February 24 County Council Meeting Update

At the February 24 Council meeting – in 4 hours the following additional appropriations occurred:
1. Dillsboro Civic Ass’n (Dave Wendelman)- $2000 toward the Homecoming Festival- same as last year.
2. Clerk of Courts (Gayle Pennington)- $500 appropriated from county general toward computer maintenance agreement of $1000 total for Midwest Data Services. The clerk stated Midwest Data charges nearly $298 for the first hour of support if you do not have a service contract. She will get the remaining $500 from their Repair line item.
3. Lorie Howard, the new County Administrator, is preparing a proposal for IT to present to the commissioners at their regular Thurs morning administration meeting. When asked if this appropriation would interfere with the IT plans being presented, Commissioner Benning reiterated several times that it would be no problem to for the Clerk to have her support contract with Midwest Data. Midwest Data built the clerk’s voter registration server.
4. Sheriff Lusby- received $80,000 from county general to cover the medical expenses and prescriptions for inmates at the jail. Last year they spent $138,000 on prescriptions alone. Apparently $15,000 from the pension fund may be returning to the county- it was over appropriated last year.
5. Solid Waste (BJ Ault) requested a property tax rate increase from .0103/$100 to .034/$100. The state average is .068/$100. The request is based on the growth in the county and resulting needs for recycling. Council voted to table this item until they could see exactly what the property tax assessment would be for Dearborn County. Deadline is May 1 for Solid Waste to get their request to the state.
6. Transportation Dept.- (Mike Davis) – March 18th 7PM at Tate St. is the final presentation of the Transportation Assessment study- all invited. $48,000 came back to account 203 (special projects). Because of extra road miles, $4,000 was appropriated to pay for the assessment of those extra road miles.
$4000 was appropriated for an extra computer and the training of one person who can then train the others on the use of the GIS based system for road inventory.
$1500 was appropriated for 5 GIS handheld units to keep the inventory updated. Health Dept. and Planning and Zoning and Building can also use units. The vote on this item will need to be redone at the next meeting- it requires a majority of the whole board and only got 3 votes instead of 4 required. (Negangard and Kraus wanted less units- thinking that the staff could drive back and pick them up as needed)
$18,000 was appropriated from 203 special projects fun to repair the slip on Pinhook Rd. Other roads need to be itemized and prioritized before Council will approve. Some bridge kits are being utilized with in-house installation in order to save money. CPI Culverts is supplying the engineering for “free” and then selling the county the bridge.
Charlie Fehrman stated that he and Cary Pickens last year wiped out a bunch of old unspent money and put it into county general…
State inspector found a buried tank at the highway garage. $4240 appropriated from 203 – special projects- to remove the tank using a certified inspector.
7. Planning- (Travis Miller) tabled from last month- took nearly 40 minutes of discussion- but finally received approval (one Nay from Kraus) from 203 special projects fund for $21,400 for software to unite the data sharing for 4 offices (Planning and Zoning, Health, Hwy, and Bldg. Inspector). This will eventually lead to one stop shopping for people seeking permits.
Approval also to sell burned CDs of zoning and subdivision ordinances for #10 total.
Approval also of a fee schedule increase for tech review on certain certified surveys.
8. Water Rescue (Steve Jackson) $3200 for equipment to locate underwater prior to diving was denied- Charlie to seek aid from Argosy and Lawrenceburg instead.
9. Conquerors Boy’s Club (Dan Weisbrod) approved $2440 for equipment (tabled from last month.
10. Health Dept. (Doug Baer)- approval to hire employee at $32,900 – and continue that salary into 2005. Baer to write up salary ordinance for entire dept.- needed to be signed next month.
11. South Dearborn Babe Ruth (Dave Burris) – no money granted for JV field repair at South Dearborn or for Dillsboro Field. He’s to check with the school and also with the Park Board.
12. Manchester Athletic Ass’n (Steve Wolfer)- $2400 for fence to keep kids from running into County Farm Road during baseball games.
13. Charlie Fehrman reported that Haag Ford is prepping leased cars for the sheriff department for $200 each rather than the $400 they previously had done. This is to keep business local rather than driving two deputies to Indy each time and paying for all that to get the “free” preps.
14. $1580 approved to clean up the personnel manual.
15. A second shared lobbyist was hired. County share is $56,200 and the municipalities share the other $56,200. The entire amount is appropriate from the county and the reimbursements get paid back to the county from the municipalities. (One nay from Mitter)
16. Commissioners received additionals for gas, mileage, oil lube, repair, tires, and travel. Total $15,605.24
17. Aaron Negangard asked to be appointed to the Lawrenceburg School Foundation and was approved.
18. Negangard reported that the 3rd court requested was killed in House Ways and Means. He is to head up a committee now to look into extra space or building and the costs for adding more prosecutors and staff for this court if it gets granted eventually.
Adjourned 11:40 PM
Christine Brauer Mueller
Lawrenceburg Township