Kiowa County Commissioners Meeting

Courthouse Lower Level Conference Room

October 21, 2019

Bert Lowery, John Bertram, Ronald Freeman, Kristi Cooper, Kerri Ulrich, Chris Tedder, Scott McMann, Dewey Koehn, Bruce Foster, Stacy Barnes and Jeff Blackburn attended the meeting.

Consent agenda included: Agenda, Payroll reports, Accounts payable reports and Commissioner minutes of 10/07.

After the prayer was given by Jeff Blackburn, Bert opened the meeting. John moved to approve the consent agenda as presented and Bert seconded, motion carried 3-0.

Bert adjourned the meeting and called the Board of Health (BOH) meeting to order. Kerri came to give updates for the Health department which included; KDHE performed the federal family planning program audit, flu vaccine updates, flu clinic totals, shortage of daycares in the County. Ron asked Kerri to check if the County could be part of that and he referenced the Senior Center as an outside entity who receives funding. Kerri will check and let them know. Bert adjourned the BOH and the regular meeting was called to order. Kerri left the meeting.

Jay Schmidt came to give updates for the public works departments which included; noxious weed charges for R&B, grading updates, chip seal on Belvidere and Brenham blacktop, B street blacktop due to grain trucks causing issues, recyclable recycle dumpsters and Railroad crossing at Wellsford. Dewey Koehn and Stacy Barnes attended the meeting to be part of the discussion on County continuing recycling. Jay explained the costs of continuing the service and the life of the landfill. He informed them that cost of keeping the recycling containers were a significate cost to the County and they will not be making in decisions at this time. Next, they discussed Noxious Weed charging the County for chemical. After some discussion Ron moved to approve that Noxious Weed will no longer charge the County for those services and they can review his budget at the end of the year and transfer funds accordingly each year if needed and Bert seconded, motion carried 3-0. Bruce and Jay left the meeting.

Chris Tedder came to give updates for the Sheriff office which included; jailer wages, dispatcher position, damage to transport van, deputy applications, payroll change for S Retallack (separation) and Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the City of Greensburg and Digiticket for electronic ticketing software for upcoming years. He presented the MOU with the City of Greensburg and explained that this is just the start of working on a contract with them. Ron expressed his concerns on not charging for dispatch services and Chris explained that they will discuss that when to move forward with this process. Next, he requested a 15-minute executive session for non-elected personal to discuss employee relations. Bert moved for the executive session for 10 minutes and John seconded, motion carried 3-0. Chris requested an executive session for non-elected personnel to discuss employee relations. Ron moved to go into executive session at 10:25 for 10 minutes and John seconded, motion carried. Kristi, Stacy, Dewey and Jeff left the room. Regular session began at 10:35 with no action taken. Chris and Scott left the meeting.

Chris came back and presented a payroll change for J Bruckner (new hire) for approval. After review Bert moved to approve the payroll change for approval and John seconded, motion carried 3-0. Next, Ron asked to talk more on the MOU with the City of Greensburg regarding the wording on fees for dispatching. Kristi asked if they needed to act on the MOU and it was by consensus that they didn’t need to take any action at this time.

There were no topics for Commissioner Discussion.

Meeting adjourned at 11:18