 adequate opportunity to go back and say, okay, we heard 14 what you asked for but it ain't going to work so come 15 back to us with something different. 16 JUDGE KELLY: And that's what we're trying 17 to accomplish with this. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. Let's do it. 19 COMMISSIONER PACES: Okay. Fair enough. 20 JUDGE KELLY: Is there a motion and second 21 to approve the budget schedule? 22 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move that we accept 23 the budget schedule as presented. 24 COMMISSIONER PACES: I'll second. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 88 1 accept the budget schedule as presented. Those in favor 2 say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 3 Move on to Item 1.22 consider, discuss and 4 take appropriate action to surplus a chair, a computer 5 tower, a table, two desks, and five filing cabinets from 6 various departments. And this is the one we have to do. 7 MRS. SHELTON: This helps us keep up with 8 the assets of the County is the reason and that's why 9 the Auditor's office presents it, because then we have 10 access for it so it gets off that list. 11 JUDGE KELLY: And we appreciate it. But 12 this is what we -- this is the way the government runs. 13 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I'll move for 14 approval. 15 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 16 JUDGE KELLY: We've got a motion and a 17 second to approve the surplus of items as presented. 18 Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? 19 Unanimous. 20 Item 1.23 consider, discuss and take 21 appropriate action to decrease up to $258,547.00 worth 22 of IT projects approved for debt and related debt 23 proceeds, or increase R&B equipment expense. Miss 24 Shelton. 25 MRS. SHELTON: Yes. The projection of the 89 1 cost of the IT equipment has changed from -- from the 2 time we looked at this until now, and so we've actually 3 moved out about $258,000.00 worth of items that were 4 placed with a debt and moved it back to general fund. 5 So we'll be talking with our financial advisor for the 6 debt. And so, we just need to firm up what we need to 7 request in the budget. 8 We were asking for a total of about 3.3 9 million, and so this would decrease that ask by this 10 equipment or you could choose to increase the amount for 11 Road & Bridge, based on everyone knows they have a 12 five-year schedule. It would allow them to go ahead and 13 make, you know, order the equipment because they would 14 have the money at the end of the year, but it might be 15 for the next year's. It's just up to you. 16 JUDGE KELLY: And kind of put this in 17 context. We approved a lot -- we purchased a lot of IT 18 equipment. And Bruce is still with us. Thank you. And 19 we approved a lot of equipment. And because of the 20 budget demands, we looked into ways to finance that. 21 And amortize it over the life of the equipment. And 22 that's partially what this reflects is, it's the 23 difference between what we actually have to pay now and 24 what we've been able to borrow to do it. 25 But then it also includes the Road & 90 1 Bridge -- some of those funds can be moved over to Road 2 & Bridge I think is what we're talking about, right? 3 MRS. SHELTON: I'm sorry. Some of it was 4 supposed to be moved over to Road & Bridge? 5 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Could be. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Could be. 7 MRS. SHELTON: Could be. Yeah. You could 8 increase the amount that Road & Bridge has to spend. 9 JUDGE KELLY: And so really all -- all this 10 agenda item is doing is asking the Court to approve 11 being able to look into that. We know we're going to -- 12 we know we've got 258,000 plus, right? 13 MRS. SHELTON: It's about -- that would be 14 the max would be 258,000. But if we stayed with the 15 same debt level. 16 JUDGE KELLY: And with that money, it would 17 then be to be determined where we're going to use those 18 funds. 19 MRS. SHELTON: I would think based on the 20 budget, it would almost need to go to Road & Bridge. Or 21 I guess it could be used -- 22 JUDGE KELLY: I'm fine. Just tell us what 23 the motion is. That we're going to move that money over 24 to Road & Bridge? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I just have a question. 91 1 I don't understand. Why can't we -- why can't we use 2 the money for the IT that we wanted to purchase? 3 MRS. SHELTON: We purchased it using general 4 funds. There were items that were on that list that 5 upon further looking into it could not be used with debt 6 proceeds. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 8 MRS. SHELTON: For the -- one of the things 9 in there, the software is a service, that was part of 10 that whole issue with that. And so that can't be 11 purchased if it's not a capital item. 12 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Oh, so it came from 13 the general funds. So then the savings can go back to 14 the general fund, and then it can be redirect? Yeah. 15 Maybe. 16 JUDGE KELLY: Essentially, everything that 17 was in the IT budget made sense to IT, but then when we 18 went to the finance people and tried to finance it to 19 borrow the money and pay for it over time, some of those 20 things didn't qualify for financing. So we had to pay 21 for them out of general funds. 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Out of general fund. 23 So this savings is going back to the general fund? 24 JUDGE KELLY: Yes. 25 MRS. SHELTON: No. The savings -- we 92 1 haven't -- we don't have any savings technically, right 2 now, because we haven't gone out for the debt yet. 3 We'll start that as soon as we solidify the amount that 4 y'all want to go out for debt. 5 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I gotcha. 6 JUDGE KELLY: We put it in the budget. 7 Okay. Then we looked into the finance. And now we see 8 that we can save this much money because it's financed. 9 COMMISSIONER PACES: So did we have adequate 10 funds in the general fund to cover the amount that we're 11 not -- 12 JUDGE KELLY: It's in the budget. It's in 13 the budget; it's not in the funds. 14 MRS. SHELTON: Yeah. We made adjustments 15 for it by using contingency funds and switching out some 16 of the items that we had left in general funds that 17 could have been purchased with debt funds. 18 JUDGE KELLY: This is really just a 19 bookkeeping issue. 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The preference would be 22 to reduce the amount of debt that we look at Road & 23 Bridge during the budget. 24 COMMISSIONER PACES: Other than making a new 25 list? 93 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's either that or 2 we -- as I understand it, we either do that or we just 3 authorize Road & Bridge to buy $258,000 worth of 4 equipment that's on their list. 5 JUDGE KELLY: Well, the catch 22 is we've 6 already got it in the budget. Road & Bridge is buying 7 things and what is it going to need to pay for it? 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's next year's budget. 9 We have the money for this year's budget. It's next 10 year's budget. This will be accelerating the purchases 11 by 258,00 as I understand it. 12 COMMISSIONER PACES: I thought I heard that 13 we didn't have funds for the lift. 14 MS. HOFFER: The lift was not on the 15 proposed list. 16 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Their option, yeah. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, we can use the 18 sale of that equipment. 19 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'd also recommend 21 that the sale of that equipment can go for the lift, but 22 I'd also recommend, that's why I wanted to look at it, 23 using those funds to buy the equipment for next year, 24 and re-look at that list. 25 MRS. SHELTON: So the -- anything that's not 94 1 spent in Road & Bridge stays in Road & Bridge. We've 2 been supplementing Road & Bridge from general fund for a 3 long, long time now. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Forever. 5 MRS. SHELTON: And so that -- I do not see 6 that changing in the future. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 8 MRS. SHELTON: So anything that they don't 9 spend this year of those proceeds, it will roll into the 10 funds balance, but there's nothing that says those were 11 proceeds from the sale of the assets and they can only 12 be used for purchasing new assets. It's just all part 13 of fund balance that you can use for Road & Bridge. 14 JUDGE KELLY: But we're -- in this -- in 15 this agenda item we're doing two things. We are 16 approving the actions to decrease up to $258,547.00 of 17 IT projects that were approved for debt and debt related 18 proceeds, right? 19 MRS. SHELTON: And -- 20 JUDGE KELLY: Well, that's -- that's the 21 second thing. And that's what I was saying. Do we do 22 one or both things at the time? And that's I think the 23 distinction you're making. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, the reduction of 25 the IT equipment, that's already been taken care of. 95 1 That's coming out of the general fund or out of -- yeah, 2 out of the general fund. So the 258,000 that we don't 3 need to spend on IT; therefore, we can either reduce the 4 debt that we're going to issue or we transfer it to Road 5 & Bridge. 6 MRS. SHELTON: Or you can save it for IT 7 projects next year. 8 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: In our five-year plan. 9 MRS. SHELTON: There is a third. But -- 10 JUDGE KELLY: Well, but it's in the budget 11 and we need to move it around -- either move it or it 12 stays in IT's budget. 13 MRS. SHELTON: You -- you have a choice. Do 14 you to want to keep the same amount of debt or do you 15 want to decrease the debt? That's -- that's the part of 16 the main thing. And if you're going to decrease the 17 debt, that money will not be there for anybody to spend 18 it. And so it's just y'all's choice. 19 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: We could put -- 20 COMMISSIONER PACES: So what's the 21 Treasurer's outlook on interest rates for raising the 22 debt this time versus a year from now? 23 MRS. SOLDAN: I don't have my crystal ball 24 with me right now. But I project that interest rates 25 will go down. 96 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But this debt hasn't 2 been issued so we could either way -- 3 COMMISSIONER PACES: Which is, what, five 4 percent or something? A year from now it could be ten 5 or two. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't have a strong 7 opinion one way or the other. I mean -- 8 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I don't either. 9 COMMISSIONER PACES: It's not a big amount 10 so -- 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, my preference is 12 what I said. If we reduce the debt, the other -- I 13 don't have a problem with buying some Road & Bridge 14 equipment or I -- I really don't have a problem with -- 15 I'd probably rather keep it around for IT for the next 16 year. It's IT money. For IT for the following year. 17 MRS. SHELTON: Part of your -- the comment 18 also is, I don't -- I'm unaware of a five-year plan for 19 IT. That doesn't mean there's not one. I'm just 20 unaware if how much money IT is looking to spend in the 21 next few years. 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: There is one under 23 development. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm sure it will exceed 25 258,000. 97 1 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I don't have a motion. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make a motion that 5 we use the excess funds to reduce the amount of debt. 6 COMMISSIONER PACES: I'll second it. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 8 use the $258,547.00 of IT projects that have been 9 approved to reduce the debt. Got a motion and a second. 10 Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? 11 Unanimous. 12 1.24 consider, discuss and take appropriate 13 action to approve a request for Kerr County to pro rate 14 distribution of proceeds from the tobacco settlement 15 permanent trust fund. 16 How much money are we going to get this 17 time. 18 MRS. SHELTON: I'm sorry? This basically is 19 an annual report that we complete every year based on 20 the prior year's expenses. And we determine then we've 21 been getting about $35,000 from this, but we don't know 22 how much it will be. 23 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 24 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 25 JUDGE KELLY: We've got a motion and a 98 1 second to approve the distribution of tobacco proceeds 2 as presented. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It's a request for the 4 distribution. 5 JUDGE KELLY: To approve the request. Those 6 in favor say aye. Opposed? Motion carries. 7 1.25 -- well, Bruce, you need to come up. 8 Everybody needs to know Bruce Motheral has given his 9 retirement notice and he's departing the County on the, 10 what? 11 MR. MOTHERAL: The 21st. 12 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: March 21st. 13 JUDGE KELLY: And how long you been with us 14 now? 15 MR. MOTHERAL: Not quite 15 years. 16 JUDGE KELLY: 15 years. He's been an 17 integral part in County government. He's taken us from 18 the stone age to almost modern age. 19 MR. MOTHERAL: Trying. 20 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: With all his 21 restraints would allow. 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: A long time. 23 JUDGE KELLY: And through the whole process 24 has become a very close friend. And you will be missed, 25 Bruce. 99 1 MR. MOTHERAL: Thank you very much. 2 JUDGE KELLY: Come on and give him a hand. 3 (Applause). 4 COMMISSIONER PACES: We already had one 5 party. Are we going to do it again? 6 MR. MOTHERAL: Nope. 7 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Nope. He said nope. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Well, this was the last 9 Commissioners' Court meeting that he was going to be 10 here and I wanted to recognize him on YouTube. This has 11 been -- he's been an important cog in our relationship. 12 So moving on, item 1.26 consider, discuss 13 and take appropriate action regarding modifications 14 needed for the Information Technology Department office 15 space located in the courthouse. 16 COMMISSIONER PACES: Okay. This is 17 something that's come out of forming a committee to look 18 at office space and storage needs for the County. And 19 clearly, even when we were back in the bond proposition 20 stage, it was identified that IT was grossly crammed 21 into a small little space. 22 So as a result of getting together the 23 committee, we kind of looked at it, talked about it, and 24 this is, if you will, a band-aid approach. But I think 25 it's a very good first step for now. And the proposal 100 1 is that -- you know, and I have to acknowledge Bob 2 Reeves and his cooperation to make this happen. He has 3 agreed to give up the -- kind of the back half of his 4 storage area. He's got a bunch of things that are being 5 stored behind his office. And a table, and he does some 6 training back there and so forth. But the idea is to 7 extend the existing wall for the IT office straight 8 across, and then they'll open that up with a little -- 9 well opening, doorway, whatever. Not really a door, 10 just an opening, so that the IT folks can get in 11 between. And to compensate Bob for his loss of space, 12 the idea would be to give him the old Treasurer's Office 13 down in the basement so that he can still have a storage 14 area, a meeting room and so forth. 15 So I greatly appreciate Bob's willingness to 16 do this. He may be reluctant, but at least it's a big 17 step towards helping the IT Department. And Shane, his 18 department will actually do the work. He's looked at 19 it. His estimate for the cost is $700.00. And he has 20 told me that he can cover it within his budget for now. 21 So I'd like to make a motion to approve the 22 expenditure of up to a thousand dollars, just in case, 23 to modify the IT office, and install a wall with -- 24 extend the wall between the IT office and the tax 25 office. 101 1 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 2 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. We've got a motion and 3 a second. The floor is open for discussion. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think this would 5 probably make sense, but I'm not going to vote for 6 something until I know a full plan, where we're looking 7 at going. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Me either. We're working 9 on -- the only spaces we have to work with. And I -- 10 it's a good plan. I think it's a good plan. I really 11 do. But we got a whole lot of needs. And we -- we 12 had -- depends on whether or not adult probation moves 13 over to 550. If they do, then we're losing all our 14 space over at 550. That would fill it up, I think. 15 Just about. And so, then the only other open spot that 16 we have is the Treasurer's Office. And there are other 17 competing interests that would like to have the purposes 18 that they would want that office, too. 19 COMMISSIONER PACES: Sure. Just not as 20 valid. We've looked at that. And for the use of it -- 21 JUDGE KELLY: Well, but prioritizing that 22 validity is the Court's responsibility; not your 23 committees. 24 COMMISSIONER PACES: Sure. That's right 25 too. 102 1 JUDGE KELLY: And we appreciate the 2 recommendation. I just don't think that we're right to 3 action on it until we know what the plan is. 4 COMMISSIONER PACES: It's up to you. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's what I said at 6 the beginning. 7 JUDGE KELLY: I agree with you. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I've got to see a plan. 9 Because -- 10 JUDGE KELLY: And I think -- 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- the band-aid -- the 12 band-aid is how we got to where we are and I'm not going 13 to vote for more band-aids. 14 JUDGE KELLY: All right. So -- 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I agree. 16 COMMISSIONER PACES: Fair enough. 17 JUDGE KELLY: But we want to get it done. 18 You're doing a good job. Don't take this personally. 19 It's just -- we just need to know what we're going to 20 tell these people that are on the needs list. What are 21 we going to tell them? 22 COMMISSIONER PACES: Okay. 23 JUDGE KELLY: We've got to have a plan. 24 COMMISSIONER PACES: Well, then we'll tell 25 the IT Department that we're sorry. 103 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No, it's not sorry. 2 COMMISSIONER PACES: Well, it's -- 3 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: No, it's -- you know, 4 it's not -- it might still happen but -- 5 JUDGE KELLY: I hope it does. 6 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I agree. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's a logical thing. 8 We just need to wrap one package along with all the 9 other pieces. 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: The other dominoes. 11 COMMISSIONER PACES: That's fine. It's 12 just, you know, Bob Reeves is still contemplating moving 13 his office. That will, you know, be a three million 14 dollar cost, so the debt would probably have to be 15 raised. Whether it passes in a bond. We do have 16 clarification that we can raise another bond to cover 17 some things that failed in the last bond proposition, 18 but a lot of that stuff is a lot further down the road. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But we need a plan is 20 what I'm saying. 21 JUDGE KELLY: We want the committee to come 22 back and bring us a plan. All right? That's what we're 23 really looking at. You've got a whole bunch of things 24 on that list. 25 COMMISSIONER PACES: We do. 104 1 JUDGE KELLY: And we're not going to be able 2 to do all of them. I know that. And we need to know 3 this is priority number one. This is priority number 4 three, priority number five. 5 COMMISSIONER PACES: All right. 6 JUDGE KELLY: And we'll do what we can. 7 COMMISSIONER PACES: Okay. I thought this 8 was a no-brainer but that's okay. 9 JUDGE KELLY: It is a no-brainer. It's just 10 always been the plan. We've talked about this from Day 11 One. Isn't that right, Bruce? 12 MR. MOTHERAL: Uh-huh. 13 JUDGE KELLY: This is the way we planned it 14 from the get-go. 15 MR. MOTHERAL: Sure. 16 JUDGE KELLY: But we don't know what to do 17 about the rest of the needs. And how do we balance it. 18 Or do we just say these have to wait until next year, 19 five years, either a five-year plan or a ten-year plan. 20 Somewhere. But it's a good plan. 21 COMMISSIONER PACES: Well, so far the only 22 other need was -- 23 JUDGE KELLY: But that's only one part of 24 the plan. 25 COMMISSIONER PACES: -- you know, there's a 105 1 request to have a conference room down in the basement. 2 And that's a -- nice to have. I don't disagree with it. 3 But it's just -- you know, we don't have a need to do 4 anything with the County Court at Law and the jury room. 5 That's been clarified. So it's going to boil down to 6 whether Bob really needs to move his office or not and 7 whether we can come up with the funding to do that. 8 JUDGE KELLY: You brought up the unfunded 9 mandate for the jury room. For the public -- I don't 10 think the public understands exactly how that's being 11 handled. We have the two large district courtrooms 12 upstairs with large jury rooms. But our two District 13 Courts each share another County, one is Gillespie, one 14 is Bandera, so they're not here all the time. 15 And so what we've worked out is kind of a 16 musical chairs thing. Two jury rooms, three courts, and 17 it's working. And it's saving the taxpayers a ton of 18 money. 19 COMMISSIONER PACES: That's right. And it's 20 working perfectly fine. 21 JUDGE KELLY: So we have a motion and a 22 second. You can withdraw your motion if you want to or 23 we -- 24 COMMISSIONER PACES: No, I'll leave it. 25 Take a vote. 106 1 JUDGE KELLY: Take the vote? Okay. All 2 those in favor say aye. 3 COMMISSIONER PACES: Aye. 4 JUDGE KELLY: All those opposed? All four 5 opposed. 6 COMMISSIONER PACES: Sorry, Bruce. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. With that, we'll move 8 on to the Approval Agenda. 9 2.1 budget amendments. 10 MRS. SHELTON: You have seven budget 11 adjustments for today. You see here most of these are 12 line item transfers or that we do have new revenue that 13 came in to cover these or the existing revenue is there 14 to cover them. 15 The second sheet here is all just to have -- 16 this is just kind of trimming up what's left with the 17 East Kerr County wastewater treatment plant and the 18 grant that will remain. 19 JUDGE KELLY: Is there a motion to approve 20 the budget amendments as presented? 21 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll make a motion to 22 approve them. 23 JUDGE KELLY: And a second? 24 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 107 1 approve the budget amendments as presented. Any 2 discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? It 3 carries. 4 2.2 pay the bills. 5 MRS. SHELTON: Yes. Invoices for today's 6 consideration amount to $863,868.59. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I move for approval. 8 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Second. 9 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 10 pay the bills as presented. Any discussion? Those in 11 favor say aye. Opposed? Motion carries. 12 Late bills. 13 MRS. SHELTON: There are not any. 14 JUDGE KELLY: And Auditor reports? 15 MRS. SHELTON: Yes. We completed three 16 internal audits this past time period and they are for 17 the District Clerk, Justice of the Peace Precinct 2, and 18 Justice of the Peace Precinct 4. We're asking that you 19 accept the report. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So move. 21 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 23 approve the Auditor reports as presented. Any 24 discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? Motion 25 carries. 108 1 Monthly reports. 2 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yes. For January, 3 2024, Veteran Services Office, VSO, Jennifer Sanchez. 4 February 2024, Justice of the Peace, Judge Mitzy French, 5 Precinct 1. Judge J.R. Hoyne, Precinct 2. Judge Kathy 6 Mitchell, Precinct 3. Constable Kyle Schneider, 7 Precinct 2. Paul Gonzales, Precinct 3. Brad Ryder, 8 Precinct 4. Environmental Health, Director, Ashli 9 Badders. Auditor's office, Auditor, Tanya Shelton. 10 District Clerk's Office, District Clerk, Dawn Lantz. I 11 move for approval. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 13 JUDGE KELLY: We've got a motion and a 14 second to approve the monthly reports as presented. Any 15 discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? Motion 16 carries. 17 2.6 court orders. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We have our Court Orders 19 from our February 26th meeting numbers 40492 through 20 40519. They all look to be in order. I move for 21 approval. 22 COMMISSIONER PACES: Second. 23 JUDGE KELLY: We've got a motion and a 24 second to approve the Court Orders as presented. Any 25 discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? It 109 1 carries. 2 Move on to the Information Agenda. 3.1 3 status reports from department heads. 4 Mr. Givens. 5 MR. GIVENS: Yes, sir. Good morning again. 6 I just wanted to run a few things by the Court and let 7 y'all know of a meeting that we had with our advisory 8 board committee for Animal Services. I believe it was 9 this last Thursday. We talked about some different 10 topics. And there was a few determinations made of some 11 things that we were looking at doing and I wanted to 12 come to the Court. I guess some of this stuff is 13 probably going to have to be agenda items, but I want to 14 just give y'all a heads up about it. 15 Like I said, these were suggestions by the 16 advisory board. One being we want to do occasional 17 Facebook posts looking for information about people who 18 are dumping animals in front of our facility. We had a 19 situation where we did that. We did not -- we actually 20 did not post it. But it was actually posted through 21 Kerrville Pets Alive, they actually did figure out who 22 did it. And I think that we talked about it would be 23 better going through us. But it was a successful thing 24 to figure out who actually did that. So moving forward 25 we'd like to do that. That may be something that we 110 1 need more discussion on or needs to be an agenda item, 2 but we would like for that to be something. 3 One of the other things, it's been suggested 4 on multiple occasions taking owner-requested euthanasia 5 as just a way for a service we provide. This has been 6 something that we've talked about pretty much at every 7 advisory board meeting for several years. It's been 8 ongoing. 9 Basically what we do right now, if you bring 10 a dog or cat to us, and you need to have the animal 11 euthanized, we're going to look and see if there's a 12 legitimate reason. Okay. We're not going to just 13 euthanize an animal that comes through the door if it's 14 perfectly healthy. We're looking for vet 15 recommendation. If they have a letter from a vet, we 16 will do it. If they -- if they don't have anything, if 17 it's obvious. I mean, this animal -- a lot of times you 18 can look at an animal and say, yes, that animal needs to 19 be euthanized. It is miserable, it's suffering. Okay. 20 So the only thing that we would actually 21 euthanize is legitimate medical vet reasons or if it's 22 injured. One of the things that we also do is in the 23 field, and we're not looking at changing this, but if my 24 guys get out there and they have an animal that's so 25 injured that it's determined right there this animal 111 1 needs to be euthanized because it is suffering, we do 2 that. But this is just for people that come through the 3 front door and want their animal euthanized. And so 4 that's what we've been doing, okay. And we charge a 5 $10.00 fee to do that if it's determined that we should. 6 But the proposal right now is, as far as I 7 can tell basically the same, but taking it off of our 8 fee schedule. Still euthanizing if we determine that 9 it's a legitimate reason, but not euthanizing -- you 10 know, I don't see a change so my -- my proposal is we 11 just eliminate it entirely. Because I just -- 12 JUDGE KELLY: Eliminate it on the fee 13 schedule? 14 MR. GIVENS: Eliminate it on the fee 15 schedule and then stop doing it. Basically whenever 16 somebody comes in if you have an animal that needs to be 17 euthanized, you have to take it to a vet or some other 18 avenue. I think it's a good service but I've been -- 19 to be honest with you, I just -- we're going to be 20 talking about it again in a few months and we just -- 21 we -- I don't want to talk about it anymore. It's 22 really -- there's no -- there's no -- I can't convince 23 some people that -- that we're doing the right thing 24 with it. So I just think it's a service that we should 25 just eliminate. 112 1 JUDGE KELLY: Well, Reagan, it sounds like 2 to me that what you're doing is the right thing. If 3 people come in and say this animal needs to be 4 euthanized, it's much more humane for you to do it 5 professionally. Whatever the fee is, that's -- you 6 know, that's up to you guys to determine what that fee 7 ought to be. But to put that suffering animal in the 8 position where they're going to go out and just throw it 9 in a field and let it die or lay it along the side of 10 the road, I think that's inhumane. 11 MR. GIVENS: I do, too. But I also -- we 12 have reached a point where -- 13 JUDGE KELLY: Am I missing something? 14 MR. GIVENS: No, you're not -- you're not 15 missing anything, sir. It just we're -- like basically, 16 I have to go argue these points every time we meet. And 17 I'm losing that argument. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Why don't we put this on 19 an agenda item? 20 JUDGE KELLY: I'll tell you what -- 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Put it on an agenda 22 item. Then KPA can come and do the -- 23 JUDGE KELLY: -- until you put down a horse, 24 you have not suffered. I'm telling you. That was the 25 hardest think I've ever had to do. 113 1 MR. GIVENS: So -- so make it -- so it's -- 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'd put it on the agenda 3 so we have a discussion. Because we really can't 4 discuss this right now. 5 JUDGE KELLY: Right. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I figure then we 7 could recommend -- and I can explain their logic. And 8 I -- 9 MR. GIVENS: I think I've just reached a 10 point where I need the Court to make the decision 11 because I can't. 12 JUDGE KELLY: Well, these are policy 13 decisions. 14 MR. GIVENS: Right. 15 JUDGE KELLY: First it's been brought up and 16 I just gave you my input quickly. If you want to trace 17 the source of an animal that's been dumped to your 18 facility, I think that's your operations. I don't think 19 we need to approve that or not. If you decide you want 20 to do a Facebook page, you can do a Facebook page. As 21 far as I'm concerned. 22 Now, this issue as to how -- what our 23 euthanasia policy is going to be, for voluntary 24 euthanasia, that's an important issue. And that's 25 something this Court I think needs to set the policy for 114 1 Animal Services. I don't think that's an operations 2 decision. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 4 MR. GIVENS: Okay. So I'll put that on the 5 next agenda. 6 Then just an update here, and this is kind 7 of an operational thing, too. On this one I totally am 8 for, I'm totally in favor. We are currently picking up 9 non-high-risk rabies carriers in traps. We've been 10 doing it for years. These guys will drive all the way 11 across the County to pick up an armadillo out in the 12 middle of nowhere, which some people would consider that 13 to be a nuisance type thing, they dig, they root, things 14 like that. But my proposal is we only pick up the high 15 risk rabies carriers which are, of course, coyotes, fox, 16 raccoons, skunks, and bats. But you're not going to 17 trap a bat. But we'll still get all of that. Of course 18 if you've got a sick or injured animal that you're 19 seeing, we'll respond to that. 20 But your general trap calls where people are 21 calling in, I've got a trapped possum, not responding to 22 those anymore. That's something that they need to deal 23 with. And I think that would save us a lot of time and, 24 honestly, money not -- not going out on those types of 25 calls. 115 1 JUDGE KELLY: And quick feedback. If you do 2 it, you're going to have to enact a policy to penalize 3 people that lie and they come out and get out there and 4 it's not an injured animal. I'm just telling you that 5 you will. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Or it's an armadillo 7 and not something else. 8 JUDGE KELLY: No. 9 MR. GIVENS: And then there's one other 10 thing. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Make my day. 12 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Get it off your chest. 13 MR. GIVENS: So this -- this is another 14 right here, so our County order eliminates -- it omits 15 cats from the County order. Okay. It basically says 16 that you cannot let your dog or cat roam free, run free, 17 unrestrained. But our order removed cats from that. So 18 it is not illegal for your cat in the County to run 19 loose. And I know it sounds silly because who's going 20 to keep their cat contained. But it can be a tool to 21 use if you need it in nuisance situations. It is not 22 illegal for your cat to run loose, so we are 23 proposing -- it was suggested that we stop picking up 24 cats in traps. Still have people if they trap a cat, 25 bring it to us. But for our guys to stop picking up 116 1 trapped cats, because it is not illegal. It's -- 2 they're all nuisance conditions is what -- basically the 3 reason people trap. And it's been suggested that we no 4 longer pick up cats. But we'll still take them. 5 JUDGE KELLY: That's -- that's policy issue. 6 Bring it to us. 7 MR. GIVENS: Okay. I think that was it. 8 JUDGE KELLY: I think that's enough for one 9 day. 10 MS. HOFFER: I have a couple things I'd like 11 to -- 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make an unrelated 13 comment about Facebook. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Kelly. 15 MS. HOFFER: I just wanted to let everybody 16 know that the policy that we did for the dead animal 17 pickup, there was some feedback in the paper. And I had 18 a lady that e-mailed me and I think two out of the three 19 were likely changed our policy. Well, number one, we 20 never had a policy but we haven't changed our -- what we 21 pick up. It's the same schedule. We don't go onto 22 private property. If an animal gets hit by a vehicle 23 and it's, you know, in the road or off in that drainage 24 area, in that right-of-way area that Road & Bridge is 25 responsible for, that we will come and pick up those 117 1 animals. So nothing has changed. 2 I just -- we never had a policy with a court 3 order behind it. And I also wanted the Court to 4 understand, you know, how we've been operating all this 5 time. But we have not changed anything. I think some 6 people think that we have always picked up in their 7 backyards and that, but we have not. And so I wanted to 8 make sure that the public knew that is -- basically that 9 policy pretty much is how we have always operated. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you, Kelly. There's a 11 distinction between Animal Services and what their 12 policies are and what Road & Bridge's policies are. And 13 I appreciate the fact that you're bringing that to the 14 public's attention. 15 MS. HOFFER: Yes. 16 JUDGE KELLY: You're doing the same thing 17 you've always been doing. 18 MS. HOFFER: Uh-huh. 19 JUDGE KELLY: We're having to make some 20 decisions on these others. 21 MS. HOFFER: Yes, sir. And one lady had 22 said well, what about, you know, the animals that might 23 possibly be rabid. And I said, well, that has never 24 changed either. Like if it's an animal that -- like a 25 skunk or a raccoon and that, I said you would call our 118 1 Animal Services Department. And I said and I don't 2 believe that's changed at all. So she was very nice. 3 I know that there was some letters to the 4 editor and people were like, you know, Road & Bridge 5 changed everything. And we haven't. We just -- we 6 actually have a policy now that has a Court Order behind 7 it, since this all happened. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Well, keep your relationship 9 with Animal Services. We like the way you all work 10 together. 11 MS. HOFFER: We do. Thank you. 12 JUDGE KELLY: Any other Department Heads? 13 Okay. Elected Officials? 14 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Got one. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Got a taker. 16 MR. COLLUM: Good morning, Judge. Good 17 morning, Commissioners. For those that don't know, I'm 18 Ian Collum, I'm the Kerr County Clerk. I just want to 19 go over a couple of things that changed due to the 20 election we just had. 21 First off, I want to from the bottom of my 22 heart, extend the largest thank you I can to not only my 23 staff, who this is -- would have been their first run 24 election that they've handled, as well as the tax 25 office. They provided throughout this whole process, 119 1 and continue to do, to provide an insane amount of help 2 to us. It's been wonderful. The Sheriff's Office who 3 was there with us that night as well. IT who was there 4 with us that night as well. And any and all election 5 judges and election clerks. That was, in my opinion, 6 very, very smooth for the situation we are in and for a 7 new office taking over. 8 Moving from that, I did want to discuss a 9 little bit about what Commissioner Paces had mentioned 10 this morning with 312, Precinct 312. The Zion Lutheran 11 Church. 12 JUDGE KELLY: I'm sorry. Say that again? 13 MR. COLLUM: I want to talk on the issue 14 that we had at Precinct 312, at that voting location. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Yeah. 16 MR. COLLUM: So that morning when I got a 17 call about there being an issue with the scanner, I 18 promptly went over there and what was determined was the 19 ballot -- the bar code on the ballot was not being 20 properly read by the scanner. What the two judges there 21 did, one from both party, used -- appropriately used the 22 emergency ballot box that we have specifically for 23 situations like this. 24 I went, we replaced the scanner, did some 25 diagnostics on it and replaced it, and the issue 120 1 persisted with the second scanner. So it did not -- not 2 as much, but it was persistent, which leads me to 3 believe that it was an issue truly with the paper 4 ballots and the bar codes not being able to be read. 5 That being said, from my understanding I was 6 there about an hour and a half that morning. Both 7 judges knew, as well as all the clerks that were there, 8 knew not to tell anyone that they could only vote 9 electronic during this process. Folks were given the 10 opportunity to -- those specifically while we were 11 replacing the machine while it was down were given the 12 opportunity to -- said hey, if you want, we can go ahead 13 and take appropriate action and get you set up to vote 14 electronically if you do not want to wait while we're 15 doing this. 16 That being said, everyone has to be offered 17 both paper ballots and the possibility of casting them 18 electronically as well. They have to be offered that at 19 the time of signing in, you can call it. 20 COMMISSIONER PACES: Is that in the Election 21 Code where it says they have to be offered both? 22 MR. COLLUM: Yes, sir. I believe so. 23 COMMISSIONER PACES: I'd double-check that. 24 I'd like to see that. 25 MR. COLLUM: Yes, sir. So we're offering 121 1 both. So they need to be made aware that we have the 2 ability. 3 COMMISSIONER PACES: I know they have to be 4 available; I'm not so sure they have to be offered. 5 MR. COLLUM: Beyond that, I did not see any 6 issues that persisted. Once we got that scanner swapped 7 out, there was one or two that happened, and again they 8 went into the emergency ballot. The emergency ballot 9 box was attached to that box. And we're standing at the 10 end of the night. So everyone's vote counted. There 11 was no, in my opinion, failure of the system. Simply 12 because the machine let us know, hey, I can't cast this, 13 I see an issue with it. That doesn't come off as a 14 failure to me. It seems like it was a safety net. 15 Moving through that. We were able to get 16 our preliminary result in by about 11 o'clock. Was very 17 happy with that. Getting through about 20 precincts in 18 about -- that's four hours from poles closing at 7:00. 19 Our manual counts compared against our scan count 20 started this past Friday the 8th at 3:00 o'clock. We 21 are well on our way on that. And we hope to finish 22 it -- we have until March 21st, I believe. But we 23 should be done with that within a week. 24 And then the ballot board meets tomorrow to 25 go over the remaining ballots that came in by mail that 122 1 met the mandated deadline that are able to be accepted. 2 So we're -- we're getting through it. 3 And again, I just want to stress I'm very 4 happy with how this turned out. The fact that we were 5 able to get out when we did. We did not have to stay 6 until the a.m. It was very nice. And again, I couldn't 7 have done that without -- couldn't have been 8 accomplished without my staff, the tax office, without 9 the assistance from the IT and the Sheriff's Office, all 10 of that. So that's it. Thank y'all. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Well, we want to commend you 12 for running a very excellent first election. 13 MR. COLLUM: Thank you. 14 COMMISSIONER PACES: And I agree with that. 15 I mean, I was particularly appreciative of, you know, 16 the phone call we had and you were right on it. So -- 17 MR. COLLUM: Oh yeah. I was there for quite 18 awhile. 19 COMMISSIONER PACES: So I appreciate how 20 quickly you responded and got it resolved. 21 MR. COLLUM: Yes. I was very happy. 22 COMMISSIONER PACES: Thank you. 23 JUDGE KELLY: Any other elected officials? 24 Okay. 25 3.3 Liaison Commissioners. 123 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: A comment on something 2 that Reagan said, just to kind of clarify something 3 about a Facebook post. In previous situations something 4 was posted not by the County and comments started coming 5 in and comments started causing some issues, not being 6 real accurate. And my recommendation was that the 7 committee, and Reagan agrees, that it's much better for 8 the County to post it and probably turn off comments and 9 have them call. Because people misinterpret things on 10 Facebook frequently and start writing comments and it's 11 just not at all appropriate. 12 So, to me, it's much better for the County 13 to make the post if we need the information, give a 14 phone number and turn off the comments. That's kind of 15 it. 16 JUDGE KELLY: And that would be the detail 17 of operations. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 19 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I want to say 20 something. I want to recognize Lisa Walters. 21 Commissioner Belew and I started talking about doing an 22 employee spotlight and kind of got it off the ground and 23 threw it to Lisa and she's just taken it and run with 24 it. And I think everybody appreciates what she's been 25 doing with that. How many have we done so far? 124 1 MS. WALTERS: Three. 2 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Three. Well, you've 3 done an excellent job with that. I just wanted 4 everybody to recognize you for that. 5 MS. HOFFER: Well, I'd also like to say Lisa 6 has done a lot for the Road & Bridge Department. She's 7 gotten the word out on things and it has really reduced 8 a lot of our phone calls and that from the public. So 9 she's done a lot for us and I really appreciate her. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I'm going to -- as you 11 know, I am greeted by many people on the street. Some 12 warmly, some not. But I will tell you to a person, I 13 have received nothing but great confidence on the work 14 of our public informations officer. Lisa, thank you. 15 MS. WALTER: Thank you. 16 (Applause) 17 JUDGE KELLY: Any other comments? 18 COMMISSIONER PACES: Yeah. I just kind of 19 want to inform the public that we -- it's been a long 20 time but we're going to have an aggregate production 21 operations community advisory council meeting this 22 Wednesday night starting at 6:00 p.m., Hill Country 23 Youth Event Center. 24 You know, we're going to hear from two of 25 our aggregate producers on the progress they have made 125 1 on voluntary best management practices. That will be 2 from RA Materials and Martin Marietta. There will be an 3 update on Tram and the APO industry collaborative 4 efforts. And also, a little bit of a legislative and 5 regulatory update. So I look forward to that. It's 6 been quite a while since we've had an APO meeting, so 7 we'll see how it goes. 8 The only other thing -- yeah, I attended a 9 KARFA meeting with the VFDs. Primary focus of the 10 meeting was on eclipse planning and preparation. I 11 think as Dub pointed out, another meeting on the 20th to 12 finalize everything. And then, of course, there's a lot 13 of discussion about the new radio system and channel 14 setup in particular. So that's all I got. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Anything else? Okay. Then 16 we're going to take a five-minute break and we'll 17 reconvene in Executive Session. It is now 11:28. 18 (Recess.) 19 (Executive Session.) 20 JUDGE KELLY: It is 12:31 and we're coming 21 out of Executive session. And the next item on the 22 agenda is 5.1 action as may be required on matters 23 discussed in executive session. 24 First one we talked about was 4.2(b), which 25 was to consider, discuss and take appropriate action on 126 1 request to hire a temporary part-time person, up to 160 2 hours, to cover for an employee due to unforeseen 3 medical emergency. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make a motion to 5 approve the request. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second that 7 motion. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: May regret it. 9 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 10 approve the request as presented. And we did hear from 11 Judge McGuire on that. And that was authorized him 12 to -- 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Work with HR. 14 JUDGE KELLY: -- work with HR. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Be a temporary. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Temporary and do a 17 budget amendment. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Any other discussion? Those 19 in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 20 4.2(a) consider, discuss and take 21 appropriate action to approve SB22 supplements for the 22 Assistant County Attorneys and Investigator in the 23 County Attorney's Office, to begin the first full pay 24 period after receipt of the grant funds. 25 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 127 1 COMMISSIONER PACES: Second. 2 JUDGE KELLY: Got motion and a second to 3 approve the request as presented. Any discussion? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: On that one, is that 5 specific enough to keep in our records? 6 MRS. STEBBINS: You will be getting a budget 7 adjustment once the funds come in to be paid out, so 8 you'll have -- if you want me to read it into the record 9 so you have an order? I can do that for the Court -- 10 JUDGE KELLY: I don't think we need to do 11 that, do we? This is a state supplement. 12 MRS. STEBBINS: Yes, Sir. 13 JUDE KELLY: And so for the public that's 14 listening if they're still out there. The State is 15 actually sending us some money to perform our vital 16 functions. 17 But I think you just receive the money, and 18 you come to us asking us to approve your receipt of the 19 money and allocation for these purposes. 20 MRS. STEBBINS: Yes, Sir. And you'll get a 21 budget adjustment at a later time. 22 JUDGE KELLY: And that's when we approve the 23 actual amounts for the individuals. 24 MRS. STEBBINS: Yes, Sir. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Good. 128 1 JUDGE KELLY: So with that, we have a 2 motion? 3 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yes. 4 JUDGE KELLY: And a second. So those in 5 favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 6 MRS. STEBBINS: Thank you. 7 JUDGE KELLY: There being no other business 8 before the Court, we are adjourned. 9 * * * * * * 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 129 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 Regular Commissioners' Court. 9 Dated this the 22nd day of March, A.D. 2024. 10 11 /s/DEBRA ELLEN GIFFORD Certified Shorthand Reporter 12 No. 953 Expiration Date 04/30/2025 13 * * * * * * 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25