1 1 2 3 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS' COURT 4 Regular Session 5 Tuesday, May 28, 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 JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Precinct 3 DON HARRIS, Commissioner Precinct 4 25 2 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 *** Commissioner's Comments. 6 4 1.1 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 8 action to administer oath of office to 5 Thomas Pogue to serve on the Kerrville-Kerr County Joint Airport Board beginning June 1, 6 2024 for a five-year term. 7 1.2 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 9 action following presentation regarding 8 request for public infrastructure reimbursement incentives for "The Bluewood" 9 project, a planned multifamily development project in Kerrville. 10 1.3 Presentation by Texas Department of 28 11 Transportation, TxDOT, San Antonio of the 2025-2028 Rural TIP, Transportation Improvement 12 Plan, for Kerr County, which includes a list of upcoming projects to be funded in the next 13 four years. 14 1.4 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 43 action on request from the Alamo Letter 15 Society to place a bronze plaque containing the Col. William Barrett Travis "Victory or 16 Death" letter on the courthouse grounds. 17 1.5 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 47 action to approve Kerr County Animal 18 Services policy for trapped wildlife pickup. 19 1.6 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 49 action to approve Kerr County Animal 20 Services policy for owner-requested euthanasia. 21 1.7 Update regarding issues related to the 51 Comfort radio tower. 22 1.8 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 52 23 action to approve a donation of a Southwest 14-foot flatbed trailer from the Kerr County 24 Sheriff's Foundation. 25 3 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 1.11 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 53 action for the Court to set a public hearing 4 for 10:00 a.m. on July 8, 2024 for a Revision of Plat for Creekside at Camp Verde 5 Phase 2, Lots 94, 95 and 96. 6 1.12 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 54 action for the Court to set a public hearing 7 for 10:00 a.m. on July 8, 2024 for a Revision of Plat for R.S. Walker's Addition, 8 Block 8, Lots 9-16, and a portion of Fourth Street right-of-way. 9 1.13 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 57 10 action for Commissioners' Court approval to purchase a 2025 International HX520/X15 11 Haul Truck and trade in RBU173, a 2001 Peterbilt 379-127 Haul Truck towards the 12 purchase. 13 1.25 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 58 action for the Commissioners' Court approval 14 to surplus RBU173, a 2001 Peterbilt 379-127 Haul Truck. 15 1.15 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 62 16 action to approve the agreements for storage of Kerr County owned materials/equipment on 17 private property, and have County Judge sign same. 18 1.9 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 64 19 action to accept Compilation Report dated September 30, 2023 for the Kerr County 20 Emergency Services District No. 1(ESD#1). 21 1.10 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 65 action regarding request from the City of 22 Kerrville to support their request to the US Board on Geographic Names(BGN) to update the 23 name of Kerrville Ponding Dam to Nimitz Lake. City Council voted on the matter in 2011 and 24 BGN is requesting verification that the County is aware of the request and supports it. 25 4 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 1.16 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 66 action to surplus a desk with tag number 4 0359 from the Tax Office. 5 1.17 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 66 action to determine what fund will be used 6 to pay for the Shred-It contract in FY 24-25. 7 1.18 Update regarding the American Rescue Plan 67 Act(ARPA) funds. Discussion will include 8 an estimate of expended funds, update on current projects, and input from the Court 9 on what projects to pursue with the remaining funds. 10 1.19 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 76 11 action to approve the Xerox lease agreement for Kerr County Environmental Health Department. 12 1.20 Discussion regarding proposed budget and tax 77 13 rate. 14 1.21 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 84 action to authorize County Judge to sign and 15 submit County's Request for Capital Credits from the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts. 16 1.22 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 84 17 action to add Michelle Lux to the OASys Access Agreement with Texas Association of 18 Counties Health and Employee Benefit Pool as an Administrator. 19 1.23 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 85 20 action on request from the City of San Antonio to submit a letter of support to the U.S. 21 Department of Transportation to allow nonstop flights between San Antonio International 22 Airport(SAT) and Reagan National Airport(DCA) in Washington, DC. 23 1.24 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 86 24 action to approve payout of remaining PTO time for former Tax Assessor's Office 25 employee. 5 1 I-N-D-E-X 2 NO. PAGE 3 2.1 Budget Amendments. 87 4 2.2 Pay Bills. 88 5 2.4 Auditor Reports. 89 6 2.5 Accept Monthly Reports. 89 7 2.6 Court Orders. 90 8 3.3 Status Reports from Liaison Commissioners. 90 9 1.14 Passed. 10 1.13 Consider, discuss and take appropriate 93 action for Commissioners' Court approval 11 to purchase a 2025 International HX520/X15 Haul Truck and trade in RBU173, a 2001 12 Peterbilt 379-127 Haul Truck towards the purchase. 13 *** Adjournment. 94 14 *** Reporter's Certificate. 95 15 * * * * * * 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 6 1 JUDGE KELLY: Court will come to order. It 2 is Tuesday, May the 28th, 2024, 9 o'clock in the 3 morning, and the Kerr County Court is now -- 4 Commissioners' Court is now in session. If you would, 5 please stand for the prayer and pledge. 6 (Prayer and pledge.) 7 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. The first thing I ask 8 everybody to do is to turn your phones off or to at 9 least vibrate so they don't interrupt the proceedings. 10 This is our regular Commissioners' Court meeting. And 11 we put it off for yesterday for the holiday, so we're 12 holding it today. 13 And as with all of our regular 14 Commissioners' Court meetings, we have an opportunity 15 for the public to offer input to the Court. This is our 16 opportunity to listen to you. Anyone that has anything 17 to say to the Court, this is your opportunity to tell 18 us. The only limitation -- there's two limitations. 19 One, we can't say anything back. We have to listen. 20 And number two, I'm going to limit it -- we limit it to 21 three minutes and no more. So with that, is there -- do 22 we have -- is there any public input today? Anyone want 23 to address the Court? 24 Okay. With that, we'll move on to 25 Commissioner comments. And we'll start with Precinct 1. 7 1 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Precinct 1, got this 2 much rain, but it didn't measure. But I've heard from 3 Rosa that there was some pretty severe wind sheers that 4 went through last night. I know somebody got hail last 5 night too. So interesting weather yesterday after all 6 that heat. 7 I attended the memorial ceremony yesterday 8 with my granddaughter and that was an awesomely prepared 9 ceremony. Kudos to Jenna and to Chase for organizing 10 that and everybody that participated. 11 I spent the week last week in Georgetown 12 with two other County employees at the IT conference. 13 Learned a lot. Hope to bring some of that back to 14 Court. And that's it. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Very good. Three. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So ditto about the 17 ceremony yesterday. It was probably the largest, best 18 attended as I recall. Very nice. It was a little bit 19 warm. But if you sit in the shade it wasn't too 20 unbearable. That's it. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Number four. 22 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I agree. It was good. 23 Not only probably the best attended, but probably the 24 best organized as well. So hats off to Jenna and her 25 crew for lining everything up. So that's all I got. 8 1 JUDGE KELLY: And as a footnote to the 2 service yesterday, I think I lost two pounds to the 3 sweat. It was hot. It was hot and humid. But it was a 4 very, very good service. 5 Okay. So with that, we move on to our 6 Consideration Agenda. And the first item on the agenda 7 is 1.1 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to 8 administer the oath of office to Thomas Pogue to serve 9 on the Kerrville-Kerr County Joint Airport Board 10 beginning June 1, 2024 for a five-year term. And if you 11 would come forward? 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We've gotta vote first. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Oh, we've gotta vote. I'm 14 ready to get him sworn in. That seat's been empty too 15 long. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I make a motion that we 17 accept the recommendation of the Airport Board for 18 placing Thomas Pogue on the Airport Board for a 19 five-year term. 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second that 21 motion. 22 JUDGE KELLY: We have a motion and a second 23 to approve the recommendation to appoint Thomas Pogue to 24 the Airport Board. Any discussion? Those in favor say 25 aye. Opposed? Unanimous. Now we're going to swear him 9 1 in. 2 (Sworn in by Judge Kelly.) 3 JUDGE KELLY: Congratulations. I'm going to 4 get you to sign here. 5 MR. POGUE: Okay. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Everybody always balks when I 7 give this next one but I've gotta do it. Okay. Raise 8 your right hand again. 9 (Sworn in by Judge Kelly.) 10 JUDGE KELLY: Congratulations. See what I 11 mean? Gotta sign this one, too. 12 MR. POGUE: All right. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Welcome. 14 MR. POGUE: Appreciate it. 15 JUDGE KELLY: I swore some people in at the 16 school board last week and when I read that oath, they 17 looked at me like, really? Yeah, really. 18 Okay. Item 1.2, it's a 9 o'clock timed 19 item, consider, discuss and take appropriate action 20 following the presentation regarding request for public 21 infrastructure reimbursement incentives for the Bluewood 22 Project, a planned multifamily development project in 23 Kerrville. Who's going to go first? 24 MR. WHEELER: We'll let -- we're both going 25 to speak but we'll let my partner, Shea Byers, start. 10 1 MR. BYERS: I'll start. I'm Shea Byers -- 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: You've got to go to 3 the podium. 4 MR. BYERS: Okay. 5 JUDGE KELLY: It's on YouTube. It's being 6 broadcast. And the camera's right there in front of 7 you. 8 MR. BYERS: Hi. All on tape. All right. 9 I believe we have a presentation. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 11 MR. BYERS: Perfect. I'll be brief. Again, 12 my name is Shea Byers. I'm with J Street Company out of 13 Dallas, Texas. We're a development firm. We focus in 14 building workforce housing in communities that, quite 15 frankly, need housing. The Bluewood project is our 16 latest and greatest project that we're proposing to 17 develop on the north side of town here in Kerrville near 18 Holdsworth and Cailloux. It's 273 apartment units, 19 Class A units. About a 55 million dollar project total. 20 You can see some of the amenities that we're 21 bringing to the project, which are very -- it's a very 22 nice institutional style project. When I say 23 institutional, I mean it's going to meet and exceed any 24 apartment housing project in the greater Kerrville 25 Fredericksburg market, including the new project that is 11 1 being built in Fredericksburg right now. 2 One of the most interesting points I'd like 3 to point out is that although this is a very well 4 monetized project and a very expensive project, it's 5 going to meet the median income, 95 percent of our 6 units. So 250 plus units will be priced between the 80 7 and hundred percent AMI for Kerr County. So this is 8 going to meet the workforce housing need that's here and 9 that everybody's aware of. Next slide please. 10 This is the community benefit that we 11 thought was really important to bring out. I've already 12 made that first point. It's also going to be a 13 catalytic development for the Holdsworth Avenue. And 14 recapture, hopefully, a return on investment of the 15 infrastructure that's been put over there. There's all 16 brand new roads, sewer, water, everything that's been 17 invested in that area has been done for a reason. 18 And so, we're the -- you know, the City, the 19 County, the people, the organizations that made that 20 investment, that was a calling card and a green light 21 for us to really want to be on this project. 22 It probably is going to renew the public 23 engagement, community engagement of the sports complex 24 that has been developed over there. We're an 25 experienced owner-operator. We're not a merchant build 12 1 developer. I think this is another point that's worth 2 mentioning is many of these projects get built using 3 bank financing. Next slide please. 4 We're using a loan that's federal insured by 5 HUD. It's market rate. Ground up construction, 40-year 6 financing. And without getting into all the details on 7 the financing, it is the type of financing that is very 8 punitive if you sell. There's a feasance or a build 9 maintenance on selling. So it's typical that a 10 developer that would use HUD would stay on the project a 11 little bit longer. Why does this matter? Because we 12 have private ownership, we want to be in the community, 13 we want to be here. We really believe in Kerrville and 14 we want to make this investment for the long term. 15 Most of these investments that sponsor on a 16 project like this in San Antonio would be -- you know, 17 they build it, they lease it in two years or they sell 18 it in a three-year turnaround. This is more like a 19 seven to 12-year hold for us. That's the type of 20 investment we're making here. That's where it's 21 located. There's the ball fields that were developed 22 there that we're right next to. A significant City 23 investment. The Cailloux Family as well. Next slide. 24 So lining up the presentation. A few things 25 on the economics. None of this is probably new to you 13 1 guys, but inflation, interest rates, development costs 2 have all created a really difficult capital market. So 3 to give you a sense of where we are today in annual, I 4 guess I'll handle this so we don't have to do the switch 5 off here. But if you could flip to the slide. 6 Where we are is we're way down the road. 7 This isn't a maybe deal; this is a very live deal. So 8 we have our loan commitment from HUD for 42,181,200. 9 We're in the middle of our equity raise. We're in the 10 City for review and permits on our plans. And so where 11 we're at is we've kind of come to a roadblock where 12 capital markets have said you're deal doesn't, you know, 13 equate for the returns that we need for investment. So 14 the reason we're here is because we've walked this 15 project all the way through to the point to where the 16 last thing we need is a little bit of an incentive to 17 get us over the hump so that we could induce capital to 18 invest with us. We're looking for a ground breaking 19 probably in the fall. 20 And so the request today from the County 21 is -- well, this is the City, actually. I'm sorry. Is 22 that the City up there? 23 MR. WHEELER: Yeah, the first one was City. 24 MR. BYERS: Okay. This is -- just to give 25 you an example, what we're looking for is an equal 14 1 investment from the City as well as the County. So in 2 full transparency, we're here to just show you what 3 we're requesting of the City. We're in council tonight 4 at six o'clock. But the total contribution from the 5 City is just over a million dollars. It's made up of 6 fee permits and park waivers, along with a ten-year 7 property tax reduction that would equal about a million 8 forty-six dollars. Our funding gap is around a little 9 over two million dollars. 10 And then for the County, what we're 11 proposing would be a public -- basically the public 12 infrastructure that has to be built out. Obviously 13 there's some investment that still needs to be made to 14 get onto our to site with roads, public utilities and 15 whatnot. And we have a hard bid, Daniel, around -- 16 you're not on camera but -- a little over a million 17 dollars for the public infrastructure. So that's how we 18 arrived at the million dollar number. 19 And so how that would be handled by the 20 County is -- I'm not familiar with your protocol, how 21 you would handle that reimbursement, but we would look 22 for that to be reimbursed to us once construction 23 started. So I think the graph there was just to show an 24 equal contribution between the City and the County. And 25 that's the conclusion of our presentation. 15 1 MR. WHEELER: If it's okay, Dale Crenwelge 2 is here with us. He is the landowner and partner in 3 this project as well. And if it's okay for him to say a 4 word or two, we'd like to ask him to come up. 5 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 6 MR. CRENWELGE: Thank you, Commissioners. 7 My name is Dale Crenwelge. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Oh, we know you. 9 MR. CRENWELGE: I live in western Kerr 10 County. I've developed quite a bit in western Kerr 11 County. Basically, you know, the economics of the 12 situation, is like all of the developments I've done, 13 everybody's tapped the brakes on building the houses. 14 The interest rates are -- the interest rates and 15 development costs have basically put a squeeze on these 16 guys on the numbers. So I bought this property, 68 17 acres from the Cailloux. My plan was to do some sort of 18 affordable housing. That's a demand we all need. 19 I've been on the Notre Dame school board, 20 the Comfort school board, the private school board in 21 Fredericksburg. I've been on the hospital board in 22 Fredericksburg. I'm still on the Methodist Hill Country 23 advisory hospital board. The shortage we have for 24 nurses, the doctors, the staff, trying to get 25 specialities out here. The workforce housing. We need 16 1 this project and this is a prime area. The Cailloux 2 have spent a lot of time developing this whole master 3 plan, the City. 4 With Holdsworth Drive, this is one of the 5 prime sites to do a multifamily deal. I've talked to 6 Justin McDonald. He said, Dale, this is -- I have one 7 site, this is the prime site to put it. So the guys 8 have done their homework. They've done their homework. 9 The HUD deal is critical for them. If they go away, 10 know there won't be any apartments built. So we need 11 these apartments for the community. Trying to get on 12 the board of Schreiner. Trying to get ag programs set 13 up. And there -- it's a number one problem. Housing 14 for the employees and staff is critical. It's putting a 15 bind on all these communities and the services that we 16 want. 17 So anyway, that's my two bits worth and I 18 appreciate your consideration. So I've been here a long 19 time and these guys' numbers are good and they just need 20 help. And I appreciate it. 21 JUDGE KELLY: I think there are others here 22 to speak on this project as well. Dr. Ringo, are you 23 speaking? 24 DR. RINGO: Judge, Commissioners, great to 25 see you all. I'm Brent Ringo, Superintendent of 17 1 Schools. And just the highlights for this project. And 2 we have a hundred percent graduation rates, 13 3 certification programs that need their pilot licenses at 4 their high school, PAs in one of ten districts. Be 25, 5 26. And that's going to cause our kids can certain 6 their associates degree. And I feel that because hiring 7 employees is a challenge. 52 thousand dollars. 8 Teachers start with. And projects like this allows us 9 to recruit teachers. And we've had teachers turn us 10 down on job offers because of the housing and cost of 11 living. And so projects like this -- I know the 12 hospital, nurses, teachers, is going to open up that 13 market where we can get employees, great employees to 14 continue that nurturing condition that we have for the 15 ISD. Thank you for your time. 16 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. Mr. Pogue, I 17 believe you signed up to speak on this, too. We swore 18 him in and now we put him in the hot seat. 19 MR. POGUE: Switching it up a little bit. 20 I'm Thomas Pogue. I'm vice president of manufacturing 21 for James Avery. I represent our Hill Country artisan 22 centers. Both here in Kerrville, Comfort and 23 Fredericksburg. Thanks for the opportunity to speak. 24 First of all, I just want to address as 25 y'all know, we have an artisan center next to the 18 1 Airport here in Kerrville in Kerr County. It was built 2 in 2016. And we took a multi-decade approach to this 3 facility to be able to produce our product and our 4 beautiful jewelry here in the Hill Country in Kerr 5 County and Kerrville. Not just for the immediate future 6 but for decades to come. We built it with capacity to 7 exceed our long-term plan, which would have got us 8 through ten years. However, just recently we've had to 9 undertake a new project. 10 We've started a new artisan center in Corpus 11 Christi, Texas as of 2023. The reason we had to make 12 this additional investment was strictly for workforce 13 ability. We're seeing the number one issue along 14 workforce availability is being housing and affordable 15 housing. And most people would think it's just our 16 entry level technicians that are seeing this, but even 17 our housing skilled and even engineering and management 18 and leadership are having to seek housing outside of our 19 community. I was fortunate when I relocated to the 20 area, just happened to be another James Avery employee 21 that had built a house and put theirs up for sale. So 22 those family housing and being able to see the two and 23 three bedroom, it's important for us to continue to be 24 able to attract and retain our workforce. 25 Many of our associates, again, are choosing 19 1 to still work for us but having to relocate in adjacent 2 communities. And obviously, we spoke about the increase 3 in food and gas prices. That, along with the commute, 4 is becoming unsustainable to continue to attract and 5 retain those employees here. We'd love nothing more 6 than to be able to go back to continue to grow our 7 Kerrville facility. 8 We have a lot of capacity there and can even 9 double the size of our workforce inside of our local 10 facility, given we were able to obtain housing for 11 those. Happy to share any of the details you all may 12 have afterwards or they've got my information to be in 13 contact. But again, we're in support of this and happy 14 to take any questions. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Thank you. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: A couple questions I 17 have. I mean I guess the traditional way -- you have to 18 go up to the podium. 19 I think the 381 type agreement is kind of, 20 you know, what we would probably want to do. Have y'all 21 done the calculations, as to what kind of abatement on 22 the increased value, the property tax values would be 23 required to bring in a million dollars? 24 MR. WHEELER: Yeah. Commissioner Letz, we 25 have run the numbers on that. Over a ten-year period, a 20 1 70 percent County tax abatement would equate to the 2 County half a million dollars that we're seeking here 3 today to bridge that gap. So 70 percent of the County 4 tax -- 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And that's with 70 6 percent of the increased value, correct? So when it 7 gets built out, it's 55 million that is taxable for the 8 70 percent of the value per -- 9 MR. WHEELER: So -- yeah, yeah. Correct. 10 So it is 70 percent of the County mill rate on the 11 assessed value. The assessed value for this project -- 12 it's actually in our presentation for this evening, it's 13 roughly 25 million is the assessed value for this 14 project. And so, of that County mill rate, 70 percent 15 reduction over ten years equates to that one million 16 dollars. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So the County's 18 looking -- so the County still is receiving 30 percent 19 of -- 20 MR. WHEELER: Correct. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- the value for ten 22 years and then after that it goes to a hundred percent? 23 MR. WHEELER: Correct. Yeah. I have some 24 other numbers I could pull up. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, I think, you 21 1 know, to me, a couple of things. One is that 2 development, especially with the water situation, makes 3 total sense to be in the City of Kerrville. Where 4 they're using surface water as much as possible. With 5 the droughts we're having, it's a little bit more 6 difficult to fill, even during the winter months we're 7 putting a lot of water back into the aquifer. So it 8 makes a lot of sense for us to push development into the 9 City. 10 Secondly, our subdivision rules and well 11 drilling rules have forced that. So you -- where the 12 land is cheaper in the County, you can't build any 13 development so we can't get workforce housing in the 14 County essentially anymore. So I mean, I'm in favor of 15 this type of project and I think it's a reasonable 16 request. That's my comment. And I don't know how the 17 rest of y'all feel. 18 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: If this project is a 19 go, you've got 275 units, correct? Or y'all -- 20 MR. BYERS: 273. 21 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: 273. I can't read my 22 own handwriting. Are you interested in doing more once 23 this one is in place and up and running? 24 MR. BYERS: We are cautiously, but yes. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 22 1 MR. BYERS: So Mr. Crenwelge has a large 2 piece of land there. 3 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I mean you've got the 4 land, okay. 5 MR. BYERS: Yeah. And we've -- we've 6 planned out, we've looked at what, you know, the next 7 takedown would look like. And I think we're at 555 8 total units. So another 260, 70, whatever the math is, 9 on a Phase 2. But that's probably four to five years 10 from now. And understanding, there's just a lot that 11 goes into that. But yes, there's an appetite. If 12 there's an appetite and we can, you know, raise the 13 money then -- 14 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Well, after listening 15 to them speak those are going to fill up pretty quickly. 16 MR. BYERS: Yeah. Yeah. We're -- we really 17 believe that. That's why we're here. 18 COMMISSIONER OVERRBY: Okay. 19 MR. BYERS: We know that. We know there's a 20 real need here. Just want to be a help to that. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Well, let me say as the 22 chairman of AACOG right now, and I sit on the AACOG 23 housing finance corporation, we have -- AACOG is 24 building -- affordable housing is one of our most 25 essential needs right now. And we simply don't have it. 23 1 And we can't get it in the County because we don't have 2 the water source or wastewater source. So because of 3 that, it has to be done in the City. If we could do it 4 in County, we would. But we don't have any sources to 5 be able to do that. 6 AACOG has sponsored one affordable housing 7 development in New Braunfels, another in Seguin. This 8 past month, AACOG approved another affordable housing 9 development for Seguin, and has one on the drawing board 10 for New Braunfels. And guess who's on the list after 11 them? Us. We're trying to get on that. So whether 12 it's your subdivision or -- development or others, 13 without affordable housing, Kerr County's going to dry 14 up and blow away. 15 And we have to use the surface water. I 16 can't emphasize how important the surface water is 17 because that's the river. That's the surface water. 18 The groundwater, we keep sticking for a ten acre tract 19 of land and you get a well permit and we start sticking 20 500 to a thousand straws in that aquifer, it's not 21 sustainable. So this is the future and it's going to 22 have to be done. And we understand that the school 23 district, the hospital, the big employers, Avery, are 24 behind this. And you're going to have the work staff 25 that's going to be probably living in those units. And 24 1 so anytime we talk about tax abatement, we always 2 grimace, it hurts, but sometimes we have to have short 3 term sacrifice in order to get the long-term benefit. 4 And I think that's what we're looking at on this. So I 5 will be supportive of your project proposal also. 6 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I'm typically a hard 7 sell on tax abatements. Always have been. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Really? 9 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yeah. Are you telling 10 me this million dollars is a deal breaker? 11 MR. BYERS: Yes, sir. It's not my deal 12 breaker; it's the capital market deal breaker. Seeking 13 investment right now, talk to any develop -- the cranes 14 aren't going up anymore right now. You've got a very 15 compelling reason to bring capital in. And we would -- 16 we would -- we wouldn't be seeking the money if we could 17 fund it ourselves. That's the true gap to get it 18 developed. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think it's an 20 important point is that, yes, it's an abatement. But 21 it's still -- the County and the taxpayers receive 30 22 percent of the value of the tax -- you know, taxable 23 value going forward for ten years. I mean, they're 24 not -- it's not costing the taxpayers, current 25 taxpayers, anything. It's -- it's just a matter of the 25 1 amount of tax -- new tax is less than for ten years and 2 then pick it up at the end of that ten year period and 3 pull them out. So it doesn't cost current taxpayers 4 anything. 5 MR. BYERS: May I offer another piece that's 6 probably overlooked, that the fact that the Housing 7 Urban Development has green lighted this project is a 8 milestone in itself. It's very hard to originate 9 financing right now with debt. If you've got any bank, 10 you might get 50 percent leverage. So I might get a 25 11 million dollar loan on a 55 million dollar project, so I 12 gotta go raise 35 million dollars. If possible. 13 This project is very well capitalized 14 because the debt really reaches high up in the sky. So 15 my raise, my equity is 12 million bucks. And we've got 16 some soft commitments on that. But if HUD goes away, 17 and there's a timeline on HUD, so we have until 18 basically the end of August to red light the project. 19 And if we don't, we start all over and go to the back of 20 the line with HUD. 21 And financing is a huge piece of this. So 22 getting this incentive makes the deal live and it makes 23 it really live right now so that we can finalize our 24 capital. And it's project developed. What we don't 25 want to see is HUD go away. That's one of our biggest 26 1 concerns. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: So you're using this 3 two million to go back to your soft commitment to fund 4 that -- 5 MR. BYERS: That's correct. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: -- to make -- it's the 7 whole deal? 8 MR. BYERS: Correct. 9 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 10 JUDGE KELLY: So that -- would that be 11 public funds -- it's not going to happen in this market. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Judge, I'll make a 13 motion that -- 14 MRS. STEBBINS: We have application process. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I know that. But I can 16 still make a motion. I make a motion that we accept the 17 proposal as proposed, subject to the application process 18 being completed and the documents being prepared by the 19 County Attorney's Office or outside counsel. 20 MRS. STEBBINS: We -- there's a whole 21 application that they -- 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. The application 23 process. And then we'll come back to the Court for 24 approval at that time. 25 JUDGE KELLY: And I'm looking at the County 27 1 Attorney. Can we pass a Resolution in support of this 2 to be followed by the application process? 3 MRS. STEBBINS: I'm sure that that would 4 make them more comfortable and moving forward as they 5 go. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Well, we want them to get to 7 HUD. 8 MRS. STEBBINS: But they -- you can't 9 approve it today without following the application 10 process. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Correct. 12 MRS. STEBBINS: So you can -- a Resolution 13 would probably be something that they could take away 14 and feel pretty warm and fuzzy about. 15 JUDGE KELLY: So your motion is to -- for 16 the resolution -- 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll cancel what I 18 previously said and I'll make a motion to approve the 19 resolution to propose the 381 agreement as presented. 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second that. 21 JUDGE KELLY: We've got a motion and a 22 second. Any more discussion? 23 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Well, this wouldn't be 24 final approval. It gives them more time to ponder the 25 situation. 28 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 2 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I'm -- we welcome public 3 input. So we're trying to get you on the track and keep 4 this project live. So any other discussion? Those in 5 favor of the Resolution as presented say aye. Opposed? 6 Abstain? Unanimous. Thank you. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Thank y'all. 8 MRS. STEBBINS: Commissioner Letz, will you 9 get with me after this so we can draft the appropriate 10 language for the resolution? 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Certainly. 12 MRS. STEBBINS: Okay. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. We've got a timed item 14 at 9:15, we're running late and I apologize. This is 15 1.3, which is a presentation by the Texas Department of 16 Transportation, TxDOT, from San Antonio for the 17 2025-2028 Rural Transportation Improvement Plan for Kerr 18 County, which includes a list of upcoming projects to be 19 funded in the next four years. 20 And we had Richard De La Cruz, but you came. 21 MR. GONZALEZ: It will be me. My area, I 22 guess. I'm Andres Gonzalez. Thank y'all for having us. 23 That would mean I'm not Richard De La Cruz, our 24 transportation planning and development director for 25 TxDOT from our San Antonio office. We have Rodney 29 1 Coursey, Maintenance Supervisor for the Kerrville area. 2 And then there's Ivonne De La Rosa is also in the 3 planning and development department. 4 So today I'll just be speaking about the 5 rural transportation improvement plan, which is just 6 kind of going over just funding principals in general 7 regarding TxDOT and then, obviously, the upcoming 8 projects that are for the Kerr County area. 9 So briefly the agenda will be a Safety 10 Minute. We'll go over the San Antonio District and 11 boundaries, transportation planning process, the rural 12 TIP, the transportation improvement program, how the 13 rural TIP impacts you. We'll go over the projects for 14 the next four years, touch on funding, and then we'll go 15 to the next steps and a Q & A as well. 16 So for safety minutes, we have a slogan in 17 TxDOT that's called "End the Streak Texas." And what 18 that is about is basically the fact take the last 19 deathless day in Texas was November 7th, 2000. So if 20 you think about it, you know, for 23 years every single 21 day somebody has died on Texas roads. 22 So, you know, for TxDOT our number one 23 priority is safety so we're really looking with 24 intention at improving safety. And today I ask 25 everybody in this courtroom to share with their family 30 1 members, your loved ones, really anybody whenever you 2 get an opportunity, you know, the importance of paying 3 attention while you drive. The three main contributing 4 factors are speed, driving under the influence, and then 5 distracted driving. So with those three alone, if we do 6 a better job in that aspect, we'll be in a lot better 7 shape. So please share the message. I try to do it as 8 much as I can. Obviously all of us at TxDOT do so. The 9 more we spread the word, the better things will be. 10 Okay. 11 District boundaries. There's San Antonio. 12 We have counties in light blue, those are the counties 13 in the AAMPO, the Alamo Area Metropolitan Planning 14 Organization, there's urban, with the counties shaded in 15 brown being the rural RPO counties in our district. 16 Uvalde is not part of the rural RPO as of now, but it's 17 still part of our district. Okay. 18 So what is ARRPO? It's Alamo Regional Rural 19 Planning Organization. And the organization is 20 organized by elected officials. And the intent of that 21 organization is to help identify transportation needs, 22 plan transportation, and recommend the rural 23 transportation priorities. 24 So we have a -- basically a program called 25 Connecting Texas 2050. That's more of a TxDOT statewide 31 1 main, if you will, but basically the strategy for 2 connectivity throughout the next 25 years, to 2050, and 3 obviously those are based on performance and strategic 4 aspects of transportation, including safety, 5 preservation, mobility, connectivity, economic vitality, 6 and stewardship. Okay. 7 And after that. It kind of breaks down into 8 more rural programs, if you will. For -- I'm sorry -- 9 there's two main sections, planning and programming, 10 kind of a break down on how we structure projects. 11 Those are the long term range plans is just 25 plus 12 years, where we kind of talk about those future 13 projects, and then it moves on to the metropolitan and 14 rural plans, long range plan of 20 years. From there 15 it's kind of more of a solid filtered. So we have a 16 program list of ten years called a Unified 17 Transportation Program, the UTP. So if you hear me talk 18 about potentially projects in the ten-year plan it's, 19 you know, in that UTP list. And then from there we have 20 the STIP, which is the Statewide Transportation 21 Improvement Program, which is a four-year list of 22 projects and basically the urban and the metro TIPS and 23 the rural TIP are both included in that STIP. And then 24 we have a two-year letting list as well, which is the 25 projects that are actually being designed and funded to 32 1 be -- for light construction in the next two years. 2 Okay. So -- go back, I'm sorry. 3 So for the rural TIP is a list of added 4 capacity and regionally significant projects. So it's 5 multi-level traffic, but for pedestrians, bicycles, 6 commercial, you name it. So it includes everything. 7 Yeah, next slide. 8 All right. So in order to strategize and 9 implement everything, a lot of things are considered. 10 Obviously growth is one of the main aspects. We look at 11 average daily traffic values. We look at the crashes, 12 fatal and severe crashes. Safety areas. Kind of choose 13 your implementation, you name it, we consider it for -- 14 for kind of prioritizing and implementing projects, and 15 then changing that ten-year UTP and STIP for you for the 16 change that we see. All right. 17 So how the rural TIP impacts you. The rural 18 TIP process includes opportunities to provide input. So 19 this is, you know, this is a process to where -- and 20 we're required to present at Commissioners' Court with 21 different counties -- to share officially kind of the 22 projects that are upcoming and then to provide an 23 opportunity for you all to kind of provide more input 24 for consideration and modification of that TIP list for 25 Kerr County. 33 1 So again, our list, you know, includes road 2 expansions, sidewalks, bike lanes, pavement repair or 3 maintenance, new or improved signals, and turning lanes 4 for the -- for the TIP process. 5 So for the projects -- next slide, please. 6 The projects under construction, we just left a 7 bridge -- replace bridge and approaches at FM 1341 and 8 Cypress Creek. Construction is probably looking to 9 start pretty -- actually about two months from now. So 10 that's what we have in the works and we're going to have 11 a pre-construction activity for that. It's -- there's 12 going to be a detour included in that project as well. 13 So we can talk about a little more a little later, but 14 we're kind of tying down those detour -- 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Thomas, where is that -- 16 where is that exactly on Cypress Creek or on 1341? 17 MR. GONZALEZ: It's at Cypress Creek -- 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But where? 19 MR. GONZALEZ: -- three miles east of town 20 basically -- or south of town, if you will. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So it's right past the 22 rest area, kind of? That's if you're on the 23 interstate -- it's right next to the interstate. 24 MR. GONZALEZ: Right. Past the rest area 25 coming from San Antonio, I guess. 34 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. Okay. 2 MR. GONZALEZ: Yes. Now, we're actually 3 looking at closing the entire -- kind of shutting down 4 that area, so it's for both sides, just to get it done 5 quick. We have an incentive on that. So if they finish 6 it within a certain amount of time they get an 7 incentive, so that's kind of what we set it up to be 8 quicker on that. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How long does that plan 10 take? 11 MR. GONZALEZ: Thirty days. 12 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's not too bad. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's not too bad. 14 MR. GONZALEZ: Thirty -- actually maybe a 15 little more. But, you know, not exceeding 40 days. I 16 think the -- 17 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's good. 18 MR. GONZALEZ: -- the number is actually 36, 19 38 days. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 21 MR. GONZALEZ: Still where, you know, 22 it's -- close it all off, remove it, and then the plan 23 was to get in and out quick, we'll bring it back up to 24 where traffic can ride and then slowly finish the 25 project while having traffic on the loop. 35 1 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Good. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. All right. Thank 3 you. 4 MR. GONZALEZ: We've got a feasibility study 5 ongoing. Y'all may have seen the surveyors there at RM 6 783. That's -- so we're basically tying down the 7 concepts to look at kind different criteria to rebuild 8 the breaks there and have -- provide greater clearance, 9 and then get rid of those half clover leafs on those as 10 well. 11 So we -- there's a printout and a map for 12 y'all that, you know, I brought for y'all to review. Go 13 on to the next slide. 14 The '25 that we have. Most of our projects, 15 you know, really with all counties is preparations, and 16 you'll see a lot of seal coat and pavement markings in 17 regard to that, to which Rodney's crew is doing prep 18 work to be able to come and seal a project. 19 On the '25 list, we're going to kind of 20 briefly mention the Hill Country Drive project that we 21 have for sidewalks. Construct six-foot wide sidewalks, 22 filling gaps, correcting existing sidewalk deficiencies 23 along Wesley Drive, Cully Drive, and Hill Country Drive. 24 And then on '25, I changed it in the 25 presentation but your printout says '25 on the Crossing 36 1 Street and Ehlers Road bridge replacements. As of last 2 week, I changed -- well, I met with the Commissioners on 3 it but that's -- the letting date is now moved to 4 January '26 due to some challenges with utilities, 5 right-of-way, environmental, kind of you name it. But 6 we're working towards getting that project in order. I 7 know it's kind of been a little -- kind of a long time, 8 but we're actively moving the ball over and getting the 9 project together. Next side. 10 In '26 you'll see more seal coat projects 11 and pavement markings. There's also one or two projects 12 that highlight just with the pedestrian infrastructure 13 improvements. This is on State Highway 16 from Thompson 14 Drive to Lehmann, and then Thompson to 394 and to SH 16. 15 Okay. Next slide. 16 For '27 and '28, you'll see more seal coat 17 projects listed on there for pavement preservation. 18 This is a four-year plan list. There's, you know, 19 not -- you know, we're constantly -- like we said, 20 safety is our number one priority so we're constantly 21 looking at kind of improvement like, you know, 22 right-turn lanes, left-turn lanes, access management, 23 you know, improvement. Striping requests. We've 24 recently done striping in town. So kind of as issues 25 come up, we have kind of funding allotted for different 37 1 safety improvement aspects. So, obviously, this is the 2 four-year plan but not to say there's other improvements 3 along the way as well. Intersection work and things 4 like that. 5 So the funding, you know, it comes from 6 different kind of sources and types of Federal 7 Government. TxDOT funding and then local governments 8 are kind of allowed to pitch in as well. 9 Next slide shows where we are in the rural 10 TIP process. So we have on the slide the project 11 selection of the rural TIP, the rural TIP coordination, 12 and then we are presenting the rural TIP right now. 13 After this is -- TxDOT reviews each revised rural TIP 14 proposal and integrates them into the statewide TIP. 15 And then with funding secured, project development 16 and/or construction schedules can move ahead. And then 17 we can also resubmit or re-share a rural TIP at this 18 time. 19 Okay. I also provided a comment card to 20 y'all. You know, if -- mostly everyone has my direct 21 line, so feel free to give me a call to discuss any -- 22 any projects that you we may need to discuss. But you 23 can also fill out the comment card. I actually have 24 more comment cards available, if anybody is interested 25 in writing comments to us. 38 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Are you done? 2 MR. GONZALEZ: I'm done, yeah. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: One of the comments I 4 hear a lot, I don't think it's part of these projects 5 but it's the speed limit on Highway 27. A lot of 6 people, a lot of complaints that 70, from basically 7 Government Crossing all the way to Comfort, is way too 8 fast, especially with the amount of traffic. How is 9 that changed? 10 JUDGE KELLY: The process? 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah, the process. 12 MR. GONZALEZ: The process to do a speed 13 study? Is that -- 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I guess a study. I mean 15 it's -- because it goes -- you know, it's 55 and then it 16 goes 65, which 65 is, you know, a lot of people think 17 too fast. But, you know, when it goes to 70 that's just 18 hard to figure with the amount of traffic and businesses 19 that are now on that stretch. 20 MR. GONZALEZ: Sure. Yeah, I mean those -- 21 kind of the way to -- how the process works, and I know 22 we've kind of talked about with a couple of y'all, it's 23 just -- you know, basically I -- I'm basically going 24 through our aim for everything. And then I kind of 25 coordinate with whoever I need to coordinate with. In 39 1 this case, the traffic section. 2 And, you know, in order to start a speed 3 study -- before the speed study there basically needs to 4 be counts, traffic counts, and such thing called the 5 85th percentile of vehicles. And you measure kind of -- 6 there's a lot of things that kind of go into it. I'm 7 not a traffic engineer but I know driveways are 8 considered. So the stop-and-go conditions to where that 9 may affect, you know, the safety of that speed. But 10 I'm -- I believe for 27 there have been studies. I can 11 go back and look. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, I mean, I could -- 13 even though it's not part of the TIP program, I could 14 put it on the comment card? 15 MR. GONZALEZ: Yes, sir. Yeah, that's why I 16 know there's one in Center Point that actually got 17 passed. There's actually two sections in Center Point 18 but it has not gotten passed yet. But we kind of 19 approved and recommended a speed limit change and then 20 it goes to the commission in Austin. And then that's 21 when it fully gets implemented. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 23 MR. GONZALEZ: So, I mean, it's a very 24 common kind of request. I mean I get a lot of calls 25 saying hey, the speed limit is too fast. You know, 40 1 fortunately again, one of the main factors of -- 2 contributing factors for crashes and things like that is 3 speeding, right? So speed limit is 45, everybody goes 4 75. So that's kind of a very common kind of issue. 5 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 6 MR. GONZALEZ: But we -- we kind of struggle 7 with it as well because, you know, that's kind of -- 8 more of a -- you know, we can't really control how 9 drivers fail to drive the speed limit. So please try 10 and get it out to your loved ones, you know, please 11 drive the speed limit. You know, if people are driving 12 75 in a 45, changing it to 35 is not going to help the 13 situation. 14 Kind of where we -- but it's not to say 15 that, you know, we have -- like the Center Point one we 16 did. Kind of discovered, all right, this is -- this is 17 a good area to change the speed limit. So that's kind 18 of the process that we take. And so -- 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. That answers 20 that. I mean I can put it on here but it's one of the 21 comments -- I don't think it's addressed on this 22 directly -- is that seems that on Highway 27 -- I pick 23 on 27 because I drive it a lot. It's really rough in 24 areas. I mean, it's gotten -- you know the Airport and 25 then several places, it's -- I mean it's rough. Add 41 1 that to the comment as well, or is that -- 2 MR. GONZALEZ: Yeah. You can add whatever 3 you want to the comment. I'll speak to a little bit on 4 that. 5 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: You're welcome to. 6 MR. GONZALEZ: Maybe 27 is upcoming for a 7 seal coat project. I know Rodney's been working through 8 some of the area. So the paving contractor reservation 9 and road improvement program and seal is always ongoing. 10 You know, we try to kind of keep up with the 11 deterioration and development and things like that. I 12 know Rodney wanted to speak a little bit towards 27. 13 And Shea's done some kind of plans for us to go through. 14 JUDGE KELLY: We need to see you. 15 MR. COURSEY: All right. Right now we're 16 working on State Highway 173, right next to Comanche 17 Trace to get it up and ready for seal coat season. 18 We've got about a week left there. 19 And then we are actually -- 27 is on the 20 next list. We'll start at Kendall County line, and work 21 our way back. Because there's a lot of damage near the 22 Kendall County line. So we're going to be working that. 23 Probably looking at then -- starting late next week and 24 the week after that to get it ready for seal coat. So 25 all that area around the airport and stuff like that, 42 1 we're going to hit the major areas and get it up and 2 ready. So you should be seeing some improvements out 3 there within the next month, month and a half. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So -- 5 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: It's coming. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- now that's something 7 else we can complain about and maybe y'all will be 8 slowing them down. 9 MR. COURSEY: Yeah. We'll be ready for that 10 phone call. 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: When is y'all's goal 12 on -- on seal coat every -- each -- around like every 13 nine years, ten years? 14 MR. COURSEY: It's every seven years -- 15 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Seven years. Okay. 16 MR. COURSEY: -- for roads. So some, it 17 depends on your -- the temperature when the material is 18 put down. Your weather, sometimes it delays it or 19 sometimes it speeds it up. 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Gotcha. 21 MR. COURSEY: But usually every seven years. 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 23 MR. COURSEY: Sometimes we can -- it can 24 come around quicker. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 43 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All right. Thank you. 2 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Thank you. 3 Okay. Trouble with these timed items is 4 sometimes they move fairly slowly. So we're now almost 5 25 minutes late for the timed item at 9:30, which is 1.4 6 consider, discuss and take appropriate action on a 7 request from the Alamo Letter Society to place a bronze 8 plaque containing the Col. William Barrett Travis 9 "Victory or Death" letter on the courthouse grounds. 10 Dr. Don Frazier. 11 DR. FRAZIER: Judge, Commissioners, I 12 appreciate the opportunity to bring this to the County. 13 We have a donated plaque that is a replica of Travis's 14 February 24th, 1836 letter from the Alamo which is 15 really, in many ways, one of the foundational documents 16 of the Texas identity. That's the famous "Victory or 17 Death" letter. While we're really representing to the 18 County is that we have this plaque, it's about two foot 19 by three foot, about 250 pounds, bronze. Very 20 attractive item. We'd just like to put it up somewhere 21 on the courthouse grounds. 22 It can be affixed to the wall with the right 23 kind of hardware. It can be placed on a plinth, like 24 you see the County marker out in front of the 25 courthouse, or it can be put into some sort of stone 44 1 cradle and made part of the landscape architecture of 2 the grounds. It's really no right or wrong way to put 3 this up. 4 The folks down in Nueces County put it up on 5 a pole. The folks up in Hood County have put it in a 6 stone cradle. The point is, this is going on all over 7 the State of Texas. It's going on across 254 counties 8 with any luck. And Kerr County is being asked. That's 9 our business today. 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: What's the size of it 11 again? 12 DR. FRAZIER: It's two feet by about three 13 feet. 14 JUDGE KELLY: So 200 plus pounds. 15 DR. FRAZIER: Yeah. 16 JUDGE KELLY: I've been contacted a couple 17 times on this. And I don't know who the "we" in all 18 this is. What group is doing this? 19 DR. FRAZIER: I -- 20 JUDGE KELLY: Did -- somebody donated one 21 for Kerr County? 22 DR. FRAZIER: Yeah. 23 JUDGE KELLY: I don't know who the donor is. 24 I just don't know -- what is the -- the group that's 25 behind all of this? 45 1 DR. FRAZIER: Right. 2 JUDGE KELLY: Because we try to vet them. 3 DR. FRAZIER: Oh, absolutely. So you and I 4 are somewhat in the same boat in that they contacted me 5 and said, well, you're doing a bunch of Texas stuff down 6 there in Kerr County, and I said, well, I guess I am. 7 So I vetted. And so everything from state senators, 8 historic commission leaders in Stonewall -- or I'm 9 sorry, Rockwall County. I'm a retired Baptist minister. 10 These people are all essentially just 11 average Texans that said, you know, it would be kinda 12 cool if we could put the Travis letter in all the 13 counties. It's a non-profit organization. And they've 14 got people within their sphere of influence that are 15 willing to pay for these bronze plaques. 16 JUDGE KELLY: Well, it's highly unusual that 17 somebody calls you up and says somebody's already 18 donated -- it's $4,000.00. 19 DR. FRAZIER: Yeah. 20 JUDGE KELLY: But you can -- this has 21 already been paid for you but we're not telling you who 22 and we're not telling you who we are. 23 DR. FRAZIER: Right. No, I get that. And 24 in many ways I feel your plaque floated up here. 25 Because I'm trying to figure out who all these players 46 1 are too. They're not from around here. But they are 2 going statewide. So -- 3 JUDGE KELLY: Well, we have -- we have a 4 policy that we don't just pass Resolutions without 5 vetting the organizations first. 6 DR. FRAZIER: You bet. 7 JUDGE KELLY: And so I would feel more 8 comfortable -- I -- nobody's against the Alamo. All 9 right. And the letter is just a letter. We want to 10 promote our Texas heroes as much as possible. But at 11 the same time, I would like to know who this 12 organization is, and I'd like to get some information on 13 it -- 14 DR. FRAZIER: You bet. 15 JUDGE KELLY: -- and be able to study it. 16 DR. FRAZIER: I agree. 17 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: It's the Alamo Letter 18 Society is the organization? 19 DR. FRAZIER: That's the organization. 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 21 DR. FRAZIER: That's a 501(c)(3). 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. So it should be 23 registered. 24 DR. FRAZIER: So in principal and time, 25 we've got this plaque. It's a plaque that I think 47 1 everybody can rally around. But who is this 2 organization that's willing to make this gift -- yeah. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Right. 4 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I agree with that. 5 What if we agreed to accept it, and then once we 6 investigate a little bit more whether or not we're going 7 to put it up? 8 JUDGE KELLY: Well, I like the precedent the 9 other way. Let's look at who they are before we 10 tentatively agree to it. 11 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Well, I mean, we 12 wouldn't stick it on a wall or put it up until we verify 13 it. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But if somebody spends 15 $4,000.00, we don't want to accept it if we're not going 16 to put it up. 17 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Of course. 18 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Why don't you find out 19 more information and come back and talk to us. 20 DR. FRAZIER: Great. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 22 DR. FRAZIER: Then we'll all be educated. 23 Thank you. 24 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Next item on the agenda 25 is 1.5 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to 48 1 approve Kerr County Animal Services policy for trapped 2 wildlife pickup. Mr. Givens. 3 MR. GIVENS: Good morning. So this was 4 something I actually had had on the agenda last time. 5 And I got with the County Attorney, kind of revamped the 6 whole thing and made it less complicated and it worked 7 out. So we've got that there in your backup to have a 8 look at. And I can answer any questions about it if you 9 guys have any. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Why don't you give us a quick 11 overview of it so that the public knows what it is? 12 MR. GIVENS: Okay. So basically it's a -- 13 the trapped wildlife, what we've been doing for many, 14 many years is picking up -- anything you trap we will 15 come and get. You know we're rabies and animal control, 16 but mainly all that revolves around rabies. And we've 17 got extremely low risk rabies carriers, like possums, 18 squirrels, armadillos, things like that that are 19 everywhere and we never have turned up with any rabies. 20 And so what we're looking at is just picking up the high 21 risk rabies carriers, which are listed out as skunks, 22 bats, foxes, coyotes, and raccoons. 23 So you're going to get some of those, mostly 24 we're dealing with -- we do get some foxes, a lot of 25 skunks, a lot of raccoons. Obviously bats don't go in 49 1 traps but we end up with a lot of bats that we pick up. 2 So it's basically just kind of a stop to critters out in 3 the middle of the country that, you know, you can catch 4 every time you set a trap and we're picking these things 5 up. And it's a lot of driving and you can catch one 6 every day if you try. So -- 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make a motion that 8 we approve the trapped wildlife pickup standard 9 operating procedures as presented. 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 12 approve the trapped wildlife pickup policy as presented. 13 Any discussion? I can attest to the fact that you can 14 trap squirrels. I can drive for five miles down the 15 river and turn them loose and they come back. 16 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I think it's you 17 making the mistake there but -- 18 JUDGE KELLY: I've been told that. Okay. 19 Then those in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 20 1.6 consider, discuss and take appropriate 21 action to approve the Kerr County Animal Services policy 22 for owner requested euthanasia. 23 MR. GIVENS: Yeah, so basically what this 24 policy outlines is what we are going to do whenever an 25 owner comes in and wants to euthanize their animal. 50 1 That's been mostly the cats and dogs. Basically, we can 2 refuse euthanasia anytime, which happens quite a bit. 3 Someone wants to come in with a perfectly healthy 4 animal. Well, there needs to be a legitimate veterinary 5 recommendation for that. So we're looking for that. 6 We're going to call and also confirm that the 7 documentation is authentic and clinic is in good 8 standing and not, you know, made up with a doctor's name 9 on it. 10 And then, obviously, you know, we get into 11 situations too where we have animals that have either 12 been deemed dangerous or they haven't been deemed 13 dangerous, but there may be situations where we know 14 that an animal is a high risk to -- based off of an 15 incident that may happen and then sometimes we'll have 16 somebody want to euthanize as far as that too. So -- 17 but most of what we do is going to be just -- is just 18 pertaining to when someone comes walking in through the 19 door with an animal that they want to euthanize. And 20 this basically just puts it down to a procedure that 21 we're going to do. 22 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Didn't we just go over 23 this? 24 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: We didn't have any 25 backup for that. 51 1 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Okay. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah, we talked about 3 it. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I make a motion to 5 approve the owner-requested euthanasia standard 6 operating procedures as presented. 7 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll -- 8 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 9 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: You've got it. 10 JUDGE KELLY: We've got a motion and a 11 second. Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. 12 Opposed? Unanimous. 13 Item 1.7 update regarding issues related to 14 the Comfort radio tower. Sheriff. 15 SHERIFF LEITHA: Good thing: This should be 16 the last time we have to go over this. Two weeks ago 17 today, I approved Motorola to start moving on the 18 project. So a quick update, they're actually there this 19 morning putting in a propane tank in there, a generator, 20 and extending the fence. Just a quick reminder, our 21 lease is just until March 31st of '25. And as y'all 22 know, the landowner, his name is Mark Riser. He is the 23 landowner. So it kind of gets complicated. You have 24 the landowner and then the landowner has leased a piece 25 of property, let's say an acre, to another business. 52 1 And then West Texas Wireless has leased that land to put 2 their tower on, which then we lease space on that tower. 3 So West Texas Wireless' lease is good until 4 September 26th. They are in negotiations with somebody 5 who we don't know. We're hoping it's the people that 6 have the land lease. The people that have the land 7 lease have told us that they're okay with us staying on 8 there but we haven't talked any kind of numbers. 9 So with all that being said and us holding 10 up the project, I went ahead and approved it. Let's 11 finish the project and move forward. So that's what 12 we're doing. I will definitely keep the Court updated 13 as we go on. I'm very confident that the people that 14 have the land lease will be selling the tower to 15 somebody, I just don't know who that somebody is. But 16 everything looks good. We're installing radios in our 17 vehicles and then we'll move forward. So it all looks 18 good. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Good. 20 JUDGE KELLY: You got another one here, 21 Sheriff. 1.8 consider, discuss and take appropriate 22 action to approve the donation of a Southwest 14-foot 23 flatbed trailer from the Kerr County Sheriff's 24 Foundation. 25 SHERIFF LEITHA: Yes. Looking for the 53 1 Court's approval to accept this trailer from our 2 Foundation. This is -- this trailer will be used to 3 handle some of our Operation Lone Star equipment. 4 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Move for approval. 5 SHERIFF LEITHA: Great. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 7 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 8 approve accepting the flatbed trailer from the Sheriff's 9 Foundation. Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. 10 Opposed? Unanimous. 11 Let's take about a ten-minute break. We'll 12 be back at 10:15. 13 (Break) 14 JUDGE KELLY: Court will come back to order. 15 At this time, we move over to our timed 16 items which we're required to do and we've got, looks 17 like, about five timed items at 10 o'clock. We'll start 18 with Item 1.11 consider, discuss and take appropriate 19 action for the Court to set a public hearing for 10 20 o'clock a.m. on July 8, 2024, for a Revision of Plat for 21 Creekside at Camp Verde Phase 2, Lots 94, 95 and 96. 22 Charlie Hastings. 23 MR. HASTINGS: Thank you, Judge. This 24 proposal combines and divides Lots 94, 95, and 96, 25 that's about 23 acres, into two lots, 94A will be 12.54 54 1 acres and 96A will be 10.53 acres. Both lots will 2 continue to front on Citadel Drive. And Citadel Drive 3 is currently under construction. 4 The County Engineer requests the Court set a 5 public hearing for 10:00 a.m. on July 8th, 2024, for a 6 revision of plat for Creekside at Camp Verde, Phase 2, 7 Lots 94, 95, and 96; Plat File #22-09621, Precinct 2. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move for approval. 9 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion. Is there a 11 second? 12 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 13 JUDGE KELLY: And a second to approve 14 setting a Public Hearing for Creekside at Camp Verde, 15 Phase 2, Lots 94, 5 and 6, for July 8th of this year at 16 10 o'clock a.m. Any discussion? Those in favor say 17 aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 18 Item 1.12 consider, discuss and take 19 appropriate action for the Court to set a public hearing 20 for 10:00 a.m. on July 8th, 2024 for a revision of plat 21 for R.S. Walker's Addition, Block 8, Lots 9 through 16, 22 and a portion of Fourth Street right-of-way. Charlie 23 Hastings. 24 MR. HASTINGS: Thank you, Judge. This is a 25 very old plat over in the Center Point area. There's a 55 1 very tiny lot and there's eight lots there. And this 2 proposal would revise parts of 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 3 15, and 16, that's eight lots, and a portion of Fourth 4 Street right-of-way totaling -- the total is 1.16 acres, 5 into two lots. So you've got eight lots, they're trying 6 to combine five of them here, three of them there to get 7 two lots. Lot 9A will be .35 acres, fronting on Third 8 Street and Avenue C. Lot 16A will be 0.81 acres, front 9 on Avenue B (sic). 10 County Engineer requests the Court set a 11 public hearing for 10:00 a.m. on July 8th, 2024 for a 12 revision of plat for R.S. Walker's Addition, Block 8, 13 Lots 9 through 16, and a portion of Fourth Street 14 right-of-way, Volume W, Page 381, Precinct 2. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 16 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second 112. 17 JUDGE KELLY: We got a motion and a second 18 to approve setting a public hearing for the R.S. 19 Walker's Addition, Block 8, Lots 9 through 16, on July 20 the 8th, 2024 at 10:00 a.m. Any discussion? 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: How small are those 22 lots? 23 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: They're little. 24 JUDGE KELLY: Tiny. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Originally I mean -- 56 1 MR. HASTINGS: Well, there's eight. About a 2 tenth of an acre. 3 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 4 MR. HASTINGS: Each one's a little bit over 5 a tenth of an acre. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I was gonna say 7 they've gotta be little. 8 MR. HASTINGS: So they're city sized lots. 9 If you were to move into the City of Kerrville, you 10 could get a tenth of an acre lot and have a home on it. 11 But we're just so used to five and seven and ten and 20 12 acre lots in the County, a tenth of an acre lot just 13 seems like a postage stamp. 14 JUDGE KELLY: That's kind of cemetery size. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Just note, this is under 16 a public sewer and public water system to allow for lots 17 that small in size. 18 MR. HASTINGS: Yeah. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And it's making it 20 better than it was. 21 MR. HASTINGS: Exactly. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Because they're small. 23 MR. HASTINGS: They have a right to have 24 eight lots over there and they'd like to make it two. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Got it. 57 1 MR. HASTINGS: And they've got two homes 2 over there and so one's for one home and one for the 3 other. Just makes sense. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: It does. 5 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 6 MR. HASTINGS: They don't have to do this, 7 also. They want to. Just want to clean it up. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Any other discussion? Those 9 in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 10 Moving on to Item 1.13 consider, discuss and 11 take appropriate action for Commissioners' Court 12 approval to purchase a 2025 International HX520/X15 Haul 13 Truck and trade in RBU173, a 2001 Peterbilt 379-127 Haul 14 Truck towards the purchase. Ms. Hoffer. 15 MS. HOFFER: Can we go to the addendum 16 that -- that needs to go before this? 17 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 18 MS. HOFFER: I had happy fingers when I was 19 typing the agenda. 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: So that's 14? You 21 want to go to 14? 22 JUDGE KELLY: We're going to go to 25. 23 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Oh 25. 24 JUDGE KELLY: On the addendum. 25 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Oh, the addendum. 58 1 Gotcha. 2 JUDGE KELLY: So let me call Item 1.25 3 consider, discuss and take appropriate action for the 4 Commissioners' Court approval to surplus RBU173, a 2001 5 Peterbilt 379-127 Haul Truck. Ms. Hoffer. 6 MS. HOFFER: The Road & Bridge Department 7 would like the Commissioners' Court to surplus RBU173. 8 It's a 2001 Peterbilt 379-127 Haul Truck. At this time 9 I ask the Commissioners' Court for their approval to 10 surplus RBU173. Precincts 1, 2, 3 and 4. 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll make a motion for 12 1.25 to surplus. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 15 approve the surplus of the RBU173 Peterbilt Haul Truck 16 as presented. Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. 17 Opposed? Unanimous. 18 Now go back to 1.13? 19 MS. HOFFER: Yes, sir. 20 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. That's consider, 21 discuss and take appropriate action for Commissioners' 22 Court to approve the purchase of a 2025 International 23 Haul Truck as presented. 24 MS. HOFFER: We would like to purchase a 25 2025 International HX520/X15 Haul Truck from Kyrish 59 1 Truck Centers under the Sourcewell Contract #060920-NVS. 2 The contract discount for the HX series is anywhere from 3 24-52%. Our discount is listed on the sales proposal at 4 49.1%, government discount. 5 I have contacted the Auditor's Office and we 6 have about $137,000 in Line Item 15-370-260, which is 7 surplus property sales. This would be the revenue that 8 we made from the auction in October. The unit that the 9 Auditor's Office -- or actually that I could surplus 10 will be traded in on this new unit with a trade value of 11 24,000 is what they're going to give us on the trade-in. 12 The Haul Truck is on our original capital 13 equipment list. It is listed under the '26-'27 list. 14 The final price with trade-in would be $130,198.64. 15 At this time, I ask the Commissioners' Court 16 for their approval to purchase a 2025 International 17 HX520/X15 Haul Truck and trade in RBU173, which is a 18 2001 Peterbilt 379-127 Haul Truck. Precincts 1, 2, 3, 19 and 4. 20 And this truck would, if you're wondering, 21 the Haul Truck issue with some of our equipment can be 22 difficult to road if the distance is pretty far. So 23 we'll haul it out to where the project is going to be, 24 but it also gets used for equipment that has to be 25 hauled to San Antonio for repairs that our shop is 60 1 unable to handle. So a haul truck can be very, very 2 important when you're trying to get equipment out to 3 locations. Also for floods, if you're trying to get 4 stuff out to location. 5 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: So it can be used for 6 emergencies as well? 7 MS. HOFFER: Yeah. It's for all sorts of 8 things. 9 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I'll move for 10 approval. 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 12 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 13 approve the purchase and trade in of the -- purchase of 14 the International truck as described and trade in of the 15 Peterbilt truck as described. Yes, ma'am? 16 MRS. STEBBINS: There's not a budget right 17 now in Fund 15 for the purchase of equipment. We'll 18 need to do a budget amendment before that new -- and to 19 increase the proceeds. I think you had a budget of 20 about a hundred thousand for your sales. 21 MS. HOFFER: Uh-huh. 22 MRS. STEBBINS: So that we'll have to make 23 sure is covered. And the only thing available is what 24 it was over the budget coming out. 25 MRS. SHELTON: I think there was money left 61 1 in Fund 16 -- 2 MS. HOFFER: Yes. 3 MRS. SHELTON: -- that we had kind of 4 discussed. 5 MS. HOFFER: Yes. I think it's about -- a 6 little over 300,000. 7 JUDGE KELLY: So can we take this action of 8 approving this transaction today? 9 MRS. SHELTON: You would -- can -- how 10 about -- can you, like, recess and let me come back with 11 that? 12 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. 14 MRS. SHELTON: And let me just check. I 15 don't know if -- how the money is or what that budget 16 is. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Then maybe add it to the 18 budget amendments for today? 19 MRS. SHELTON: Uh-huh. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Do that. 21 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. So we'll table that. 22 MS. HOFFER: Okay. 23 JUDGE KELLY: The next timed item is 1.14, 24 which is consider, discuss and take appropriate action 25 for the Commissioners' Court approval to purchase a 2025 62 1 International HX520/X15 Haul Truck. That's it. 2 MS. HOFFER: That's it. 3 JUDGE KELLY: So that's tabled too? 4 MS. HOFFER: Yep. 5 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. So let's go on to Item 6 1.15 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to 7 approve the agreements for storage of Kerr County owned 8 materials and equipment on private property and have 9 County Judge sign the same. 10 MS. HOFFER: These are just agreements that 11 I think a few years ago the County Attorney helped us 12 draw these up to store materials and/or equipment. And 13 so the first location is in Precinct 3, it's 920 Lane 14 Valley Road. And the other location is where we usually 15 store stuff, it is across from Grace Bible Church on the 16 corner of Valley View Drive and Southway Drive. And 17 we've been using that location for many, many years to 18 put stockpile materials so we don't have to travel so 19 far when we're working on a road. So I just need the 20 Court's approval on this. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Move for approval. 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 23 JUDGE KELLY: We've got a motion and a 24 second to approve the storage agreements that we've been 25 using for years, just to renew them. So any discussion? 63 1 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: And they've already 2 signed off. That's what this next to last letter is? 3 MS. HOFFER: Yes. 4 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 5 MS. HOFFER: Yes. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's the private 7 property owners' signature? 8 MS. HOFFER: Yes. 9 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Question. Have you ever 11 visited with Mr. Brendel about purchasing that piece of 12 property? 13 MS. HOFFER: No. 14 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Just a thought. 15 MS. HOFFER: Do you know him? 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes. 17 MS. HOFFER: I mean, we'd be interested in 18 it. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You might ask him. 20 MS. HOFFER: Yeah. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean it's a piece of 22 property that's isolated from the rest of it and it's -- 23 there's like a two to three acre piece of tract that can 24 never -- nothing can be done with it. 25 MS. HOFFER: Right. And a portion of it, 64 1 which we know, it's the northern portion of it is in the 2 floodplain so we have to stay in the southern portion of 3 that small piece of property to make sure. But yeah, 4 you're absolutely right. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You might ask him or -- 6 he may want a lot. I don't know. 7 MS. HOFFER: Yeah. Yeah. We can always ask 8 him. Never hurts. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 10 MS. HOFFER: Thank you. 11 JUDGE KELLY: Any other discussion? Those 12 in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 13 MS. HOFFER: Thank you. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Let's go back on our Agenda to 15 Item 1.9, right before we took a break. And that is 16 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to accept 17 Compilation Report dated September 30, 2023 for the Kerr 18 County Emergency Service District No. 1. Commissioner 19 Harris. 20 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: It's something we do 21 each year with all our ESD's. And this first one -- we 22 got one in. So we need to get it done, and so I move 23 for approval. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: This is the audit report 25 from Pressler Thompson? 65 1 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yes. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Is that a second? 4 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: And I'll second, yes. 5 Now that you confirmed that, sure. 6 JUDGE KELLY: We got a motion and a second 7 to approve the compilation report as presented for 8 ESD 1. Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. 9 Opposed? Unanimous. 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Just for the record, 11 this is -- for the people out there -- this is the one 12 that covers the Ingram -- 13 JUDGE KELLY: Right. 14 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: -- VFD. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Let's quickly do Item 16 1.10, which is consider, discuss and take appropriate 17 action regarding a request from the City of Kerrville to 18 support their request to the US Board on Geographic 19 Names to update the name of Kerrville Ponding Dam to 20 Nimitz Lake. City Council voted on this matter in 2011 21 and BGN is requesting verification that the County is 22 aware of the request and supports it. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I move for approval. 24 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 25 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 66 1 officially approve what we've always been calling Nimitz 2 Lake. Okay. So those in favor say aye. Opposed? 3 Unanimous. 4 Now moving back to -- not quite. 5 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: 1.16? 6 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah, we go to 1.16. It's an 7 untimed item. Consider, discuss and take appropriate 8 action to surplus a desk with tag number 0359 from the 9 Tax Office. 10 MS. MENDOZA: Good morning. I have a desk 11 from the Tax Office that they removed from his office 12 and is no longer in usable condition. 13 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Move for approval. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 15 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 16 approve surplusing a desk from the Tax Office. Any 17 discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? 18 Unanimous. 19 Item 1.17 consider, discuss and take 20 appropriate action to determine what fund will be used 21 to pay for the Shred-It contract in FY 24-25. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Non-departmental. 23 JUDGE KELLY: Non-departmental? 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Makes sense to me. 25 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Because all 67 1 departments use it. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Everybody uses it. We 3 use it. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Is that a motion? 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I make a motion that we 6 move the Shred-It contract to non-departmental. 7 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 9 move the Shred-It contract to the budget item for 10 non-departmental items. Any discussion? Those in favor 11 say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 12 Item 1.18 -- getting caught up here. Update 13 regarding the American Rescue Plan funds. Discussion 14 will include an estimate of expended funds, update on 15 current projects, and input from the Court on what 16 projects to pursue with the remaining funds. Miss 17 Putnam. 18 MS. PUTNAM: Good morning. And there should 19 be one also for Nadene there. 20 Okay. I just wanted to kind of give 21 everyone an update on what has been requested from the 22 remaining ARPA funding. We're coming up to a point 23 where by the end of this year we need to have the 24 remaining funding obligated in some form, like a 25 contractual or a purchase order type of way. 68 1 So I did -- there's been some departments 2 that have reached out with requests for the funding, so 3 the ones to my knowledge, I asked them to place on a 4 form that I made, that kind of says what their project 5 is, their approximate amount, and what -- if they had to 6 estimate a time to display the project then what type of 7 method it would be for procurement. 8 I did redact on one of them for the County 9 Attorney's Office for the estimated funds because 10 they're in negotiations right now. And so they don't 11 want to -- they don't want to hurt that at all in that 12 process. 13 But what we're looking at right now, is the 14 County Attorney and the 216th District Attorney are 15 looking for Tech Share Prosecutor. It's a software to 16 help manage their caseload. We also have the 17 maintenance, which we've discussed in Court so you're 18 all aware of that with the fire alarm system around 19 here. And I think y'all already pretty much approved 20 that, but it's about 14,000. But I did include that as 21 a just in case. 22 We also have the AG barn, which Commissioner 23 Paces has kind of been looking into. And I just put 24 down a general estimate of what the things are. Not all 25 of them have -- he doesn't -- he's not requesting ARPA 69 1 funding for all of it. It's just this is what the 2 priorities are, so if we want to use some of those 3 funds. So this is a breakdown of what they could 4 possibly be used for. 5 We have the Alamo Region Transit, which has 6 also been discussed in Court and that's a matching. I'm 7 not a hundred percent sure we can use ARPA funding for 8 this, but possibly we can. And so that is another way 9 that we can use some of this funding and set up matching 10 for the grant for the project that's being discussed and 11 going through focus groups right now for the transit 12 system. 13 The Sheriff's Office also has a request for 14 mobile devices in their cars. Laptops in their cars. 15 They don't have that currently. And that is -- that's 16 something that they've been discussing for a while and 17 the AACOG grant or the Office of the Governor grants 18 that come out that we typically do with their funding, 19 -- just that funding method. So it's more than what 20 they could request from the Office of the Governor. 21 There's also from the -- from the 22 Treasurer's Office, payroll keeping software that is 23 another one. And I don't have exact numbers on that. 24 She gave me some numbers from a couple of years ago, but 25 I don't have an actual number on that one. But those 70 1 are the things that are kind of out there that people 2 are requesting. 3 And so, I wanted to bring it to the 4 attention of the Court that we are running out of time 5 as far as figuring out what we're going to do. Because 6 if some of these projects require an extended 7 procurement process, then we need to get started on it 8 now in order to get them obligated by December. For 9 instance, like if we do the ag barn that's going to 10 require us to go out for request for proposals or 11 qualifications or something possibly, and to do each and 12 every step along that line it takes some time. And 13 we're going to run out of time if we don't kind of start 14 really looking at making some decisions on this. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What -- how much do we 16 think is available? 17 MS. PUTNAM: So I spoke to GrantWorks this 18 morning. And their numbers -- their numbers might be a 19 little bit off but it's around 320,000. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Oh. So we've got -- 21 MS. PUTNAM: So it's give or take. Give or 22 take a few thousand on either side. I don't know if her 23 numbers jive with yours real well. 24 MRS. SHELTON: They're close. I would say 25 325 but -- 71 1 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: That's close enough. 2 MS. PUTNAM: Yeah. So -- 3 MRS. SHELTON: There's also, just to kind of 4 add to it, it's not part of what Noel's speaking about, 5 but there's another at least 600,000 that's interest 6 that can be spent also. 7 MS. PUTNAM: Right. 8 MRS. SHELTON: But it -- it has to, I think, 9 follow kind of the same guidelines. But we don't report 10 it. We don't have to do -- 11 MS. PUTNAM: No. So the interest does not 12 have ARPA requirement. And so the interest doesn't have 13 the requirement to use -- to use that with the same 14 legal methods or procurement methods. And also, it 15 doesn't have to be returned. So we don't have to 16 obligate that. That is literal interest that we can do 17 whatever we want with. Yes. 18 JUDGE KELLY: We'll have to put it in the 19 budget though. 20 MRS. SHELTON: But we can use it, yes. It 21 is still in the ARPA so that we can show how much we 22 earned, but still accounted for in Fund 30. And so 23 we -- it's still money that is there that can be spent. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Does it stay in Fund 30 25 or does it go into general fund? 72 1 MRS. SHELTON: It cannot go to the general 2 fund is what I'm being told. We can't -- 3 MS. PUTNAM: From my -- from what I 4 understand, you cannot use the money to replenish your 5 financial reserves. So we can't -- 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 7 MS. PUTNAM: -- like, for instance, we have 8 the Road & Bridge thing from Winter Storm Uri that we've 9 discussed as possibly trying to take some of that lost 10 revenue. And I think we can do that to an extent. I 11 need -- I would need the go-ahead to go ahead and do 12 that. Because what I would have to do is figure out 13 what we missed in that initial procurement process that 14 was supposed to happen that did not happen because of 15 ARPA didn't exist at that time. So there's going to be 16 some missing pieces and paperwork that I would need to 17 get together from how we chose to do it. We have to 18 force account labor. And we have to force account 19 equipment. And that's all different because that's 20 ours. And that -- that comes out to about 162,000. The 21 contractual labor is about 676,000. So we could do that 22 but -- it's another option out there, but the thing that 23 gives me hesitancy is that you cannot replenish your 24 financial reserves. So if we -- if we tried to pay 25 ourselves back for that -- 73 1 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Doing it -- 2 MRS. PUTNAM: -- where are you going to put 3 it? 4 MRS. SHELTON: The rules were changed. 5 MS. PUTNAM: Yeah, the rules have been 6 changed. 7 MRS. SHELTON: The rules have been changed. 8 So whenever -- if the rules that we have currently were 9 in effect during the ice storm, it probably would have 10 worked. But the rules got changed. 11 MS. PUTNAM: Yes. So that -- they're 12 changing also constantly. 13 JUDGE KELLY: But to put this whole 14 discussion in context, this basically -- you're advising 15 us of kind of what the wish list is -- 16 MS. PUTNAM: Yes. 17 JUDGE KELLY: -- right before we go into 18 budget because we're going to have to budget these items 19 if we decide to do them. 20 MS. PUTNAM: Yes. 21 JUDGE KELLY: And they have to be obligated 22 by the end of the year and we don't have much time to 23 waste -- 24 MS. PUTNAM: Yes. 25 JUDGE KELLY: -- to figure out what we're 74 1 going to do. 2 MS. PUTNAM: And the way they're obligated 3 is by a contract or a purchase order. And if it's 4 something that needs to be a contract, then we need to 5 start soon because -- 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Better get on it. 7 JUDGE KELLY: But this is your report to the 8 Court so that we know the items that are on the wish 9 list -- 10 MS. PUTNAM: Uh-huh. 11 JUDGE KELLY: -- that we're going to have to 12 pull through. 13 MS. PUTNAM: Yes. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And any other items -- I 15 mean, you said one for Treasurer. If you can fill out 16 the forms, because these forms are great. 17 MS. PUTNAM: Thank you. And I don't -- I 18 just didn't get a form back from her. She did send me 19 the e-mail -- an e-mail with some information. But it's 20 about two years old. So she just needed more time. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. It just -- it's a 22 handy way to keep track of them. 23 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: There's one more after 24 getting back from Georgetown. There is an IT one that 25 just opened up that we may want to look at. And I have 75 1 that information on my desk. I'll forward it to you. 2 MS. PUTNAM: Okay. I -- 3 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: And I'll fill out one 4 of these for it, yeah. 5 MS. PUTNAM: I will give you my form. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. I'll take your 7 form. 8 MS. PUTNAM: I tried to make it easy so that 9 you could literally just see what it is that's out there 10 and -- 11 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Lay them out and pick 12 them. 13 MS. PUTNAM: -- and then also with this. If 14 there's something else, tell me now -- 15 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 16 MS. PUTNAM: -- and so I can inform you 17 guys. I do -- I do plan on coming back to Court on the 18 next -- our next court and have Leticia from GrantWorks 19 here. So if you have any questions at all, whatsoever, 20 she can be here to help answer any of those and kind of 21 give an update as well. 22 JUDGE KELLY: And just as -- to remind 23 everyone, we hired GrantWorks. We paid them a lot of 24 money. And they oversee everything that we do. We 25 don't spend any of those ARPA funds without their 76 1 blessing. And Leticia Turner represented that -- I know 2 you talk to her almost daily. You all talk to her all 3 the time. 4 MS. PUTNAM: I talked to her this morning. 5 JUDGE KELLY: Yeah. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 7 JUDGE KELLY: But that would be good to have 8 her here so you -- the public can see how we're 9 overseeing the fund. 10 MS. PUTNAM: And if y'all have any questions 11 or anything, just let me know. And I will get you that 12 form, if you'd like to fill it out. And -- 13 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 14 MS. PUTNAM: -- if anyone else in the County 15 has a request, get it to me now. 16 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: All right. 17 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Thank you. 18 Let's go to the 10:30 timed item, which is 19 1.19 consider, discuss and take appropriate action to 20 approve the Xerox lease agreement for Kerr County 21 Environmental Health department. 22 MRS. BADDERS: Yes. Good morning. This is 23 for our Xerox printer, for the upgrade. And we are just 24 asking for the Commissioners to give their approval for 25 our contract. 77 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I move for approval. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 4 approve the Xerox contract as presented for the 5 Environmental Health Department. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And the County Attorney 7 has looked at it? 8 MRS. BADDERS: Yes, sir. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 10 JUDGE KELLY: Any discussion? Those in 11 favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 12 Okay. Moving on to Item 1.20, which is a 13 discussion regarding the proposed budget and tax rate. 14 I'm assuming that's why Mr. Reeves is here. 15 I gave a talk a week or so ago to the 16 Republican Women on the budget. And as a result of 17 that, I prepared a couple of exhibits that I handed out 18 to them and I wanted to hand them out to everyone else 19 on the court and with the County. And one is my revised 20 version of the schedule. We've got the official budget 21 schedule. And everything that I put in my little 22 summary -- what I was trying to point out is the 23 opportunity of how we're going to do the budget. 24 In years past, I would do a proposed budget 25 and then when we'd get to ask from the individual 78 1 departments to go through a series of workshops. And 2 during the workshops, a lot of decisions would be 3 tentatively made but not formally adopted before we got 4 down to finally approve the budget. 5 But this year we changed it around to get 6 the ask first. And those of -- the department heads and 7 the elected officials, and there's about -- there's over 8 40 of them. So I mean there's a lot of input that we 9 get from the County employees. 10 And again, looking at those back in April of 11 this year and they got them to us by mid-May this year. 12 So we now have the cumulative past of what everybody's 13 looking for. We're going to go through a series of 14 workshops. There will be three workshops. One starts 15 Thursday. The first one. So we're -- we're there. 16 It's budget time. 17 And that workshop -- there will be three 18 workshops that we're going to have before I start 19 working on my proposed budget. I want to hear everybody 20 before I come up with a proposed budget. And then we 21 have three more workshops after my proposed budget. So 22 there's going to be plenty of opportunity to get input 23 from everybody associated with the County. Both before, 24 during, and after my proposed budget. And then we can 25 make our decisions. 79 1 One of the things that I wanted to make sure 2 that we included in the budget process this year is 3 public input, and not just public input. Because this 4 is not public input like we have in our agenda where 5 they come tell us but we can't say anything to them. We 6 can have a conversation with the public. 7 And so, when I put this on the agenda at 8 10:30 today as a timed item and on every Commissioners' 9 Court meeting, regular Commissioners' Court meeting, 10 that we have between now and the enactment of the budget 11 and the tax rate, there will be an agenda item at 10:30. 12 So members of the public that want to come talk to us 13 about what we're doing with their tax dollars, they'll 14 have the opportunity to come talk to us. Today I'm not 15 going to take up a whole lot of time but that's -- I 16 just wanted to remind everyone that's what we're doing. 17 I did prepare another exhibit, for those of 18 you that looked at the attachments to the agenda, 19 summarizing our recent budgets. And I put on there the 20 last five. Those are the ones that I've worked on. 21 Beginning back in 2019 and '20 FY, that's my first 22 fiscal year. And one of the things that I spent some 23 time explaining to the public that I want to make sure 24 it gets on YouTube so the public has the access to hear 25 what we call -- 80 1 (Person coughing.) 2 JUDGE KELLY: And we -- that's a term that I 3 think Commissioner Belew actually introduced that term 4 years ago. But it's helping us understand that we enact 5 budgets every year. And if you look down at this, you 6 can see if you look on -- I think it's line five, 7 they're in parenthesis because they're negative numbers. 8 Right? Accounting procedure. 9 And it looks like we adopt deficit budgets. 10 But the truth of the matter is we've not had a single 11 deficit budget in my tenure on this Court. And that 12 means that we had plenty of money at the end of the year 13 to pay for everything that we had budgeted and more. 14 And I explained it to the public that it's not really a 15 deficit. It's over-budgeted is what it is. 16 And the way that's done is each department 17 head, each elected official, as they prepare their 18 requested budget, their ask, they think about what could 19 happen during this next fiscal year. Contingencies that 20 might occur. And in their own way, subliminally, they 21 account for little -- little -- I call them their own 22 silent contingency funds in their budgets. And quite 23 frankly, of all the contingencies that we plan for, and 24 everybody does it, not all of them occur. Sometimes one 25 of them occurs, we had the big winter storm. That was 81 1 one of them that blew in on us. But if you look at the 2 last line item on that exhibit, line six, you're going 3 to see that's the fund balance at the end of that fiscal 4 year. That's how much money we had in the bank. We had 5 more money in the bank than we over-budgeted in the 6 budget. 7 And so -- and I know people get nervous when 8 they say, you know, deficit budgets. And those of you 9 that don't remember, I tried to balance the budget my 10 first year in office and it was a miserable failure. 11 And I own that. Because it -- and I did it on the basis 12 of the things that we're required to do by law that are 13 mandated and the things that we do voluntarily. And 14 there's just too many things that we do because we want 15 to and need to, and our constituency demands it, such as 16 a lot of our animal control process is not required. 17 Rabies is our mandate. But we do a lot more than 18 rabies. Another one that's not mandated is Veterans 19 Services. And for those of you that missed the service 20 yesterday, it -- I bet we had, what, 150 people out 21 there. 22 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Oh, it was more than 23 that. 24 JUDGE KELLY: It was a great turnout. But 25 we do that for the veterans because we want to. It's 82 1 the right thing to do. And it pays off for us because 2 they bring a whole lot of money into this County, 3 believe it or not. So I just wanted to get the basics 4 out there, introduce it today, and we'll be doing this 5 every two weeks when we get together. 6 And I want to make sure that if the public 7 comes and challenges us on what we're spending the money 8 on or the tax rates, and look at that one line there, 9 it's the tax rate. And for those that tax rate has 10 decreased, it went from 51 and a half cents per hundred 11 dollar valuation when I took office, down to 40 and a 12 half before we had the train wreck last year with the 13 elections and adding $250,000 at the last minute, and 14 that brought it back up to 43 cents tax rate. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And part of that 43 16 includes what the public voted on bonds, right? 17 JUDGE KELLY: Yes. Well, if you look at the 18 budget numbers themselves, you'll notice that last year 19 and this year, it jumped in the neighborhood of ten, 20 12 million dollars. And what that really is, is taking 21 the ARPA funds and working them into our budget because 22 it has to be budgeted before we can spend them, and this 23 year we brought in the Animal Control facility because 24 we had to put that bond issue numbers on there. So 25 that's why they're there. That monies not been spent. 83 1 And you can see we're still estimating even this year. 2 We're going to have as much in the fund balance when we 3 start this budget process is 16 million dollars. So -- 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And Judge, just so you 5 know, that every County Judge that I've worked with, 6 which I think you're the fifth, tried to balance the 7 budget the first year and realized it doesn't work. 8 JUDGE KELLY: And it's just our culture. 9 And we're a conservative county and conservative 10 department heads and elected officials, and everybody is 11 going to try to make sure they don't run short for their 12 budget. It's just human nature. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And we never -- and 14 another thing I think that's part of it, is that we 15 budget for full employment and we -- 16 JUDGE KELLY: Never. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- never have full 18 employment. We're closer this year than a lot of years 19 but -- at least in some departments. But you have to 20 budget for the position because you try to fill them. 21 JUDGE KELLY: So all these exhibits are, is 22 a starting point to start the discussion when we get 23 together Thursday morning at 9 o'clock. So that was 24 informational. 25 We'll move on to the next agenda item, which 84 1 is Item 1.21 consider, discuss and take appropriate 2 action to authorize the County Judge to sign and submit 3 the County's Request for Capital Credit from the Texas 4 Comptroller of Public Accounts. Ms. Shelton. 5 MRS. SHELTON: Yes. This is our annual 6 request for the unclaimed property capital credits. And 7 this money that we receive has stipulations with it, but 8 we use it to fund our contributions to the economic 9 development corp. 10 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 12 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 13 approve the request to apply for capital credits from 14 the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts. Any 15 discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? 16 Unanimous. 17 Item 1.22 consider, discuss and take 18 appropriate action to add Michelle Lux to the OASys 19 Access Agreement with Texas Association of Counties 20 Health and Employee Benefit Pool as an Administrator. 21 Ms. Zapata. 22 MS. ZAPATA: Good morning. I'm just 23 requesting the Court's approval to add Michelle Lux so 24 she's able to log in and OASys is the system that TAC 25 uses for health benefits. 85 1 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Gotcha. 2 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Move for approval. 3 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 4 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 5 approve Michelle Lux as presented. Now, is this related 6 to Judge Lux in Kendall County? 7 MS. ZAPATA: Yes, she is. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Looked like it. 9 MS. ZAPATA: Yes. 10 JUDGE KELLY: And for those of you that 11 don't know Judge Lux, he's quite a character. And a lot 12 of fun. So with that, I'm going to call for a vote. 13 Those in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 14 Item 1.23 consider, discuss and take 15 appropriate action on a request from the City of 16 San Antonio to submit a letter of support to the U.S. 17 Department of Transportation to allow nonstop flights 18 between San Antonio International Airport and Reagan 19 National Airport in Washington, DC. 20 We got a letter from San Antonio and Bexar 21 County asking us to send in a letter of support. They 22 sent them to all the neighboring counties. We -- and 23 our COG, our Counsel of Government, includes 24 San Antonio, and then 12 of the surrounding counties. 25 And so that's who they're asking to support. 86 1 I'm not headed to Washington anytime soon. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: But if you were, it's 3 a whole lot better deal. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll move for approval. 5 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 6 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 7 approve the letter of recommendation regarding the 8 San Antonio Airport flight schedules to Washington. Any 9 discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? 10 Unanimous. 11 Item 1.24 consider, discuss and take 12 appropriate action to approve the payout for the 13 remaining PTO time for former Tax Assessor Office 14 employee. And what -- what -- are you going to explain 15 it? 16 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Is it Executive 17 Session or no? 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Do we need to go in 19 Executive Session on this, do you think? 20 MRS. STEBBINS: If it's about a specific 21 employee then yes. If you're not going to talk 22 specifically about an employee and approve it then no. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, that's obviously 24 who it is, it's the Tax Assessor. Well, it's not the 25 Tax Assessor; it's an employee of the Tax Assessor. I 87 1 mean it's -- I'll make a motion to authorize the payment 2 of the remaining PTO time for the former Tax Assessor 3 office employee. 4 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 5 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 6 approve payment of PTO as presented. Any discussion? 7 Those in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 8 We've already done 1.25. So we'll go to the 9 approval docket. 2.1 budget amendments. 10 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Are we coming back to 11 13 and 14? 12 JUDGE KELLY: Oh, I -- 13 and 14? 13 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Did we come back to 13 14 and 14? 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I thought we did. 16 JUDGE KELLY: Oh, no, no. 13 and 14 is on 17 the table. We tabled that. 18 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 19 MRS. SHELTON: I don't have the answer yet. 20 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Oh, she didn't have 21 the answer yet. Okay. There you go. 22 MRS. SHELTON: I will -- I will get it. 23 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 24 JUDGE KELLY: Okay. Well, we're going to do 25 budget amendments first. 88 1 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Okay. 2 MRS. SHELTON: Yes. You have nine budget 3 amendments in front of you. You've got two that were 4 adding renewed revenue, and therefore increasing 5 expenses. And then the grant proceeds, we're truing up 6 the ARPA grant and where we are right now compared to 7 last year. We thought there was more money that was 8 going to be spent by the end of last year when we did 9 this year's budget and so it's just truing up the 10 numbers. 11 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I move for approval. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 13 JUDGE KELLY: We've got a motion and a 14 second to approve the budget amendments as presented. 15 Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? 16 Motion carries. 17 Move on to Item 2.2 pay the bills. 18 MRS. SHELTON: Yes. Invoices for today's 19 consideration, $691,864.12. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I move for approval. 21 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 22 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 23 pay the bills as presented. Any discussion? Those in 24 favor say aye. Opposed? Motion carries. 25 2.3 late bills. 89 1 MRS. SHELTON: There are not any. 2 JUDGE KELLY: 2.4 Auditor reports. 3 MRS. SHELTON: Yes. You have received one 4 report on the Animal Control Services. And we're asking 5 that you accept the report. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll make a motion to 7 accept that report. 8 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Second. 10 JUDGE KELLY: We got a motion and a second 11 to approve and accept the Auditor report as presented. 12 Any discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? 13 Unanimous. 14 2.5 monthly reports. 15 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Yes. For April 2024, 16 District Clerk's Office, District Clerk Dawn Lantz. 17 Environmental Health and Animal Services, Director 18 Reagan Givens. Treasurer's monthly report, Treasurer 19 Tracey Soldan. Environmental Health OSSF, Director 20 Ashli Badders. Justice of the Peace amended report, 21 Judge Mitzi French, Precinct 1. Amended report. Judge 22 J.R. Hoyne, Precinct 2. Amended report. Judge Kathy 23 Mitchell, Precinct 3. And report, Judge Bill Ragsdale, 24 Precinct 4. Investment portfolio summary January 1st, 25 '24 to March 31st, '24, Tracey Soldan. And I move for 90 1 approval. 2 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 3 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 4 approve the monthly reports as presented. Any 5 discussion? Those in favor say aye. Opposed? Motion 6 carries. 7 Court orders. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We have Court Orders 9 from our May 13th meeting. Number 40620 through 40643. 10 And Court Order from our May 20th meeting, 40644. I 11 make a motion we approve all of them as presented. 12 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: Second. 13 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second to 14 approve the court orders as presented. Any discussion? 15 Those in favor say aye. Opposed? Unanimous. 16 Information Agenda. Status reports from 17 department heads. None? 18 Okay. Moving on. Status reports from 19 elected officials. None? 20 Status reports from Liaison commissioners. 21 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: No, I don't really 22 have anything right now. 23 JUDGE KELLY: The only thing that I would is 24 remind everybody that we have a workshop Thursday 25 morning on the budget. Starts at 9 o'clock. And to 91 1 remind the public, the way we handle workshops, we will 2 have them on YouTube. They will be televised so the 3 public can see them. But the public can come observe, 4 but they don't have input at a workshop. That's why we 5 put it on the agenda for the Commissioners' Court 6 meetings because that way that's when we can talk to 7 them about it. But they are welcome to come and observe 8 if they like. And then at our next Commissioners' Court 9 meeting is, what, July 8th? 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: June. 11 JUDGE KELLY: June 8th? 12 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Yeah. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: 8th or 10th, yeah. 14 JUDGE KELLY: Somewhere in there. That's 15 when the public can actually come and give the public 16 input. 17 So with that, we have nothing on the 18 Executive -- do we? 19 MRS. STEBBINS: We do. Yes, sir. And it is 20 a discussion related to a contract being negotiated. I 21 sent you guys an e-mail last week. 22 JUDGE KELLY: And we have to vote on this? 23 MRS. STEBBINS: If you think my written 24 determination that negotiations in an open meeting would 25 have a detrimental effect on the position of the 92 1 Commissioners' Court in negotiations with a third 2 person. Now the Court has to vote and it needs to be -- 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'll make a motion that 4 we go into Executive Session to discuss the contract 5 issue. 6 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: Second. 7 MRS. STEBBINS: Thank you. 8 JUDGE KELLY: Got a motion and a second. 9 Any discussion? Those in favor raise your hand. And 10 we'll make sure it's all unanimous. Okay. Got it. 11 Unanimous. And we'll take a break now to go into 12 Executive Session. 13 (Executive Session.) 14 (Commissioners Overby, Letz and Harris are 15 present.) 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What's the difference -- 17 what's the difference between 13 and 14, item 13 and 14? 18 MS. HOFFER: Well, they're both basically 19 the same item to purchase. But one shows that we're 20 going to use RBU173 as a trade-in. And one of these was 21 only supposed to be to surplus it. Because I have to 22 have it surplused before I can -- 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So the purchase is 24 really 14. 25 MS. HOFFER: No. No. The one that we 93 1 should have had is we should have had 13 that said hey, 2 Court, can we have permission to buy this, we're going 3 to trade in 173, that was just surplused, the item 4 before. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So no action on 14. 6 MS. HOFFER: Right. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. So recall item 8 1.13 consider, discuss and take appropriate action for 9 Commissioners Court approval to purchase a 2025 10 International Haul Truck and trade-in RBU173, a 2001 11 Peterbilt Haul Truck towards purchase of the 12 International Haul Truck. Precincts 1, 2, and 3. 13 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: And 4. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We have a budget 15 amendment -- so we have to approve the budget amendment 16 along with the purchase? 17 MRS. SHELTON: That would be easier. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Make a motion to approve 19 the purchase and the budget amendment as presented. 20 COMMISSIONER HARRIS: I'll move for 21 approval. 22 COMMISSIONER OVERBY: I'll second. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Motion and a second to 24 approve budget amendment and the purchase of the new 25 haul truck. Any further discussion? All in favor say 94 1 aye. Unanimous. 2 And with that, we're adjourned. 3 * * * * * * 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 95 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 13th day of June, 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