good afternoon everyone i would like to
welcome you to the
russell county board of supervisors may
the 19th
2021 at 5 p.m this is a reconvened
meeting
i'd like to first start off with a call
of order and roll kyle
tim lovelace here luanne wallace
here corey here david
here stay braiding here voice christian
here rebecca die here ma'am you have a
quarrel thank you
let us stand for the invocation and
remain standing for the pledge please
bow our hands thank you dear lord for
giving us another day
thank you lord for the blessings that
you've bestowed upon each and every one
of us
help us to look to you for strength and
guidance
to make the decisions that we will be
making for our
county bless each and every one of us
that we do thy will
and thy work to better our county to
help our citizens
in jesus name
of amen and to the republic for which it
stands
one nation under god indivisible
with liberty and justice
all right our first item is the approval
of the agenda
and i believe lonzo handed us an item
that he does want to
add to the agenda this evening it is the
uh position of the enforcement officer
for the
uh tax so if i will
with someone have a motion to amend the
agenda to add this please
all right thank you second
lou and uh we'll add that
under um alonso we'll add that
under um i guess new business
that's fine yes ma'am number two under
new business okay
all right all those in favor of this
amendment uh
anyone opposed all right we'll accept
the
uh mended agenda all right now we will
open the
floor on their public hearing for the
uh russell county fiscal year 21
22 budget and the 22 tax rates
anyone have any comment we'll open the
floor to the public
all right feels
thank you
good afternoon i'm kelly mcbride delf i
direct the russell county public library
and i have
just three brief points i would like to
make with you
if you would turn to page 30 46 or 47
i said 46 but the library's budget may
be on page 47 i think
had that moment of paranoia that i think
that's wrong
but if you look at the second line
salaries and wages part time
and look at the current year and the
previous year
as much as anything at this point that's
a little bit
inexplicable to me the library board of
trustees allocates and spends only the
money that they know to be theirs and
they weren't notified of a cut or
reduction in funds and
i didn't receive a copy of the allocated
budget indicating that to me
so what we have been spending is what is
necessary to maintain what has been the
library schedule for a couple years
so we did request an additional ten
thousand dollars to cover the minimum
wage
increases that are going to be
uh you know another one in january but
truthfully we needed that ten thousand
dollars in addition to
what the budget was last year
not what is presently shown there
the budget that you see
we got a lot of money for instance that
comes in that came in after
mr lester had put the numbers in the
budget so
i don't try to match against that
document
that we get other than making sure that
no invoices are attributed to us that
aren't ours
and that all the ones we sent did in
fact get put onto one of our lines
so
um
my second point would be just um
what cuts to library services and hours
do i need to make if we're going to have
to stay
within that budget that is as proposed
there
because as that is i mean that's
that's significant um
so and i and i asked that because
you know you are a representative of the
public and my third point would be just
the thing that i'm finding difficult is
we start into this minimum wage thing
and i know the county
employees are you're having to look at
that with all the county employees
is that what do i say to those employees
that see
recent hires or staff they supervise get
an increase in wages when they don't
i mean this i mean i do not begrudge the
minimum wage i understand
and particularly we've already had
difficulty in the last five or six years
getting people to
even apply when we have an opening
because our wages are so low you can
work at walmart and make more money
so that compresses and you've got those
folks that have been there
for 15 or 20 years and had experience
when they walked in and
now they have 20 years seniority
and experience in their job and have
worked at it and
been diligent loyal employees who try to
build their skills
and that people who work for them in
three years are going to be making the
same thing they are
so um if you flip to the top
the top of your sheet does have
confidential salary information although
it has been
made anonymous that's basically what i
think
we'll end up spending give or take on
part-time salaries this year what i
expect next year
and based on what the
minimum wage is going to do again in
the following year what we would have to
do and my recommendation is that one
year when
at this point in theory there will be no
minimum wage increase you know it skips
a year it goes every year
it was supposed to be like 18 months and
then a year
and then a year and then skip well there
is going to be a year where i think we
don't get an increase that you should
plan to put
that same amount of money into the
budget to help us
adjust the salaries of those people um
our wages are so low that in january i
have an additional part-time and a
full-time person whose salary will be
adjusted
by law because of the minimum wage
increase
and this is a full-time person with
responsib a lot of responsibilities
um so i just asked you to keep that top
path kind of confidential
um i i will make the hard decisions
if i have to as i have in the past if we
have to cut
services and hours and mostly cutting
hours is how we will have to do it
um and i know the library board will
but at like the library board you
represent the public so we would
ask you to give us guidance on that you
know what is the best
what is the way that you are most
comfortable with us doing that
if we have to cut ours we will but
we've learned that an amazing number of
our people can work effectively from
home in the last 18 months but
that makes it a lot harder to serve the
public from home
so i thank you for hearing me i thank
you for your
efforts because i would not want your
jobs
but please bear this stuff in mind and
thank you
all right is there one anyone else
any other comments from the public
seeing none we'll close the public
hearing on that
and we'll move on to our new business
and alonso will go through
our fiscal 21 22 financial budget
workshop
comments thank you alonso
thank you madam chair
of course this is the second workshop
of the board of supervisors and of
course during the first conversations of
the
uh the budget workshops we had
certain line items that were concerns
that were affecting the county from a
financial perspective
of course during the fy 2122 budget
uh again this is uh during the pandemic
there's been a many impacts as ms
kelly had said there has been you know a
salary increase
of course a minimum wage increase we
have
implemented a cigarette meal tax of
course we've had
impacts at the regional jail because of
separation
we've also had you know uh cost with
education the g3
impact and of course we have looked at
the internal things on cut and cost for
the leche operations and disposal
operations
so as as we go through these um
each one as the salary increase right
now we have been working on since the
beginning of the fifth
calendar year since january on the
salary increase
for the county's employees and that
includes
all the constitution officers schools
and the county employees
we have been looking at a five percent
raise
so with a lot of hours spent you know
trying to work through the numbers
without having to raise taxes at all
um and again i'll go into that here in
just a second
that we have had to look at ways to cut
costs to get
the five percent implemented and
especially during the pandemic has been
a very difficult task
we've had to look at line-ins after line
items so
as we go through each and every one of
these line items
as everyone can see and what i wanted to
point out
the total impact to the county budget
even with the five percent raise
will be on the general funds alone is
about a
seven 1.7 increase so we've implemented
a five percent
solid increase while simultaneously
cutting cost with a total
impact of 1.7 when we add in our special
revenue which is of course
the state and federal
and our enterprise funds we're looking
at a total impact of 1.3 percent to the
budget for the year
but one of the things that we had to do
because of the raises
and the increases in the in the minimum
wage
we had to make sure that we were keeping
within
what we were spending what we're
collecting and what we're spending
and one of the things i want to point
out to you know
the board of supervisors and the general
public
is that for right now the fy 22 the
board of supervisors as far as the real
estate
mobile homes personal property machine
and tool and the merchant tax
will not be raised so the rates that
were set in fy 21
will be the same rates that are in fy 22
and calendar year 22. so to get to that
to those numbers we had to become very
creative
on ways to cut cost the way to implement
it and take a look
while giving the services back to the
russell county citizens
that you know at the same level of
service
so as we go through these and y'all had
an opportunity to look at the board
each one of the the expenditures
and the revenue as you can see there's
been very little movement in as far as
revenue especially during the pandemic
and one of the things that i want to
point out is
the is our real estate
and during that time as far as the first
half
even during the pandemic and even with
the stimulus money
you know work we're right now running
3.82
short this is as of yesterday or day
four yesterday
so if we take those same numbers
and move them to from the first half to
the second half
we're looking at you know a combined you
know if we take both of them combined
we're looking at a six percent drop in
the real estate
so had how we had to take those numbers
to make it up to get
five percent raise while cutting cost of
course
you know there is certain operations
that we're doing well in
the same way as the state virginia you
know the state virginia shut down during
this time
and then they all of a sudden in their
revenue projections came
up with a major surplus well that major
surplus came from the sales tax
everybody was staying home they were
spending their stimulus money or they
were going out to walmart when they
could and what they were ordered so
there were
line items that within the revenue
budgets they went down
and there's line items that went up but
one of the things that we have to
remember
in any county government is the the king
and queen of tax
is your real estate and your personal
property that's number one and
number two respectively so when we see a
draw down
in and based off of last year's
collections
last year russell county collected 99.8
percent
of our revenue on real estate so for
we're in a six percent drop in real
estate
and we were hoping that people during
this time would either set up a plan
you know to pay these or pay it out of
stimulus money
they you know some of them had other
they were either on a fixed income
or they had you know they were taking
the funds and they were paying for their
medical costs
food etc so their needs so right now
even with the planning those are some of
the major
impacts to our budget so
working through this and as you all can
see from the real estate tax the mineral
tax
i have outlined in john's packet for
each one through the public service
taxes through the personal property
as you can see we the ones that have
went down
have somewhat compensate for the ones
that uh the ones that have went up had
somewhat compensated for the ones that
went down
along with our costs that we'll go into
later
so as we move through this you know
again we implemented the cigarette in
the mill tax
when the state virginia first
implemented this
for the counties to be able to implement
these
the legislation during the time you know
they came out with their figures
on of course we could tax
cigarettes you know from loosely snuff
tobacco and vaping
well they carved that portion out to put
it back into the
subcommittees to for consideration next
year so right now the only thing that
the county had
ability to do was to tax the cigarettes
one step at a time process
so then based off of those numbers we
had to recalculate our estimates so we
had to carve out the loose leaf
the snuff and the vaping then
when it started in some of the towns the
town of lebanon which
is doesn't tax cigarettes right now is
actually for consideration
so if the town is taxing their
cigarettes then
we have to carve out that portion also
so
by the time we carve out our cigarette
our
loose leaf our snuff tobacco and our
vaping
and the towns then we're left with
what is only within the county
boundaries within you know 1958
up and down like we discussed during the
previous meeting
as they travel through to the new casino
and again
that's that's about basically what is
coming down to the traveling public this
one
this will not have an impact to russell
county citizens because
the citizens that live within the county
live around
the town of honea or live in the the
around the town of lebanon and saint
paul and
they will go into town to purchase them
we will be picking up a majority of the
15 to 17
000 car per day on 19 and 58 and 80
those will be our customers based off
the mere
the cigarette tax and the mail tax now
the meal tax
is only applicable to you know the
carryout food
you know the hot dogs the pizzas the
restaurants that are not within the
town jurisdictions so that's all that we
can pick up
so between them both is what is where
i'm getting to
is what started off at 600
700 000 level by the time we take out
the towns and the
other tobacco products is not taxable
we're at the 400 000 range on both and
that
is at gross so therefore at gross
even within the program we have to carve
out the enforcement officer which is
right now
y'all just approved to put on the agenda
the second thing is
the way the program on the cigarette
taxes is these stamps you must buy
up front now to the counties and
in the five distributors that we're
dealing with these comes in large
increments either 15 to 30 000
increments so we must invest in this up
front so
automatically we could be in the six
figures
really quick without the first dollar
ever implemented
so there is going to be upfront costs
before we
start to realize a return on investment
so per se so as we walked through these
and again we had to take these into
consideration we have had discussions
with
the state agencies actually department
tax has
has a tobacco unit and i have sent these
numbers to them they have looked at them
they said
mr lester this is based off your
population base
based off of what the apa has stated
based off of what vaco has stated we
would be in this same range too
actually you're being very conservative
when you do this but one of the things
that you
can't do because of the historical basis
we
have not included this into the budget
now the reason we have not included into
the budget because
the board of supervisors by the code of
virginia can only guarantee on your
budget when you approve it
what revenues are guaranteed until we
get a trend which we can do by law
later in the budget we can do
appropriations
on that revenue but until we know what
those numbers are
the code of virginia will not allow us
to put it into the budget
to approve it unless it's estimatable or
concrete based off of historical facts
so
may i interrupt a moment so that could
take more than one year
that's to set a standard correct or not
the this is quote quote unquote coming
from
the tobacco unit out with the state
virginia does
every municipality in the state they
said mr lester
they said for you to get a clear picture
you'll need at least six months of trend
on the first row
to be able to get through it by the time
even at the end it can fluctuate because
of the variances you know within those
outlying issues you're absolutely
correct from six to 12 months
six to 12 months
is there any more questions yes sir
uh i've got a concern one is
i'm definitely against shutting down the
dmv select
and that's a horrible disadvantage for
our citizens in the county
uh when this board got elected we worked
with commissioner revenue
at the time at to help collect taxes
by that stop measure with them
mv select excuse me and now what's
happening
is people's got to call in get an
appointment go to dmv
they got a tax problem they got to come
all the way back out to the treasurer's
office
to get a remedy and
so now we're going to hire an
enforcement position
working within the commission revenues
office to
collect these other additional payments
is this something that
they just say i don't want to do it
anymore they just don't do it anymore
they're under this position because i'm
telling you
uh i feel like my personal feeling i
think somehow someway we really need to
get that dmv select
back in service somehow for the citizens
of the county
because that's one of the reasons we did
it to help collect the taxes
that we was doing it and now we're going
to hire an enforcement person
on another initiative to try to help
collect
taxes in this and that that to me is
uh kind of a black eye
because that i think it hurts us i think
we're going backwards
we need dmv select to be able to so
people can if they got a stop payment on
it they could walk right over to the
treasurer's office they get the remedy
and you know they get it fixed and i
thought it was working really good i
don't understand why we should
am and if it's about making money i
think it's
that's a a very healthy service for the
citizens of our
county to be able to a one-stop shop to
pay the tax and then
you know get their uh initial uh
problems resolved because i'm gonna tell
you i've called dmv and had to get an
appointment
two months out and you go out there to
the dmv
and then they say well we can't issue
you this or that or i've heard people
call well they've called a lot of them
called me said we can't get this for
that because
now we got to go back out to the
treasurer's office and we got to get
that fixed
before and then they got to call back
get another appointment
and i think it's a real disservice to
our citizens not to have that in place
i'd like to fix that
you know because if we're going to do
this and hire another position
to collect these taxes is that going to
be something that
down the road that says well you know we
just decided we didn't want to
do it anymore so we're not going to do
this or keep this service in place
i mean i'm real concerned about it
because i felt like us as a board
put that and worked that out so it would
make it
the ready available to collect the taxes
that need to be paid
i understand the this new position that
you're asking for lonzo is going to be
the
field position that will enforce the
cigarette
and food tax yes sir okay
they will report to the commission
revenue purchase
so this is an additional commissioner
revenue yes and they're going to
administer the program as well
they have to administer they have to
investigate they have to force they have
to work with the distributors
this is this is their job but regardless
of whether or not we can
show a trend or not we're going to start
collecting money when this goes in
i mean there'll be upfront expense but
at the end of the year
we'll be able to write that off and
there'll be you're projecting 400 000
in revenue out of which we'll have to
pay for the stamps and this enforcement
officer
yes sir the dmv select and i've talked
alonzo about this
uh i understood the treasures office was
looking at picking it
up and as i understand it it's not our
call
as far as the dmv office that's the
commissioner's call
that is correct and in the letter that
he sent us he said he was closing it
down
period so you know but and it was
because of
it was not paying for itself as i
understood
but you told me that we're looking in
order to keep it we're talking about
what
fifteen thousand dollars additional a
year if
if we can find a place to put it
as as the commissioner revenue wrote in
his letter to y'all
and that you know i'll let him speak for
himself but i can't speak for the
numbers
um i'm just quoting what you told me in
my office the other day
and that's where i'm going to go to the
right now
those two positions when dmv select
those are county positions
the the county those are paved with the
from the
the board of supervisors those two
positions well those two positions
were actually converted to
constitution officers so that is a
decision of the commissioner of revenues
he
that is a service that he volunteered to
do and
some of them around the state have also
you know
stopped doing it during the pandemic too
because it got it
but i can't speak beforehand that
pre-pandemic that if you have two
part-time positions in you barely are
meeting the cost
and y'all got to remember this as a
state service so you know
it does help us in the collections but
what you got to remember
is it what you're paying on the v stops
is it collecting what you're paying out
in cost well you should know that
yeah and and and that's what we got so
if you're paying for two part time which
is equivalent
is with the part-time was it paying for
itself i mean
it was not with collections it wasn't it
was not not pre
now during the pandemic when we was uh
one of the at first we were the only dmv
that was currently open in the state
believe it or not
we were and that included the dmvs and
the dmv
selects there was only we were one of
the first ones to open up
we got people from other states other
counties they were coming from
everywhere i mean different i mean they
were coming in
and they still are coming in we're
coming in until the end
so even at that end even on the high end
you're the collecting even with the high
volume of traffic
because what you got to remember is and
and
again i can't speak for the commissioner
revenue he had reached out to the dmv
see the dmv selects do not get to do
the premium services what they are paid
for
is the things that the state dmv does
not want to do because of the volume it
is
they they want the big ticket items so
they rest out to see if they could get
those additional services and of course
dmv for the state will not give those up
so the only thing that we were doing is
giving tags by the thousands
while the state of virginia the dmv in
the county
was taking appointments just like you
said every 15 million increments
we were running 250 a day
through that are you not charging those
people
that come in i'm sorry tim
tim was just kind of hatching yeah
between herself
i mean they do but it's a fraction you
don't get
everything you collect you get to give
the state their portion
not just on the tags which is a very low
reimbursement
you don't both of them for the whole
time
during the year you might have made 48
to 50 000
that's it pre-pandemic i figured it
helped us tremendously with the
collection process because of the
convenience of it
it is but you got to rem one of the
things that i've seen in the trend
analysis
on the collections is this the ones that
are on v-stop are not your big taxpayers
so you're spending 50 000 in
in personnel dmv of richmond is not
reimbursing you at the maximum amount
you're making that you're not making
enough back to get the employees
if you're hiring that for the v stop
which is going to happen anyway out here
because it will stop and they will have
to come
the
it would have been nice to have this
information prior to knowing
that it was going to be shut down or
closed because i'm going to tell you
something
this is elected board i don't know if
the rest of y'all was getting calls
i was getting overwhelmed with phone
calls with wanting an explanation of why
well we didn't know why and again that
is a
an elective of the commissioner revenue
so that
that as a constitution officer
has has treasure done her analysis is
she still considering it
if the the treasurer had talked had
discussions with me
but based off the volume of what it is
right now
currently during the pandemic to pick up
the load you would have to have four
people
that not just the two the 50 to break
even you would have to have four
to be able to carry the volume and also
you got to have the upfront training
now that's her numbers and and that's
what randy had done
is is that based on the numbers that
we've been seeing during the pandemic
yes sir
and what i had been doing with this
because we were the first dmv
to open up we were compensating
you know out of the board of supervisors
during that time for
those four positions part time the
volume
even with a high volume even if you look
at
what was collected i think and i can
pull it up here in a minute i think it's
82 000 you were getting during
the most heaviest volume of all
but again the point is it is a
state it it it is a state service
are we subsidizing the state service
like the regional jail
you know y'all know the figures on land
too so
what how much how much benefit are we
getting
out does the v stop because
your major pact tax taxpayers that 3.8
percent
is not your primary residence it's not
the ones that own property have
businesses
are doing what they are required as
citizens of russell county
so again it's it's
if there was money that was to be made
in it as much as we've cut
then if it was an opportunity we would
definitely be
you know be considering it but when you
get into that cost that kind of training
it it the numbers just don't work if
that's what you're at okay okay
if that's the case could you provide us
with those numbers
i can sir i think we need to have that
so that we have a response to the
citizenship because they consider it a
service just like a
trash service
yeah i and i understand
but again you know it's like the vision
of motor vehicles
i understand you know it
in in again if we look at
all the services that we're already
providing to stay how much
do we see as the board of supervisors
that's being pushed down
from the state level to the local level
to keep up
the volume you know in in the
enforcement so we got regional jails and
other services so
so it would take four people to pick up
and do what
they're doing now that's during the
pandemic because right now hopefully is
winding down you'll drop back down to
two but again
even at the two level you're you're
barely breaking even because the
reimbursement is nil to none
well i mean from a budgetary perspective
it'd be nice to know these things up
front
prior to shutting something down and
just saying well you know we're just
going to cut it out we don't have
another plan
we don't have another option or if not
the board of supervisors even in the
budget discussions
might have a different idea of what we
need to do to provide these additional
services to the citizens of the county i
mean
you know just uh cut and dry and then
our phone's ringing off the hook that's
not a good idea
it's just coming from me personally but
i don't like the way it's been handled
and i'm just going to tell you i think
if you could run the numbers and show us
this is
this is it this is factual and you know
you're going to lose this much money by
providing this
really great service to the citizens of
the county give us something to show
one of the things you also got to
remember is it is a constitution
uh that's well no it is not it's not
only a cons
no it's not if the treasurer's willing
to take it up it's not just a
constitutional
office i know but it's a remedy
i mean there could be a remedy for it's
what i'm saying if she's willing to do
it i've talked to her yeah
and what you've got to remember is too
constitutional officers cannot perform
these
duties so whatever the board of
supervisors decides is
her constitution officers are sitting in
there right now
can not perform these duties and ain't
that strange
you her constitution officers that are
paid by the state
cannot perform a state job well you're
just saying we'd have to hire additional
you have to hire
the same thing randy under yes under the
under the budget well let me ask you
this can a constitutional
office perform this duty
is that enforcement no it's a local tax
no
i an employee since that's been cut out
you you kept the same additional
employees
one of those employees couldn't be an
enforcement officer they could be
they could but they have to apply for it
this is a local
it's uh it's the case the county's i'm
just asking
nobody's losing their job no what you
got to remember there was two
in there that became constitution
officers so
during that time two of those county
positions got converted
to constitution positions i understand
that but i mean
those two positions that became
constitutional positions
could they do this one time if they
applied if they if you're a
constitutional position you cannot do
you can't do this
well
are you saying that uh these people have
been doing this
selective service for dmv
was county employees yes sir and
and they came in and they work in the
randy's office i understand
to me i've heard a lot of good comments
how good a job they were doing how many
people
are waiting on there because you go off
the other place like david said
it was a nightmare of trying to get
anything accomplished out there i've
been out there
a long time myself for the last probably
three years
so uh if we can if we could do something
to keep this service
to the people uh i think it would be
well appreciated by the public and and
it probably would but
back to the type of clientele and this
is
this is what they're saying you know as
each one of y'all walked into the
building
the lines were very long one number two
is some of the customers were not so
we're not worried about the uh or
concerned about the b stop because
they are not russell county citizens one
you know they were coming from multiple
states
number two is some of the legalities
that we got it we
even had ones that showed with false
titles
false you know cars they ended up being
with they had to stay police had to be
contacted etc
there's things that are going through
here during this time
when you have a dmv open that they were
trying to move things through
not just of high volume to multiple
counties but you had also legal
issues that you were doing and they
would get very upset
this was just part of the doing the
business during the pandemic
but again if you go back you run the
numbers on the number
the two part time versus what you're
going to be collecting versus the v
stops i mean it's it's again a state
service
i'd like to see us send a letter to our
house the delegate members and our
senators to see if they could review
this is a great service they did a
wonderful job i agree with thor's i mean
no wonder everybody want to come to it
yes they did i mean they did a
wonderful service how much you've done
in 15 minutes
and not went through all the heat and
aggravation you have to go through and
which they're they've got a little bit
better out there but i mean
if this could be looked at as far as
dividing the fees or giving more money
to the localities maybe more counties
want to do this because it's such a
great
service for the citizens and i think we
were to send them a letter
and see if there's a way that they could
up the ante a little bit financially
to provide this one-stop shop you know
and if they want to keep the gravy maybe
they were to redistribute some of it
down here because they can see
how good the services work on the local
level
than it did at a local dmv i had people
say they had to drive all the way to
bristol get help
yes and we do too and and again
the the the commissioner revenue like
you said they did a great job during
that time
but the commission revenue also
contacted the division of motor vehicles
we're going to have to have you know the
better we can provide the additional
services
but those are the not the ones that are
highly reimbursed
they didn't want to do the you know the
big ones that has
you know the large tractor trailers etc
you know the big
the big numbers we got tags
50 dollars at a time i mean multiple no
it was just high volume high volume high
volume and the reimbursement even on the
end it was nil to none
by the time and this is just at the
counters we had to implement four
windows
at that time just to serve those 250-300
customers are coming through
per day that was not counting the
constitution officers which should not
be in performing the multiple phone
calls in the back room
that because all dmvs were closed
during that time were having the answer
so he was using
all of his staff just to trying to work
the dm
the and again i don't want to speak to
work the dmv
operations on during this time but again
if you go pre-pandemic
you had two you might have if you run
the salaries between what you're playing
two part-time especially with the raise
in the part-time hour
based off of what you stu your your
services cost
based off of what v stops we're
collecting it you're not
you're providing a state service if you
had all that written out and an
explanation to the house of delegates
and senators to say look
this is what it did it was able to help
collect taxes he was able to do these
things and
it was a very good convenient service
for our citizens
and we would like for you to take a look
at it and see you know
what could you do in a piece of
legislation to make them up the ante and
pay
us more for the services that we did not
just cut it out but see if they would be
if they say no we're not going to do it
we're not going to help you any more
than that
then you can let it go but if that's
what it is it's just four is the money
side of it but i'm like tim and tim was
talking i mean you
you know if you're telling steve it's
ten thousand dollars
uh and that's the number that you told
him i mean
i think there's ways in the budget you
know to be able to maybe
pull something it comes down to decision
are we willing to pay that additional
money to provide a service
yeah and i was curious just how much you
know that the locality got
per transaction and you said it's just
is that it's a percentile yes of it yes
and i i can get out when i get that it's
not one of the things
if you decide to do a letter to to the
legislators
if you decide to do a letter to the
legislators probably the best thing
would be to start off
is to inform the legislators get the
dmvs open because
again the volume would if if you
remember pre-pandemic
those numbers we didn't have anybody at
the counters it was a low volume
we didn't have any long lines if the dmv
gets back to the services they're
required to provide
that they're getting compensated for
then we would not be having this
issue legislators need to get the dmvs
open well let's send a letter to them
and
encourage them to do it so while we're
talking about
um money unfunded
mandates that's that's exactly
so while we're talking about that so
let's talk about garbage
let's talk about water let's talk about
other things
we cannot select what we want to select
here
so i understand what you all are saying
but
we just need to move on and try to do
the best we can but if you're going to
send a letter to the legislature
why don't we work on the other unfounded
unfunded mandates that we have to do
like our schools and everything else
that is taking our tax dollars
our local tax dollars
that's a good point there's a lot of
services there but you are going to
provide us with that cost information
yes okay i will do that
any more questions
again back to the cigarette and the meal
tax
what was implemented i would love to
counting like i said i have talked with
the state funding agencies you know the
state bond councils i've talked to the
secret agent units
until we get a historical trend
something that we can put in
you know into the the general fund that
shows a trend
then by lyle you all cannot you know
include this into the budget as a number
and and run
operations off of it so way we design
the budget
is based off of no raising no taxes
what we are collecting now based off the
clint that our collection rates which
has had dropped
especially in the real estate which if i
take
as you all seen before i'm looking at a
hundred and forty fifty thousand dollars
off the first half
if i project that into the second half
i'm looking at a three hundred thousand
dollar short file
so during that time we had to make keep
the
budget at level funding even with the
increased cost and that's hard
we're gonna have to look at ways to do
this and you know live within our means
which all have done while raising
the salaries of five percent also
another
things that we have done for the county
employees so that it's mentioned and
and is and tim and steve they said in
you know
in these meetings we increased the
employees health care
we took it from 70 30 back to 80 20. we
also dropped the out-of-pocket max from
2450 to 1750
we have worked on other things and that
is as is equivalent to raises
that i mean we are providing the
services
and and later when we get into the leche
and the disposal
as lou had mentioned the trash and the
rest we have looked
at ways of cutting this to make these
numbers work and work efficiently
uh if if there's a way that we can make
money and do a service
you know i'd be the first one in line
you know to raise my hand
so meal tax okay noun
is the g3 of course the education has
been mentioned before
this is on uh as everyone knows the ross
county board of supervisors provide for
the race program
that is every by every every
student that attends russell county
schools during their last senior year
can attend southwest virginia community
college for free for the first two years
now the state of virginia has also
implemented
the g3 program that has an impact on the
county tuition programs
now this program is applicable to
the blue collar ones not just this gives
opportunities for the ones that want to
go into professional
careers but this and also gives the ones
to the ones that's needed right now they
would
actually is paying very high salaries
especially your hvc your electricians
and your tradesmen the blue collar this
is a great opportunity for our kids we
are working with
the colleges and the schools to
implement this
so we will be proceeding on this and
hopefully we'll have a savings
from this on what the state is picking
up through their g3 programs too
on that there was some language that dr
wright recommended we put into the
race program
we did propose to add that the race
program will cover students who are not
eligible for
yeah g3 funds yeah yes yes that's what's
doc doctor
so that's that's going to go we're going
to go ahead and add that yes that's all
we're going to implement yes sir
so back to the uh no
increases in tax and let's say let me
get back to the first page
so we went through the salary increases
the minimum wage cigarette and meal tax
of course the regional jail is next
as everyone knows the board of
supervisors in january
did a resolution for agreement for
consolidation
and restructuring of our
co-share of the regional jail and
one of the things that
with the low interest rate cost and of
course
the board of supervisors and working
with the courts
a lot of the uh people that go through
it are working in the community aware
program
and you know just just to tell you you
know how
how we came up with the biggest portion
of our raises was taken out of this line
item
this what we have reduced in jail cost
and in restructuring debt
along with the reduction in uh
our other costs this was one of the
biggest cost savings
of course i just went through the g3
impact
and the only two lineums left
is the uh leche operations in the in the
disposal operations
it's always you know it's uh either the
the canneries or the the trash or
the the animal shelters so again i want
i'd like to introduce
i have brung brian ferguson he is our
disposal manager
and brad patton he is our sewer
treatment
operator manager to go through
to explain to you what we're trying to
do for cost savings and operations on
the led chain disposal side so gentlemen
welcome and let me have time to pull you
up
all right we're going to talk about the
leachate and i just got some general
information to sort of start so
everybody can understand what liche
is and where it comes from and why we
have to handle it
uh the la we got a landfill it was
closed several years ago
it's located on century farm road
outside of lebanon
there's two tracks of land there's 96
acres and a 31 acre track
two permits permit 258 and 515.
on m2 tracks we've got nine and a half
acres it's waist
and then the other one is six and a
quarter acres and it's also that's where
current transfer station is located in
between
on a permit number 258 it uh
it began in 1978 in october and they
seized operations in 92
they estimated to be around 338
000 tons buried there and
they was it was closed the activities
were completed in 97.
on 515 it began in 87
and went through 94. and there's
estimated to be around 188
368 tons buried there and the
closer activities on that landfill was
in 2003.
per our deq closure plan
maintaining these we have to follow
guidelines
we got to do quarterly inspections i go
down or somebody we
drive out on the landfill we check for
make sure there ain't no cattle getting
on fences are good
uh the gates are locked if there's any
seepages
we've got to mow it twice a year we've
got to keep it maintained keep all the
trees cut off
and you know keep it clean we also have
to maintain the lychee collection system
and make sure there ain't no surface
water along that line
we also have to have groundwater
monitoring which draper
does that and they report semi-annually
then they have to report to the eq we've
requested to terminate some of those
we just have to go through the process
with deq to terminate some of the
testing which will save us some money in
the long run
uh it's just getting their blessing to
do it and then we also have to maintain
financial assurance and that we're
we've got the money to maintain it and
also we have to pay
the deq annual fee every year and also
last i think it's last year we closed
the gas monitoring
we we closed all that that was part of
our deal with them
to close all the monitoring areas on
that
as far as the leachate collection system
that's what we're mainly here to talk
about
we have to do a pump and haul record the
volumes and daily logs
they also require us to maintain the
integrity of the system
any chase seeps that we come across we
have to repair
uh there's been a few in the past i i
haven't had to do any since i've been
but i know in years past they've had to
go in and repair them
and then we only have to only have to
test the lychee as required by the
treatment plant
uh for the parameters
everybody you might know what is
leachate
well leachate it comes from all the
trash it's uh
as water goes through the trash it
produces what they call leachate
and they've got like systems that's got
a
sort of like a septic fill bed against
simplest way to put except reverse
it collects all the water and takes it
into big concrete tanks
we have to maintain those tanks make
sure it's all captured none of them
getting away
from the area
to um i get put on some volumes of
what we collect it depends on the year
if it's a wet year
we're gonna have a lot of water if it's
a dry year we ain't gonna have much
water and
it just varies i mean as you can see
we've gone from 2016
1.3 million to last year was 2.2
and this year we've already done 572
000.
so we've averaged probably 1.9 million
gallons
which gives you a daily average of 5 000
gallons a day they both produce
currently we have contracted
with pump and hall to uh collins
they collected every they do all the
pump make sure the tanks don't overflow
and they haul it to the wastewater
treatment plant currently it's costing
us a hundred thousand
two hundred dollars a year to do that
for them to provide that service it
don't matter if it's a dry year
he's coming out good it don't matter if
it's a wet year
you know he's hauling more so it just it
balances out i mean that's the fee he
gets no matter what
uh the wastewater treatment plant we're
currently taking it to lebanon
and they're charging us five cents a
gallon to treat it
last year's cost was 112 000 is what it
cost us to run it through their
treatment plant
uh our current storage you know like say
we had
concrete tanks that are underground
we've got six different collection
points
there's a three on two permit 258
and there's one on 515 and we also have
to collect the leachate
from the transfer station where we wash
the floors down and any leachate comes
off
we're looking to increase our storage
and uh
to provide maybe right now we've got a
total of 30 000
gallons and we're looking to increase
80s
a little over 80 000 to sort of help us
to control the leachate
currently what we're looking at doing is
purchasing another roloff truck
and we're going to get us a roloff
vacuum pump and some vacuum tanks
the reason i want to go with the roloff
truck is before we do the rotation
program we keep the trucks rotated
it's really come out a lot as far as our
maintenance
currently if you base it on a five-year
payment
we're paying 470 dollars for the truck
based on our rotation now if we finance
the truck kept it five years
it would cost us 2 600 a month for that
truck
but this way we keep it under warranty
and we always have a new truck and don't
have to worry about as many breakdowns
as we would
with a used one and alternatively with
the roloff truck i'm looking
is to be able to haul trash when we're
not pumping leachate
or times that we have a truck down or
hot
years of high volume like during
christmas
or holidays etc
or pandemics yeah
i'm gonna let brad talk about the
wastewater treatment plant
basically alonso made a request that we
look about processing the leachate
through the daint treatment facility
which is
i guess jointly owned with the board of
supervisors and now the russell county
psa
the plaint's 125 000 gallon plane a day
we're only currently we're running less
than 50 percent with the volume
of waste water coming from the community
of daint
so we definitely have the capacity
we created or i created a
a pilot study program and presented it
to the eq to
basically get their blessing to try to
process the leachate through the dank
facility
they agreed to give us a three-month
trial run to look at it
we had to increase our permit testing to
three times a week
and agreed to do a metal analysis
because of the
unknown components within the leachate
and of course
you know the daint plank discharges into
loot creek which is just a few miles
from
the clinch river which we all know the
diverse ecosystem
that's involved with that so basically
we've been at it since the first of may
we're not seeing any kind of problems or
anything you know at the current time
we've been processing varies according
the last
few weeks here anywhere neighborhood of
10 roughly
i guess on average about 10 000 gallons
a week
which is you know basically saving about
five hundred dollars a week
as you know the processing with the town
of lebanon
but i think with the
with the items that brian's working on
to get in place with the storage tanks
and things like that it'll give us
a greater ability to handle the volume
and hopefully this will turn out to be a
permanent thing and
you know it'll pass on some savings to
the citizens of russell county by being
able to process it
through our plane the plane of dane
also i've done a cost comparison here to
give you an idea
currently you know it's costing us 212
000 a year
uh to take it with the contractor and to
the lebanon treatment plan
if we go we've projected run the numbers
and uh buying a truck full-time employee
and getting equipment we should be able
to haul it for 67 000
because we're going to be able to haul
more loads and
if we get all this in place with the
storage we'll control the leachate it
won't control as far as overtime or
anything of that that's one of our goals
and uh taking it to the waste treatment
plant
our cost is going to be way down uh
we're as we go through the study we're
learning more but we think we're going
to get it down to 22 000
is what we're looking at and we're
conservative on that number
so that gives you a projective savings
121 000
hopefully so and then
as far as our goals we're going to keep
working towards
eventually we want to eliminate the hall
i'd love to
but we just got to find out an
alternative way to treat it if we could
treat it on site
you know it's going to save a lot but
over the last five years i've been
researching it
wetlands you get into deq standards
there's a lot of standards
but there might be a possibility to do
on-site treatment
me and brad's talked about doing some
treatment before we take it to the
treatment plant
to make it easier on them whatever we
can do
to make the process work better
like i say you know if we can increase
your storage
and just keep cutting our costs on the
hall i
you know look at an irrigation
evaporation different alternatives
is what we're hoping to look for and
possibly maybe
taking some of the trash out and said
doing away with it completely
so we don't have to be done with it me
i'd love to dig all of it up
get rid of it all but i understand the
process
so so i guess with that does anybody get
any questions or
i don't know i do and i know enough to
be dangerous so
bear with me um on ammonia
uh are you all are you all using uh the
the dilution at on-site
no for that to evaporate no all we're
doing is pumping and haul
i'll let brad talk on that part as far
as the we're currently monitoring
ammonia at the plane and what we
discharge
and our ammonia is well within our
permit limits we're
our limit varies to the seasons i think
top of my head i want to think it's like
a 12 milligrams per liter in the winter
maybe a seven in the summer most of the
time we're less than one
at the dang plane among and we still
have a lot of capacity things as far as
what the
removal of ammonia comes from the
biological activity within our aeration
tanks
and basically with the amount of time in
which we can hold the
waste water we can do a lot more into
the nitrification process
and we really have some room there if we
need to that we could improve our
ammonia removals but we're
well within our limits you're one of the
few that are lucky to do that
well the damp claim was designed it's a
sequencing batch reactor
and it has the ability actually we can
it's just
i guess leaves a small footprint and
it's actually computerized controlled we
so it gives us
ability that we can actually hold things
a little longer as far as like
a conventional plant what flows in you
know
10 gallons flows in 10 gallons flows out
the system at daint it's a little more
complex it's controlled by plc
and basically we can take in we can take
in
100 000 gallons hold it as long as we
want to
as long as we have the capacity within
the system to hold it
then we can discharge it so you know
like right now
even with brian's flow we're only
running about 25 000 gallons a day 30
and our planks designed for 125 000 a
day so we have a lot of ability to
really
really work on that and keep promoting
all of our standards
that's interesting even even with the
state's reduction
in allowance of ammonia that's that's
really interesting to know that
the epa is actually coming down and
setting those ammonia standards
that's epa's passing down down to deq
that a lot of
some of the older conventional planes
that don't have the
a lot of the biological abilities or has
not had an upgrade
that we're going to probably end up
having problems with that but i
think shouldn't be an issue
we're monitoring it we was well below
the groundwater standards even with the
leachate from the landfill
yeah and i we actually just pulled the
heavy metal samples
of the discharge from the plant last
week but
actually with what the amount that we're
taking
in from the leachate i guess it's been
there so long and
nature has kind of worked its course and
we know we did when the day plant went
online i was actually
an employee there back 20 years ago
and we did try the lead shave jim
gillespie
you know it was we did try it and it
wiped us out because the leachate was so
strong with the volume that we had
but years later the leachate
the natural occurrence has happened and
the leachate's not near as strong
characteristics have had you know
so it seems to be working well right now
trying to understand there was one cell
up there that you might be able to just
haul out and eliminate all together yeah
and reduce the volume of leachate yeah
and i know we've talked with deq and i
think alonzo has contacted dmemes who we
actually got to go through
and you know that might be alternative
to actually take it and send it to the
landfill
cheaper than hauling the leachate over
time because the leachate we're going to
be dealing with
way i look at it from now on i mean it's
ours
we're stuck with it yeah so i mean
you're basically
with engineer fees and everything i mean
you're talking 250 300
000 currently what we're paying a year
and you take over 10 years that adds up
to a lot of money
so anything we could do to cut costs
any other questions thank you all
appreciate you so much
thank you
just just to add to
what brian and brad had emphasized
and that's the way we have been
progressing in our planning
the landfill is long-term if we
we take out the sections that were
temporary that we can excavate out and
reduce up to 250 000 gallons per day
and also we have got a dhcd grant in to
go in from
daint to saint paul this plant
of course right now you know we've got
we're still low on it so this revenue
will help pay for the
remaining payments on this as long as
we're due compliant
then we're even looking at maybe longer
as
as part of the permit and part of the eq
and brad and brian will
tell you we have we have upgraded this
plant
to where it is permitted for deq for
not just the leche but for the daint
sewer treatment plant that's going
into liquid so in that capacity and all
these upgrades we have made it as clean
as clean as can get
from an environmental perspective but
also after this plant is done
and everything is in place for the you
know for the
uh saint paul project we
are also looking in conversation and
talked to deq
of of course the control panels and brad
and brian can
emphasize on this is maybe take the plan
out and move it to the landfill
because our control panels and the
equipment is still in good enough shape
to where we could actually move
on site and take that out and just have
the rest of the just to treat it on site
so one of the control panels and and
what's a sitting on site
is there and let the leche just proceed
on to saint paul
and that takes all of the treatment out
or any environmental issue because
who knows down the road what the
environmental is going to do they may
change their
their specifications which they do often
so
let's just get it to where it's at maybe
in the long term but this is step one in
the process
so
and and in the meantime as as part of
deq's
uh protocols and insurance that
with us treating it there we're not
going to alleviate
the the town of lebanon as as as to
treat either
that way if something happens at the
plant we are also in conversations with
town of saint paul to be able to put it
to be able to treat it either plant if
something goes down at our plant or if
we have an abundance amount that we
cannot handle
dq will want to see that in our
contingency plan
so we're going to set these up to take
us up one step at a time to where
we long term this is a landfill and it's
owned by the board of supervisors so
we will be treated with your great great
great grandchildren hopefully
so that being said uh is there any
questions
any questions
i think that's it thank you brian thank
you brad it was a great excellent job
now let me
get back to the budget
again that was we went through the
salary increases the
wages the cigarette mill tax the
regional jail again
what you have seen from the cost savings
from
these operations that you're seeing
along with what we have restructured
with the regional jail and the other
components
and other departments have done cuts we
have been able to
without raising taxes implement the five
percent raise that's what you know the
state virginia and everyone else got and
proceed on with no impact to the
taxation
so i have included
the projected budget i have included the
general ledgers
as as reflection on these and
if i have any more questions concerning
any other issue on the budget or
impact of the financials or let jay or
as far as your projected salaries
do you take into consideration the
minimum wage change
in january 22.
the one in january of 2022 yes
yes so it's in there yes and
you know with that said i i think that
kelly did bring up a legitimate
issue that we need to look at is you
know how that
you know if you have salaried people
that are
at a certain level and the minimum wage
is
changing so that the hourly people
in essence could be more than the salary
and i understand you know the part-time
people don't get benefits and salary
people do get benefits but
i think it's something you we need to be
looking at right now
because you know there's another one in
january of 23 it jumps up another dollar
to 12. and then january of 25 it goes to
13.50
well and and
and and just to add to you know those
are considerations but hopefully
of course you know we're in the pandemic
that the businesses get back
open our jobs will become more open so
therefore
our real estate will get back to normal
yeah right now this is trying to get us
over the hump i understand that but i
think it's just something you need to be
looking at
on all these hourly people as to what
kind of
impact that has and we're just we're
going to have to do it
you know and how it how that
sour increase affects the salaried
people
you know we may we need a plan as david
says
to how we're going to address that issue
if it's an issue i think we need to find
out if it's a real issue first
and then if it is an issue if all of a
sudden the
hourly people are jacked up above the
you know
then we're we're probably going to look
at some sort of adjustment on the salary
people
you know just we just need to know that
in advance and
have some sort of plan as to how to
address that the um
the first wave as everyone knows the
9.50 went into effect on may the 1st and
of course me and vicki you know we had
to actually had this conversation this
morning
when it will start really hitting our
budget and the impact on these
other positions that our county will be
the january move
you see because our our employees right
now they're
they're some of the well the less
you know right now we are the we operate
within means than any other county
even including half our positions that
we operate you know efficiently and and
like some of them have not been raised
i've you know that's and it's going to
be
something that we'll have to fix but we
have to we'll
the impact one will be the the january
impact
that's like i was telling well talking
to tim steve here i mean as far as you
need a long term plan
i mean you still got debt service and
like if you owe 200 000 on the
dancer plan you're going to save 100 and
some thousand
you pay extra on the principal just to
get that going out your way off your
debt service payments to where you have
that extra
monies or flexibility to be able to make
those adjustments for these salaries
and additional repairs or truck costs
and i want to commend these guys
that's a huge savings to be able to do
that and take on that responsibility
and you know and and what brian's done
with the trucks and being able to buy
those vehicles i'll say it again i've
said it numerous times
i told him i was going to have to take
him car shopping i don't know how you do
that
and be able to save that kind of money
and buy and just have a new vehicle
coming in all the time but
i commend you for that but i think a
long-term plan is
needed i mean just to see that not only
the econom
economic impact but if you can save it
over here you might want to re-establish
it somewhere over here
to be able to adjust on those numbers
and salary employees and
part-time and full-time
right and so the next thing you need to
discuss is our
[Music]
enforcement officer that will be working
with
the meal and cigarette tax yes ma'am
of course i i need a um this was added
to the agenda
for the excise enforcement officer they
will be within the
commission revenues office for they will
be
overseeing the meal and tobacco taxes
program to ensure that we're enforcement
by the ordinance
by the code of virginia i need a motion
to proceed with advertisement of the
excise tax enforcement office or
for the commissioner revenue okay
do we have a motion to advertise for
this enforcement officer
i'll make it all right thank you david
do we have a second
lou any discussion
all those in favor anyone opposed
all right move on with that ma'am that
concludes the county administrators
reports if
any uh and uh on the financial budget
in taxes is there any more questions
or comments all right david with that
you were talking about our
plan i know that we have been uh alonso
has been discussing with the
psa the consolidation where
we have three years of deferred payments
we're going to take those and all that
money that
we're saving there will be to pay off
some of these loans that we
the board of supervisors are responsible
for and
i think the psa is doing the same thing
well
vra had intended those monies for them
to set aside to
work build a reserve so i wouldn't take
much of it
you know because that that's
what vra's intention was let them try to
get healthy
and build up a reserve so that they can
do some of this replacement work and
such
i've got one more thing alonzo i'm gonna
bring it up since i guess this
is addressed to you as far as i've had
many calls from
school board people that's on the school
board as far as
uh wanting their and i know one of the
school board members have brought it up
wanting to make an adjustment on
salaries and
what i would like to do is kind of look
at it or send a letter over there to the
school board
uh for a short and long term plan
as far as the adjustments of these wages
between
you know and the reason i think this
needs to be addressed it's another can
that's been kicked down the road for
years
we got elected when i got elected that's
all i heard is
the salaries in the county and we're the
lowest paid
between washington county and wise
county and buchanan county dickinson
county tazewell county i've had phone
calls from administrative people
we've had great discussions i've had
calls from teachers had great
discussions
and i don't think it needs to be a
negative issue i just think it needs to
be an issue that
needs to be talked about and there's
going to have to be a long-term plan
from a budgetary perspective to see how
we fix this how do we how are we going
to ever be competitive
whenever other counties given a 5
increase
and we're given a 5 increase there's no
way
that we can ever and i'm a very
competitive guy just like
about everybody in this room is very
competitive and you don't like going
backwards you don't like to lose
and i think there's gonna have to be a
time
to world we request something from the
school board as far as working with the
county
they say well you know they get their
pile of money we get our pile of money
to me it's all one money it's it's
brussels county funds
and i think that we're going to have to
really look at this deeply
and ask them to
show us a plan how do you fix it bring
some
administrative people in bring some
people in from the school system
mathematicians or algebra teachers and
let's sit down and try to figure this
thing out because
if we we we have been very blessed to do
what we did in giving raises but you'll
never catch up
there's no way we'll ever catch up and
be competitive now if you want people to
come here live here work here and stay
here
we have got to get that thing fixed and
it's got to get fixed somehow
someway we need to look at ways to be
able to
either cut or either work it into a
budgetary or pay off debt services
to be able to fix these allocations of
salaries
that need to be addressed so we can be
competitive with these other counties i
mean
we're losing we lost three to three this
year in castlewood
went to wise and we were losing
teachers and all these other people
that's going to these other counties
because they can make 10
000 more than a year i just want us
to focus on how to fix that a long-term
plan
how do we get there and i know me and
steve worked on a matrix plan in our
first year we got elected
and presented it to him and they you
know
i i agree with david you know as long as
we do the state recommended and
everybody else does
if their salaries are higher they're
five percent higher than our five
percent
so the gap just keeps getting wider and
wider as we move along
and what i would like to see is how our
positions in russell county
administrative
principals assistant principals teachers
custodians
cafeteria workers how we stack up
against
the state average i think that would be
a good tale right there
and and see where we need to concentrate
but it's something that has to be done
to the school board
we don't you know the school board is
going to have to do it and i would
you know i think we just need to write a
letter and ask them if they can take
a look at that you know and let's let's
analyze the problem and see
how we might be able to attack it some
way we don't know right now but
you know i agree with david you know
five percent of washington county's
is gonna be much more than five percent
of russell county so
the gap between russell and and
washington just keeps getting bigger and
bigger and bigger you know the more we
go
so we need we need to to do i don't want
to kick that can down the road anymore
you know we've
found enough of those have been kicked
down the road and we've had to address
them so
this is a big one you know and this goes
for our county employees too
and our part-time people we know we're
going to be forced by the state into
higher minimum wage
levels but this thing should have been
fixed years ago it's not
i mean you know we're just dealing with
a lot of things that we got handed but
i'm serious about this we need to send
them a letter
and and look at a serious plan 5
10 15 year plan i don't think it's
anything that's going to be fixed
overnight it can't be
but it's going to have to be addressed i
mean
we need to be competitive we've got 11
new industries in this county
good lord's blessed us we've done a lot
of good things and
uh brought a lot of good paying jobs in
here and
you know whether you lose one or two or
you gain three or four or whatever we
need to do but
to me that's the largest industry we
have in our county is our school
systems and we got great teachers we got
great administrative people
great staff and i think we need to
justify them by being able to fix this
issue however whatever it takes just put
a plan together
we even made a mention to hire an
outside independent
somebody come in and look at it do an
evaluation how to fix it
didn't we
i would like to say this so i said it's
not the bottom line
and the amount of revenue that each
county gets is
has something to do with how much money
they can pay these
school employees and county employees
you know you've got some of these
counties that's got the coal money
coming in we don't have much of that so
i would think the bottom line one of the
factors would be
how much revenue that we've got coming
in that we can put
to those sources
you're you're absolutely correct mystery
cursing yes
it's the revenue and i would like to do
a whole lot of things if i had the money
i've told my wife time time again i'd
like to fix up all these antique
homes run down home i don't have the
money to i love to do it
but the money's got to be done if we
don't have the revenue here in russell
county
to do that then that could be one reason
why we have fallen behind
well hopefully we're going to generate
some more revenue we've got several
industries that are
just sort of hanging out there and i
just feel like i've said this for the
last two years we're about ready to turn
the corner
i hope that corner gets here quick but
you know we have to look at the problem
and we have to see if there is a
solution we may find there's not a
solution to it i don't know but we need
to
we need to figure out have the
information available in front of us to
see what the problem is
and then try to work on some solutions
you know
wars is right you know if we don't have
the money we don't have the money but
you know
we we need to look at it we just can't
you know put it on the back burner and
say well that'll be okay next year we'll
worry about that
i agree with that we need to look at it
but we also like say we can look at
these things
see what possibility we can do and then
see if we're going to have the revenue
to take care of it yeah we can
we need to look ahead and plan ahead and
such what's your favorite say in lonzo
the king and queen
of what king queen tax
is what real estate and personal
property real estate and personal
property
so that means that's where your revenue
base is
and we need to have what this is a test
more people living here in homes
paying real estate and personal property
taxes so why do people choose to live in
certain places
because of amenities because of things
to do
so we can have lots of jobs if they're
going to live in washington county
because that's where the fun place is
and what's the tax base over there i
didn't look that up today
but i do know that wise county is nine
cents higher than russell on the real
estate
yes they just raised their seven cents
and
and one of the things like this is a
pandemic
so it's kind of like an anomaly that
we're trying to get through
and get over and work through this even
with our cost savings from
what the board of supervisors are saying
i mean if y'all hadn't implemented
you know the debt restructuring on the
regional jail i would i could have came
up with five percent other there is no
way i could have reached those numbers
uh with those things and then we cut the
leche and you know
and trying to run the operations of here
we would have never got to this point
even at the five percent
but what we had said in the previous
board meeting
once these businesses we get these
things open
we get the casino there's the real
estate
if you was to go to the assessor's
office right now on the on
housing in russell county it has
went up 20 to 25 on sales the sale price
has
there is no inventory we are about there
so you're right but we've got to be
there to consider
these programs but don't wait in the
meantime to get to there
to start the planning process like the
leche
you know if we had the money you know
brian would love to go ahead
with our plan and move it to the
landfill to take care of this
but to to work within our mains
and based off the plan that we got and
for the closures and the rest of the
projects
it's one step at a time there is a
housing shortage and it's going to be
even worse when some of these industries
come in
the conundrum now is that building
materials are so high you can't
i bought i bought some wood over the
weekend and it just put me in sticker
shock
three pieces of wood was over a hundred
dollars you know two by twelves
eight foot two by twelve almost forty
dollars a piece
there's a tremendous amount of money
that is coming down through virginia
housing
and i think that part of the plan
that we're talking about here is how we
get that money on the ground
and how we do workforce housing
not any other kind of housing but work
good
workforce housing for families
and that puts children in our school
systems
so it all goes makes a nice big circle
here and
i don't think that we've looked at
workforce housing in the direction that
we need to look at it
that's my two cents i'm done hey thank
you anyways
all right next on the agenda is our
citizens comment period
any citizens right
seeing nine we'll move on to
constitutional officers reports and
quests
none here next on the agenda is matters
presented by the board members tim do
you have anything
uh no ma'am david steve
no me anymore i've already whined about
whatever
you are doing all right orris no
lou be so glad no i don't have a thing
yep carl no ma'am all right
um i r i don't have anything either uh
the next thing on the uh agenda is our
adjournment and our next meeting will be
june the 7th here so i will take a
motion
david to adjourn thank you sir
and a second from steve all those in
favor
aye any opposed all right next meeting
june