Notes -- April 2012 Council Meeting

Note: These are my personal notes from the council meeting. They are NOT the official minutes, nor should they be construed as an official record of any kind.

Boone County Council
4/10/2012
Present: All Council Members present.
The council approved the minutes of the March meeting.

The Council sang Happy Birthday to Council member Butch Smith.

RE-APPROPRIATIONS:
None.

ADDITIONAL APPROPRIATIONS:
Auditor (Melody Price):
Requested $8740 to pay the remaining installment on a contract with GUTS for conducting the most recent tax sale. This is money in, money out, coming from part of the revenue generated by the tax sale itself.

Sheriff (Ken Campbell):
Requested roughly $940 in postage, inmate medical and inmate supplies (damages), as well as not quite $600 in part-time for reimbursement from sheriff’s sales. All these are transfers of reimbursements.

Circuit Court (Judge Jeff Edens)
Judge Edens introduced new Magistrate Sally Berish, who was recently appointed (April 1st) to that post (juvenile court IV-D magistrate) by the state. This means the state will now reimburse two-thirds of Ms. Berish’s salary, and beginning next year she will be receiving the state benefits package. This is a very positive development for the county in a variety of ways. Ms. Berish will essentially have the powers of a judge, which should help alleviate the need for an additional court in the county for the foreseeable future. For budget purposes, this means a difference of $16, 464, pro-rated for the year, that the county will not be spending. The council approved a Negative Additional (two months in a row!), transferring that amount out of the salary line. The council also amended the salary ordinance to reflect the new magistrate salary of $41, 393.
Unrelatedly, Judge Edens requested an additional $2000 for medical/psychological services. Approved.

Before moving on, Council President Steve Jacob addressed the state’s recent “adjusted distribution” of County Option Income Tax revenue. Boone County received essentially $3.97M, but that will be distributed amongst all the county’s taxing entities. While the details have not yet been released by the state, the county general fund will likely receive about $1.4M of that. No word has been given yet, either on what impact this adjustment will have on the county’s distribution of COIT revenue for remainder of the year. Jacob, Thompson and I all pointed out that this additional money would still be less than what the county has pulled from its reserves the past two years to maintain operations. Jacob also questioned the wisdom of acting before the state completed the outside audit it has now begun, and before all details of the distribution have released.

Highway (Rick Carney):
The council approved an additional of not quite $6,500 for a truck driver salary, as discussed at last month’s meeting. This is overall part of a much bigger savings plan due to restructuring in the highway department.
Additionally, Mr. Carney submitted several large requests from various funds (Rainy Day, Economic Development, Food & Beverage, CCD) for funding a summer road maintenance program. The advertised totals were as much as $2.5M, though Carney said that he had a maintenance plan totaling roughly $1.770M. After extensive discussion, the council approved $1M out of the economic development fund (which retains a balance of just over $3M) and $500,000 out of the Food & Beverage Fund.

Health (Cindy Murphy):
Ms. Murphy discussed the department’s past practice regarding their process for purchasing vaccine and reimbursing automatically. A new state accounting decision now requires that each transfer be presented as an additional request (much like the Sheriff’s department does with several items). She had submitted a request for $317, but stated that the department did not expect to need it this year. The council decided to approve it anyway.

NEW BUSINESS:
Assessor Lisa Garoffolo presented updates to the GUTS re-assessment contract reflecting the recently-adopted “rolling re-assessment” plan. The final form approved by the legislature allows the county to assess one-fourth of its property each year, so all property will still be assessed every four years, but the hope is that spreading it out will allow more accurate assessment. The commissioners approved an updated contract with GUTS last week. Financially, Garoffolo expects the current levy to be sufficient but anticipates an increase in the future. In terms of the adjustments made due to the just-completed re-assessment, GUT reports finding tens of millions of dollars in new property, but also some adjustments for mis-entered information which might reduce the assessment for some individuals. Overall, though, the county’s total assessed valuation (AV) should increase significantly. This should mean a reduced tax rate for the vast majority of taxpayers. In areas where taxpayers are currently hitting the tax cap credit threshold (mostly Zionsville, Whitestown, Lebanon, Advance), this might mean some additional revenue for taxing units, as fewer taxpayers would be beyond the cap.

Auditor Melody Price distributed a monthly financial update, as well as a breakdown of health insurance expenditures over the past three years. Price and Treasurer Deanna Willhoite also answered several questions concerning last week’s new disbursement from the state. Generally, they have received no information from the state other than a notice of transfer of funds, which has been noticed with multiple different totals. NO information regarding dispersal of those funds to other entities, the effect on the remaining monthly disbursements for the rest of the year, the ongoing withholding of funds from the county from the alleged OVERpayment of COIT funds in years past. The consensus was that no actions should be taken until more information was forthcoming, which would likely mean no action this year, though the “new” money would be included in deliberations this summer in setting the 2013 budget.

Cindy Murphy of the Health Department pointed out an oversight in the salary ordinance which left off employee payments from the Tobacco-Free Boone County grant. The council moved to update the ordinance to correct the oversight.

Ms. Murphy also advised the council of the resignation of a part-time public health nurse. She asked the council’s approval to re-fill the position, and also to amend the salary ordinance to reflect an hourly rate of $25/hour, rather than the current $20. This would not affect the budgeted annual cap of $28,000. Council approved.

OLD BUSINESS:
Commissioner Marc Applegate updated the council on the progress of talks between the county and the Zionsville Town Council regarding Bridge 220 (the Ford Road Bridge). Applegate and representatives of the Town met last month with engineers from Barker Engineering and VMI (?) Engineering, which was hired jointly by the town and county to review the bridge project. That group will be meeting again next week. Applegate feels they are moving positively toward a satisfactory plan to move forward.

PUBLIC COMMENT:
Sheriff Ken Campbell addressed the possibility of contracting with Umbaugh (or some similar firm) to assist in assessing the impact of the new 911 funding formula passed through the state legislature.

Sheriff Campbell also addressed his ongoing concern about revenue options, including a Public Safety Local Option Income Tax and increasing the Cumulative Capital Development Fund rate.
Cindy Murphy of the Health Department echoed Sheriff Campbell’s sentiment regarding adopting additional revenue measures. She encouraged enactment of a county Wheel Tax. Murphy lives in Clinton County, where they do pay a wheel tax, which was recently raised from $25 to $40 per vehicle. Murphy advocated that the county take the lead in enacting such a tax.

Rick Carney advised the council that at next month’s meeting he would be coming forward on behalf of the commissioners to request funds for building an additional storage facility for unused salt due to the mild winter. The Highway Department is committed to buy an additional tonnage later this year, and will need somewhere dry to keep it.

Gene Thompson suggested altering the scheduled joint evening meeting (May 22) with the commissioners and instead holding our regularly scheduled June 12th meeting in the evening and inviting the commissioners to join, without forcing a particular joint agenda. After much discussion, the council agreed to this motion. The council’s June meeting will be held June 12th at 6:30 p.m, in the regular council chambers at the Courthouse Annex.

Meeting adjourned at roughly 10:30.
Next regularly-scheduled council meeting will be WEDNESDAY, May 9, 2012.