good afternoon everyone
i'd like to welcome you to the russell
county board of supervisors
june the 7th 2021 at 6 pm
i'd like to first start off with the
call of order and rocol
tim lovelace here
luanne wallace here carl ray
here david here
state breeding here forest christian
present and rebecca die here
ma'am you have a quorum thank you at
this time i'm going to ask mr cuba
porter for our invocation
for stand and then remain standing for
the pledge please
thank you
please pray with me heavenly father we
give you honor and praise and thank you
for this blessed day thanks for the good
rain lord that
has come to water or earth as many of us
order
farmers around here we appreciate that
so much and father we pray for our
county for our state and our country
that god you would be the leader in our
lives and that god we would follow your
precepts
now father i pray for this board as they
have many decisions to make
that affect the citizens of this county
and i thank you father that they realize
that they are to serve us not the other
way around and we thank you for people
like that lord
we thank you lord that they have wisdom
we have many
many of us have great knowledge lord but
wisdom is a much more important thing
for us as we make decisions
now father we give you honor and praise
thank you for what you've done in this
county father and what you're going to
do
for us in the name of jesus our lord we
pray amen amen and to the republic
for which it stands one nation under god
indivisible with liberty and justice for
all
all right at this time i'd like to
have a motion to amend the agenda as it
is there's uh several things that we
need to
add that have come up so
i'll make a motion and we amend the
agenda to add
three individual items under the county
administrator's report
and the first would be to address a
letter from the auditor
uh for their 20 2020
audit that would be number eight
under under request letter of support
correct mr lester
it's a letter engagement man okay
engagement yeah
and number nine would be an excise tax
enforcement officer
i think to review that in
number 10 would be consideration of the
budget
that's one will the board will have an
opportunity to
discuss the budget
so we have a motion to amend the agenda
do we have a second
second second loop thank you all those
in favor
anyone opposed all right we will amend
the agenda
and we accept the agenda with those
amendments
all right the first thing we'll do is to
have our public hearing on the
21-22 fiscal year budget
and the tax rate for 22.
so we'll open the floor on any comments
on that
all right members of the board uh thank
you for having us
um my name is nathan kaiser i live in
green valley
and um i come to unite about the budget
about uh specifically about the the
school
budget as you know
as many of you know we're dealing with a
state law
that's come down that is forcing
our school systems to adopt
policies that are contrary to our values
here in russell county
and a lot of that uh is going to be
forced on the parents
in a way that's that's not really fair
and
not fair to our children what i would
like to see the board do
is we need to have start having some
discussions and take a hard look at what
we can do
on the county level here in russell
because we know that that state uh state
agencies state ways of uh
of creating programs where parents have
choices as to where they send their
children for education
how they educate their children that's
not an option right now and we hope to
change that
but we can do something here so our our
school board can't do a whole lot
they're going to have to pass some sort
of a policy
but you as the board of supervisors can
do something
and you can take a look at this school
budget
and say that for parents who don't agree
with this who does this does not value
line up with our values we can take
the first steps in russell county and
this might be something that carries
over to other counties throughout the
state but we can take a step
now to give parents a choice
to create a marketplace for education
so i encourage you to take a hard look
at this
if that means reducing budgets
or withholding budgets until we can
make a decision on what we can do here
on the county level
i think we need to take a hard look at
that i think it's on just as much on you
all as it is on their school board
to attack this and approach this in the
most responsible manner we can
and i hope you do take an account
tonight i've talked to a few of you
and i know others have talked to you to
a lot of you
and i hope that we can we can come to
some sort of a plan
to move forward where our parents have
choice
for our students because it's not fair
and
i'm not just talking about people who
disagree with the transgender thing i
mean everyone
all students all parents should have a
choice
and the fact that they a lot of them
don't because they have to send into
public schools
it's not fair so if we can make it
easier for our parents in russell county
to have better choices for education
then we need to do that
thank you
good evening i'm kelly mcbride dauph and
i'm speaking
as library director i hope that
you will provide sufficient budget for
the library to continue
our operations the proposed budget
is not really sufficient to support
existing operations
the minimum wage increase is going to
affect half of our staff by the first of
january when the
next increase rolls through
and if there's not an accompanying
increase to
part-time wages
the money for part-time wages we will
have to cut library hours
and services and don't want to do that
but
i just want to make sure y'all are fully
apprised appreciate what you're doing
difficult choices and i don't envy your
position and i thank you for
it appreciate it
anyone else
michelle vance um i'm gonna go a little
bit more in depth than what nate kaiser
did
about the board of education as they say
the buck stops with you
buck stops here
the lgbtq community
i have absolutely nothing against it i
have several family members
that are in that community and i love
them no less because of it
but what we are here to try and protect
our children from
are those who are going to use that
and are going to say i'm a woman
i'm going to go in that little girl's
bathroom
that's what we're here to stop we're not
here
to stop the other children or to bully
the other children we want to protect
them as well
it's all the children that need to be
protected
every single one of them and i know that
i have spoken to my cousins and i have
spoken to my uncle who is gay
and they wholeheartedly agree with me
this is not something that is
you know that all of us here are trying
to you know bully up against somebody
that's pretty much all i have to say is
you know just
consider the budget before you pass it
let us you know all work together on
this and get this done
and as far as the library budget i can
tell you where you can cut one person
but i'll get into that later
anyone else i'd like to address
the board about the school board budget
until the school board comes up with the
policy
that's acceptable to the county citizens
i don't think you should
make the budget available let them
get it together my understanding they
had
contracted the budget down the policy
out to someone in northern virginia or
something
to write the policy and that's kind of
strange i can't quite understand why if
you have uh
the school administration at the central
office and i understand they have some
pretty decent wages
further wages well they haven't
developed the policy themselves
in in in conjunction with the
commonwealth's attorney or or excuse me
the county's attorney
but i think the that needs to be the
policy needs to be fourth
present to you to the citizens and see
if you will agree to it
and if you don't agree to it then don't
don't don't fund it
i thank you if you fund it before you
before they make a policy then
you'll say okay do what you want to do
and i think that's a problem right now
we shouldn't be dealing with
thank you
creek this is just about the budget
right we get another public comment
section later
all right uh as far as the budget uh i
agree with what we're saying about the
schools
and so forth uh also i'd like to see
more money in the budget
for psa or something done with a psa
because it's just not working the way
that it is i have a friend that
said they ask him 12 000 to put water to
his house
and almost every fire hydrant from
swords creek to raven
is in a trash bag which means it's not
working
so i would like for the board to really
look to psa's funding
and either look at their board and see
how they're using their funding
it's what i'd really like to see happen
because something's not working in the
psa system
thank you
okay anyone else any other public
comments
all right seeing none we'll um
close the public comments on our budget
and
um the tax rate is
level it has not changed
any other comments on their public
hearing on our
budget all right seeing them we'll close
it
um next item is our new business which
is
approving our minutes uh from the may
5th meeting
do i have a motion to accept those
minutes
for may the 5th there was one change
sorry madam chair um in the report and
in the minutes for the report under me
for the rfq the request for
qualifications the minutes reflected a
request for quotes and that needs to be
changed to qualifications
qualifications all right
okay with that being said vicky you
catch it is
is there anything else on those minutes
all right with that change
do we have a motion to accept the
minutes for may 5th
uh madam chair i'll offer a motion to
accept the minutes
amended per the attorney please all
right
thank you do we have a second second
thank you david
any other comments aren't all those in
favor
anyone opposed all right a motion for
our minutes for the may 19th which is
like a budget workshop
and the permit with our campground do we
have a motion to accept those minutes
for any corrections some move madam
chairman all right thank you steve
do we have a second with phil
morris thank you all those in favor uh
anyone opposed next
is the approval of our expenditures to
make their payments do we have a motion
for those
so move david do we have a second
second carl all right any comments
all those in favor any opposed
the next thing we have on our uh
agenda is committee appointments for
board considerations
and the first one was the planning
commission and i think
katie was going to look some information
up for us or make a discussion on that
so katie yes i've
reviewed your old bylaws and there's not
really anything that discusses
um changing that but i do think that's
something that could be
added to your bylaws that the board
can vote on the number now i do think if
you do make an adjustment to your bylaws
you will have to put in the statement
um so long as not contrary to law
because i did look up
the planning commission and specifically
i think that was the one we were talking
about and by statute
it does require there to be five members
between five and fourteen
so i think you can you can decide in it
and the statute also says that the
that it shall be appointed by you so i
think you would have to take it up on an
individual basis
um but if you have in your bylaws that
you could you would
could change those numbers i think you
could do that as so long as it's not
contrary to law and then
if you if there is a specific board or
committee we would just have to look it
up to make sure there's not any minimum
or maximum requirements that you all
would violate
um i'll
ascertain a motion that we just table
this to what katie
can come back and give us actual more
comments and we can
discuss with them because i know mr
sword uh he resigned
so that when we can you know we'll just
strike yeah
and then mr charles edmonds his
um position was up on the third april
the third we can let that one just
stay in till we make some final
decisions on that
so so yeah you can you can table it i
guess
i guess so i don't cause any kind of
delay does the board wish for me to
bring you some draft
language for the bylaws to consider yes
could you look at each of those bylaws
and report back to us at the next board
meeting so that we can resolve something
and get on with these appointments i
have no problem with appointing
like the russell county psa or any of
these
community centers where one supervisor
has basically all the points anyway but
the ones like the psa we've already
resolved that each supervisor has one
point
i think we would like to get to that
point on all our boards if we could
with with the exception of the ones
there's something in their bylaws or
that prevent us from doing that yeah so
do you want me to review all boards and
committees or just the ones where the
appointments are
up right now well i think all boards i
think we needed
we had talked about doing it way back
yeah so i think we
need to be consistent with all
throughout all our boards
the reason i brought that up i just
think it gives you equal representation
from your district to be able to have
that and you know
it just i think it'd work a lot more
efficiently and save
save a lot of money too for the taxpayer
margin
so i'm happy to do that so i'll take a
motion that we table the uh planning
commission until
she brings us further information
all of them i love them but i'll make a
motion that will just table all these
with the understanding that whoever's in
there now continues in their position
until we resolve this issue
all right i would like to mention this
that the life planning commission
uh chairman meadows said if we reduce
this number that we have had
that there could be times that the
attendance wouldn't be
high enough to actually be able to have
a meeting
a quorum have a corner well they don't
need to be on there
yeah we need to put something in the uh
in the
in our in the bylaws that would require
you know to be at the meetings if they
miss so many meetings and they can be
you know removed from the board
yeah i mean that they're you know to me
i mean
that's why they're appointed to show up
and if they can't show up i mean
there needs to be some rules in place
that says you know you miss three you're
gone and we'll get somebody else in
there to do it
we have a lot of great candidates in
this county that would love to serve on
the board we just
have had trouble getting them into these
positions
well he i guess was referring to you
know the junior's pandemic
that they did have a lot of people that
didn't attend the meeting
but maybe it was out of my phone i
attended one of myself except
one and i was out of town
any further discussion katie
the wording's okay you're you're fine
with it you just made a motion
yeah do you bring it back to us all
right and david second
what what about the russell county
public service authority because they're
already
saving that one's taken care of
that one is already fixed we took care
of that
a couple of years ago so if we want to
we
clifford is uh carl's and chris is
david's
so we can exclude that one
so y'all let me end your motion i'm
ready to make those appointments
okay i would like to amend my motion to
exclude the russell county psa from that
tabling motion because we we've already
taken care of that
all right any further discussion
he did he did any more discussion
are all those in favor of the amended
motion
uh anyone opposing all right
thank you um
we'll skip the cumberland plateau
economic development
the dank community center and we'll move
on to the appointments of the
russell county public service authority
the psa
and we do have two positions
clifford has chris dye and we did on
when we changed their bylaws it gave
each board member
representation of one person in their
district
so the first one is mr clifford hess
that was
i'd like to make a motion put clifford
heads back on him yes
okay do we have a second second
david all those in favor
anyone opposed all right the second
position was uh
in sword creek christophe i like to
reinstate chris and
i'll tell you with his job knowledge and
experience working
in this field uh he's done a really good
job with the psa so i want to
have him reappointed all right do we
have a second second
carl all those in favor
all right the next one is the library
board and we will
hold off on that katie
next on the agenda is our citizen's
comment
limit to three minutes please state your
name and address
and would you bring me the sheet from
out
all right the first person to have
public speaking
is mr nate kaiser so if you stand up
give us your address and your discussion
uh 918 green valley road um
i i really already said what i wanted to
say earlier i thought that sign up sheet
was for
for for that but i will say i want to
commend you
on on making the motion and passing that
that you reduce the boards
uh in the county to to one person per
per supervisor i think that's excellent
i think it's very fiscally responsible
and and i really really appreciate
that i think it's a wise move um well
now the only thing is i want to see us
look at look at some doing some stuff
where we can have some
some money for our heat for our parents
to make some school choices
and help them make decisions in doing
that if they choose public school great
but if they
don't want to do that they should have
that taxpayer funding available to them
to do whatever they need to do
to uh to do what's best for their
children i think that's
each parent's responsibility and i think
it's wrong for the
for the state or or any government to
tell a parent how they should raise
their kid
as long as they're doing it responsibly
they should be able to choose how they
educate their children so
all right thank you
next miss kelly mcbride dale
i'm sort of like nate i thought that was
the budget one but i'll say something
anyway
thank you for all you do but
i hope that everyone will think about
participating in the library's summer
reading program we're going to kick it
off
back to normal with like live humans
in the library and on the grounds and
doing fun stuff
we're going to have a scavenger hunt at
each library as a kickoff
and we'll have some reading groups and
fun activities for folks
and i will point out too that
i i do think equalizing the boards is a
good thing
but i think the public should also
understand that not all the boards
are compensated the library board for
instance receives no compensation no
reimbursement so you can reduce a
library board but you
won't save any money thank you
lynn hayes
137 oakland road swords creek
i come here tonight to talk to you about
this law that's come down from richmond
i seen the school board meeting the
other night i didn't get to attend it i
had some other things going on but
i think that our supervisors that passes
the law in russell county may be able to
do something about this to bring it to a
halt
i'm asking the board to pass a
resolution
that every school the males will use the
male bathroom and the women will use the
girls bathroom by the gender that's on
their birth certificate
i think that would be a pretty simple
way to take care of this if we pass that
i know there's some fear about we're
going to lose funding for our schools
through the state of virginia
but let's do what's best for our kids
i know you was probably hoping that this
wouldn't come back to this board but you
are the ones that passed the laws
in russell county or passes resolutions
however you want to put it
and i think that's a resolution that
needs to be passed in our county
and put a stop to this evil doctrine
that's coming down
crt also critical race theory is nothing
but garbage
uh if you've not read on it you need to
read on it before it gets here
it is a bad thing it's very bad
it teaches children to hate their
country and to hate other races
i mean that's bottom line i already
spoke about the psa
i would like to see the psa looked into
like i said it's not functioning like it
should be
there's also one other subject i meant
to mention about school board
i'm under the understanding that
tazewell county has quite a bit more
population than what russell county does
but we got two extra board members and
several different
jobs through the school board that's not
necessary
so maybe that's way to help us save some
money on their budget
and again i think you should hold their
budget until something's done about this
transgender
and and like i said to crt it's coming
next so
be thinking about it and i appreciate it
[Applause]
michelle vance
michelle vance 99 willis springs drive
um
we've been talking a lot about kids
tonight and
about everything that's been going on
one thing that i do want to bring up
because we are
trying to protect all children
everyone's children
i would like for the board of
supervisors to let their county
employees know specifically the russell
county library employees know
that what they put out there in facebook
world
is out there for most people to see if
you don't put it on private
it's out there for children to see it's
out there for
parents to see it's out there for
everyone
i know that
the patriot as they call him
ruffles a lot of feathers a lot of
people don't like him
i get that but
his children are off limits
that's just not right
one of your employees called them an
unvaccinated herd
and told me that they didn't mention his
name so therefore they weren't talking
about him
we all know who the patriot is we all
know who they talk about
and i know that
the county has rules and regulations
just like most businesses do
regarding social media and
everything else i know i you know we we
do at the
company where i work and i know i've
seen things here come through where you
all do as well
so you all know me you know i'm not
afraid to call people
out i've called lonzo out before and i'm
not gonna stop calling people out if you
do something i don't think is right
you're going to hear about it and
children that's where you hit me
so i would expect that someone on the
board of supervisors here
talks to the library
and the employees now i know that this
facebook page has since
gone dark and black and it can no longer
be
found but there were several people that
saw it
so it is it was out there but i just
wanted to bring that
uh bring that up let you all know what's
going on in your county
is there anyone else there's no one else
on the sheet and is there anyone else
okay state your name and your address
please terry hughes
live at 30 great hard drive across the
county i just want to
mention some more about the lgb i mean
we i'm worried about all kids
you know we we discriminate if we we
might
transgender bathrooms i guess quite what
we want to call it
are we not discriminated against the
kids that don't want it
so there's a reverse discrimination i
mean i ask you to think about this put
yourself in this position
you as a man or as a lady you in the
restroom
and the office that comes and sex comes
in with you well how would you feel
about that
now if you feel uncomfortable with that
can you imagine what a child will feel
like
we really need to think about the
children i know myself
i would feel very uncomfortable with it
and i you know
as an adult i should be able to defend
myself more
but as a child i really think that we
really need to we
i don't i don't have an answer i wish it
did it's it's a very
tough decision a tough question that has
to be addressed
but we have to come up with something i
just don't think we can say hey
open it up going if you want to and i
think that we're going to have some
people that
really should be in there will be using
this excuse
thank you
anyone else
all right seeing none we'll close our
citizens comment period
constitutional officers reports and
requests
next we have our county attorney report
and request
thank you madam chair and the first
thing under my report
is just the request for qualifications
that we discussed at the last meeting
and lonzo and i work together to draft
this so that we can
hire either an individual or firm to
provide the
erosion and sediment control and the
industrial building
inspection services for project jonah i
think
we didn't have time to get it in the
board's packet but
we do have a copy of it that's been
presented to you it basically is just
following following procurement for
competitive negotiation for professional
services
for that and so we would ask the board
to approve that tonight i'll make a
motion to approve
all right do we have a second second
steve any discussion on this rfp
request for qualifications
all right seeing none all those in favor
anyone opposed
the next thing under um my reports is i
believe
mr breeding had asked me at the last
meeting the board had asked me to look
into
a county business license and i had
previously done that and
our county has the merchants merchants
tax
and you have to pick between the two and
i have i have reviewed a little bit of
it for the county business license
and if you decide to do this the maximum
fee that could be charged was 50
and i know the board maybe wasn't even
so interested in creating a fee but that
is
that is the limitations for our the
population in russell county also
if you did decide to do the business
business license tax and that would know
that would not apply to any businesses
whose gross receipts were less than
fifty thousand dollars
and it would be whoever's in excess of
that i do think this is a
sort of complicated issue that you
probably really want to hear some
feedback from the count the county
administrator as well because what the
differential is going to be and if that
was going to affect any kind of revenue
that the county is receiving
and because if you do have that if you
do have that business license
and then you can't do your your
merchants merchants tax i have reviewed
a county who does have
excuse me county business tax and and it
was fairly complicated granted it was
it was a much larger locality than ours
but the reason i look at their statutes
is because they're more likely to be
tested legally
and so they're more reliable and
but i i don't think that it's you know i
don't know that it's in the county's
best interest i'll keep looking into it
and i'll work with the county
administrator
but i guess if the county wanted to do
some kind of voluntary directory of just
you know to have businesses sign up but
there wouldn't be any penalty
for not getting a license because if you
do adopt this there
you can even have a criminal penalty for
failing to get that business license
could we do something like a
registration
just require registration through an
ordinance and not even charge for it i'm
not even concerned about that
i just want to know who's doing what
what service they're providing where
they're at
we we need it from an economic
development marketing standpoint
and even the from the
county you know businesses you know the
business association
would like to have something like that i
guess the issue would be is
you know you can only do things certain
powers that are conferred upon you and
powers that flow from that and there is
a specific statute on that and
what you're wanting to do really isn't
what that statute is created for
so i mean as far as i think you could do
a voluntary
you know whoever won it but if you were
going to require i guess i guess that
would be the question what's the penalty
going to be if they don't register
um because under this you can enforce it
through fines or criminal penalties but
i don't know if that's your intent
either i mean i'm happy to keep looking
at this but i don't want it to have
a adverse finance i don't want to advise
you to do something that may have a
potentially adverse financial impact on
the county either can you say the
business license wouldn't apply to
anybody
under a fifty thousand dollar grace no
they would they would still be required
to get the license but the tax
there's a business because you would
you're replacing the tax that you have
with the business license tax
and it does not apply to gross receipts
under 50 000
and by by statute so i mean it's
it's something i can keep looking into
but
the the biggest question i think for you
on this is i'll work with the county
administrator on that is what kind of
financial impact it would be to switch
from the capital merchant tax to the
business license tax
and if it's comparable it may be
something that you want to do
it might be something that our tourism
director can work with the chamber of
commerce to try to
accumulate that information i know a lot
of people
don't sign up to be a member of the
chamber for some
reasons or whatever but you know
like steve said if we knew what certain
businesses were doing actually out there
we could help them market
and help them you know kind of get their
business out and help
generate that opportunity when when you
don't know it's hard to
to know how you do that but maybe it's
something that our tourism director
lonzo
or uh chamber of commerce could work
together on to maybe see if they could
get a database built
on people that you don't have to be a
member of the chamber you just get a
collective
amount of you know that information
sorry can help with certain
certain grant applications and stuff too
just like smart scale with vdot i know a
lot of that's based around
the economic development impact you know
ours wouldn't be that large
but anything that we can do to help is
is positive
um i'll i'll keep looking into that but
that's where i'm
at right now right now i don't and it it
seems like it could potentially be a
more complicated process than what you
have in place
and that could potentially even require
additional staff which would be an
additional cost so i mean that would be
all those things would just be things to
consider
so i'll work with lonzo and hopefully to
get you some maybe some
projected numbers on what it would be
um the the next issue is kind of
similar into special assessments that's
something i'm continuing to work on and
i will
try to report back to the board next
month about
about how to go about that it's it's not
again all of these things
you know require some drafting and and
what you're trying to achieve so i'll
continue to work with lonzo and report
back on that at the july meeting
and the last um
item under me is a purchase of a piece
of
property um and lonzo did contact me
about a purchase of a piece of property
and i think he can discuss probably more
what it's
for um but um i think he did work out a
purchase price
for the board to consider and you can go
ahead and approve that
purchase if you want to once he
describes what it's for and the price
but if you do approve it you need to
approve it subject to
um and final title opinion by legal
counsel because i have not had
an opportunity to do a title opinion on
this property
and yet but you do you can't approve it
you don't have to have
a public hearing for the purchase of a
piece of property
well
there you go thank you
the piece of property pertains to the
sun disposal site that the board had
agreed to that we did the presentation
back in march
we have been proceeding forward and
working
with dq vdot and to make sure this is
the appropriate
side i would like to
ask the for not just a motion with a
final title opinion but also continue to
spawn
vdot's side distance per approval
for the permit so those two components
to approve
the sun disposal site purchaser
you haven't told us how much it's going
to cost you 35 000.
that's probably that's probably going
right
that is going right
so you need a motion now for this yes
ma'am
based on these two things based on the
vdot site approval
and title opinion from our legal counsel
so do we have a
motion to move forward with this
purchase madam chair
i'd like to make that motion please
which will state
um that the purchase of the property is
subject to final
title approval from the attorney and
also vdot's
site line of distance i guess permit at
the
uh thank you at the sun disposal site
charles second that and say that we need
to get all to all men's sites as soon as
we can
you know once this one's finished we
need to progress right on to the next
one
yes sir longer hours and weekends open
yep all right any further discussion
all right all those in favor anyone
opposed
all right thank you
next we have our county administrators
uh reports
thank you madam chair the county
ministry reports
uh is the first on the line item and the
only line
is the american rescue plan act of 2021
when you
that has been in the national news
of course this is a new program that is
given to
each of the estates and counties cities
and municipalities
to help with the impact of the kobit 19.
the these funds are
the funds that will be used to reimburse
recipients for the costs incurred by
state and local governments
in responding to the public health
emergency and the negative
economic impacts prior to the passage of
the american
rescue plan based upon the
use of fiscal recovery funds and
the interim and final rules these funds
permit to be used for cover cost
incurred beginning march the 3rd 2021
so these will begin for costing curve
for the march
the 3rd 2021. also in addition
these these funds have been
classified into four classifications
the four classifications of course are
to respond to the public health
emergency
and its negative in economic impacts
also to respond to workers performing
essential work
and for the public health emergency it
also
it is a provision of the government
services to extend the reduction in
revenue
it also is as the last one is to make
necessary investments
in the county's infrastructure so those
four things
um are the guidelines
for the american
rescue plan these funds come different
than their carers did
they have different restrictions they
came directly from the feds to us
instead of coming through the conduit of
the state like the cares did
this is a a little different
it doesn't deal with the pp and e and
all this stuff
but it is there to help russell county
citizens so
in the russell county so that being said
this has been a separate set of funds
that must be accounted for under the
single audit
act so the committee must be appointed
for the this fund as separately from the
cares so madam chair
and i need a committee appointment for
the american
rescue plan act of 2021.
so i i'm going to appoint myself and tim
lovelace again
and please feel free any of the other
board members that need to
come in and pick up stuff and look at it
so tim
i'm going to ask you if you'll help me
again on this and
we'll start uh dispersing and overseeing
how this money is
delivered to the county okay so tim if
you don't care yes ma'am
i have a question uh can we
publish this out to the public on our
website
the full document yes sir i'd like to
have that done
we can do that what how much money are
we talking about
okay uh a total of 5.2 million dollars
done it in two to four two increments
yes yes so it'll be half this year
half next year yes that was given across
two fiscal years and it's a good point
to make
it it was it's given across two budget
years to be able to get the counties and
cities and towns and municipalities back
on their feet
because as well as we have said in
the other many other budget meetings
during the cove ed of course state of
virginia
had a great run on revenue sales
everybody bought from amazon
everybody ordered everything online that
was that was great for the revenue
for the state of virginia but what they
did
at the locality level they there was
unemployment
there there was businesses that were
shut down
the this money is to put that back in in
us back on our feet over the next two
years so
again the four classifications that we
have
done and we will publish back on the
website with uh
like mr eden had had requested that
we can work over the next two fiscal
years it's it gives us an opportunity to
next two years to build back up to where
we were our unemployment rate right now
in russell county is at 6.8 percent
so we were at 3.7 so we've got to work
right now and everybody's got to sign up
and
it is hiring they're having a hard time
getting
you know workers back to work so and
that does impact the county
you know our revenues and our services
so this is a supplement to help that
it is not a cash flow it's it's to put
us back on our feet over the next two
fiscal years
i have a question for the attorney you
don't have to answer me tonight i'd like
for you to research it
but in one of the lines here it says
addressing addressing educational
disparities
exonerated by coping 19 including early
learning services
increasing resources for high poverty
school districts educational services
like tutoring
or after school programs and supports
and support for students
social emotional and mental health needs
i'd like to get some debt to really
define men on this or definition on this
to
see if that would impact our public
education our students
having to deal with this these other
issues that the governor's trying to
force down on some of these laws
so if if this money it can be or
could be available for alternative
source of education if you could look
into that let me know i'd really
appreciate it
and mr eaton can i make one point on
addition that
now this is the county's appropriation
of funding over the next two years i
understand
the school board has their own american
rescue plan
that is applicable to their programs
which is different than ours
this is this one is ones that we can
offer for supplement but their main
programs will run
under their american relief plan the
only thing i'm talking about supplement
okay
next on the account administrator
request and reports is the home anchor
library foundation repairs
you'll have a bid quote in there and
it's up on the screen
this is for construction i need a motion
for approval to
install the subfloor supports and
shoring
per the uh engineering uh plans that we
got from dr price
to make sure that uh the weight
placement on the
uh hoeniker library is is sufficient for
you know the general public i'm trying
to need a motion for approval for this
second any further discussion
all right all those in favor and you
want to post
next is the the
vdot resolution for replacement and
maintenance of wheel springs
drive culverts to elevate flooding on
route 679 which is tumbles hollow road
i need a motion for uh approval on this
motion i'll make it
i'll second it all right tim
any discussion and jeff and mail are
here if they
wanted to say anything i'm not to put
you on the spot
just not to put you down point you out
or anything not
point you out or anything that's why
they're sitting over here i'll say i'll
go ahead and say this is great news
because it's on the six year plan and
that is scheduled for next year
but this is going to get that started a
little
early and that'll i know it doesn't
totally take care of the problem but it
will help
until the rest is is done
second phase started we're going to put
the new entrance pipe in
and then we'll see you know how it's
going to act before we
we're going to raise the road also and
see how it acts before we put the
topping on it
you know it's in two phases but this is
a really good starting point
and i think it'll make a really big
difference thank you very much
yeah thank you all
all those in favor of this
thank you madam chair also again v dot
resolution supporting the closing of
route 663
rock fork road uh for the bridge
reconstruction
i need a motion and approval on this one
i'll make that motion
carl all right a second a second
second team any discussion
any comments all right all those in
favor
anyone opposed
next one thank you madam chair next one
on the kennedy ministry request is the
vdot resolution supporting the three
rivers destination pedestrian bridge
this is uh of course in the
fy 2324 transportation alternate program
applications
that is on a piece of property that was
given
by the virginia department of
transportation to the russell county and
the town of saint paul
this is where the three river
destination center is being applied for
the erc grants and the dhcd
and tobacco grants etc this is the
predecessor
pedestrian bridge that is adjacent to it
in
crossing over from the desk the
destination center
over into the town of saint paul
this is one of those eligible programs
for this and this is a
resolution in support of the saint paul
application for the the transportation
on alternative program this will come
from saint paul we are supporting they
are the applicant
this is a resolution in support of their
application
luanne if you have any more comments
that you want to make on this one
um before we um well i'll make the
motion so that we can get it on the
table for discussion so i'd like to make
the motion that we
move forward with uh this request
for the pedestrian bridge and the vdot
transportation enhancement program that
will
fund that we hope okay so do we have a
second on that
pause second all right thank you awards
all right discussion
and and for discussion um we the
county have a transportation enhancement
grant already open with the
daint depot and until we get
85 percent complete is that correct or
something like that
80. okay 80 complete
then we cannot ask for another
transportation
enhancement uh pro into that grant
program and so um years ago before i got
here
the decision was made that the town of
saint paul
and russell county would work together
on a piece of property
down next to the county line and it had
to be developed
per vdot standards and and they wanted
to be a tourism
piece they didn't care what it was they
didn't say what it was
and so we have worked together on that
and um so we've come to the point where
we have
a destination center that will more than
likely
be on that site that will work for the
entire region of southwest virginia
and so we have worked to get a
connection
to the new state park which that
announcement is coming later on this
month
so we're using a pedestrian trail
because of the
four lane pedestrians and bicycles and
everything else are not
allowed out there or shouldn't be out
there so this is going to work with
everything that's going on within the
region
so that's the store back story behind
the pedestrian bridge and
we uh the county are working in tandem
with the town of saint paul who has
graciously said they would be the
physical
agent and so it's it's a win-win for
everybody
all those in favor anyone opposed
all right
just add on to uh what miss wallace had
conveyed
about the destination center this is
actually going to be home to
the heart of appalachia that will serve
all of southwest virginia
counties so this is uh it's
what we call a spoken hub this will
direct
them into russell county but it also
will direct them to the breaks of
buchanan county there are all
will be partners in this one hub to get
them into
dickson county buchanan county scott
county wise county
uh tazewell county this this is a
come in i guess is and i'm not going to
use the one
where nabin and i'm not going to say the
name but this this will be
our own for southwest virginia so this
will be
part of that hub i have a quick question
uh for vdot i appreciate extremely
appreciate what you all are doing
uh but i've got a question about our
swinging bridges
uh and i know that's been a kind of a
real
thorn uh with the type of funding that
you get
is there a possibility that we could
also get these as a tourist designation
for our local swinging bridges in our
areas
and and y'all don't have to answer me
tonight you can take it back and do some
investigation
uh i know you know for a couple years
here i know y'all went back
and repaired that one and got it fixed
back and actually had to put some signs
on it because people just
tore it up i mean they just go down
there and they're not very respectful
they tear this stuff all
all the pieces and that's a sad
situation
but i thought if there's some uh tourism
dollars that could be
utilized for these designations these
these things
are just awesome to look at
awesome for families to take photographs
at i've seen
and the reason i'm bringing this up i've
seen a lot of prom pictures
are are they historic
are they his well i mean that's a good
question are they historic
i mean you know i'm sure they were
putting in
well way before my time because i know
mel we used to go down
run across those the whole swinging
bridge is down there at hubbard hole
that's how he got to work he lived on
the other side of the river so he
crossed the swinging bridge to get to
work every night
so it's been her many many years well
lonzo if you could look into that uh and
kind of get an idea
to see if uh what the historic
bay i'm like lou i mean i'm sure there's
a lot of history with those
and we need to do our research on those
to see i mean i i don't want vdot to
take full responsibility if there's some
partnerships or
you know alignments that we could bring
to the table that we could utilize
for funding or upgrades or stuff like
that i think it's good i said
and while i was getting back earlier
i've seen a lot of people getting their
prom pictures and stuff like that look
at these bridges
i thought it was pretty awesome you know
and i hate to see them go away if
there's anything that we could do to
save and restore
and keep them up and i'd love to be able
to do that without having to put the
full burden
to try to continue maintenance on these
things if we could do some partnerships
but i appreciate if y'all look into
anything or find help i'll i'll be an
advocate for you
we'll definitely
thank you guys next on the account
administrative
reports and requests is the legit
treatment agreement with the town of
lebanon
um of course we've did one
change to uh the
the agreement that y'all have in front
of you and it is
uh to be stricken from it upon legal
uh legal counsel in the first paragraph
the town agrees to treat lychee on
behalf of the county
at its sewer treatment plant in the same
manner in which the parties have
heretofore acted from the
in the same manner in which the parties
have
heretofore acted to be stricken
as as outlined in your your agenda
i need a motion and approval upon those
changes
that's the only change legal counsel
okay
everyone have that all right do we have
a motion to
accept this agreement with the town of
lebanon
somebody steve do we have a second
second carl any discussion
yeah no juanzo this is kind of we're
still looking at the leech eight
down at the damn wastewater facility yes
sir
okay so this is kind of like a secondary
backup
or a primary when we need it exactly sir
right okay ma'am chair yes
um while we're in discussion so the one
two three
four just to be clear is stricken right
or just the one just one
in the same manner in which the parties
have heretofore acted
that's that part right there we'll be
stricken
in the first paragraph just clarifying
they had put in
you know for sole treatment but we're
treating it at the daint we're also
looking
at you know deq as a backup to give them
on a contingency plan for the town of
saint paul in the town of lebanon so
we're trying to get it all in
in appropriation with deq's you know
final
wishes
any further discussion all right all
those in favor
anyone opposed thank you madam chair
next on the county ministry of reports
is
a prepayment of the july 2021 exec
county expenditures i need a
pre-promotional approval on that
i'll make that motion chair all right
thank you steve do we have a second
second thank you david and the
discussion of that is
um our next meeting was supposed to be
the monday after the fourth
and that is a holiday so we're moving
our board meeting till the 12th and they
wanted to go ahead and make sure we made
our payments of their expenses their
bills
before we uh okay they would be due
before we had our next meeting
so all those in favor of the prepayment
for the july meeting
anyone opposed
thank you madam chair next on ken county
administrative request is the russ
county auditor's engagement letter
with robinson farmers and cox for the
upcoming
fis budget audit i need a motion
approval on that
on the engagement letter so move mr
madam chair
all right thank you luanne a second
second steve all right any discussion
all right all those in favor of
anyone opposed thank you madam chair
next on the county ministry request is
the
excise tax enforcement officer that we
had posted in the paper for interview
for the at the commissioner revenues
office for the
cigarette and meal tax enforcement i
need approval for
the hiring for that position and a
salary of 30 000.
so do we have a motion to approve this
hiri this uh excise tax officer
i'll make that move carl thank you do we
have a second
second thank you lou any discussion
those in favor all right anyone opposed
all right thank you ma'am chair
now the last one on the county ministry
request is
of course russ county fy 2122
county county-wide budget and the
calendar 22
county tax rates by the way the
tax rates have not changed there's no
increase in taxation
and i need approval and motion approval
on this
do we have a motion to approve the uh
budget for next year can we do
discussion before any motions are made
miss katie
we make our motion a second and then we
discuss it
i'll make that motion then steve
do we have a second i'll
face it okay
discussion okay i've got major issues
here
i'm as i sit down and look
at the budget resolution for 2022
i see that we're level funding the
schools from what we did last year which
is about 9.1 million dollars
and a little over eight of that is in
operations and a little over
well the balance of it a little over
like one
is in debt and then
i go back and i did i went back and
checked that against
2021 resolution that's all right that's
correct
however in the 2022 resolution i see
that the total budget for the schools is
57 just a little less than 57.2 million
dollars
when i went back and checked it against
the 21 budget
it was like 47 million dollars which is
a differential of almost 10.2 million
dollars
now my question was where is that money
coming from and i got part of it out of
dr brown's email
that came in late friday which i got
this morning
uh and but
that's even in his email
you know he alludes to 11.7 million
dollars
so is that 57 million dollar
number correct or
my big issue is i haven't seen a copy of
the school's budget
all i see is bottom line numbers
and and i'm in the position now
i want to i want to see a detailed
budget i'm not ready to vote on this
until i see a budget
i want to understand where they're
i want i want to understand and
and i know they're limited on what they
can do with their money but i
i want to see a plan and i want to see
a budget that reflects that plan on how
they intend to spend it
and i know he says they're going to do
air conditioning at the high school gyms
it's great i'm all for that replace the
coal-fired furnaces with the
natural gas and four schools that's
that's fine too
he's talking about renovating locker
rooms and restrooms at
uh i guess probably the football field
like this is where he's talking about
for lebanon high
but there's no price listed on it and it
talks about
the installation of a bipolar ionization
unit
in the air handlers which in all the
russell county buildings which purifies
all the
i guess it purifies the air and cleans
the viruses out you know it's kind of a
safety precaution and i guess yes
what i saw that is on their needs list
that they send out every year
was about six hundred thousand dollars
but you know i
i look at this thing and you know we're
we're looking at big dollars here
and i just wonder is there some of that
money that can be used to offset some of
the money that we appropriate
we've level funded them for years and
years and years
for on the screen here the 57 million
195 377 64.
that does include their american relief
it's uh funds does it include that 11.7
million dollars yes
yes sir okay it is included in it and
that's been verified so well
okay then the the es
what is the e-s-s-e-r
they're this is for one and two or two
and three
it was 11.7 million so i guess what
you're seeing then is the differential
between
last year's and these years is the mercy
they got
phase one the esser phase one was shown
in last year's
numbers no last year's numbers was cares
this is
a total difference this is american
relief this is how they're accounting
for it
uh last year's it was more of partial
funding and
a reimbursement and tim can speak on you
know
not to put him on spot but that was the
part of it it was not a budget component
like the american relief plan
is the this one is they have to account
for it directly from the feds through
the department of education
so that's what i was referring to
earlier what we have in our american
relief plan
is going to be totally different than
what they can use theirs for it is
restricted
these are federally funds funds so it
will be accounted under the single audit
act
and it must be accounted for and it does
have restrictions now you're talking
about air funding
now no the school is yeah yeah the the
50s
both have to have the single audit yes
but they have to be accountable
yes but they have different guidelines
that is given to them
under the american relief fund act when
you go through the 151 pages
and that's what that's how long it is of
the of the law that was established the
department of education has its own set
of guidelines on how they can spend that
money and what it's appropriate for
actually their funding actually extends
out to
2025 that they even got a longer term to
be able to expend it
so our what we gave them on the 9
million
101 317 which is here
that includes the operational and the
debt load
that that takes part of the operational
plan that includes both
which includes right here you see that
there's thousand twenty four
thousand eight million twenty four
thousand seven eighty one
in operations and then the million
seventy six five thirty six which is
what you know that's for the debt load
which we have an
obligation on now that comes out
you know to the nine one nine million
one hundred
one thousand three hundred seventeen
dollars which is more than our required
minimum above 1.3 million above
the required local effort rle yes sir
required local effort is seven
million and some odd dollars yeah yeah
so it's 1.3 million
differential 1.313 i think
another another issue that i've got
when i re read through that and i feel
like i've haven't done due diligence
because i i really sit down and read
through this thing
this resolution uh
there's one part of it
okay one of the last paragraphs that it
says
in fact i probably should just read that
in the resolution
but it just kind of floored me
okay this is on the next last page of
the resolution it said be it still
further resolved that the annual
contributions that are hereby
appropriated
shall be disturbed shall be dispersed on
a monthly basis
with the amount dispersed not to exceed
one-twelfth of the total appropriation
unless otherwise otherwise agreed upon
contributions to the russell county
school division
in the russell county department of
social services are exempt from this
limitation
in addition the county administrator may
require written reports on how
previous allocations was or were spent
before the future disbursements are made
and
why would the dss and schools be exempt
from this same requirement
this this requirement and
was decided up on by the previous boards
this is at the at the discretion of the
board of supervisors
if they're being exempt now if you
from the exemption and i haven't seen
them katie can
you know also come in on this i have not
seen
any restriction that restricts the board
of supervisors from
any department that you give funding to
of not providing budgets or
or monthly reporting that's why it's in
there
there there's i mean every other
department sheriff's department
uh commissioner revenue treasurers they
all
do their thing on a monthly basis they
submit their invoices
clerk's office everybody who is
departmental well
and and it is but see the other
departments the sheriff's office
the clerks the courts the libraries and
kelly's reigning hearing
they automatically come through us they
come through our financial management
system they are accounted for
immediately we we have total oversight
now
these um the school board
the dss the ida and the psa has its own
financial management system
so they're all separate from our
reporting
you know i'm going to comment on this
steve you know i think
i think this is something that they
should do for us and i think
we should include the psa the ida
dss school board i mean i have no
problem with them
and i'm expressed in my opinion i have
no problem with them giving us these
monthly reports
well i think the monthly reports too but
i want to
i want to i want to see
how much they've spent on a regular
basis and we'll never really know
i mean the way it's set up right now the
only time we really know
what they've spent is at the end of the
year
and what category they've spent it in if
we go ahead and appropriate the money
then it can be moved around to whatever
category they want
right it can be shifted from line item
to line by law once you transfer the
funds to the school board
it becomes their autonomy to be able to
make the money
which it may not be used for the
intention that we approved it for
you there there katie can chime in on
this one
i haven't researched the specific issue
that you're discussing stephen i know
i've looked at it into relation of
i guess a conflict inquiry and when you
have
employees of the school system that are
serving on the board um
one of the reasons that it's not a
conflict for them to vote on the budget
is because you don't do a line item
budget you don't approve a line item
budget for the school system
um it's just it's an amount that you you
fund so
um i wouldn't want you all to do
anything that's not
that's that's against the law i mean i
think i would have to look that up to
see
if it is against the law for us to prove
a line item budget
no i know that's what i'm saying i have
not looked into that specific
issue but i know that's when you look at
the law
and the attorney general opinions
regarding conflicts of
school employees serving on board of
supervisors that's one
reason that it's not is because that
that budget is not approved line by line
it's approved as as an amount and so you
don't have that control
over it so again i haven't looked at
that but i mean i just want to make the
board aware that that
may be an issue that needs to be
resolved before you make a decision on
it
one of my concerns is i'm like steve you
know i haven't seen their budget
and i would like to i'd like to have a
reconvened meeting
after they meet on the 15th
when's their next meeting july
july 15th july the 15th i really don't
feel comfortable
voting on this at all until i can see
that budget now we're really good they
have some sort of plan
as to what they want to spend that money
for you know i can i can sit down and
look down the
the needs list that they sent and i can
see
you know there's some things that they
could do and i'm i'm not opposed to that
i think you know if you've got that
money and you can and you can take care
of some needs you need to go ahead and
take care of it
you know as long as it's a legitimate
expense
you know well one of my i had asked in
our last meeting
for a plan to look at their teachers
wages and our janitors and
lower level employees i've not seen or
heard anything from anybody
as far as a plan where we can be
competitive with some of the surrounding
counties
i would honestly like to see a plan a
short
mid long-term plan to see how we're
gonna get from point a to point b
and uh you know i i just
i have some real concerns with this
because one the lack of communication
too there's no plan in place i mean
or somebody needs to show it to me that
we're you know that we can
attract more people to live here and
come here and want to work here
if we can be more competitive here in
the county and i've not seen or heard
anything from anybody
one of the things you've got to remember
also under the code of virginia the
board of supervisors by law
by law has to approve the budget by june
30th
yeah so several days before june 30th
time enough for them to give us a copy
of the budget give us a week or so to
review it
we could adjourn to reconvene at that
time
i did um i did find the um statute it's
actually under the
education statutes and i'll read it to
you about what the law says about that
it's um 22.1 appropriations by county
city or
or town governing body for public
schools and it says a governing body may
make appropriations to the school board
from the funds derived from local levies
and from other funds available for
operation
capital outlay and debt service in the
public schools
such appropriations shall not be less
than the cost of portion to the
governing body for maintaining an
educational program meeting the
standards of quality
for the several school divisions
prescribed as provided by law
the amount appropriated by the governing
body for the public schools shall relate
to its total
only or to such major classifications
prescribed by the
board of education subject to or
pursuant to 222.1
to the appropriations may be made on the
same periodic basis
as the governing body makes approaching
appropriations to other departments and
agencies
so i do think you're limited to those
nine classifications but you can make it
periodic
as you would other agencies
you know that i just i just feel
frustrated
and you know the bottom line is that if
you're an elected official you need to
have some accountability
you know i'm tired of being have it
being said we'd be glad to give you a
raise but that board supervisors won't
give us any money
okay one way to one way to to address
that issue is give them taxation
authority
we'll just pull nine million dollars
right off our bottom line and give it to
them i don't know what the process
is to do that and and uh
you know maybe it takes some legislative
action i don't know but i
would imagine maybe we'll talk to some
of our legislators about this
i mean if you're an appointed school
board it's one thing
you know the responsibility lies here
but if you're an elected official
you need to be you need to have the
taxing authority that you can
you can set your own budgets and uh
we can deal apples to apples orange just
oranges
so and i'm just griping right now that's
what i'm doing but
well i mean even with the pandemic i
didn't mean to interrupt you from state
but i mean even with the pandemic you
can't live off free money
this somebody's gonna end up having to
pay all this money back and eventually
we are servants of this
whole county and we should take the
financial fiduciary responsibility
individually
to say we've got to do what's right i
mean i'll just tell you
and we don't know what's coming down the
road i mean we didn't know the pandemic
was coming we don't know what's going to
face us down the road but i
i like a plan in place to address
every one of these issues to say what if
what if this happens or what if that
happens it's just not
write a blank check let's get something
together and get a plan
not only for that but you know i guess
depending on
what actions they take at their next
meeting you might see a max
a mass exit of public students
leaving the county or for the public
education we don't know
does anybody can anybody answer that
question in here knowing what's going to
take place
so i feel like we need to take some very
serious
steps to address some of these things if
we approve
this and and we don't take those steps
and have a plan in place and
communications between all
entities and boards and leaders in this
area
and not just talk to one or two on the
phone we all need we just need to have a
reconvened meeting and have the whole
school board and the board of
supervisors here together at one time
[Applause]
i'd be okay with that
[Applause]
you know every year we we've been level
funding them for several years
and every year we always get money back
and and it baffles me
how we can do that you know i mean
we need to work everybody has to work
with a real budget there can't be
so much excess in the budget that you
just don't have to worry about this or
that and you
end up giving a million dollars back at
the end of the year that's a million
dollars that the county could use to do
some stuff
uh you know that that we need to do
there's many projects we need to do
right
now but we just we're just underfunded
you know maybe some of this cobin money
maybe we can
do a thing or two with that but uh you
know i'm just
i'm just getting really frustrated with
this whole situation so
i'm looking for answers i'm looking for
alternatives but
i'm not ready to vote on this i want to
amend my motion
to table this until we get
a budget a detailed budget from the
school board even though
we've gotten them before they've given
us budgets before
even though you know if it's you know
even though if we can only allocate
based on
those nine items that katie mids that
that's fine
but uh i want to see that i want to see
a plan
on uh with numbers on it how they intend
to use this
this uh 11.7 million dollars
that they're going to get over the
obvious through 2024 and i understand
they can only
project out part of the way but uh you
know
we need need to see if they're going to
use it for things that you know
are going to be useful although all we
can do is complain apparently
i'll second it so this is
motion is to amend to ask for a
reconvened meeting
once we obtain a budget and a plan
for the utilization of that
er money
we'd have to do that sometime before the
end of the month
we have to have our budget in place and
approved
are they even meeting is the school
board meeting do you know what their
calendar is
they they had a continued meeting for
june the 24th
and to approve their budget they are
they are not allowed to pass their
budget
until you all pass yours so if you do
wish to have a reconvened meeting
um then i would just ask that you give
them enough time so that they can pass
their budget within that time frame as
well
so they don't have to advertise
yes they would have to have a special
called meeting um to move it up to
discuss it so
that's and that requires three days
notice
we can adjourn to reconvene in
particular yes that's what they did
and they but that they they didn't until
june the 24th so
um they would have to
well they would have to call a special
call meeting and give three days notice
to take it up before that june 24th date
which i think that would have to happen
for
both boards to meet again because they
would have to meet after you all
after you all approve your budget yeah
it's not that we have to have their
approved budget we have to have their
proposal
they have to have your approved budget
before they can officially pass that
well if they'll give us a proposed
budget
we can give them our approved
it's complicated
he shouldn't be this complicated
okay okay okay i just wanted to make
sure they come into play
because they're watching you don't if
you didn't if they tell you exactly what
they're doing with the mint with the
projects
the minutes are more enough
but you know they can give us their
budget we can certainly get their
budgets
from anybody else psa and dss
and whoever you know
whoever was exempted i guess you know
i think under that section you read it
was the school board in dss
um but but rebecca's also mentioned the
psa
who is independent the ida which is
independent
just ask them for their budget as well
to everybody
all right
i think the motion was to table the
budget for right now
until you can table the budget and have
a reconvened meeting once we get a copy
of their budget
the school board's budget for us to look
at and the rest
in all the other groups who are
independent
i've asked for that plan if you can
throw it in the plan
i i guess that's the issue that we've
gotta we've gotta look at
is um which the ida they will meet
thursday
so i mean that can be discussed with
them and the psa has not had their
meeting yet this month it will be next
week
but the school board will have to have a
reconvened meeting to
to make any um changes to
approve any changes to be submitted to
you all
what changes are they going to submit
well i mean i guess
or the the details they would have to um
well i mean i assume they're going to
submit to us all i'm asking for is just
the budget
they've submitted to us but i'd like to
see it in some detail
if they can just and dr brown apparently
has some sort of plan he's
he's listed out several things here and
i'm you know i'm just concerned with the
you know money for the next year or two
you know i understand he can't you can't
spend it all uh
you've got until 2024 to spend it but
we need to you know what he's got
planned for the next year so what he
what he envisions you know
yeah i mean i i think he would have to
get approval from the board though
before he could submit you know if he's
gonna if he's gonna provide
more detail than what this board already
has i don't think he has the authority
to do that without their approval and
saying yes
send this to the board of supervisors
and i guess potentially instead of you
all having
instead of you all adjourning to
reconvene since i'm going to have to
call a special call if you want to have
that joint meeting
um i'm going to have to call a special
call meeting for the school board
i could just call could it all be done
at the joint at a joint meeting
i mean i think that's fine i mean again
i don't want to i'm i don't want to be
speaking for another board to
you know but that's that's the process
that i'm going to have to go through
okay um and so i mean i think that i
think it would need to be at the can
the government center you know because
it's you know
it's going to get crowded so
it's just it's just difficult to
schedule for another board without them
being here so
um but that that may be the simplest
process
it's just for you all to adjourn and to
call the special meeting once
um lonzo and i guess myself have been
able to reach out to them because
i don't know what times if anybody's
going to be on vacation and i think
everybody would probably want to be
present so if we could if we could make
it happen so
could could we tentatively just set it
for the 24th
i mean
yeah i mean i think i think you can but
especially if it's going to be a joint
and they already have they've already
adjourned to reconvene
but they did not have it at the
government center so i'd still have to
give notice to move it if it's going to
be here
um but we might could do that it's just
you're pushing up against the deadline
is the only concern i have if there's
going to be if
any if anybody's going back to the
drawing board you're running out of time
to pass the budget
but that's possible
all right so your motion
the amendment
maybe the best thing we can do is just
reconvene
on a certain date and then they do
and we'll we can look at the budget
reconvene look at the veggie
and if dr brown can do a plan and find
you know if he can't
we'll just have to go without that okay
i'll amend that motion to reconvene and
we just need to come up with a date
prior to prior to the 24th
you know i mean if they should decide
that we they want to meet with us we can
adjourn again and reconvene on the 24th
you know if if that's if they want us to
do that
you know so you're saying you would
you would adjourn to reconvene to a date
prior to june 24th prior to june the
board our board we need to go ahead and
get a copy of the budget
have an opportunity to look at it and
then reconvene
to discuss that you know okay
and then at that meeting we could again
adjourn
if if the school board wants us to meet
if they want a joint meeting we could
adjourn then and reconvene on the 24th
with them
even if it was a school board office is
that where they're going to meet
that was where they were going to meet
for the june 24th just to even if this
budget
even if it uh we we could we could do a
school board office okay
because yeah i mean um
i i think that's fine again i think
they'll have to i think they'll have to
call a special called meeting to get
this
approved to send to you all but that we
they can do that and then keep their
june 24th as
as a hope to approve the final budget
well the idea would be
to get a copy of their budget and let's
go ahead and review that prior to our
reconvened meeting
and then if they can get a plan together
on what they're going to spend that
money on that'll be great
we can look at it at a later date and i
do think the superintendent can probably
be
getting that together but he he can't he
doesn't have the authority to submit it
to you so
three days to call the special called
meeting so if you want if you want
even if he wants to call it a draft a
tentative plan or whatever
because they're probably going to go
ahead and go along with whatever he
wants
you know if he wants he wants to make it
put some i guess just to be safe i would
probably
i would probably try to set the meeting
at least not before next wednesday
and that way that if they do want to
meet and take that up
they have time to do that prior to you
all having your meeting
yeah somebody's ready
i'm sorry that's that's what i hate on
that's
that's that's where we've been working
with so just get a little bit of clarity
on it
the board of supervisors will reconvene
to look at the draft budget that was
will be approved
that will be submitted to the board
russell county school board
then we can reconvene after that with
the school board if appropriate yes
if appropriate okay
that is next thursday
okay do we have clarity on that how
that's been
stated you have to we had a book of laws
back here because i want
i'm on a second that but i want to make
sure i'm clear on it is that right
do we have to are you clear on it we
have to have a time yes you do have a
time
yes but i would highly highly encourage
them to meet with us
yeah and at the government center not
that yes that's got to be an emotion too
we're at times
and the date
and you want to approve our budget on
that night on the 17th
no i'm not going to commit to approve it
i'll consider it but i'd like to be able
to see the
factual information first
and ck to me and i mean k has been
looking through the codes to make sure
both boards has had the appropriate
public hearings the
the separation of times the public
notices and that's what we were doing
while y'all were sitting there changing
the dates so
if you reconvene on the 17th that'll
give y'all enough time
if you need to reconvene with
joining the ross county school board if
you don't you can approve the budget
that night
i mean they already should have this
information together you should be able
to get it to us tomorrow couldn't
i no no no we know a lot
i just thought i'd throw it out budget
that
but we need to back up and vote on this
because you've made that so
steve made the motion for us to
reconvene on the 17th at five o'clock
david seconded here to go over what
they're sending us
okay all right uh any further discussion
all right all those in favor anyone
opposed
all right okay
all right now we're moving on madam
chair that concludes the kind of mystery
reports and requests
thank you now matters uh before the
board
tim you have anything no ma'am
what the only thing i guess i want to
say is
we've had a lot of our kids in our
county that's had a lot of success in
castlewood
and home acres and i know we haven't had
the opportunity or availability to
recognize those children
with the success that they've had with
the pandemic and with the sports and
everything but you know maybe
as time goes along madam chair maybe we
can
have some sort of opportunity to back up
and maybe do
some recognition for these student
athletes and a lot of them like the
valedictorians and
uh salutatorians and stuff like that
that's had a lot of success
uh i just wanted to make that known that
you know even through the pandemic
we've had a lot of kids it's really
excelled and done great things in our
county and
it's a shame we been able to get them up
here and recognize them like we
usually did and to show them how much we
do appreciate them and we want them to
stay here live here and
raise their children here in this county
but maybe at a time madam chair we can
get all this behind us and we can have a
special day of recognition to back up
and do that
no ma'am i've created enough havoc
tonight i think i'm good
chris do you have anything sir i had a
call last night but tayden and david
probably know more about this a bridge
at blackford they want to
move to some prop that belongs to john
combs
are you familiar with that yeah we've
already checked into that the old
the old bridge it's full lead i couldn't
understand
the location of the bridge the old one
the old bridge is down there at
hubbard's hole
yeah we about four years ago we looked
into that
and to try to see if there's an
opportunity to get that bridge moved
and what we had found out was in
richmond and we found out
that that bridge has a lot of
contaminated factors you're really not
allowed to mess with it or move it or do
anything to it if that's the one you're
talking about
they said it was a blackfoot and wanted
to be moved to john coleman's property
and i don't know where he has some
popped out i might have to look into it
yeah
i'll get with you and we'll find out
which one it is okay okay
uh the only thing i want to say is i
want to thank the board
for helping me out tonight on the sun
transfer yes i agree steve thank you
david and the whole entire board who
agreed with this that we need to work on
our transfer stations their convenience
centers whatever you're calling these
things because
um this is definitely a needed service
in all of our areas so
thank you very much carl
no madam chair okay and now where
i just need a motion to save it
reconvene we've already got it on the
17th
we've already made it right katie at
five o'clock
okay thank you