Tuesday, August 21, 2012

21 August 2012 Dearborn County Commissioners Meeting Notes


21 August 2012 Dearborn County Commissioners Meeting Notes

Present: Jeff Hughes, President, Tom Orschell, and Shane McHenry
Also present: Gayle Pennington, Auditor, Teresa Randall, County Administrator, and Andy Baudendistel, Attorney.
OLD BUSINESS:
Maintenance for Dearborn County Vehicles - removed from agenda until November or when Terri Randall feels it necessary to add it again.

Whitewater Canal Scenic Byway - Randall recommended the county withdraw their support as their INDOT contact changed jobs and is passing it on and she thinks we are holding the Byway people in limbo. There are too many unclear issues on liability, in-kind services, etc. Because they are without guidelines from INDOT commissioners decided to withdraw their being lead agency for the Canal scenic Byway project at this point.

OKI Funding Contract Agreement- Randall said she researched  SIRPC and OKI and there is no overlap of their funding sources etc. She said OKI funding historically has been a good deal and we get our contribution back several times over in thongs they do for us. She wants to table this to get them on our calendar year and not their version which is their fiscal year. They could extend the current agreement thru Dec. as an option. Hughes is concerned about the $90,000 OKI spent for the Water project being considered a benefit as it is still tied up with IDEM. Commissioners are leaning toward getting it in line with our calendar budget year. They will talk about it next meeting.

Jail Architect Contract - Randall and Baudendistel went over this AIA contract and eliminated the clause that had the architect getting a percentage of the POTENTIAL profits should the building be discontinued for some reason. Fee is $425,000 over the life of the project for the architects. It is broken down by phases. $ 359,900 for the construction manager. There are no fees for either architect or manager for reimbursables. Rossert International is the architect. Commissioners awarded the contract and signed it.

NEW BUSINESS:

Carla Burkhart- LifeTime Housing property Lien releases for owner occupied rehabs they have accomplished. This allows owners to sell homes if they wish. She will have more in September. They were able to apply for an additional grant for $405,000 to do 20 homes in their service area. Approximately 5 homes in the county will be done. Commissioners signed the lien releases.  

Ratify Signature on Special Crimes Unit Grant Application- Shane Henry said this is a grant to work with drug endangered children and funding for analyzing data and overtime for some officers. He said their administrator has been working on this grant and didn’t just bring it in last minute because they hadn’t worked in it. Hughes had already signed it and Orschell and he ratified it. McHenry did not vote.

Absentee voting Location Change- Phil weaver said they are using a vacant room in the courthouse to do this as it is easier to staff than the library as before. They will send a thank you to library when they cancel their reserve over there. No vote needed- Clerk just notifies the commissioners.

HIGHWAY DEPARTMENT: Todd Listerman, Highway Engineer- said that there was a concern about paving dead end and to chip seal roads in the county. Millings were available in the past that are not available now. First they did all the thru roads they could. They did some dead ends near the millings sites like those off Yorkridge. Now they will go to county council for budget to request a fund for upgrading some more of the gravel dead end roads in the county. Roads that get done will have to be close to where the millings are available to avoid trucking costs. They do have a priority list. The millings at Penntown can be used but they are not as good as the milling as they have had available in the past. Jurgenson owns the Penntown millings. Lutz, Bulach, and Bitner were three priorities in each section of the county. For example, Wessler Rd would cost $31,000 plus $7000 to chip seal for 6 inches. They like to do 8-10 inches. That’s about $40,000. They use state approved mixes for county roads.

They are also asking for bridge and slip money. Mt Pleasant and others will require a lot if state money requests for slips.

We have about 45 miles of county roads that are not paved. There are 15 that are chip sealed and 30 are gravel of that 45 mile set. A gravel road can be graded, but chip seal cannot.

Swales Drive was left off inventory at 0.08 miles in 1995 when Picnic Woods was accepted. County needs to add this. Commissioners approved.

The following  5 roads are to be taken off the county maintenance inventory, but not giving up county ROW: Chapin stub 0.03 miles Depot Road off Volz Rd. 0.06 miles, Darling Rd 0.06, Ridge Road 0.21 miles, Twin Oaks 0.06 miles ,and reduce  Brady Anderson Rd off Long Branch from .37 to  0.08 miles. Commissioners approved.

School flashers INDOT acceptance letter was approved. This should be the last to sign for this project. Commissioners signed off.

St Leon has requested the county do the driveway inspections for them to size culverts etc. they do about 3 or so a year. The highway dept gets the fee same as Building Inspector does. Baudendistel will have t he interlocal agreement drawn up.

Hughes asked Steinmetz for his comments and Steinmetz was very unhappy that Wessler Road was not a top priority for millings. Mrs. Wessler was upset that they have come to so many meetings and nothing is happening. Vote for the boat and we’ll fix your roads. She said this was not progressive. And this was not fair. She said you have designated smoking areas here and over 10 years I lived with dust every day. They want some of the money that was left over from the Weisberg road project. He asked Todd how he could prioritize Wessler as number 4. Listerman said- I have 45 miles of roads that are like yours. I look at numbers of homes and miles of road. If a road has 9 residents and another has 3, then I have to recommend the 9 homes vs.3 first. Was the road gravel when you bought the property? Orschell said that even if people aren’t at the meeting, they are calling us commissioners about their roads. Steinmetz said that Council told him Commissioners have to ask for it. Listerman said he does ask for it- but the amount of taxes coming in only allow for a lower budget. Our tax revenue has not increased since 2000. Money to maintain and upgrade roads is now being used for operations. McHenry told them that we are asking for additional money for this. Mrs. Wessler asked where the money is. McHenry said- like with the salt not used last year, we will see savings this winter UNLESS we have a bad winter. Steinmetz said they are tired of waiting- “One more years has turned unto 10 more years. That’s all I have to say.”  Highway Dept is at Budget hearings on Thursday Aug 30th morning.

Replacement of bridges at 4 sites and they are getting designs for these. 6 companies sent in proposals. They also get fees with proposals. Fuel Pettit Bender and Hauser bid $35,700 for one bridge. $54,454, $56,050, and$ 56,500 from Howard Barth for the other 3 bridges. Commissioners recommended they get the contracts ready for signatures on these projects as recommended by the Bridge Review Committee.

Tim Grieve, Highway Superintendent- Chris Durham is being promoted to foreman. He has worked for the highway dept for several years and lives in Manchester. Durham said he’s ready to step up to the plate and prove himself to the commissioners. Looking forward to starting.

$84,197.91was the low bid from Schirk ( sp?)  International from Greensburg for a single axle tandem chassis. These can be used in subdivisions. It’s a replacement from their replacement list. They are looking at a Chambers tractor mower that can be used on embankments etc. they have more mobility. Smith Implement- Greensburg bid was $52,072.32 for the whole mower package.

Hughes asked about someone who had complained about corn at an intersection blocking his view at Mt Tabor and a resulting accident. Have to see if the corn was in the ROW.

ADMINISTRATOR: Teresa Randall- Contract with Harrison for Fire and EMS. She and Orschell visited with them. They looked at the other area fire EMS depts. and they don’t have the ability to cover all this. She recommends they renew this. The contract was to be a 3 year contract from 2011 thru 2013, but it has language that ends it Jan 1 2013. Math is wrong. It should end Dec 31, 2013. We could never provide the services for the price that Harrison provides. They will run the contract thru 2013 and get our attorney to draft an agreement to clarify our current contract dates. $111,898.00 per year is the fee for Harrison’s services. Commissioners signed the agreement. They will then go to Harrison to get their signature. Orschell supported this and said that we can work towards working something out in the future perhaps. Randall said they should work with Township Trustees on the Fire dept. issues for the future.  Harrison needed to know as they are in their budget approval process also.

Tara Cunningham sent a letter from SIEOC- SE Ind Economic Opportunity Corp. Sonya Kaffenberger is up for reappointment to that board. Commissioners approved.

Sat Oct 13- Surplus Vehicle auction – 16 surplus vehicles with no one wanting any of these remaining vehicles. A dump truck and a wheel chair power lift to a van etc. are also there. 

GRW Engineering requires soil borings at Wilson Creek and US 50 for the Aurora sewer line. Commissioners were OK with this.

Hoosier Square staircase building is proceeding- started Monday.

AUDITOR: Gayle Pennington presented Claim which were approved and signed by commissioners.

2013 Employee Holiday Calendar- Commissioners approved. Judges need it in advance. Since there are no elections in 2013 the employees also get two floating personal days.

ATTORNEY: Andy Baudendistel- Ordinance on firearms qualifications for the Merit Board for retiring officers. There is a $10 fee for training the officers to have the firearm on retirement. Signed and approved.

7.1-5-12-13a does not restrict the county from adopting an ordinance more restrictive that the state code on smoking. Ordinance restricting smoking on county property and county vehicles was approved and signed.

Transferred old lease radios to Aurora for $1. Resolution 4 signed to allow this. Then Stratman will get Aurora to sign.

Moores Hill Resolution 5 for the light bar for $1 was signed.

Baudendistel did not know if L-bg had signed the interlocal agreement on the Votaw demolition last night at their meeting.

COMMISSIONER COMMENTS- Hughes said Marty Hon has become Work Force 1 Chairman. He extended his appreciation to him. They will try to have a meeting in Dearborn County in January per Hon.

McHenry wanted to see if the burn ban was going to be rescinded soon.

LATE ARRIVAL INFORMATION- Recorder’s Office is getting the Probation dept. calls as it is being advertised on Google per Glen Wright. Teri Randall will follow up on it. Commissioners will send a letter to Google on this to officially change it.

PUBLIC COMMENT- none

Meeting adjourned at 11:14 AM
Christine Brauer Mueller
Lawrenceburg Township

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

the county needs to go and build another garage how much money have they wasted on that place they didnt need next they will probley what more money for a deck for it who call was that lets check the records just asking?