--------- Okay, let me pull up my packet. Okay, it's 3:00, so I'll call the work session of the county board to order. Uh, introduction of new employees. >> Good afternoon. How you guys doing today?
>> Good. >> I'm William Anderson. I was born and raised in this county. Uh, I've been with the county for about three months and I'm hoping to do good for the county that I was raised in. >> Cool.
I'm a CEO with the jail. >> Congrats. >> Nice to meet you all. >> Thank you. >> Have a good one. >> Hi, I'm uh Wes Malrude. Been with the county for about two weeks now. Um born and raised in Baiji. So good to be here.
>> Welcome. Congrats. without you. >> My name is Jesse Hamilton. Um, born and raised in this county and I've been working for the jail as a corrections officer about seven months now. >> So, congratulations. Welcome. >> Thank you. >> Thanks, guys.
>> Thanks, guys. >> So, Mr. Chair, quick question maybe for for Tom or or the sheriff. Uh, are we at full capacity for the uh, corrections department or I guess uh, with the new
jail coming up uh, a quick >> Mhm. So outside of having a couple of sick layman lazies that are occupying a uh either their home bed or desk, um we're at just shy of four employees right now.
Uh so that the council or the commissioners know, we've actually brought all but one of our inmates back from Morrison County. Um that happened last Thursday or Friday. Yeah. Yeah. We still have females housed up in Pennington, but that's just based off of
what we can accommodate in our current facility. So, uh staffing levels are up. We're and we are tracking right now with uh having a number of other employees uh being uh in the pipeline being backgrounded and then in addition to starting an academy. So, we're doing
really well. >> Yeah. Did you get did you hire that uh baift position I saw advertised or is that still open? >> Um you know I haven't seen Trish for a little while now. I probably should inquire about that. I have I'm not sure.
>> Okay. What's next? Identify future work topics. >> Mr. here. Um just had a housing trust fund cabinet meeting yesterday uh at the United Way. Uh Ann and I were there in
attendance for the county and and uh Nate was there a door that um gave a presentation last time and um we started talking about uh tiff districts and um tax abatements and um hoping we could
kind of just do a a brief educational presentation on on tax abatements and tiff districts. I know tiff districts aren't super common with counties, although they are still uh legal and possible and some counties do utilize them. Sometimes it's more common with
cities and tax abatements are more common with counties. Um but with our housing crisis, I I just think it would be a good idea for all of us to be up to speed on on those two items. Um, so I I'm open to whoever to come in and and
do a little spiel on those um to kind of maybe get us in in uh the right mindset going forward uh because I know we're going to be talking about housing more uh in the coming months. So that's it.
Anything else? Anybody? Okay. New jail project update and virtual tour. >> Got a full house here today. >> Where do you want me? >> Well, we could start uh probably start
with the slideshow first and then uh >> All right. This thing go to the right. Next slide. You want me to just narrate a little bit with each slide? >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Of all these are old news. Things are
moving fast out there. Uh we're all done with underground work. All the floors are poured slab on grade. Um so skylights, we're just finishing up a little rework on those.
Middle one there. Week 117. That's uh putting the chiller on the roof of the valley court getting ready to put it up there. But last week we set >> all the RTUs and the chiller. So all the units are on the rooftop.
So that's inside. We're currently working on masonry. You can see there's a big detention frame there. We're setting that. We have to put masonry around and all that stuff. But just kind of continues here. You see the
jail cells going in. They were all completely installed. I'm going to say a month ago. So those are all in since we've actually gotten a bunch of steel for tear framing up. And you know, maybe we'll have a picture of that. >> That's the slabs.
>> Here's your slab on grade photos again. The last couple of ports stairways are going in. You can see a little bit on that metal set framing there. Um I would say by the end of the week we'll have all the metal
set framing up in the admin now. And I think this would be the next slide that has the virtual tour that Diana I believe be able to click on. If anybody has any questions during this, just speak up. I suppose you could
pause it. I can't. Thank you. Maybe. Can you get it to go? >> Yeah. We're here at the new Belrammy jail site. We're going to walk you through a quick virtual tour of construction
progress uh as of today, October 7th, 2025 with Gary Francisco and Carl Clark with Integrity Group. Oh yeah. >> Yeah, that's the old >> I think that's the first one.
>> Yeah, that's that's old news. >> October the right one. The first one said December, January. So maybe that's the right one. No, it said October. >> That's October. The very first one said December, January, and I came out.
>> They may have labeled them incorrect. >> We're here at the new Belrammy jail site. We're going to walk you through a quick virtual tour. Okay. >> Sorry. Well, I like like Gary said, all the slabs have been poured for a while.
Cells have been in now for like almost a month ago. Uh masonry work is on one end of the building. That's going very very well. I think we're getting 800 to 900 block a day. are going up. Uh crew size as of well last Tuesday I know we had a head count of over 90 workers on site.
Uh so it's a busy site. I'm glad we got Kicaro and uh Gary on site to s two seasoned veterans are doing a bangup job. Uh trades are getting along well. The quality construction uh steel studs going up, steel erections going up. Uh every week you you show up, there's
something new. Even from last Tuesday when I was here, quite a bit of work is done. And uh we've had a great collaboration with Fly McCarthy, with Danielle and Austin and things I I couldn't say are going any smoothly than what I would have hoped. So yeah,
>> yeah, you know, there's a few issues, minor type things we deal with out in the site, but that's any construction, but they're minor minor in in in nature. Um trades are getting along good. You got a good core of contractors here. I think we're blessed that way and uh they
all take ownership in the project and the things are going very very very good. So >> I echo that >> any long lead time stuff that we're going to the proced >> well the the next thing is is uh the detention hollow metal tear frames and
you can't order them until they come field measure. So sequence wise, you need to get like the masonry wall partitions up and then get the mezzanine walkways up and the bulkheads so they can actually measure along there the stairs. Uh but we do have a schedule with them. We're working through uh
we're going to try to get them out here in two different segments. So we can order them because there is about a 14 to 16 week lead time once they field measure. Um but once they field measure, provide shop drawings, we can send that off to the glass company. They can order the glass based on shop drawings. You don't need to field measure. And uh the
install is a few weeks per area I think is what it was on >> that's seven weeks total. >> Yeah. >> So we're going to progress with that. That's probably our longest lead item. We saw like I said the gen sets there. The rooftop units are all in place. Um mechanically electrically I think everything we we have is that way. But
it's just some of the detention thing that you just you can't pre-order. So >> the big ticket items are procured and installed. >> Yes. And so far, knock on wood, the weather's been good. I know you guys are gonna going to get a little bit of snow up
here. I don't know how much >> you just I just know we're a little bit on the south side of your snow event. So, >> yeah. >> Yeah. And I was just going to say I'd
echo what Larry and Gary have said in terms of the coordination and I think we get almost daily phone calls or questions from We're here at the Belrammy County Jail site. Alex with Noah detention is
here. Alex, what's happening with the first set of cells arriving? >> Yes, we got the first set of sales here from Crossville. Uh we're wrecking them up right now. You got the crane gear. We're going to set up all the skates there pad. Um double stack them roll
them in the building. Uh just started to be a great day. >> Nice. And how many do they expect to do per day? >> I'm expecting to do about uh 24 per day. >> Oh, nice. >> Yeah. >> Nice. >> Yeah. Bet. >> Well, it's a great day. Yeah. First day that the cells are arriving and we'll
work on areas A and C first. >> That's right. >> And then you'll come back in January to finish up with area B. >> Yep. Yep. We got 105 sales for area A and C. Then we'll come back and do area B. >> Nice. All right. Thank you. Yeah, thank you and take care.
>> Hello all. Been a couple of months since our last video and a lot has happened since then as you'll see as we work our way through the building. See that we got total of 105 cells set
since then. Um, I think we have about 82 left over on the other side, which will happen January 12th is when Noah's coming back uh to do that. So, you can see they get
a bunch of dot for you and split our bottom point to get all that uh done ahead of the cells. you see above the cells are really hard to do it after the cells are in currently in area B we're pushing
forward with that stuff in preparation for the cells on January 12th here we are getting down with the cells um I think there's about 15 handicap cells
>> all right so this is the sale I report they just poured this last Wednesday. Uh well, again, it'll be I these fours uh in a week or so with upper right either doing all that scissor list. It's going
to be a little challenging off scissor list because of the contours in the floor. We assume there won't be any issues with drainage. This floor also has in flooror heat piping in it. uh as does when we get
over to area C all along a fra that has for you as well. So this is the kitchen area. The plumbers have finished their underground. Um they just need to back fill now a little bit. So while the electricians are working over in the
maintenance area on their underground and then the electricians will move into the kitchen. Uh we expect couple weeks of underground in the kitchen and then it'll be ready to pour. Uh this will be the last area we pour.
We've got quite a bit done. Area A B a little bit of C are poured already. So we're just finishing up with the the admin area in the coming weeks. Should be all poured up by mid January, real close to
that. So now we're in the booking area. So, we'll have our booking facel along that wall. Couple more back here. Uh, so like I said, we're in the process.
Uh, this is still area B. We're in the process of you can see rain leaders going up. Duct workers start will start going up next week. Uh, because we need to get ahead of the sales again in this area. So, by January 12th, we hope to
have duck work up, insulated, whatever plumbing we need in place before the sales arrive. And as always, we'll get it. So, we're in the admin area now. Electricians are just finishing up their
underground here. You can see there's a ton of it. A lot of security stuff. This is the control tower area right here. Basically, that's the end of the detention stuff
from here back. So, this is uh the main long corridor. Pretty impressive. Uh that goes down to all the cell areas and all that. So, once they're admitted
to the Sally Port book, then they'll be heading down towards the uh the cells. So as you can see some of those videos like I said all the floors are full. So any place you see dirt slabs are in place. We talked about the admin area.
Not only the slabs in place but majority of the steel studs already up in that area. Uh some of them highs are getting insulated in sheetrock already. So and of course the masonry progress is has been going going very well. So quite quite a bit of change from where the video is to where it sits at today.
>> A lot of change. >> A lot of changes. >> Time to do another one I think. Any questions? >> Estimate that you're on schedule, a little ahead of schedule. >> I would say we're on schedule. >> On schedule. >> You never want to say we're ahead.
>> Yeah. No, things are progressing very very good. I I you know, like I said, we talked about detention on those tier frames. That's probably our our next biggest probably critical path item because it affects it's got a lead time with it. But short of that, um, you know, we're going to want to get
security electronics in by the end of the year, start setting up that space so they can start prepping and testing out and wires. I mean, you saw those conduits in the board. Each one of those have wires pulled through them. So, there's a lot lot of footage of wire pulled yet. So, but we got a good crew
and a lot of guys. >> There's 18 miles of conduit underground. >> Yeah. multiple time there's seven wires that goes to each detention frame I think. Yeah. >> No, but we've had some good coordination
with the with the owner with uh talking about just even food service and and Steve and coordination with his uh you know service chemicals and how we want to route things and some of those conversations are taking place. We got their their lift in for the loading dock and um those have been going well. I
think our owner meetings have been going very well. So good collaboration. Everything's been great. It's from our standpoint on site. The team, like Larry said, is I think it's the best team I've worked with in 34 years.
>> Everybody's in harmony. I mean, it's a it's a difficult build because of detention being mixed in with everything. And it's a chopped up building. I mean, there's a lot of rooms and but everybody's working together. It's it's beautiful to see, actually.
Commission, >> I gotta give some kudos to the design team here. Like Danielle said, we're on the phone every day. Things come up. So, they've been Johnny on the spot keeping us going. Appreciate that very much. >> You know, she made, you know, day was a
10:00 meeting that talk about the calling. We had a one:00 meeting to talk about a chase. And so, we took advantage of being up here today just to piggyback with Danielle being on site and hitting some of those critical points. So, Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just want to
thank the you the crew that we have. You guys are awesome. But I also want to thank Kandra and I want to thank Steve Shadrich um and Kevin Warren from the IT department. Those three together from our committee are just doing an outstanding job in making sure that
every little detail that they have to work with when these people are gone are are satisfactory. And so all the way down to if you if you can imagine Colender being worried about the mop on the floor leaving shreds of little bits
of cotton because it was too coarse and it seriously I mean just that kind of attention to detail that um again Kandra Steve Shadrich and Kevin Warren just a nice shout out to those guys because thank you for what you their contributions on the committee have been
huge along with the crew that you have in front of you. and not they attend our job site meetings. No, they're contractors. So very very valuable to have them there. I would agree one. >> Absolutely. >> The last slide is kind of budget update
overall tracking well on that. I think currently right now shows under over under balance of about 1.6 million unused contingency and that was kind of talked about the latest update from the FF budget as well. So everyone was >> I got a question for Mr. share. Um, for
maybe for Tom as as much as you guys, we still show 80,000, but with our latest deal, we're not taking out the full 40,000 or 40 million, excuse me. Um, and that So, should that really be reflecting more like 36 million plus the
40 million originally, so 76 million at the top? >> Actually, that's a great question. Um, Mr. Chair and, uh, Commissioner Goic, the reality is we are taking the the cost isn't changed. It's the the savings that we're realizing is on the financing end. So, we'll have a reduction in the
overall financed cost, which we estimated to be about 165 million over the life of the project. Those are the monies that we're shaving off. So, when we started collecting the sales tax um and then split the bond into two issuances, we collected more sales tax
than we did the bond um cost in that first year, year and a half or so. And so that also helped us buy down the second issuance. So the savings that we've talked about are really only on the financing side. It hasn't changed at all the costs of the project itself from
a construction and a architectural design standpoint. All of those costs remain the same. >> I was just getting at the fact that we had a $40 million bond the first time and a $36 million bond essentially the second time. So, you're saying that we've made enough um from the sales tax
revenues to make up that extra $4 million or >> We've made enough in sales tax revenues interest earned on holding $40 million for you know well not quite all of $40 million but a good portion of that during the time frame that we issued the first to the second bond. Uh so those
two together uh and a favorable interest rate. All of those things together worked to allow us to issue a much lower, not much, but a a a slightly lower second bond issuance, but none of those numbers had anything to do with the actual cost of the project itself from an outlet.
>> Not talking about the cost of the project. I'm talking about having the actual cash on hand to pay and to have for the existing jail facility and the, you know, the 8.5 million or whatever we show there. Um, 8.5 million geyser glasses. um to uh to make sure that we
have enough cash to to do that cuz if we were to take 4 million off of that and we only have 4.5 million, we're projecting 6 million for the old jail remodel. So, we'd be cutting it tighter. That's >> Yeah. No. And and we we looked at all of those numbers when we ran those and the
jail uh old jail project is coming in about 2 million less than we had budgeted for. So, that's helpful. Uh aside from that, all of the >> What do you mean by that? >> Well, we have 8.5 million. We didn't budget for that though in the original deal. We had actually less than what it was coming in at. So,
>> but that's what's budgeted in the budget you there currently. And so, that's what we've been holding as a placeholder. That was before we knew what the actual costs would be. And of course, that portion hasn't been bid out just yet, but we expect it to be kind of on the order of around what we're suggesting around the 6 million. So, um, but yeah,
as I mentioned before when we I made a presentation maybe month and a half or two or so ago when we talked about how to finance the jail and that we could reduce the second bond issuance. Uh, I could try to pull that up here and and give you the exact numbers that we went
through at that point in time. But yes, the the short answer is the those three things, the better interest rate, the additional funds that we've collected that we haven't had to pay on the on the full bond issuance because we started the sales tax early and we split the
bond apart. And then also the um reduction in years was also something that is saving us that additional funding as well. Yeah, I I knew it was saving us interest over the term of it. I just wanted to make sure that we had gained enough interest on the original 40 million and so on that we have made
up for that 4 million that we are not getting in our second bond issuance. So, we actually have what we say we are needing. >> Yeah, we have. And then again, we're acrewing interest right now on that additional 36 million that we just took in on Thursday. >> Yep. wanted to make sure that was
>> all clear and and uh and that if anybody from the public happened to be watching that they'd you know put two and two in that and say why that's you know we had 40 million the first time 36 the second time essentially and it still shows 80 to get that clarified >> right
>> thank you >> any other questions >> anybody I think great job keep up the good work Thank you. Thank you. >> Thanks guys. Appreciate it. >> Gary, get on another video. >> I got another one for you.
>> Career documentary studies. >> Oh, I'm busy enough. I can't do that. You're talking. All right. >> Good afternoon, commissioners. >> Um, we
Right. I'm sorry. I apologize. Um, hopefully uh we can clarify some of the items. Um, what I drafted in the agenda bill uh was some background and historical accounts that happened with these 2911 rules. And those governing
authority rules are mandated across the state to uh license and allow jails to work underneath the authority of department of corrections. Um I have put together a high level. Um I did leave
the exhibits uh intentionally blank because I have hundreds of pages of exhibits and I did not want to bore you with it. So I have a high level um altogether 2911 is about that 120 pages in length and um I've reviewed about 104
of them because that's what has been changed or updated. Uh the first draft rules that we were proposed was back in July. I just received the latest update which was released on October 25th,
2025, but we did not receive them until last Tuesday. So giving you a heads up there. So I'm a little bit behind the scene there and I just have not had time to look over what has changed even in those. So I'm doing the best with what information I have. Um the proposed
rules exceeding the statutory minimum standards are actually um in the 241 chapter which shows the governing authority for the commissioner of corre corrections and with respect to them
establishing the minimum standards of all facilities in across the state of Minnesota. So that's what you see here and that's what also drives the 28 911 rules. Um altogether the rules oppose or
impose operational procedures rather than baseline regulatory standards what they should be doing. The jails are being held to stricter standards standards than the state prison facilities. Um, for instance, uh, the top line of the new proposed rules
actually reads, "This chapter does not apply to state correctional facilities under their commissioner's control." And anything underlined is all added brand new. Um, the end of that, it also just
another high level, uh, their checks, their well-being checks are every 60 minutes. Ours are every 30 minutes. We're just held to a completely different standard. Uh the provisions resemble hospital and treatment center standards, not jail level standards. The
rules represented unfunded mandates. They shift financial burden to our local taxpayers. Several sections introduced ambiguity, confusion, and impractical timelines. They're putting timelines on these where um all of our jail administrators across
the state are going to struggle with that due to the fact of it is It can't match my jail. Our jail does not look like the next counties across the way. It we're all completely different. That's why we have a completely different set of procedures across our
state with our with our jails. as well as there's overreach, believe it or not, to our human resources department here, just our county, the sheriff's off office, internal operations overreach, and also our medical and clinical practices, which we
spend many, many hundreds of thousands of dollars annually for our medical provider to take care of. Not only is there a a lack of adequate jail and sheriff representation on this panel
that was uh held, I have a list of the committee and 15 um out of the 20 were non-law enforcement. Five of those law enforcement, two sheriffs, two jail administrators, and one MSA attorney.
These are executive directors, families that were impacted. Um, they are director, assistant directors, they're principles of schools, medical providers, rights for clinic detainees, and the list goes on. I don't want to bore you, but if you have need that,
that's that list. Very very um mis representative as the jail side of anybody who actually works in a correctional facility. And also the onesizefits-all mandates. It also fails again like I said before jail size,
staffing levels, facility layout, arrest volume is huge. Even our county up north, we have a different type of arrest volume that somebody else who even compares close to Belrammy County and also our local healthc care access.
We have great healthc care access here and it doesn't incorporate for those smaller counties across the state. So there's a lot of uh definition changes, a lot of uh interpretation changes. Um for instance, segregation versus
separation. You guys tell me what that means. We'll just say we're going to be held accountable to that. Um undefined financial hardship. That to me is a very ambiguous statement. What does that mean? Financial hardship to me versus
another county does not mean the same thing. Uh, also rigid timelines. I already mentioned that internal manual guidance. So, one of the issues that I have a huge issue with is they the the
manuals that they um reference in the new draft rules we have are high and well above minimum standards. And those are the references they are requiring us if these proposed rules go through to
adhere to. Again, I'm not saying we can't hit for the sky because we have great services in our facility and we're not going to stop. But when you have a standard at a high level, it is going to cause a lot of grievances, complaints,
and violations, and we won't have anything to fight with it. Intakes. We have approximately 7 to 14 intakes on a daily basis. I would say in a 24-hour basis, it's a big influx and actually have seen 3-day weekends to be
uh in the realm of 21 to 25 in those high ranges. They are putting a 2hour time frame on many intake procedures for us. Each intake will take between 50 and 80 minutes each. We have seen seven
intakes either transport or new arrests stacked on top of each other. we would violate in the first couple. And these are these rules that they are attempting to pass. Also, the regulatory 15 check 15-minute checks. They're going to ask
us to put 15-minute checks on anybody exuding certain types of um in detox. I'm trying to remember the name. Detox behaviors. I would say I am not a betting woman. If
I was a betting woman, I would say we were at 80% of our inmates would be exuding something like that. In that aspect, that means that 80% of our inmates that came over or our offenders that came in, let's say a good number of
25, they would be on 15minute checks. We don't have the staffing. It's just almost it's impossible without that. We also have space limitations for our volunteers and our volunteers and our programming. I fight for those guys all the time because they just have a
passion and a complete tenacity to keep coming back and forth. They don't get paid. They just love what they do and they care about the people. um behavior management plans. They have uh overreached in medical and treatment and
me mental health care uh extensively especially giving the jail facility administrator authority to review behavioral plans of which it's it
technically called a behavioral management plan. And I looked that up on Google. I really wasn't sure what that meant. So, I apologize. I have to bring that out. Um, it would cause me to go get a doctorate or at least a master level degree to do it properly of how
that definition is. Unless the DOC has a different interpretation, I don't know what else to do. And I know the jail administrators don't have that type of time to do that. So, those are just some of the highlevel items. Um, obviously new corrections officers, I I low
estimated this because I didn't know what time or how when they would be imply or implementing these new rules if they did pass. We would be an approximation of two uh two more posts, possibly up to eight more staff on top
of what we have already. and uh behavioral health therapists, clinical social workers, psychologists, a boardcertified behavioral anal uh analyst. Um the list goes on and I don't really know how we could even afford a
lot of these items. Uh we are just moving on just to medical staff alone. My projection is at the minimum of one more nursing staff and I just reviewing what I've just reviewed in the last week. I would venture to say two. So,
we're in a obviously upper uh $170,000 extra annually for that. Um, we can keep going on. The the rough estimate, low estimate is that uh 2.1 million that I added in there. Um,
again, I did not put any percentages on uh increased uh living costs or anything like that. That was just a very very low estimate of what that looks like. And it does uh represent and mandate a lot of
uh procedures. They're going into our procedure manuals which they are unique to each one of our jails. And when they go into those procedural manuals, it means that they are going to be writing them and we will not have any uh any um
authority to change those. So with that, top priorities, my priority, every jail administrator across the state, safety for staff, inmates, and the public. We support standards, enhance safety, not ones that make it harder to adhere to
operations in real time, and that's what they're doing. All of the 2911 standards are written as minimum standards but now have become practice and rigid requirements. They fail to reflect daily realities of the operation of the actual county jail itself. The proposed changes
burden staff plans. They require staff ratios, administrative duties, not uh or don't account for the real staffing shortages or our regional regional recruitment uh issues that we've come to know very very well over the past few years. Also, the existing rules require
detailed staffing plans with specific positions covered mandated ratios that are not achievable without significant additional funding of which we know they're unfunded mandates and they'll be passed on to the counties. The county jails again are unique in size,
population, resources, risk profile. A onesizefits-all rule book does not work. It may look good on paper, but the practice it reduces the alli it it reduces the ability of the local administrators or the sheriffs to tailor their operations specifically for
effectively and uh to implement our exact unique populations. Many of the proposed requirements are going to increase the cost for training. Training alone on our correction staff, we do 16 hours are mandate mandated 16
hours annually. We supersede that. Like I said, I don't run my life at a minimum standard. We supersede that. Just the road staff alone, and uh Sheriff Riggs can talk about that. They're required for 48 hours on a three-year basis. We
we hit they are asking us to jump up to 20 hours every year annually to be over top of the road deputies. Many of the proposed requirements are going to uh um the compliance are going to shouldn't force counties to divert
the dollars from our public safety and emergency services. There's a huge concern among the jail administrators and the sheriffs across the state due to the interpretations that are forced and the rules. They're becoming burdensome and disconnected for
the actual operational uh realities that we deal with. My disagreement is not with the idea of standards. It never has been. It never will be. I believe in accountability. I believe in professionalism and I believe in doing corrections the right way. I
don't do this job out of I do this job because of passion and tenacity. I do it because I care deeply about our people inside the facility. Not just the inmates, but staff, the medical team, the programmers and volunteers and the families connected with all of them. My role is to make corrections better for
everyone who walks through those doors. In aviation, when a pilot reports before takeoff, they don't say how many passengers are on board. They actually report how many souls are on board. That has always resonated me with me. In every jail and every day I walk through
those doors, every person is the counted soul. No matter what they've done, they're still human beings and my responsibility is to ensure that they're treated safely and professionally. But we have to maintain a balance. I'm going to remind everybody that the
county jail is a correctional facility, not a hospital, not a long-term treatment center, not a social services agency. But that doesn't mean we don't absolutely part partner with them on a daily basis. We support all types of programmings. We strive to improve all
of our outcomes. The proposed draft 2911 rules push county jails further into the roles that exceed our core mission and resources. When regulations move us toward becoming something we're not structured for, staffed for, or funded for, we risk
compromise and operational effectiveness. My disagreement again with the idea of welldefined standards, it is not. It is with the rules that are too narrow,
inflexible, and disconnected from the realities of maintaining a safe, compliant, and facility that's responsible for a county jail. We want standards to promote safety, not regulations that create compliance
hurdles without a meaningful benefit. My pos my position is truly rooted in care. Care for souls in our c custody. Care for staff who serve them. Care for our taxpayers who fund us. Good corrections require a balance. Humanity
with accountability. Programming with security. Compassion with practicality. The balance is truly what I'm trying to protect. That's what I have. >> Mr. Carlson. >> Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Colander,
these proposed changes, do they still have to go to the legislature to be approved? >> Yes, they >> not the legisl >> not the legislature. No, they're actually going to be open for a public comment. I still do not have that date. And my actual question and request for
the commissioners is if each one of us would write a letter explaining why we cannot allow these rules to go through. In 2013 when the last set of 2911 rules passed, it
really opened us up with we went from 60 minute uh bed checks to 30 minute bed checks. Huge impact on the number of staff that we had to have. And at that time, uh, our sheriffs across the state were encouraged to sign basically a
letter of disscent, um, as a one body through the Minnesota Sheriff's Association. Uh, this time around, this is going to go in front of a administrative law judge. >> Administrative law judge. >> Yeah. an administrative law judge who is ultimately going to make a decision
based off of the committee and then what what other type of support or disscent there is towards this. Um, and as a governing body, we're going to be asking we'll probably be coming back to you guys to give you some some some bullet points uh
as to whether you agree or disagree with some of these things. Clander and I are writing a letter. We're encouraging every sheriff's and jail administrator through the state to write a letter. All governing bodies to do the same. Um so
that we get some impact um so that this judge has to take into account the totality of what these could potentially bring on our local tax our local taxpayers. uh county administrator and I have had this
conversation before and I know that um Steve Green, one of our representatives, was asking or was looking at creating some type of legislation where these rule changes if they took effect would have a certain amount of time before they would go in front of the legislature and then the legislature
could vote on it. We get we get none of that right now. If they just make these rules, they're just cart blanch. We have to follow them and the impact to our county and our taxpayers are just there. And we had very very little representation as a as it stands from a
like we were allowed to listen in, but there were only two sheriffs in the state and and two jail administrators in the state that were allowed to have input into this along with Rick Hodson, our uh our legal adviser through the NSA. Um, so we want them to hear from
all 87 sheriffs and their jail administrators and county commissioners that are concerned about what these impacts would have on their communities. >> And thus far, our um letter that we've drafted to try to it's all weeds. I'll
let you guys know because it impacts us greatly on a daily basis. It's only 20 pages thus far. So, um, we'll continue with it, making sure that it is tees are crossed and eyes are dotted and, uh, if you want a copy of it once we get it
close, we can. And but it is, again, it's a lot of a lot of weeds. >> So, follow up to that, I'm just wondering if at at the point that we're ready with some bullet points, is it appropriate for each individual commissioner to do a letter? would be
better if if there was if we had a unanimous uh consensus of the board to send a letter from the board if if that were to be the case. >> I think that question is directed to me. So uh >> probably I would I would you know
speaking with a collective voice is helpful um but sometimes the the influence is in the numbers too. So it just depends upon what strategy you want to utilize. Um, oftentimes we write one letter that all the commissioners jointly sign, that's pretty effective
when we do stuff with the legislative level. Um, but in something like this, if they are looking for numbers, uh, having a a separate letter, uh, slightly tailored or whatnot to your liking can be helpful as well. I guess I would lean
towards the sheriff and his colleagues as to what their strategy is in regard to, you know, potentially quote unquote inundating the administrative law judge with dissension or, you know, kind of summarizing that dissension in a much
less um voluminous way. I do sit on the Minnesota Sheriff's Association's board of directors and I will ask that question this Friday. Okay. >> At our next meeting to see if those individuals can go back to their
districts and inquire what the best and we'll get Rick's version of what he thinks is best, too. But if it's individual letters from each commissioner or if it's the governing body as a whole, uh we'll I'll get that information from you. Thank you. And I'm currently sitting on a multi-ist every
Wednesday going over the draft rules one at a time, making sure that every one of them have a voice, writing it down, how it will impact and why they either want it changed or rewarded. There is a lot of interpretation and I don't like that.
Nobody does. We need to have one interpretation and make sure it's not uh ambiguous. It has to be exactly what it means. We've had a number of jails uh currently right now in a fight with the DOC over some of this issue, but
their version of a u corrective order or corrective action such as we have experienced with lack of staffing um or grievance standards. Um,
with that being said, they're following what they determine to be the spirit of their rule or their law. Um, there is no the our biggest frustration with the Department of Corrections right now is is there is no consistency between their
staff, their their enforcement and inspection staff. And we could have one inspector come and inspect us and then two days later another inspector come and inspect us and we would get fined or or dinged on a number of different
variances in what they view. That's because they're going by what they determine to be the spirit of their rules versus the actual rule itself. And it's with the fact that they're going to leave these open to interpretation that sets us in a really bad spot as far as
being liable if something happens. Mr. Chair, Mr. >> I'm just uh wondering about you mentioned at the start of this that there was some stuff that really wasn't following state statute. Is there in your bullet points are you going to point stuff like that out? I would hope. >> Absolutely.
>> Yeah, >> that's one of my number one lines. >> I would I would hope so because that's the kind of stuff that should really carry weight with the administrative law judge. Yeah. >> Thank you for your work on it and for bringing us the wonderful news.
And just so everybody knows in this room, Kandra is kind of like the she and uh Pad Ali, who is the jail administrator for Wright County. They're the two loudest voices in the room, and they're doing the lion share of the work with the other I don't know how many
counties have jails. It's got to be close to 75, 80 of them. >> Um they're the ones that are setting the bar and and pushing these. So, you got a lot to appreciate that she's not involved in it. So, Mr. Senator, >> yeah, thanks, Mr. Chair. I'm just kind
of curious, maybe uh Tom might be able to help answer is is uh the Association of Minnesota Counties. they have a public safety uh policy committee and I'm wondering if our representative to that has any insight or
uh suggestions on how we could help as a county or if the association is some if they're talking about this amongst the association. >> Thank you uh Commissioner Sner. I have not heard this brought up at the
association as of yet. Uh it doesn't mean they not might not be talking about it behind the scenes and whatnot, but as it relates to policy position. It didn't come up in our district 2 meetings. Um and this rulem has been going on for a long time. But that might be why is because it's been taking so long and now
here it is and that was after the development of the policy positions. But I would say that would be something that AMC probably needs to get involved in if if they're not already uh getting engaged on this. I I know that there's been some discussion about reducing their policy platform because of the
abbreviated session this year. Um so I don't know if that plays into this or at all or not. >> Can you remind me who the the um representative is for the uh >> county's representative? >> Switched it to >> Yeah, we just we just switched it.
>> Okay. Okay. All right. Thank you. >> One and Commissioner Sundra one of the planner and I were just looking this up. was not one governing body representative on that committee throughout the state of Minnesota. Not not one. So,
>> and that that there in lies that like what we talked about with our legislators is rulemaking is another way of unfunded mandates being pushed on to local governments. And when the rulem process in our state doesn't involve any kind of legislative oversight whatsoever, whether it be ratification
of rules that have been developed or uh some other process for review and approval, uh we essentially have state departments that can essentially change the laws any way they'd like and enforce those laws onto local governments that
can cost us a great deal of funding or or costs, I should say. So, uh, that's that's particularly concerning and that's again why, um, Senator Green has mentioned many times about his desire to have the rulemaking process changed for the state. Um, and I think you can see
how it definitely impacts the county. Um, and of course, this repeats itself. The demolition landfill is another rule making endeavor that's now costing us a lot of money. The reason we're building a whole new jail is because of uh, DOC rulemaking changes as well. So we are
tens of millions of dollars already uh sideways with strapped with costs that the state has put on us because of rulemaking processes and there's no end in sight. This one here is going to cost us another several million on an operational basis. That means every single year it'll cost us that much over
time. So I I think this is the kind of thing that couldn't be more urgent uh and pressing for us to to take a position on. And I would encourage everyone else in the state uh in local government to do the same thing, including citizens. >> Finally, Mr. Chair, I just want to say
thank you for the uh for the update and um I didn't notice if we got your letter in in our packet or not, but I think it would be helpful. >> Yeah, I we did not add it in the letter or the letter yet because it's still in a draft mode. Um making sure, but as
soon as uh it is approved by the sheriff, then we will. and they changed it from July to October already. And we're we know that there's possibly a public comment section and we're going to submit the letter during that time frame. So, it'll be ironed out before we're hoping before June. So,
>> yeah, I think any information that you provide would be helpful. I mean, I I I I'm a good listener, but I didn't catch everything that you said. So, >> there's a lot of stuff. >> I tried my hardest to stay out of the weeds. I really did. >> Thank you,
Mr. Good. >> Yeah, I was think what I was going to say. It's the uh um What the heck was it? I got sidetracked by what Tim was saying there. >> Yeah. Really? Yeah. I'm tired first though. Um
>> Oh. Um Oh, dang it. >> It'll come back to you. >> Yeah. About the time at the time they walked away. Yeah. Yeah. No, they I can't think of what it was right off the top of my head now. Had it and I went shooting out Oh, I know what it was. It was the um timing and you mentioned that
they bumped it to October. What when do you know if this doesn't go our way which is unfortunately probably likely knowing the state um would it start? I mean when would we feel the effect of these changes? Would it be next year? >> It would be next year. Usually they do a
June 1st roll out June or July. So a year from June probably. So about the time when all these other unfunded mandates would be hitting would be really cuz this was not included in our our original unfunded mandate uh
estimation. So that's marvelous. Okay. Thank you. >> We'll keep you guys apprised of what's going on in our efforts. So >> thank you very much. built funding. Good afternoon, commissioners. Jody Treat, Belchami County auditor
treasurer. Um, I am here to give a little overview of the county's PILT funding. Um, and just to start out with that, it's an acronym for payment in lie of taxes. And by definition that means payment to
compensate local governments um for the loss of tax base by stateowned land. So the majority of wrong direction the majority of Bel Tramy County's stateowned land pilt land is in the
consolidated conservation area and that's an area of roughly kellier and north. um 75% of the county's PILT revenue comes from those Conan lands and the the
southern line of that is on the northern edge of Quiring Cormet and Tuk Shooks townships. So right close to Highway One and then north all the way up to Greg Love for town area.
In Belrammy County, we have five different land categories that make up our Pelt payment. And each of those categories has a slightly different rate that it gets paid out of at. So if we look at the county's exact
revenue in 2025, we had $3,181,000 in PILT revenue. And when we break that down by land category, the majority of it is in natural or in the acquired natural resource land. This is land that's owned
by the DNR that was previously privately owned. Um that gets paid out at about $5.28 an acre. So it gives us roughly $1.9 million of the PILT comes from those
acquired natural resource lands. DNR administered lands is DNR owned other natural resource land and that gets paid out at about $39 an acre. Um county
administered lands, these would be our tax forfeited lands that are administered by our NRM department. They also get paid out at $39 an acre for almost $450,000. So that's how the breakdown of the
revenue that comes in. So how does the county use those funds? Hilt distribution is governed by law. So it is dictated by statute how the county uses that land. The majority of it must
be used for property tax levy reduction. So in 2025 um our property tax levy reduction amounted to about eight levy points. So the little clip there is of the 26
proposed levy at 9.63% increase over the prior year. That actually would be 17.63% if we were not getting any PILT revenue coming into the county. >> Yeah.
>> The Okay. the um so there's this is the rest of the land breakdown um land us utilization project is Belrammy Island land utilization project which is up um
north of Upper Red Lake in that con area um all the way to the Lake of the Woods and Roso counties that is landscape management um for the benefit of wildlife up in that area. Wildlife
management is DNR wildlife management areas kind of spread throughout the county but again mostly up in that Conan area that gets paid out at 75% of the value of the property and then kind of a
um a bonus if you will. the county, the state came up with a formula that allows counties a certain revenue based on the percent of pill acres to the total county acres. And that's uh $133,000
a year. So again, our distribution, what we use our PILT funding for, $2.4 million of it gets used for direct property tax reduction. And again, that was about
eight levy points for this most recent levy. Um taxing authorities receive their portion their aotment based on acres and that would be township, schools and those other taxing
authorities. Natural resource management receives about 65 cents an acre for the um for the management of county administered lands. So that amounts to about $93,000
a year that NRM uses for administration of those lands in the form of um one FTE. Then lastly, there's a carveout for grants up in the North Bell Tramy area. And this is also carved out by statute
that 15% of revenue from the Conan lands must be used in the Conan area. So years ago, the board put together citizen committee that would review grants and recommend grants to the county board
each year um for for projects used up in the Conan area. We have two committees right now, a Kellier Washkish citizen committee and a four town Gregula citizen committee. The Kellier Washkish area uses this last
round of PIL grants. They use their two townships um for roads and town hall repairs. Um the Kellier Washkish first responders received an allocation and the food shelf also received an allocation.
The four town gregula committee used most of their allocation on road maintenance and then some on a wayside rest up in that area that's on state interest land. These grants have to be either economic development or uh public
safety categories. Um so they they gear their grants to those categories um and then the committees weigh in on them according to that. Also, so we have the like the Kelly or Washkish area for town Gregula area.
There's a big unorganized town township section right north of Upper Red Lake. And that unorganized area is managed by the county board. So the funding that comes in out of that area, the board
annually um spends that on Northern Deputy, so an FTE in the sheriff's department. some allocations to the Kellier and Greg Greg fire departments and also for town Greg solid waste services. So when those annual amounts
are spent then a reserve is built up out of the revenues that come in and that is set aside for the board to use for bigger projects. I think the most recent larger project that was used out of there um the city of Kellier
used some of that funding for a local match to secure a USDA um funds for their um uh curbon gutter project that went through Kelly. So it was used to leverage those USDA funds.
Grant applications are open every April 1st through May 31st and then the committees meet after that and then sometime mid June to early July those recommendations come to the board for approval.
Um that kind of covers the PILT revenues that come in and the uses that Bel Tramy County uses for them. So, if anyone has any questions, I'd be happy to answer any questions.
>> Doesn't look like it. Thank you. >> Um, maybe one question. Sure. I'm just trying to I guess get a better understanding uh from a previous um presentation that we got from from the Northern Counties Coalition and and them
mentioning that they helped Bel Tramy receive a significant amount of money increase to their PILT. Uh which part of of that did it help? That would probably I'm I'm
not familiar with how the um get back to the percent based on um total lands the PILT land coverage. >> That's a recent addition to the PILT
payments. So I'm guessing probably that piece of it. And that's what I was kind of wondering too because I I I think that this uh the land coverage is something new and uh you know maybe just want to to make note of that for my
colleagues you know for for you know our consideration for joining you know the the Northern Counties coalition. I mean, $133,000, you know, at no cost to Bel Tramy, I think, you know, is significant.
It's inquiring about that. Thank you. I think you did a great job of of, you know, the presentation, and I think it would help uh >> uh folks in my district to understand uh better about how the the Northern Deputy uh comes into play. uh because you know
that there's always questions and concerns and and I think having that uh the part of the county where the county board oversees those townships is probably where it
comes from. Correct. >> Correct. Correct. >> So it wouldn't be coming from from Washish or Kelly or or any organized townships. It it's coming from the unorganized. Correct. >> Thank you.
>> Yep. Any other questions? >> Thank you. >> 2026 development fund grant. >> Good afternoon, commissioners. I'm Shane Foley, director of the natural resources management department and I have a
simple straightforward one slide, one number for you so you can maybe relax a little bit. Um, county development fund as you guys know through a portionment. Bel Tramy County separates a portion of the revenues that natural resources
management department makes off of largely timber revenues each year. um portion of that, a percentage of that money goes towards this co community or county development fund that you work with administrator Barry on granting out the money. Um and so long story short,
the grantable amount for 2026 is $16,426. Um, and I do want to add in here that, you know, during budget committee meetings and discussions, um, expenses of NRM are going to be more
realistic in the future and, um, will be held more internally for different departments within the county and so there won't be as much realized profit um, and so a portionment will for the next foreseeable future will be um, much
less if not um close to zero. And so there really won't be additional funds put into this county development fund um due to that perspective. And so I would encourage you as a board to completely spend down that amount. The account will remain and if things change in the
future that that grant could be um reopened, but just for simplicity of tracking money and everything, this would be a good opportunity to do that one last grant. Um and so that's all I have and I don't know if there will be
discussion now with administrator Barry or how you guys want to proceed but um that's the money that would be available for grant. So >> Mr. chair. Uh Shane, what uh what about the law that says
we have to spend a certain percentage of timber sales um on economic development related grants? How do we get around that and just put all the money towards the department?
>> Yep. So how a portionment works for one county development fund. Bel Tramy County is the only county in the entire state and there was a law change specifically listing Bel Tramy County back in the 50s or the 60s that created
this development fund. It's morphed into a little bit different animal than what the original language speaks. to get to that original language. It's like black and white microf film that's near impossible to read through. And um yeah,
>> but to answer your question, >> Constitution's pretty old, too. You know, 250 years now, but it's still the law, >> correct? So, >> Yep. Oh, yeah. Not not degrading that at all. The So, a portionment is based off of the profit of a department. And so,
profit is revenue minus expenses. And so the greater the expenses, the less the profit, ultimately less the aortionment amount that would be divvied off of that quote unquote profit. Um
it's a a bit of a political conversation about um what expenses directly um related to NRM. And in my opinion, I think NRM has been subsidized by a lot
of other C county services, whether that's lease amounts, county attorney services, computer services, all of which we do pay for. Um, but we're going to be paying more for those in the future. In addition to that, um, we have
I'll be talking about the park plan update in just a moment. Um and then the windstorm as well. Um some of these items are going to have some long lasting effects over the next five to 10 years. Um which are going to cost us
more as a department to maybe update our parks a little bit to reforest areas that were destroyed. And so it's not only a shift in perspective of how we're paying for departments, it also includes these different expenses that are coming
up that are a little more unique to the timing itself. Um, and so it ends up both come together at the same time, which makes it a little more dramatic for this one certain year, but it it is a little bit of both.
>> Okay. I just I want to just make sure we're following the law here and we don't get sued. Um because this this was 30,000 last year. Two years ago it was 40,000. Um I Why is it 16 this year? Um
because of a because we just budgeted more um with these funds. Uh >> yeah. And if you if you step back a few more years, it was $200,000 every year for like a 5year period of time. I mean, all this was long before me, you know,
that um and it nearly bankrupted NRM because there was so much money being funneled out that we needed for day-to-day operations of just managing the land how we're supposed to. So, there's the extremes on both sides of of
uh managing that. My my heart, I promise you, is to use the revenues as wisely out of our county forests as we possibly can for the benefit of Belrammy County residents. I will be attempting to do that with
every breath I take here. So, no, I I trust you. I'm not worried about your um professionalism. I I just uh I just want to make sure we're following the law here. Sure. Appreciate that,
>> Mr. Senator. >> Uh, thank you, Mr. Chair. Uh, thank you for the, uh, update. Uh, it's unfortunate that, uh, you know, the time has come to, to make a decision about the county development fund. Uh I've
been stressing for years, you know, the importance and the need to kind of step back from, you know, awarding the full amount each year and creating a reserve, you know, so we can figure out, you know, what
what our next moves are um to help our community. you know, as as you know, as as we all know, a lot of our our nonprofits and our business uh organizations uh became
uh reliant. I don't know if that's if that's the word, >> but they they've come to expect, you know, the the uh county development fund would be there. And I've seen, you know, over the years that the dwindling
amounts of money that were coming in and going out, which is why, you know, I I've always tried to, you know, spend less than what was, you know, uh the suggested allocation in hopes that, you know, my colleagues would would join me.
Uh but I've seen you know over the years if I didn't spend it go back into the fund and and they would get extra money to you know allocate to you know other things again uh the following year. And uh you know I I think
um I think we need to pump the brakes on on maybe um your recommendation, you know, for the time being, you know, I'm just only one person, you know, and try to figure out, you know, I know uh
$16,000 isn't sustainable to to award to any organization, but you know, maybe there there are some conversations that could be had before we uh disperse to uh an organization
then and then as you know we got like 10 10 organizations that apply every year and and what are we going to you know a lot to to them I I'm not too sure. Um and this is you know my first time hearing about this. I don't like you
know shooting from the hip and and uh but I I do you know I always appreciate the recommendations from our department heads. Um so um if we can you know maybe bring this up again in in a future
um work meeting that that's how I would like to proceed but you know I'm I'm only one you know one opinion um I know that there are you know there is a pot of money there that we
could you know help to infuse um if the board is willing Um, but then again, you know, that will come back to, well, why couldn't we help these other organizations? So, I mean, I think we need to develop a plan before we
uh close the door on on the county development fund. You know, you mentioned that this is a 70 year old statute, you know, that that that created this, you know, I mean, once something's closed, it's it's hard to
get it back. And you know, the county development fund is something that I and many people would hate to lose, you know. So, I I just uh would like to encourage my colleagues to, you know, maybe let's let's pump the brakes and think about this one for a bit. Thank
you. >> And one quick point of one point of clarification is that this fund will not be gone because it is required by statute. It just won't be funded at the level it has been in the past. >> Unless you lose funding, you know, It's
hard to get it back. >> Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, yeah, to that end, this is, you know, I know you mentioned about the commissioner some you mentioned about the organizations that have come to quote unquote rely on this funding. However, I don't believe this was ever supposed to or allowed to
be used for operational expenses is only for basically projects or things like that. So, they really shouldn't be quote unquote relying on it um because it it isn't for operational expenses. So, um I I think that, you know, um I agree with
the with Shane's recommendation. Um it's not going to be receiving funding for the foreseeable future. Um the organizations that are looking to get money from it would be much happier to get it now than to wait get half now and half next year. I think that's what we
did last year, wasn't it? Didn't we give them half of what we had and we didn't put any more into it or or I don't remember for sure, but >> it was pretty much spent down. Did it did we spend it down? And then this is how much we've added into it. Okay. So, um I I just saying we do what we can
this year and and uh hope hopefully at some point the you know the state will quit giving us unfunded mandates if we get some changes maybe down the state. Thank you. >> Okay. Thank you, Shane. >> Thank you, commissioners.
>> Mr. chair just to maybe finish out the conversation because I'm I'm not real clear on where you would like us to go. So, >> typically what happens is the NRM director gives you this information and then you decide kind of as Commissioner Sumner started. Uh you decide what you
want to do if if you direct us to come back with a conversation. We can certainly do that. Uh but typically what would happen is you would say you pick a number you know uh maybe it's the max or some ver variation of that up to the max
and then say go and m you know county administrator and make the invitation for the grants and go through the process and bring those grants back and then you do your thing. So that it's about that time of year I'm getting questions about what to do. Um I just
not to press you but uh just to get some direction around this. What would what is the desire of the board as it relates to this? Do you do you want us to run a grant cycle this year? Do you want us to pause for a year? If you do want us to run a cycle, when would you like it to be? How much funding would you like it
to be? Um just maybe a little bit more guidance would be helpful for us to know what to do and how to answer the questions as they come in. I'm in favor of taking Shane's recommendation and doing a grant cycle for the maximum amount.
>> Okay. >> Okay. >> Mr. >> Um, yeah. I'd like us to do a grant cycle for this year. Make that number 100,000.
back home. >> Yeah. >> Yep. >> And I agree. I think go ahead with the do the grant for this year for that amount, Mr. Sar. >> Well, it sounds like it'd be a 4 to one,
but uh you know, I mean I mean well, we might as well just give it to the uh egg association for one of the county buildings. I mean, that's what it's going to go for anyway. So, I mean, let let's just not beat around the bush. Let's not waste people's time. That's where all the money goes. So, you
know, if we want to, you know, give it away, just give it away to the egg. >> I wouldn't be for that. I'd be for half to the >> county historical society and half to Paul Bunny. >> But, you know, I mean, that's just the way it's going to go though. You know, it's the way it's been.
>> It hasn't been that way. >> It has. Yeah. has got a greater community and other other organizations too. >> So that if we follow the process, you'll all get to decide that later. Um, however you want to come to that and convince your colleagues of however
you'd like to spend or whatever, but I I guess it sounds like to me to go ahead and make the invitation. Uh, and I think with your blessing, I'll probably give the notice that this is likely the last year the county can do this for the foreseeable future. um just to manage
expectations because some organizations have become maybe a little bit more reliant on the on the funding source. But if uh if if that's an accurate representation of kind of where we're at and what your direction is, I I just want to make sure I get your authorization to include that to just manage those expectations. I don't think
we have any choice. >> Okay. All right. Thank you. >> Thank you. Okay. County county parks update. What's that? >> Were we done?
>> Yeah, we're all right. I'm back, but I brought Lori, so I'll let Lori introduce herself. >> Hi, I'm Lori Clark. I'm um recreational resource coordinator for NRM department. So, I I deal with the parks on a daily basis. So,
>> yeah, what we're here for today is kind of twofold. Lori's going to give a description of the county parks. Every year, we kind of do a county park update of what's happening, what parks we have, not only for your guys' um information, but also so the public can be aware of
what's happening out there. Um, but then we're also going to be ushering in the future um and starting on a new park plan. So, I'll be talking about that a little bit after Lor's complete. >> Okay. I'm just going to give you kind of a quick overview. Most of you know this.
I know Commissioner Winger, I haven't seen you before, so hello. Um, I'm going to start with Three Island Park. It's one of our bigger parks at just over 2900 acres. It's in Commissioner Gatsbig's area. Um, we've got a large amount of trails. We've got 18 miles of
cross-country trails. Um, almost 5 and a half miles of snowmobile trails. and it's about 20 minutes north of town. Um we've got three different trail heads. We've got a shelter. It's kind of a a simpler park. Um very scenic, very beautiful. You can go out and just kind
of stand on the on the bridge over the Turtle River and just listen to it flow this time of year. So, it's beautiful up there. The next one we have is Raglin Park. This is in Commissioner Winger's area. Um it's just under five acres in the city um south of city of Wilton and it's
probably one of our most popular ones for families. Um it's got a lot of fishing, boating type things that go on. We have a playground um a beach and it's a very popular spot for lunch picnicking and things like that. Um this is our only site where we actually have a park host during the summer because they get
so much activity. Mississippi High Banks, this is one of our further out areas. Um, we have one primitive campsite that has gotten to be very popular over the last several years. Um, it's reservation only again in in Commissioner Winger's area. It's about 35 miles away and it did take
quite a hit last year in the storm. Um, I have not personally been out there since the storm happened because it was pretty much inaccessible. But pictures I've seen and I believe Shane's been out there. U, we have a lot of trees down in the site itself which is not a very big area. Um, so it is one that we're going
to have to go back in this year and just kind of take a look at, clean up and things like that. Next one we have is in Mobile Maze. Um, this is in Commissioner Carlson's area. Um, this again is a lot of trails. We have about eight miles of mountain biking trails. Uh, we have about eight
almost nine miles of cross-country ski trails and again very popular summer winter time. There's always people out there. Uh we have a shelter um that people rent on a regular basis this time of year. It's a warming shelter and gets used quite often. So this is another
popular one and it's only it's less than 15 minutes north of town. And then Grant Creek Horse Camp um which is an equestrianonly campground. Um it also is a day use area so people do go out there um you know just for picnics,
things like that. Um but it's in nine acres. We've got seven different equestrian sites. Um and it is connected to a huge you know number of you know trails for um horseback um for walking for OV for ATV things like that
snowmobile as well. So it's kind of a a hub for a lot of different trails. And then Wilton Hill Recreation Area is about 230 acres. Again, Commissioner Winger's area um is south of Wilton. And this one is doesn't really have anything
going on right now. It's one of our newer parks. Uh we're just kind of trying to figure out what we're going to do with it, which is, you know, another reason um for the park plan. It's actually, I believe 20, oh gosh, I want to say like 2021 it was incorporated, so
it definitely was not in the plan. Um so we're looking forward to putting that in there. And then we'll turn it back over to Shane. So yeah, um as we've thought about the parks and I've gotten kind of situated in the NRM department and got to know
Laura better, um and kind of tried to establish what do we have going on, um it became pretty clear that we have wonderful resources out there in county parks that we aren't utilizing probably as um proactively as we can. And so
the the current park plan was written back in 2008 and so long time ago a lot of the objectives that were in that um in that plan have been completed already. Um but then our community has grown a bunch since then and changed. I
mean, you think about the outdoor recreation of the COVID era and how some of that outdoor learning stuff has come on board that wasn't ever there before um or was much more minimal. Um all of those ideas will be incorporated into
the plan of kind of getting more relevant parks to our specific community. Um, and for an example of how old the plan is, Grant Creek Horse Camp, Wilton Hill, and Mrs. Mississippi Mississippi High Banks, they weren't even addressed or in they weren't there
yet when the original plan was. So almost half of our parks aren't even in the park plan. Um, and so in starting a plan, I'm a pretty simple person. And so it's not going to be an elaborate plan that we pay a consultant $165,000
to um to create, but it will be an effective plan that is community-led. Um the vision for the plan is that Bel Tramy County Parks will be a group of natural places that foster recreation, conservation, and community connection
while encouraging exploration of the natural world. We live in a pretty divided world these days and I truthfully I'm excited by the opportunity to do something that everyone can agree or not necessarily
agree on every piece of it but everyone can enjoy together. Um, and that's a um that's the vision I have for the parks. And the goal is to create a collection of parks that not only showcase the beauty of our county, which it is. We live in a beautiful area. Um, it's
outdoor heritage. Lots of people live here because of either their past history here um or they came to BSU because they love being outside. People love the outdoors up here. Um, but also providing a welcoming place for all people to enjoy, relax, um, and learn in
nature. Um, so I have a timeline. We're our timeline's running a little behind, so I won't go through the timeline. Um, but it's, you know, a normal planning process. It's going to take >> He has a question. >> Oh, sorry. >> Oh, I can wait. I just >> Okay. >> Okay.
>> That's okay. >> Um, it'll be about a year and a half cycle um till the plan is completed is the idea, the hope, and the goal. Um there's the part that you guys should pay a little bit of attention to is
there's steering committee meetings in May of this year, September, October of this year, and then March of March and April of next year. So there's three there might be four steering committee meetings. Um, and I think if Oh, I keep thinking you
click this forward. But so my request for the board um is to provide a commissioner to sit on the steering committee um which will be three to four meetings over the next um few year or year and a half. Um yeah, hopefully not
few years. Um, my plan is to have these meetings in the evening because I kind of like workingclass people to be able to be on this committee as well. Um, so as you guys kind of think through that, that'll be the timing of those. Um, and then also for everyone on the board and
everyone listening in the community over these next few months, anyone that has ideas of things we're missing out in the parks or that they'd like to see in this area, um, we've internally thought of a few um that we would like to see, but we really want to start it with a blank slate and get the community to be
telling us their ideas. Just because I think something would be good doesn't mean that everyone else thinks that. So, we're going to I'm I'm going to work really hard to get that collective um collaboration over this. Um and so that's all I have for now. I if
possible, I would love if you guys would nominate someone to be on this. >> Commissioner go first. >> Um just really excited to hear this. Um you're right. There's a lot of history with these parks. Uh there's generations of families that have enjoyed the
outdoors here and uh made it a part of their way of life and um big outdoors person myself. Uh love to hunt and fish and and uh visit several of these parks throughout the year and and uh yeah um I would happily be the commissioner to sit
on this committee. I do have some experience with survey work and strategic planning and whatnot. So, uh, could certainly commit to, um, how you have it laid out here. >> Thank you, Commissioner Carlson.
>> I was going to suggest that almost all the parks are in Commissioner Winger's district. He he should probably be the one on there. >> Yeah, I was thinking either Commissioner Winger or Commissioner or myself having, you know, the largest park in my area. In fact, my personal property actually a
bus park. So, I would certainly not be opposed to busy >> being on it um as well. So, >> this would give me a chance to um partake in um other parts of the county,
you know. I'm just the I'm just the city guy here, you know. Well, well, actually, three of us are the city guys now with the redistricting the new redistricting map. Um there's only two of you that don't have the city of Baiji in yours. Um but uh yeah um could
definitely pick up some tips and and tricks from uh um council member Fisk of Old Gould. She was on the city's uh uh strategic plan update for their parks and recreation department and and so yeah, it's exciting stuff. So um pick
me. >> Thanks Shane. >> Yep. Thank you guys. Do we need to decide who it's going to be today or just let you know? >> I personally would love it if we could do that if there >> let's do it. Yep.
>> Yeah, we got two. >> Mr. God and Commissioner go. Well, I've suggested Commissioner Wer, so I'll >> not the personal guys. It's just I'm busy enough.
>> Well, then with that, I would say the other large part being budded to Commissioner Gazig, I would recommend Commissioner Gazic if he's willing. >> Yeah. Tim from there.
>> Flip a coin. >> Yeah, that's where I'm at. It's >> you guys are wrestling. >> Yeah. >> You sure you don't want two? >> Well, I was just gonna go there and say that I I said one the board wants two. There's This isn't a statue or
something. >> I think it gives them both an opportunity. >> I totally in favor of that. >> Yeah. And then you got an alternate at the same time. If one can't make it, there still be one there. >> I think that's a good idea. >> Let's do that. So, we got two. Thank
you. >> That means you can double how many uh other board members you can have. >> Yeah. Thank you, Shane. Child protection overview. Sorry, we get just started a little
late, but all right. Uh, commissioners, good afternoon. I'm Jeff Lyn. I'm the social services division director. Uh with me I have Lisa Monzoud and Chrisa Golden. They are our program managers for our child protection and children services
programs. Um we're here to talk to you a little bit today in response to a conversation we had a few months ago. Uh we talked about the child protection team and it was suggested that there might be some interest in hearing a little bit more about our child protection programs and how they work.
So that's why we're back here today. Went the wrong way. There we go. So, there's an eb and flow to child protection services. There always has been. Um there are times when uh when our legislation or legislators and our
our um state looks for us to take a more proactive uh approach to protecting children. And then there are times when our state and our legisl legislators look to look for us to take a more proactive approach to preser preserving
families. So with that is the eb and flow of child protection. So in in Belrammy County we have two different uh units that work in our child protection services and programs. One is our children's services unit and
they do that does our child protection ongoing and some of our voluntary services and then we have intake investigation assessments and licensing and they're the ones that do the front-end work. They also do some voluntary work but primarily it's child
protection. So with me I have I have Carissa and Lisa. They're going to talk about these next couple of slides because they're the experts. I maybe was back in the day but my days passed. So, >> two of my main areas is child protection intake and then the investigation
assessment unit. So, I'll be talking to you a little bit about that. Um, so as far as intake goes, uh, if a report comes into our office, the majority of our reports come from mandated reporters. There's a process that we have to take. We have two intake
workers. They take the report by phone call, email or fax um read through it good, do a little research um on the report and then they have to gather a team. So by sta by um Minnesota
standards we have to have either a team of people that screen the reports or a supervisor has to be a part of the screening. So we get together every morning at 8:30. We screen all the reports that came in from 4:30 the day
before until that morning. Um, we determine whether they meet the criteria that the state of Minnesota gives us for child protection reports and decide if it the report meets that criteria or not. If it does not, um, it's screened
out. Sometimes nothing more is done other than they have to write up a report and crossreport that information to our law enforcement. Sometimes it's screened out, cross-reported to law enforce law enforcement, but we see that uh
voluntary services might be something that that family could really benefit from. So then a referral is also made for voluntary services. Yeah. >> Yep. Um Lisa Monzer's unit has the parent support outreach program. that is
a program that is there to support parents who are just um have barriers that are stopping them from thriving or who are struggling but they're not um any allegations of abuse or neglect going on. So that's one example.
Children's mental health, public health, um there's a number of areas that we can make a referral to. And then the other option is if it meets the criteria step set forth by the state, we screen that in for an
investigation or assessment. The report is written by law or by intake cross reported to both law enforcement and our tribal partners and the investigator or assessment worker goes out and starts their work.
Um so that brings us to the next part. Um Jeff talked a little bit about es and flows with child protection. Um in 2018 there was a a big focus change in the state of Minnesota as far as child protection goes. Um that change was the
primary intervention for um significant child safety issues um being out of home placement to prevention work. So um we really got a lot of education on that and made some
changes with our process that I'll talk about here in a moment. Uh so we go out and as any investigation you can imagine we do a lot um fact gathering um uh evidence collection, talk to witnesses,
victims, um alleged perpetrators. We do that some with law enforcement, some of on our own depending on the case. And some of those cases we find there's no to minimal concern. Either the report um the reporter had misinformation or it
just wasn't accurate. Those cases can be posed pretty quickly. Thank goodness we have some of those. Um the other course of action is when there's moderate to significant concerns. um we then either can work pre um the
investigators assessment workers works prevention services with that family if possible and I want to go back to I was still working in the field at that point. I believe it was at 2018 or the beginning of 2019.
I had just went through a training on um what these prevention services can look like. We received a report of parents um using a great deal of methamphetamine and unsafe environment for their children. I went out with law
enforcement and the the parents were very much under the influence of methamphetamine. Um the home was not safe for the children. In the past, even 3 weeks before that, those kids would have went on a hold. We would have placed them in a foster home.
I would have after gathering all the facts and all the information, I would have wrote a petition to the courts to get temporary custody of that child. They would have went into out of home placement. Instead, I used the information I just learned um and did a
lot of uh talking, relationship building with the family in that very first meeting. Um learned that they were admitting to their addiction. They were wanting help. they wanted to do different for their children and and
have a safe environment for their children. So, we started brainstorming who are your support people who are healthy. We called a couple of them. That was a no-go. We got a hold of a friend that said absolutely I can be there. I can help. Um that friend came
over. We made a safety plan. The kids went with a friend. The parents knew that the kids couldn't come back until they got sober. I worked with that family extensively um for two months. We
went through um a lot of hard times together, a lot of relationship building. Um but what happened is those kids stayed with friends where they felt safe and they knew and loved those people. Mom got the kids back within 2
weeks. Um dad struggled longer than that. We have avoided an out of home placement for th those kids. Um it took a lot of work and a lot more time than we were used to. Um but in the end it it feels good to do
that type of work and it was the right thing for that family and we have found there's a lot of those families here in Belrammy County. Um with the safety planning that change that can change every day. we we have to
stay really um connected to these parents that we're doing prevention work for. Um if things slip, we have to be ready to write a petition and go to court and get custody of those kids. When they're doing a little bit better, we can back off a little bit on that safety plan. Like I mentioned, mom was
able to get the kids home with her within the first two weeks. Dad could not go home because he had a harder time getting his addiction under control. Um, once the kids went home, then I needed to be there even more often. I needed to go to schools more often to check on the
safety of those kids, how mom was doing, make sure that dad wasn't coming home when he wasn't supposed to be because domestic violence was also a part of this family. Very time consuming. Um but and if we start working with a family and they're not showing
protective factors, they're not willing to cooperate with us, they're not admitting um that they have issues that they need to work on or there's safety issues within the home, sometimes we have no choice but to bring that to court to um get out of home placement
for those kids. Um, so then the investigators do as much of their investigation as they can in that 72 hours. Um, if the children are are on a law enforcement hold, um, write a petition, that can take probably the
average of 5 hours up upwards of 10 hours. Um, and have that in court within 72 hours of starting that investigation. So, it's a lot of intense um time consuming work even if we're um going to hand it off to Lisa's unit, but it's a
much shorter period of time with the families that um we can't gain cooperation with and they need to go into out of home placement. >> I have a question for you on that with the law enforcement. Um I've been out of that for a little while. Um where do you how do you place the kids
in the middle of the night? Do you have a a place now? Because it was really difficult. >> It's difficult >> for us at times uh to find a place especially when they're real small. >> Yeah, it is difficult. Um sometimes law enforcement works with the families to find um a family member that they can
safely place the children with on a hold. um if they can't find a family member or if they want to run that by us, they call us whether it's the middle of the night or the evening or um and we can um give them our thoughts on that
family member, we can look them up in our system if we happen to have our computers at home. Um if they can't find a family member and if they call us and we can't find a family member, then we're waking foster parents up in the middle of the night and getting those kids to a foster home.
So during the week um the investigators and assessment workers are who gets those phone calls. Weekends and evenings we have a rotation for on call workers and we have people from um Lisa's unit and my unit that take turns doing that work.
>> Thank you. Um, so I think that that is the main thing I wanted to talk about is that change of focus in Minnesota that Belrammy County um, really embraced and some of the good
work that we've been able to do. Um, unfortunately we still have kids in out of home placement and I can't foresee that that's ever going to get down to zero, but um, we are working with the families that there is an opportunity to work with uh, to prevent that.
>> Outstanding. Thank you. >> Commissioners, I know that we're a little bit behind schedule, so I I don't know how you if you would like us to come back at a later date and finish the second half of this up or if you want us to just continue like her to be able to give her whole
presentation along. >> I think we can get the presentation done, but it wouldn't probably leave a whole lot of time for questions. I mean, probably a little bit of time. And >> what do you guys think? >> We could hold the administrative report over to the regular meeting. >> We could do that.
>> All right. Okay. >> Hi, I'm Lisa Monzer. I rarely come to the board. So, um I just am really happy to be here to talk about my staff. And um I'm like Chris had really a lot of great things to say. I will try to summarize mine a little bit just because um my unit is ongoing case management.
So, I'm going to talk mostly about child protection and preventative services. I also do supervise children's mental health, but that is not part of our presentation today. So, um so for my unit, all of the cases funnel through Carissa's. Everything either comes through an investigator or um intake. So
everything that moves to my unit always starts in hers. Um we also do have mostly courtordered um case management but we do have some voluntary Chrisa talked a little bit about that. It is parent smart outreach which is our preventative program trying to keep people out of the child protection
system. Um we also do some truency work. Um our court ordered child protection cases and um we have one worker who does adoptions. So that's my group. We have 10 people that do all those things. Um, I think our biggest thing that I really want to um talk about is just how our
cases come in, all cases that are open for case management. There's a case plan that is a big part of the work that they do and our um workers develop those plans with lots of family input. So, we're looking at strengths, um, barriers, needs, and safety are our big
four things. We also are working very closely with tribes and guardian edems if it's a court case. Um our other big probably that takes a lot of our time is um court involvement. So there's lots of court report writing and collaboration consultation with the county attorney's
office or guardian item. So I think we like to say we're kind of a broker of all services. We're trying to make sure that families get the support services they need in order to either reunify or move to permanency. We do a lot with relatives. I think we are um above the
state average on relative placements which we're extremely proud of. And um I'm going to try to wrap up because I know that we're short on time, but if anyone has questions, I'm happy to talk about my great units that I supervise. >> Thank you. Do we have any questions? >> Guardian guardians at light. Are those
uh state positions or county? >> State they are appointed through the court. >> And are we are we staffed up on those or are there any vacancies or >> um I believe there are some vacancies especially for the equid division? >> Yeah. >> Okay. Thank you.
>> Any other questions? Okay, thank you very much. >> Yeah, appreciate >> the the statutes and acts have already been we've you have them in your PowerPoint so you can I'm not going to talk about them. You guys can peruse them at your at your leisure.
Um so investigations and assessments as you can see are on the rise. They've come up a lot in the last couple of years. Um, I think I'm going to let Carissa talk a little bit about what maybe why we're seeing some of that or why we think we might be
seeing some of that. Want to jump in on that? >> Sure. Um, these are just kind of what we're seeing. It's not factual written down anywhere, but um I think that all the drug use in our community contributes to the amount of child
protection cases we have. Also um we have parents who were prenatally exposed to alcohol or drugs um many years ago and now they are parenting and sometimes have struggles with that. Um also I
think the education in our um nation on child abuse education in schools about what to do if kids aren't feeling safe. Um those are kind of the main factors that I think that we talk about almost
any >> I think that's it. And then the number of uh children in out of home placement. When you look at that, that kind of co coincides a little bit with what I talked about earlier, the eb and flow of child protection uh and the work that we do. Um it's you can
see the numbers were very high uh back around 2017. And what's interesting about these numbers is they can change depending on one family of six that comes in. That's that changes everything in in how the the numbers look. So you can see it's really a squiggly line or a
lightning bolt, whatever you want to call it. Um, a lot of that has to do with the number of kids and the size of families that ends up coming in. Any questions on that? We've actually tracked these back to 200 uh 2006 and I I went back to I wanted to go back to 15
just to show you that eb and flow that we talked about earlier. And then child protection funding, as you can see, back in in 23, our billing was at uh uh $540,000. We went up in 24 to over 800,000. We
dropped a little bit in in 25. You might be wondering about that because our our policies and procedures haven't changed, but what we can bill for does. So when you look at the the the lowering of kids in placement and the lowering of long-term cases because of the work that
Chris's team does on the front end, sometimes we don't get those cases as long-term cases. We get to bill on the long-term ones, but if we are if we're doing our work, if Chris's team is doing their work on the front end and avoiding placements,
we're not having to pay on that side. So there's an eb and flow with that as well. It also when you look at the reimbursements um they have come down they've come down some and then went back up again. Um again that I mean it's
just the allocations how they come in how we get reimbursed the 4E uh 4E reimbursements things like that those all play into that. Any questions on that one? This one I thought might be of most interest to the board kind of the dollars and cents.
All right. Uh we wanted we probably could have taken an hour easily and gone through all this and we're trying to run through as quickly as we can. Do you have any more questions for us uh as far as where things are at with child protection here in Belchammy County? >> Outstanding job though. I really like
hearing the change in the program. Let's >> And I just want to say that um our staff and the work they do are the ones that have brought these placements down, the numbers of placements down. and Lisa and Chris's teams, they have to work together on it. Um Chris's team does a
lot of work on the front end and then these but if when the placement happens, Lisa's team is working extremely hard to to develop plans and help implement those plans so those kids can go home sooner. And if they can't go home, we're locating permanent placements for them
whether with relatives or adoptions and those types of things. So, all of those three pieces really play into the lowering of the of the placement numbers and and it's our staff and these two that are doing the work. Um, I I'm lucky I get to just sit and suggest things. I
try not to order much, but I suggest things and and and they follow through and they do the work. So, it it's them that deserve all the thanks and the accolades for the work that we do. So, >> thank you very much. >> Okay, we're gonna hold off on
administrators updates till the next and any changes on the any other business? No. The review of the agenda? Any changes or
nothing? Okay. Yeah. 9. Okay. >> 98. >> 98. All right. You got that one? All right. >> That's it. Well adjourns. Part: 2
for the pledge to the flag of the United States of America to the republic for it stands one nation for There you go. Thank you. Okay. Anyone wishing to address the county board on an item not on the agenda makeup order
at this time be recognized by the board chair. Please state your name and address for the record. Comments are limited to five minutes. A personnel complaint against an individual county employee may not be heard initially at a board meeting. Personnel complaints may be submitted to the board in writing to
the county administrator's office. Purpose a person addressing the board may not use profanity or vulgar language. We have anybody online? Anybody else wishing to address the board? No. Okay.
>> Uh Mr. Chair, I'll make the motion to approve the agenda with the following uh addition. Uh 9A is the administrator's update. >> Okay. Have a second. I'll second it. All
those in favor? >> I posted. Okay. Okay. Approval of the consent agenda. >> Mr. Chair, I'll make a motion to approve the consent agenda. >> Okay, we have a motion. Do we have a
second? >> I'll second it. >> Okay, any discussion? All those in favor say I. I posted. Okay, we're carried. All right. Uh,
so end n end club membership. >> Mr. Chair, I'll make a motion that we approve the membership to the end club or the northern county's coalition. >> Okay, we have a first and second. Any discussion?
All in favor? I >> I >> opposed carries 5. Okay. Additional items. Administrators update. Thank you, Miss Thank you, Mr. Chair. I don't have a very long update for you because most of the thunder was
stolen earlier in the work session on the jail project update. So, I'll just skip all of that since uh you've been thoroughly updated there. Uh just really quickly um the jail bond sale uh and the the closing of that uh occurred last
Thursday. That went very well. Uh and we have already received our funds. So those funds have been invested right now. Uh and then uh the auditor treasurer and I are working on the schedule for the release of certain funds to continue to pay the project as it goes, trying to keep as much of those
funds in uh investment portfolio as we can to earn as much interest as we can as well. Um we did do the service awards last week to all but one of our work groups and uh we are totally uh in total
recognizing 58 employees uh across the county for some sort of milestone which is a uh 5 10 15 something on the fives. Uh that was wellreceived. It was our 19th year uh uh doing that which is great and I just want to thank the board members that attended that and uh thank
you all for your support of the employees and uh recognizing their service and contributions to the county. Uh just a couple of quick reminders for the board. The Red Lake Nation State of the Band is at 10:00 on Friday, February 20th, so this Friday. Um, and then I
mentioned this at the last meeting, but just in case you've forgotten, uh, we are also going to be meeting with the Department of Commerce Commissioner on Tuesday, March 3rd, uh, and share our, um, our, uh, issues and concerns and current status around, uh, the storm,
uh, last June. And then, um, Biji Day at the capital, I'll remind you once one last time before it actually occurs, but that's going to happen on Thursday, March the 5th. And again, I'd encourage you to reach out to the chamber uh if you are interested in attending. Um know that they're trying
to get counts right now. Their registration is open for that. And uh they typically like to take experienced people and kind of put them together with uh um maybe less experienced or younger u members of the chamber that can get experience through the process.
So if you are interested, I'm sure they'd love to have you. That's all I have for you in the way of updates. I'll stand for any questions you might have. Any questions for Minister Barry? >> Mr. Chair. Yes. Um Tom, do you know what time that is on March 3rd? I didn't have
it on my calendar for some reason. >> March the 3rd. You're referring to the commerce. >> The Department of Commerce. Yeah. >> Yes. Um we are working actually on the time and so I'm in charge of the agenda. So I'm what I'm trying to do is put together a couple of different sections
to the meeting. You might recall the last time we went with commerce staff, we had like two sections. There's been some interest in a third section and that section would involve bringing homeowners in and having homeowners tell their stories. So, what we're doing right now is trying to find enough homeowners to sort of make that work or
business owners. And I think we've got maybe four or five or so uh with some fuelers out to others who who may want to share their stories. If we can do that, uh then I'll have to sneak in another one of those sessions and that will adjust the time. But essentially the commerce staff and we have agreed to
kind of hold the morning from 8:30 to around 2:30 that day. Uh we'll include also a tour which commissioners wouldn't need to go on but we're arranging for a bus so that if anybody wants to go they can. Um but uh essentially that's the time frame we're looking at is about
8:30 uh and maybe late as late as 2:30. Um, I'll have a little better idea in the next week or two as we get more confirmations or and determine whether or not we're going to have a third session. >> Okay. Thank Thank you. Great question. >> I'll plan on I was involved with the
previous meetings and stuff, so I'll plan on attending that. >> That'd be great. I think Commissioner Carlson, were you also? So, that would be our two commissioners kind of continuing the conversation. I guess that was good. Thank you, Mr. >> Chair. Question for Tom.
>> Yes. Um, have you had any meetings lately with the group of economic development, uh, expanding the tax base, uh, kind of working group you've been, um, >> we've had a lately? >> Yeah, we've had a few meetings, uh, maybe more informal at this point in time. I think I mentioned to you we met
with uh as an example we met with um Tim Flathers some time ago to talk about um housing and how to build housing stock and you know those sorts of things. Uh there have been a subsequent couple of conversations around uh particularly the
chamber myself and greater Baiji to sort of build synergy off of that. And um I want to say it's this week or maybe it's next week. We're also meeting with the Bel Tramy HR. So we'll be talking with the H as well about their role and and
sort of purpose and mission and those sorts of things. And there have been just a couple of brief back and forths with uh some HRD staff and myself uh trying to prepare for that meeting as well. So nothing super formal if you will just sort of background work to try to see where there are some synergies
that can be gained and and maybe some strategy that can be developed to continue to advance uh that particular topic or goal. Yeah. >> Thank you. >> Go. Thank you. Thank you.
Uh see the commissioners reports. Let's start over here. Y >> thank you Mr. Chair. Um that's another thing of union negotiations between the last meeting and this meeting and I
attended the all the county staff years of service awards. It was fun and and nice to nice to see that we have that many staff that are getting you know 58 staff was that's a pretty large chunk of our staff that is getting at least a 5-year reward and some up to 30 years.
So that was pretty cool. Um got a lot of stuff going on with the Cast Lake Rail Fire Association. our fire chief is uh taking up u another position and so we're going to be meeting have several meetings uh scheduling to determine how we're going to move forward with with
the the fire department if we're going to advertise for a um brand new full-time fire chief or if we're going to um you know keep the current fire chief on in some fashion and hire a um like a administrative fire chief or
something. So, we're got a lot of work to do um with that. So, I'll be meeting a couple meetings next week on that. Um at a fair board meeting last night, I alerted them about the county development fund situation and that uh that it would likely not
have anything in future years that this would probably be the last year. um got a airport authority meeting tomorrow and uh um we're going to have on our agenda uh working with the Chamber of Commerce regarding um bringing a TSA pre-check
event to get um have instead of having to drive to Fargo or Minneapolis or something uh to bring the pre-check people to Bumiji and and have it so people could go here to have their in because you have to do a physical inerson interview in order to get a TSA pre-check. So, I I actually had brought
that up that I would like to see that cuz I was wanting to get it and I didn't want to have to to schedule it down in somewhere else, you know, so my wife and I could hopefully both get get that done. So, I think that'll be pretty cool if we can make that happen. And the chamber is looking to to possibly just split the cost of having them come with
with the airport authority. And I've got an HRDC meeting this uh this Thursday as well. So, busy busy as usual. >> Thank you, Mr. Chair. >> Very good, Mr. Snicker. >> Uh thank you, Mr. Mr. Chair, so uh before I get on with my report, I guess I got a question for uh Commissioner
Gazwig in regards to the um uh the fair board. >> Yeah. >> I was just kind of wondering how or if we can have some sort of future discussion about about how we can help
the fair board. Um because I know that there there is a perception out there that I I don't like the fair board. Um but that is not the case. Um my my issue is that the fair board uh requests funding for maintenance and
upkeep of county buildings. Um and if it's a county building, I wonder why the county doesn't, you know, offer some sort of assistance um
to help. I mean, we we help upkeep this building or any other county property for that matter and all our buildings except the fairboard building. So, I mean, it's like, you know, maybe we can have a conversation about how we can
continue to help and the fair board in in that way. Um because that was my my issue is that they're taking money from this fund to upkeep a county building when this funding could be used for something
else. So I'm hope hopeful that we can try to figure out a way to to reallocate some money some way to you know because they're doing a lot of good things out there with the upkeep of of you know our property. But I don't I just think there has to be
a way to to figure out a a way >> to respond to your I think most of the money that they've got received for the from the development fund has been for projects or things to advance the the fairgrounds whether it be adding Wi-Fi
or or paving part of it or stuff not general maintenance type things. So I I think that's where the difference would be you know um I have directed them to see Shadrick you know if there were things like um when the storm hit you or when they had some potential vandalism
and things like that to work with with our maintenance staff because yeah they are they are county buildings you should be you know maintained by the county in some fashion anyways if there's a you know actual need for maintenance. >> Yeah.
Well thank you for that. Um well, since our last meeting, uh things have been kind of quiet on on on my calendar, uh with the exception of uh there was AMC uh meeting uh tribal tribal affairs
meeting uh last Wednesday. Uh we hosted the the tribal chairs of of uh the 11 tribal nations in in Minnesota trying to figure out, you know, how to um
develop a a curriculum similar to uh the tribal training that the state goes through. I think we have we've had that uh four years ago uh some time ago. Um and we're going to try to do that again. I have a chat about uh tomorrow. I will
be calling in and I brought my my board packet from the Northwest uh Minnesota Juvenile Center um meeting from January 29th that I said that was in my mobile office last
meeting. Um and it's and I think to to continue to update the uh our board chair and his request to learn about what you know our committees do. Uh it's my understanding that the
Northwest Juvenile Center houses uh children. Um you know unfortunately you know beginning at the age of eight you know it's how that's how young they are. um you know to 17 18 uh I know there was
a situation where they have a few uh 18 19 year olds in in satellite homes. Um so uh these individuals are are ordered uh to um the juvenile center and uh part
of the they got to work through their their their court uh process uh to get through this uh the juvenile center. Um this past year, uh there has been a fluctuating of numbers of of people coming and
going. Uh mainly towards the end of the year. Um you know, they're talking about revenue was being down. And you know, when we talk about our kids, it's it's hard for me to talk about revenue, you know, as as a it's a good thing, you know, because we shouldn't use shouldn't
be using our kids as, you know, uh uh talking points about generating revenue. Uh but uh but then you know on the other hand that's kind of how how uh these centers operate is you know uh revenue
uh generated from non-member counties. Uh we have a a huge list of folks that uh from counties throughout the uh state that send their kids to to Northwest. Um
I don't know. It's there's a lot to learn. There's a lot to um that goes on, you know, with the juvenile center. We had a >> just wondering, do you know how what the
capacity is of the juvenile center and and if they should say breach capacity like our jail they had at one point? Um >> you know, does I mean you can't h house kids. I would assume that. >> Yeah. Well, you know, I think the capacity is like 100 100 uh clients
close to it. >> Okay. >> Um but I think this year, this past year or towards the end of the year, I think there was like 50 or 60 kids. So, I think that they're seeing a decrease in numbers. >> They haven't had a capacity issue so far anyway. Okay. Thank you.
>> Huh. >> That's a good thing. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. It's it's good, you know, uh for the kids and and the family's sake, but you know, to to run a business, it's it's hard. So, you know, uh a lot of the, you know, non-member counties are are sending more of their kids here, you
know, which kind of help, you know, offset, you know, the the member counties, uh cost or or, you know, uh help the revenue. Uh we had a elections for our officers, Commissioner Gould. um unanimous consent
of of treasure, right? Um so there's there's a lot um billing I don't know if I'm missing. Can you please chime in if if I am? And also
uh this coming week uh I'll be leaving to uh the nation's capital for the Niko's legislative uh conference uh this Friday and we'll be returning uh next Tuesday. And um
to follow up on on Tom's uh Bumiji day at the capital, I also want to mention that AMC legislative conference is taking place uh March 4th and 5th. So, um, want to put that on your calendars as
well. You know, we can hit both. Um, or one or the other. That is my report. Thank you, Mr. Chair. >> Thank you, Mr. S. Mr. Juul. >> Thank you. Um
recently had BCAP met last week and uh we approved a lot of uh policies and mostly policies related to Head Start. Uh the main thing with Head Start is um things seem to have
leveled out a little bit um as far as concerns with federal funding. So that's good. Um, uh, there was a KLS meeting on Friday last week. Um, budget related.
Um, we hired an interim director because the current person is on um, paid family leave. And then yesterday we had a housing trust fund
meeting at the United Way. Um and there'll be an RFP going out very soon um for another round for grants for uh for program support. There's a lot of good organizations in the county um doing good work for um helping folks uh
find um temporary and long-term housing. Uh, and so, um, if you're a nonprofit and you work for, um, and you're and you're in the housing industry, uh, that should be coming out, um, any day now.
Um, then we, uh, talked about doing another round for, uh, uh, developments. And I was going to ask Tom if he could send me that map of county properties that was identified by our GIS guy, Kevin.
As far as potential possible developments, >> I I certainly can. Uh, Commissioner Gold, uh, just a clarification, it's not just county properties, it's um, government properties, right? Could it could be state or city?
>> You bet. I can send that to I'll do it right now. >> Sure. >> I think we should all be familiar with that. So, >> um, that's pretty much it. The I do have a request. Um, I'm hoping to go down to the Capitol,
uh, just down and back on Thursday. Um, uh, get away from my day job a little bit, uh, school/work and and, uh, head down there, uh, Thursday andor a day uh, next week as well.
So, I appreciate travel authorization on that front. I was planning on uh meeting with um both senators, representatives, both parties, just kind of going around with our uh county platform items and link up with our lobbyist and just
trying to get some hit some uh key legislators uh related to uh our legislative items, committee chairmans and the like that during the AMC stuff you're talking about. >> I'm not going to be able to go to that. So just
I was thinking of going down and back on on Thursday and and uh potentially a day next week too. So mileage would be helpful. Well, you guys want to approve that or not tonight? Uh it's not a hill I'm
going to die on, but it would be appreciated anyways. Oh well. seek advice from the chairman on that or what? >> Um how do how do we go about those requests? I mean uh I think you know the
work that we do at the capital is important and um you know I would be in support of of the request but I know uh um I'm only one opinion. So, um,
>> Jody Jody wants she told me get board approval for travel authorization if if you're going to claim mileage. >> Yeah. I mean, it to me it seems like a hassle to get board approval to do your own job, you know.
>> But it's the process. It's the policy we've decided on. >> Well, I would be in favor of you're doing your job. I don't first. >> Yeah. Um paid my expenses now.
>> N >> Yeah. uh being um being that I am on the AMC board and uh through the my no appointment from from AMC um AMC covers up to $6,000 a year for
for uh expenses to Niko events. So >> the number was approved the first time the first $4,000. >> Yeah, the first time uh it was I wasn't at on the board at the time. So um since then I have been
appointed to the board which you know has has the expenses covered. >> I I just would understand what you're saying. My only concern is to open a door where people just decide when they're going to go do
whatever and they get mileage for it and a little bit concerned about that. You know u I understand you're still doing county work. I get that. Um there's some days slotted for that coming up and those aren't something
you're going to make. >> I can't make the AMC in March. So otherwise that's when I would do that. The county would pay for mileage perm and hotel for that, >> right? >> So I was hoping to go down on Thursday or >> andor a day next week.
Not sure about next week 100% but definitely one day this week or next week. >> I think in a concern would be like with any department within the county is to to have accountability for where you
actually go. You know what I mean? I mean when you go >> that's why I'm asking ahead of time, >> right? >> And that's the process we have and that's what Jody requests I do >> is get >> get authorization ahead of time. Don't do something and then >> hope that you get it,
>> right? >> Or ask for it after the fact. Ask for it >> beforehand, >> right? So my my thing is, >> will you get something that shows that's where you were actually at? I mean, I know that's where you're going, but you know what I'm saying? It's kind of got to be for everybody in
the county. >> You want me to get some selfies with the the legislators? That's network. Now, >> you know, Mr. I was I was going to say I think we got an update from our uh our um representative uh a couple of weeks ago and and I think he highly
encouraged, you know, us to go down there as much as we can, too. Um you know, I I think hearing from from him, you know, I I think that should put enough weight on on any of us to want to get out there. I understand what you're saying, but how
do we tell other people in the county they can't do something? >> Well, I'm not too sure who is, you know, >> how often and and how much of a budget impact can I mean because that's going to be, you know, a few hundred dollars each time, you know, that somebody wants to do that. I I'm not able to make the
AMC fun either because I've got to file the following morning and and stuff and >> I just have concern. I mean, I'm not saying that what you're doing is wrong. I just have I just want to make sure everything's on the on the level of, you know, open
for everybody to understand so we don't have >> we say it's okay this and deny it for somebody else wants to be >> but else though. I mean, don't go down. >> Oh, that no absolutely go down. I just
don't I just don't ask for money reimbursement. I go down quite often. >> It's that's my only concern. But I just I appreciate you bringing it up ahead of time for sure. And But I'm kind of
of the opinion if I'm choosing to do something, it's if I'm asked to go, if we ask you to go, I would wholeheartedly say we should pay you to go, you know. Um that's just my opinion. If if somebody chooses to go, I don't put in for any of
my stuff either, but that's my choice, you know, whether that's right or wrong. It's my choice. But Um yeah, just that's my feeling. >> We were asked by our legislators.
>> Maybe we should have called No, we can't. We all have a job and and not allowing somebody to do their job is is a disservice to us to our county. Whether we think it's going to cost $200
or however much it's going to cost, I mean, isn't it worth it? I don't know. I mean because some some commissioners you know choose not choose not to you know utilize the the expenses doesn't mean that we
should all not be able to utilize it to do our jobs. I mean I I see we look at the bills we see who who submits you know uh for for reimbursements.
Are we going to tell them no? But we're gonna tell each other now. I don't know if you want to be fair. Let's Let's do it there. >> That's what we're That's exactly what we're talking about. >> Let's put signing the bills then.
>> I think you're misunderstanding, Tim. >> Every one of these department heads has to authorize their their employees going to these things >> and and all of us are in the same boat. And it they can't just decide they're going to go to something. Well, who authorizes the other elected officials?
Do you >> at the beginning of the year when we say which >> well then why you know >> considered we say these are these are ones that you can get reimbursement. We are we are authorized you know our committees too >> and and you know >> we all on that
>> well there's our authorization >> but we said which ones we get paid for like I don't get paid for doing planning commission as solid waste or anything else >> but you know going out to the capital should be one of them isn't it >> it's not there >> it's not
>> it's okay Tim I I think it makes sense but uh it's like I said it's not a and I still may So, um, you know, the it's not free to go. I mean, there's certainly expenses, uh, with with gas and and, um,
you know, lunch and whatever, but, um, uh, my my ask tonight, well, I was just kind of getting a feel. If, you know, you guys don't want to approve it, that's it's okay. Um, it it says something to
me, but um I'm not going to allow it from preventing me from doing my advocacy work as a commissioner. You know, we have legislative priorities we need to we need to show up for. We need
to be down there um working to get those passed um for the county, for our residents. Um it's okay if once in a while uh mileage isn't reimbursed but um I did want to bring it up because that is the policy
in the process. So uh I think that's something we should we should probably discuss and and make it you know get something set up so that there is some criteria that that's met to go do those kinds of things. That'd probably be a good idea so that we have that to fall
back on and say, "Yep, this is, you know, I'm going to go maybe say, okay, so many times a year we're going to allow that." I I wouldn't be opposed to something like that. But right now, we don't have that. And I think, you know, but I think that's something we could
discuss, put it on a something for future so we can talk about that and actually establish protocol. Does that make sense? So there's something there. I I I think we have a policy and a and a process already, but
>> Oh, I didn't know. Hadn't seen that. >> Yep. >> Yeah. It's okay. >> Are you done, Mr. Carlson? >> All set. Okay. >> Uh thank you, Mr. Chair. Um I had chat about after the last meeting. Um I want
to give a shout out to Kev Jackson. He does such a good job. I I just it's it's amazing how well he's kind of up on the subjects and and the good questions that he asks. So, uh Kev, if you're out there, thank you. Appreciate your job. Um at Prime West Health and Finance, uh
finance and operations committee meeting uh right after the last board meeting and then the Prime West Health Joint Powers Board. Um and then I had quarterly Magic board meeting at which I was elected vice chair this year. um the
uh head belt trai county safety action plan task force. We had out at the mind uh offices um that was the second of our meeting of about four meetings putting together a plan for um and some guidance
for what Bruce might need to do with uh engineering on making our roads or or trails safer. Um, one of the things that came up that was talked about quite a bit was the people that pass on the shoulders illegally and how dangerous
that is. That was a big topic. Um, and uh, so we urge people to not pass on the shoulder, please. Um, and whatever that looks like going forward. Um, also had the Belrammy County Lakes and River Association meeting. um looking for
anyone out on Lake Baiji or Lake Iran that's interested in starting a lake association. Uh please let me know. Um and we can help put that together. Uh it seems like we should probably have um a lake
association for Lake Bamiji and Lake Iran. Uh two of the larger lakes in our county. Um I also attended as many of the staff recognitions as I could and it was it's always fun to do that. It's always fun to kind of shake their hand and hand them their prize and say great
job and and uh I I know it's doesn't seem like a lot, but just that fact that we can thank some people for sticking around 5 years. Not a lot of people stick around in a job for 5 years. So appreciate all of those that have, especially the ones that have been here the 25 and 30 years. It's outstanding.
So appreciate that. Uh had jail design and operations committee meeting. Uh I was invited up to Nish Township meeting to talk about county budget. Uh did that um had the Bumiji Airport Affairs Council and I'm just going to say again
what Commissioner Gazvig said. If you're interested at all in the TSA precheck, just go go online to TSA.gov and look up the pre-check. There's some things that you need to do online ahead of time. And then after that is when you
have to travel to one of the um authorized centers. One of them's in Fargo. When my wife and I did it, we went to Fargo. It would have been really nice if we had this. And so what um they're going to do is they're they're bringing in the folks. So you can just go all right out to the airport. It'll
all be announced ahead of time. So be thinking about that. If you're interested at all in TSA PreCheck, go on to tsa.gov, check out the pre-check program. um follow through the things and then be watching for some information coming um that that'll be
coming forth um to be able to do that last thing that you have to do right here in town. So, it's awesome to do that. Um, and >> just so people aware that there's different types of TSA pre-check and the one that would be coming to town would be the clear type and that so that you
know they wouldn't want to do the prep work for one of the other ones and then and then have it not be the right one for this one. So it's it's the clear c a r um is the one that will be coming here and the and the chamber of commerce should be the ones bringing one. We
don't know a date yet or anything, but just wanted to give you a heads up that that's coming. >> Yeah, it's actually looking like >> April. >> Yeah, it's going to be sometime in April, I think. Yeah. So, but anyway, thanks for that clarification. Um, and then finally, congratulations to the
Bamichi High School girls hockey team for making it to state. Um, actually have a granddaughter on the team, so I'll be leaving town um on Thursday morning to go to that game. That'll be kind of exciting. Um, and I think when I'm down there, I'm going to get over I'll have time to get over to the capital and visit with some of our
legislators while I'm down there. Uh, so anyway, go Jacks. >> All right. Okay. For me, I did uh also attend the service awards and yeah, it was really uh a nice
experience to get to see those folks and see how many others came to support them. and uh nice to have conversations with some of the employees that came over and and uh and chatted for a little bit. So, I enjoyed that a lot. Was fortunate
enough to be able to make all the sessions, so that was fun. Uh attended a BAS meeting. They're uh they're doing a great job. They're finding funds that uh I don't know where Kim comes up with all of them, but she keeps coming up with more
and more funding, and it's great what they're able to do. And so, they're going to be putting out some uh some grant type of things, too. So, um doing a great job over there. Uh Solid Waste got cancelled. uh attended the Prime
West meeting uh via Zoom um and got to listen in on all of their reports which was pretty interesting. Um what else did I have? Oh, the the health board was cancelled so we didn't do that one
either. So um so I had a couple that I didn't attend this last time. Everybody um be uh prep for the storm that potentially comes in. U you know be careful driving because it's going to
get wet first and turn to ice after. So >> Mr. Chair, got to be remiss who our administrator Barry was one of them that received his five-year award. >> Oh yeah, I did. >> His first of five five year award or you know >> Yeah.
>> Beer for 25 years, >> right? Who wants that cutting board? >> Bamboo cutting board. >> That's That's all I have. Okay, we got a motion. Second.
>> I'll second. Okay. All in favor? I >> opposed. No. Perfect.