--------- Hello. Today is uh Tuesday, May 12th. It's 8:30. I'll go ahead and call today's meeting of the Klay County Board of Commissioners to order. Our first item on the agenda is an approval of the agenda. We do have an agenda addition. Uh Steve, were we wanting was Quinn
going to come to cover this or was this >> um Madam Chair, Quinn will be here this morning for uh for that? item. >> We'll add add those after the proclamations. >> I second. >> Have a motion offered to approve the
agenda with the addition. Uh, Commissioner Campbell, Commissioner Abinger, sorry. Any further discussion? Any further discussion? Any further discussion? All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. I
>> oppose. Same sign. Carries. The next item on the agenda today is the citizens to be heard. Are there any citizens in the audience wishing to address the county board on any item that is not on the agenda?
Any citizens to be heard? Steve, have we had any requests online? >> Uh, nothing, Madam Chair. >> Thank you. The next item today is approval of the payment of bills and vouchers. >> Madam chair, I'll make a motion to pay the bills and vouchers. >> Motion offered from Commissioner Bar, second from Commissioner Kavanagh.
Further discussion. Further discussion. Discussion. All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. I. >> Oppose. Same sign. Carried. And our packets. We had the minutes from
April 28th. Madam Chair, I'll make a motion to approve the minutes from April 28th, 2026. >> We have a motion offered from Commissioner Bayer to approve the minutes. >> Second. >> Second from Commissioner Abbinger. Any further discussion? >> Any further discussion?
All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppos. Same sign. >> Period. Item two today is a request approval of the amended language for the abatement policy. Good morning. >> Good morning, Madam Chair and
commissioners. Um, annually the Department of Revenue meets with county assessors and does an office review. They look at about 20 different categories uh for compliance. And one item they looked at recently was the abatement policy. It was found that
um in there the policy references that homestead application deadlines is not a reason an approved reason for abatement. Um however the in the past um prior to 2021 the abatement or the homestead
deadline was December 15th and in the 2021 legislative session that was changed to December 31st as the application deadline. So this is kind of a technical update needed on the abatement policy to bring it into
compliance. >> Thank you for the presentation on that and the clarifications. Any questions? Yes, Commissioner. >> I'm sure one question in all the changes are what is in red I assume. >> Yeah. >> Yep. It's just two changes of the date
from the December 15th to December 31st under the application for homestead or exemption paragraph. >> Madam chair, I move to approve the amended language to the Clay County abatement policy. >> A motion offered from Commissioner Campbell to approve the abatement policy
language. >> Second. >> Second from Commissioner Bear. Further discussion? I think this is a positive change. Uh certainly from the legislature it seems to make sense to align with the dates. Any other discussion?
All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. >> Same sign carried. Thank you. Thank you. Item three today is a proclamation for family child care appreciation month. >> Good morning.
Thanks for joining us today. >> Quinn, you'll kick it off. >> I sure will. >> All right. Got Julie and Gail with me here today from our licensing team. Karen says hi. She was going to come as well. Just had a few things to take care of this morning, so couldn't make it. Okay. >> Um that said, the first uh first reason
we're here this morning is I'm requesting a motion to approve May as uh family child care appreciation month. I do have an attached proclamation as well. Um, family childcare providers are trusted partners in supporting children, strengthening working families, and
contributing to our local economy by providing safe, nurturing, and highquality care in homebased settings in Klay County. Uh, this proclamation would recognize the dedication, compassion, and important contributions of family child care providers throughout Klay County and honors the vital role that they play in promoting
healthy child development, family stability, and strong communities. Uh, I think anybody that's got kids that would would acknowledge or recognize how important daycare is for Klay County. So, we just wanted to um really have a proclamation that that shows how much we appreciate what they do um and our
recruitment efforts as well. So, with that, I would yield to any questions that the board would have about family childare. >> Yes. Any questions? Is Karen getting ready for a party on Friday? >> Sure is. Sure is. >> Any other questions?
Well, uh certainly, uh we all know how vital child care is for folks. We've a lot of us that have, uh raised kids while working know the challenges that that can, uh mean. Uh sometimes bringing kiddos, I know this board has been uh patient with me on times where I've had
to bring a kiddo along to this board, but uh really really appreciate the work that you do in our county. Uh I can't even underscore how important it is. So, thank you. Uh we will go ahead and read the proclamation starting with Commissioner Campbell.
>> Whereas family child care providers offer safe, nurturing and de developmentally supportive environmental for ch environments for children throughout Klay County. And >> whereas family child care professionals
support the healthy growth, learning and social development of young children during the critical years of life. And whereas family child care care providers play a vital role in supporting working families by providing dependable and accessible care options with local
communities. And whereas family child care businesses contribute significantly to the economic stability and well-being of families and employers throughout Klay County. And >> whereas fam family child care providers demonstrate ongoing dedication,
professionalism, and commitment to serving children and families through high quality care and early learning experiences. And >> now therefore, be it resolved that the Klay County Board of Commissioners recognizes the important contributions
of family child care providers and their lasting impact on children, families, and the community as a whole and hereby proclaims the month of May 2026 as family child care appreciation month and encourages all residents to recognize
and thank family child care providers for their dedication and service to children and families in our community. >> Madam Chair, I move the proclamation. >> We have a motion offered from Commissioner Campbell to move the proclamation. >> Second. >> A second from Commissioner Ebinger. Any
further discussion? Discussion. Discussion. All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. Same. Sign. Carry. You >> Thank you for all you do. >> Thank you.
Item four is another exciting recognition, the proclamation for foster parent a appreciation month. >> Yes, exactly. Um wanted to bring these at the same time. Um just from a timing perspective, but also the interplay between both of these providers is really really crucial for the community
and for the kids that we serve. Um so with that, I would also request a proclamation designating May as foster parent appreciation month in Klay County as well. um we wouldn't get very far doing the work that we did without our foster parents um or our daycare providers to be honest, but foster
parents in particular. They provide safe, stable and supportive homes for children and youth experiencing out of home placements. Oftentimes this is the most difficult time in a child's life and these foster parents provide that stability and support for kiddos that are really having a tough time. Um, this
proclamation recognize our foster parents commitment, compassion, and partnership um, demonstrated by them throughout the county and highlights the importance of community support for our foster care services. So, I have an attached proclamation for that as well, but would yield for any questions that the board would have.
>> Madam Chair, one question, >> Commissioner Bear. So with with us always looking for more foster families, could you give a little little uh synopsis of how someone would become a foster parent? Who would they have to reach out to to
>> Absolutely. >> Right here. >> That is myself. I'm Gail and I license our children's foster homes, our non-relative homes. Um we have an application packet I walk people through directly. It's both online, so they can access it online as well on our county
website or calling me directly and I will sit down with them and meet with them and go through that process step by step with them. >> Perfect. >> Gail will eliminate as many barriers as we legally and financially can eliminate in order to get licensed providers. Absolutely. And we do Alex is her
counterpart and Alex licenses all of our uh family and kinship homes. So if uh child protection placement occurs, the first people that we're asking is other relatives. And if those relatives decide to be licensed, we have Alex that will help kind of go through the exact same process but with the relatives and kin.
>> Thank you very much for asking that question. >> Yeah. And follow so um in in finding people are there um we've talked about this in the past but a refresher um certain challenges of ages um in finding
care. You know, I think um oftentimes it's harder to find homes for our sibling groups, our larger sibling groups and also our teen, our older kids that are going through the system. Um I think that's always a challenging um aspect. We have a lot of great foster
parents that are open to that and they may start with a younger age and then just feel drawn to these older kiddos. So, it's really great that >> they're open to that um and willing to do that. So I think that's the challenge the two challenging groups. Yeah. >> Um that are a little bit harder for
>> good to know. Thank you. >> Additional questions. >> Go ahead and read the proclamation. >> Whereas children and youth in foster care need safe, stable, and nurturing homes during times of uncertainty and
transition. And whereas foster parents provide compassionate care, guidance, support, and advocacy for children and youth placed in their homes. And whereas foster parents play an essential role in helping children maintain connection to
family, school, culture, and community while supporting permanency and reunification efforts whenever possible. And >> whereas foster families in Klay County open their homes and hearts to ch, excuse me, to children and youth facing
difficult circumstances and help create opportunities for healing, growth, and stability. And >> whereas the the partnership between foster parents, kinship caregivers, social workers, schools, healthc care
providers, and community organizations strengthens outcomes for children and families throughout Klay County. And >> now therefore, be it resolved that the Klay County Board of Commissioners recognizes the extraordinary commitment and service of foster parents as well as
the positive impact they make in the lives of children and families every day and hereby proclaims the month of May 2026 as foster parent appreciation month and encourage all residents to recognize and thank foster parents for their dedication, compassion, and service to
children and families in our community. Madam chair, I move the proclamation. >> Motion offered from Commissioner Campbell to move the proclamation. A second from Commissioner Bear. >> Further discussion. >> Further discussion. Discussion. All those in favor of the
motion signify by saying I. >> I. >> Same sign carried. >> Thank you. >> Thank you so much. >> Please make sure and thank your teams and also the families from us. >> Absolutely. >> Thank you guys. >> Thank you. When would you like to do the
agenda edition? >> That would be great. Thank you. >> Almost forgot about it, didn't you? >> I wasn't sure exactly where you wanted to throw it on the agenda. Okay. So, I was going to hang around. >> Uh well, I you know, we are in the last week of session, so I really appreciate uh continuing to bring awareness to this
piece uh as we've testified and it's a priority for AMC as well, but certainly we'll hand it to you to discuss. >> Thank you, Madam Chair and Commissioners. I'm here requesting a motion to send uh the attached advocacy letter uh to the House leadership uh regarding SNAP administrative cost
shifts and the error rate fiscal penalty. Uh so Senate File 4612 is a Minnesota Senate bill intended to address these major SNAP cost shifts that are expected to impact all counties due to upcoming federal funding and fiscal error rate changes. The bill includes provisions designed to prevent
these new costs from being shifted directly onto our county property taxpayers. Uh the Minnesota Senate passed Senate File 4612 on April 29th, uh the House later amended and passed its own version of the bill, but because the House version differs from the Senate version, the legislation is now proceeding through conference committee
negotiations where the House and Senate must agree on a final version before the bill can become law. Uh, I am requesting this county board uh approve me to send this advocacy letter to the house leadership encouraging support for retaining and strengthening these county
protection provisions uh during those uh negotiations. Uh just to uh highlight the importance why uh without this legislative action, Klay County is projected to experience a SNAP admin funding loss of $392,137 and a projected SNAP error rate penalty
exposure of 1,532,831. About a quarter of that we will see in uh quarter 4 of 2027 without any action by the state. So those those two combined just in 2027 would be approximately $800,000.
Um so combined overall uh these two impacts represent nearly $2 million in potential direct cost shifts to local county property taxpayers. And the importance the the reason that I'm kind of concerned and bringing it to board is that doesn't get us any additional
services. That doesn't improve what we're doing. It doesn't help the residents on the other side. Those are just cost shifts to counties without any improved service delivery or benefit for our residents. Um, so this letter emphasizes the importance of preserving these county protections uh with the
final negotiated version of Senate File 4612 to reduce the local impact on our taxpayers. With that, I'd yield for any questions that this board would have. >> Thank you, Commissioner or Thank you, Quinn. Commissioner >> Good morning, Quinn. Um
can you go into a little bit of detail regarding the SNAP error rate penalty exposure? >> Yes, absolutely. So the the federal the big beautiful bill uh is assessing a a percentage of a fee based on the overall
state's error rate. Um if it's 5% or lower, there wouldn't be any fiscal penalty at all. If it's up to 10%, uh it changes what the state is owed. And it's up to if you have error rate of 15% or higher, it changes what it's owed there, too. So the worse your error rate is, the more that a state is going to owe
the federal government. So right now, Minnesota's error rate is hovering right at that 10% range. So Minnesota would owe money to the federal government for errors in administering the SNAP program. Right now, there is no legislation to equally or to uh like
prorate how the state would divvy out that error rate to counties. So right now it would just be equal across the board. It would be whatever that percentage of air rate is based on how much your county administers in SNAP aid. So the uh the 1.5 million is based
on last year's SNAP expenditures. So Klay County administered about $15 million worth of SNAP to our residents. And as a result of that, that's where the 1.532 million comes from because even though our error rate is 1.68% 68%
uh we I guess would chip in because there isn't any legislation that says otherwise. >> So So if we would have been getting direct federal assistance to Klay County, we wouldn't have any penalty. >> You'd have no penalty at all. Yeah. based on these
>> as it goes through the state and then the state is basically um having all 87 counties regardless of what each county's error rate is uh take part of that 10% >> penalty.
>> That's correct. Yes, that's correct. might my >> and then so that one that 1,532,000 portion of it um who misses out on that is that is that the SNAP recipients >> their benefits would not be impacted.
The issue comes that's a penalty that we've never paid for before and so the county social services is going to have to figure out how to budget that money to provide to the state. That's that's not an expenditure line that we have right now. That would be 1.5 million of
brand new expenditures that has never happened before. >> And then and then the loss of revenue that we would used to get at 392,000. So you're so it's about $2 million that goes to the levy. >> Correct. Yes. My concern is that's a gigantic number to go onto the levy and
it also loses the or we lose a chunk of the funding that helps support the staff that administers the program. So if if we don't choose to put it all in a levy, we're looking at a reduction in staffing which could then ultimately result in delays in processing snap.
>> But also if you don't get the delay adds into >> component of an error. >> Correct. >> And the important part is that we are getting penalized even though we had a very low error rate which resulted in $59
worth of benefit being calculated differently. That wasn't $59 of fraud. It was in the calculation. >> Correct. >> We are getting penalized at a far higher rate than people that had doubledigit errors because of the way >> correct >> in the infinite wisdom of legislators.
>> My my concern with how this exists today is counties that have a very good error rate, a very low error rate, that do a great job administering are actually subsidizing counties that don't have a good >> a better error rate. >> Yes.
Do you have a followup, Commissioner? Commissioner Kavanagh. >> So, um, give a little background, if you will, where this conversation has been, uh, when it went through the Senate, did it pass with any opposition?
>> I I'm I'm not sure on the opposition. I just know that both protections for the federal admin as well as the fiscal error rate uh in the Senate file that was initially passed, both of those protections were passed in there. Okay.
Both of them, the governor's budget has uh protections for counties for the error rate but not for the admin loss. And I'm I'm not sure what the House amended. And on the admin piece that was part before that was covered by the
state. Is that correct? The admin part. >> So how it works is the this is where when I say FFP, federal financial participation specifically for the SNAP program, >> that's the 50% revenue that comes in from the federal government. So for easy math, if an eligibility worker that
administers SNAP, if our expenditures are 100,000, we would get 50,000 in FFP from the federal government. Do I >> as this stands today, if this passes without any protections, we would only receive 25,000 from the federal government in FFP or the SNAP program,
not for MA? >> And uh any background or knowledge of where the House was at on their part as it went into conference committee? And last question, that conference committee, is that already started or is
that yet later this week? >> I Yeah, I don't know. I >> I can answer. So the this the first the Senate piece was the Wickland bill. Y >> uh and so that went along party lines 3432 and the Senate the House rendering passed 6963
and then conference committee uh started on the 11th. So um obviously this all has to if it's going to pass get done by Sunday. up. >> Uh, sorry, really quick. I one really appreciate this. This is um imperative
that we continue to talk about that story. The only piece that's not in here that I would want to have in there is what Klay Countyy's error rate percentage is. I think it's important I'm really really it's I think it's actually less than 2%. It's like 1 >> 1.68% our last
>> 1.6. I think it's important that we put that in there. And I would um also like this letter to go to the members of the conference conference committee. Commissioner Campbell. >> So these the between these two these are
these are revenue loss. They're cost shifts to Klay County. >> Correct. Um I I was al I also heard that there would be reduction in SNAP benefits to people. Is that that's not even part of this?
>> I'm no I'm not aware of >> not aware of any. Okay. >> The concern would more be on the admin side of when people come in and they need to meet with their eligibility worker, report those income changes, stay true to what the program designs.
is if we have less people to do it, it's going to be longer wait times which then incur more errors, >> right? There it's going to go up, not down, >> which then incurs more of a cost shift, which exacerbates the problem. >> Uh Steve,
>> thank you, Madam Chair. Last Friday, we uh had a MCA meeting with AMC. Matt Hillgard spoke spoke specifically on this issue. uh the AMC has been putting a significant amount of effort uh into bringing forward uh this. We were able to share information uh from counties on
the impacts that this is going to have on on levies across the state of Minnesota. And so I just want the board to know that AMC is actively actively working this here till the end of the session. >> Thank you. >> I'm just curious, what's the state doing to reduce their 10% error rate?
>> I guess I don't know that I can answer that. I'm assuming they would say their efforts in system modernization would help. Um, but that's been a huge lift by all of you and I know AMC as well. Uh, we have pretty complicated policies in these program areas and it's kind of
been my opinion as I've learned over the years that we need to really shore up some of these policies and uh make them easier and streamline them. Well, I appreciate him asking that question because countless times we've told the legislature the number one way to reduce
these error rates has to do with the modernization piece. And then to continue to hear them say, "Well, we'll see. We'll see if we have the money. It costs a lot of money." So does this. This is a $2 million unfunded mandate for Klay County. >> Just for Klay County, >> $2 million.
>> And we're going to have a discussion a little bit later about what our budget looks like. And what will happen is that we will need to make hard decisions on the programs and services that our county residents have directly told us, which are very important to us, how we
triage what that need is. Not saying that there's not a huge huge uh need in the SNAP area, but this is not a $2 million unfunded mandate that will go to benefit families that are facing hunger. Uh again, as soon as we can get this
sent today, I certainly support it. Board wishes. >> Madam Chair, I'll make a motion to approve to send the letter to advocacy the letter regarding SNAP, administrative cost shifts, and penalty impacts to state legislators. Madam Chair, I'll second it with the uh
stipulation that we include the two items you identified to Quinn that need to be added to this letter for Sent. >> Uh >> Commissioner Bayer makes the motion with the additions. A second from Commissioner Ebinger. Further discussion.
>> I just want to give kudos to Quinn and his staff for the error rate that Klay County does have. Under 2% is tremendous. And if the state's averaging 10, I mean, we're bringing down that average. So, some counties are way over that. >> Commissioner Heinger,
>> I want to echo that. We have uh a textbook example of what good administration and good staff can do. And instead of uh shifting burdens onto us, they need to maybe take a few lessons from people like Quinn that understand the system, see the flaws,
and they need to be heard and and uh leads a way in addressing the needs of our community without uh the some of the fraud and the the incompetence we've seen. We have not seen it here in Klay County. And I don't think anybody on
this commission wants to take credit for that. We know where the credit is. It's a welladministered, well- led team and you've got that and we're grateful for it. >> Thank you. We have great staff in financial. I mean, um, as you heard in the department updates, we we carry pretty high case loads and so my concern
with that has always been our error rate handling those high case loads, but I've been impressed at least in the last two years, year after year, at how low that error rate is, knowing that we run higher on case loads. So, our staff are pretty amazing. Thank you. >> Thank you. All those in favor of Did we
vote? >> Not yet. >> All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. >> A vote same sign carried. This is one of those things that I think voting twice would not hurt. So it Okay. Item five today is a request for out of state travel for the 2026 NO
conference. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. As you mentioned, Commissioner Mojo is requesting to attend a Niko conference in the Orleans Parish in New Orleans, Louisiana on from July 16th through the 21st. Uh the uh the
funding for that would come from our general re revenue training budget. uh uh the cost right now with without your board approval uh Commissioner Mojo has been unable to secure some of the some of the exact costs but uh believes that
uh the the total cost would be up to up to $3,000. With that, I'd yield for any questions. >> Thank you. I requested this be put on the board. uh uh one given the fact that we just talked about an item that came from uh Washington DC that's filtering
down to us in an amount of up to $2 million feel like it's really important that this board continue to advocate at the um in DC as well. Uh the other reason that I brought this forward is uh as you know AMC has covered some of my trips to St. Paul to continue to
advocate on our behalf. And those trips have already secured almost $2,000 in savings for Klay County, knowing that that will another trip to St. Paul this week. We'll continue to add an additional $500 to Klay County and felt like it was within uh reason. Uh
certainly willing to um field any questions on this piece. Uh if anyone has anything, >> Commissioner Abinger. Yeah, I just um it's a shame this is in New Orleans because some people may think that uh she's going to have some fun there, but
I've watched Commissioner Mojo over the last couple of sessions and I haven't seen any recreational activities. When we go up to uh to our AMC conferences, we usually go out someplace and have dinner and Commissioner Mojo is with the
other executive board people working into the evening. And I want to express as a taxpayer my appreciation for the value we get out of what she and what she commissioner Krabenoff have done. Try going and dealing with St. Paul is
not a a recreational activity and it brings money and it keeps money in Klay County and brings money back. So I appreciate the efforts. >> Yeah, I'd like to add to that. Um, Commissioner Mojo is uh, in my opinion a
um, highlevel advocate for not only the state for Klay County. um when we're at that state level. The other thing I agree with everything that Dave said, but I'd also add that being as top leadership within
AMC, that's a bigger voice yet and and um having walked the halls with you and speaking with legislators in Minnesota, I know your um ability to um convey
messages in a way that is receptive to people. I I certainly hope that when you have this message uh and you're in DC, what's the dates again? July. You know, you're uh
able to talk to our two senators and and I'll put a lot of pressure on Senator Cloverar in particular and so that she understands uh what's going on, especially from things we just heard about with SNAP.
which is horrible. So, I mean, I strongly support this. >> Next year, if if reelected to this board uh in November as being part of the leadership team, AMC would cover 100% of the first vice president to go. Uh we've
talked a lot about uh the ability to maybe have some I talked to Grant Wayland a long time ago and what the value was to have someone do that. And so if this is something that we feel is a benefit, uh, and then having me go with AMC's payment next year would
potentially open it up for someone else to to go as well if it's a budget item we see benefit. >> Any Yes, Commissioner C. >> I it's always been this board's position that to allow one board member from our
county to attend the National NL conference. So I this is right in line with that. questions. >> Yes, Commissioner >> Abinger. >> Sorry, my mic's off. Uh, I want to move the motion that we approve funding for
you to attend the NAO conference. >> Second. >> Thank you. So, I think for clarification, we need to have the up to amount and then the dates >> and the out of state portion. Okay. Um already put this. Here we are.
Um up to $3,000, which is currently estimated uh for the conference, which will be in New Orleans, Louisiana July 16th through the 21st. >> Thank Thank you. We have a motion
offered to approve. Second and >> a second from Commissioner Kavanagh. Any further discussion, discussion, discussion? >> All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. >> Opposed. Same sign. Carried. Thank you
all of you. I appreciate it. >> Item six today is the Klay County budget update presentation. >> Oh, thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. As we uh next two items are budget related. As we move towards uh 2026, we always like to come before the board uh
and provide a recap one of of 2025. Uh and then also a snapshot of looking at our our expenses uh mo mostly focused on for 2026. And so within your packet you have uh several documents. The first document that we're going to address is
is taking a look at the revenues and expenditures by departments. Uh again, the focus uh that we have generally looked at during this process uh is those items that are 110% uh out of alignment uh or higher or if there's
something that's significantly lower, we'll also address that. Uh Miss Johnson is here today. Uh and so if there's different questions that you have that we do not necessarily have highlighted uh or highlighted through this presentation, uh we do have the ability to to uh look up some of those
additional uh questions that you may have. Uh and so what I would like to do is first focus on uh the expense side of the of the general revenue uh document. Uh the first item that would focus on is court administration. uh we we saw uh an
expense of 114% uh out of the 100% that was anticipated. What we're starting to see too is this this addresses uh two of our uh two of our contracts for contracted uh legal fees. Uh and within that we also have a
dollar amount uh to deal with additional uh additional costs that the the attorneys may need for testifying purposes, different testing of for their clients. Uh and so with the complexity of cases that we continue to hear and see, uh we saw an increase demand for
services there. Uh in the next item I would address is the the county administrator budget. As you can see, that's 141%. If you recall, this board approved after the levy was set to to make the county administrator position from a half-time uh position to a
full-time. And so that is where uh that adjustment is at. Uh the next item uh that I'd focus on is is the internal accounting that is at 111% of expenses. Uh again, some of that is the timing of paying bills. Uh but in speaking with
Lori, there's also uh some additional costs that we do have to look at that we'll have to make minor adjustments for the 2027 budget. Uh the next item that I want to focus on about uh halfway down there down the column is the building ground and
buildings. It's at 116%. Uh again, the the transactions uh this includes transactions for detox. uh those have not been in included yet either in the uh either in the revenues or the uh the expenses in this case and
so that uh uh Troy will be covering those costs that will I'll bring that that percentage down. The next item after that is planning and zoning. Uh the big push there is repairarian aid. That's at 113%. Uh if you recall this
past year, this board looked at the repairarian aid and made allocations uh to to specific areas and some of those dollars were not just expended from this year but expended from previous years uh from from that balance. And so uh we saw
an increase uh there. The next item is the narcatics tax task force. The only amount there it's all staffing staffing related. So it would be salary and overtime that is included in that line item. Medical examiner of
course that uh that line item is out of our control. Uh again that we utilize the medical examiner down the twin cities and so uh that is just subject to basically to need. The next item after that would be the
juvenile detention that was at 115 uh%. Uh just to kind of give some clarification uh this as this board knows the juvenile juvenile center uh the secure unit has a you pays for bed purchasing on a two-year look back uh
and so that is included uh in this figure that would get us to 100 110%. Um, this year, for the first time in several years, uh, when a youth is in need of placement at at Redwing, the Redwing facility, Klay County is still
responsible to make the payment for that facility. Comes through Quinn's budget. Uh, but it shows up in this line item. We really, in looking back, we haven't had a significant significant uh, amount of expenditures in this item since
probably 2017. Uh but we have had a couple youth that have been in that facility uh and it averages between $9 and $10,000 a month to house them in that facility. And so um uh again this isn't something that that historically we've budgeted for uh because it's not
something that happens on a routine basis but uh something that we can certainly look at uh from the board's wishes standpoint. Next item is emergency management. Uh again that would 138% in expenses. Uh
the both the expense and the revenue here is is wrapping up the ARPA expenditures. Uh should be the last time we see some of those dollars uh in uh in in our expenses and revenues. But that's uh that is the the adjustment there. And
so that concludes that concludes on the general revenues expense side. Are there any questions of any of the other areas that we did not address that the board would have any questions on? >> Questions from the board on any pieces?
>> One question, Madam Chair. >> Commissioner Bear >> dispatch is at 109%. Is that contract related with >> that's just the amount that we pay the city of Fargo or dis uh pay for our portion of the dispatch >> dispatch >> and the revenues are also up yeah
>> 3% more >> additional questions as we work through this >> if not madam chair I will switch to the next page the expense expense column there's um many fewer items here on this list but want to uh touch base first on
road and bridge uh the expenses in in highway administration uh the uh is at 105% generally again we don't generally try to touch in in thatund
110% or higher. But just wanted to to touch base again that this this one has to do with the gravel tax small amount small town aotments. Um as this board is aware uh each year the small town aotments go to uh go to the cities. They don't always spend those funds. Uh and
so uh sometimes they a lot of times they save them up and utilize them at a higher rate. And so that's where you where you saw the increase this year. uh county buildings. Uh again, this is where these next two items are fund n fund 13 and fund 19. Uh again, the board
sets aside uh roughly $50,000. Again, up for Joe to to look at different county projects. Uh again, some years that all that money isn't spends available to utilize. Other years, this past year, uh
we did uh projects uh in the jury box. We had probation updates. Uh we made changes to the fourth floor of the family service center, the attorney's office, uh just to just to name a few, and that's where we saw a significant uh increase of 330%. Again, the funding for
those projects were there. Uh it's just that they were the the funding for the projects were uh saved from previous previous budgets. The next item is county uh buildings major. Uh that'd be fund 19. And again, this portion is uh
the the high joint highway facility roof project uh that this board approved this past year. And so that's where that showed up at 159%. Uh we we move down to solid waste. Solid waste there there's a few different
drivers here at 187%. Uh again, you see the revenues are also uh there's an increase there that we'll talk about in a little bit. But uh the the main issues that we had here is a a depreciation was about $1.2 million. Uh this board
approved an additional new staff uh to work in the scale house. Uh and and then with some other position salary adjustments uh that was about 300,000. There were uh additional fees for consultants and other professional
services of 139,000. And if you recall, we had uh two uh semis uh that uh ended up needing transmissions uh and that was over $100,000. Uh and so uh when you look at when you look at the the budget
as an overall uh while we did see increases there uh the expenses were lower in the other areas and so we still uh came in under budget at 98% but did want to highlight uh highlight that that >> Commissioner Campbell. >> What's this depreciation business on
here? What's that about? But when we do these things, aren't we aren't we dealing with actual expenses where you pay and receive? >> Correct. But you also have to recognize the depreciation and and it looks to me
here it looks like that depreciation probably it should have been put into 399 and it was put in 392. So, but it was still about $100,000 more than we had budgeted. So, so in terms of when they when they budget, they put in a budget for
>> Yeah, we we put in a budget of 1.1 million in uh the solid waste facility. >> And that's that's basically a paper entry, >> correct? But when we go to establish how we're going to determine our tipping fee
revenues and those types of things, we don't take that into account in terms of what we need to generate. >> We do not. >> Okay, that's I think that's important to recognize that difference. Additional questions? >> Anything?
>> Ste, do you want to move on? >> All right, Madam Chair, I I'll continue back. If you go to the first page back to the general revenues, I'll I would I'll highlight uh call out a few different areas in the general revenue area. Uh the auditor's office was collected 117%
of of the anticipated budget. Uh the driver there was additional mortgage registrations and deed tax increases. The motor vehicle department uh had an incre was budgeted at 142% uh incre 42%
increase. Uh the main drivers there uh were $113,000 in drivers uh driver's licenses mostly focused on real ID people coming in out of the year as to what we were anticipating coming in. Uh, and then we
also saw $90,000 in tab increases. And, um, I think that that's I, you know, I think that from this board's perspective, they put a great deal of, uh, time and effort into making sure that the the DMV is a is a place to do business and and you can go in there
quickly and get the work done. Uh, and and I think that, you know, TABS is a pretty simple thing that in years past we heard people be very frustrated with. And so I think this is just one of the signs along with the decreased weight times but I think uh you know the
increase in tabs show uh that our our customers are being able to be serviced and service quickly and so that was really good to see. uh treasurer. Uh the next area is an increase uh is 319%. Again, if you recall back in 2022,
uh we saw quite an a decrease in the market value of our investments. Uh over the last uh several budget cycles, we've seen those investments kind of claw back. Uh and so we saw quite a quite an increase uh there. We'll talk a little bit more about that when we get to the
fund balance document. Uh but that was really the driver uh driver there. The next area is victim witness. Uh that had 160 that was 163% of the budget. Uh and uh again that was from a new grant funding resource that they received. The
next area again is the ground and ground building grounds and buildings. We touched based on the expense. Again, this has has to do again with the election of of the detox or addition of the detox facility. Uh the riparian aid, a very similar
situation again uh that riparian aid that we spoke about spoke about. Uh and there was an error that Lori identified as we went through this process that also would uh impact uh impact that percentage. Uh the next area is is corrections. Uh
that's 288%. We've seen an increase uh we saw an increase in the number of uh people that were booked into the facility uh from other other non-cllay county facilities. We also saw a significant increase in the commissary account uh and and that was a driver for
that 288%. Emergency management again came in at 100 100 or thousand excuse me,78% and again uh that that was all ARPA related. This is where the uh emergency
manager grant comes in. Uh generally that's at 37,992 and the remainder was was ARPA. And so, uh, with that on the general revenue document, are there any questions on on the any of the revenues that we spoke about or didn't speak about?
>> Questions? I just have a question on the uh, Metro Council. U, have we not paid the 2026 bill? My understanding is those bills went out in January.
I show here that we did >> okay on the 26 year to date. It's >> If it's not on there, we haven't paid it yet. >> Yeah, it's says that it's not.
>> If there's no other questions. >> No, it does. I'm sorry. I was looking at a different variance. It requested a higher amount. Apparently >> they did. It's based on formula. So we >> got it. Yep. That's where Sorry, I was looking at the wrong thing. Additional questions.
>> Uh if if not jump to that second page again highlight the the road and bridge. Do want to highlight uh within highway construction. Uh from a from a revenue standpoint, it shows that we are at 49% of that 100% but what was budgeted. I just want to reassure the board that at
this point uh the project hasn't been closed out and so we haven't received our federal dollars uh for that project yet. And that's that essentially is the the difference uh of the 49% to 100%. Uh highway administration uh also uh is
higher than expected and as uh Commissioner Campbell and Commissioner Mojo talked about from year to year we don't know what our aotment is going to be uh our construction allotment from the state of Minnesota. We've been fortunate in over the last couple years that we have a higher uh number than the
preceding year and so uh subsequently that encapsulated 116% of what we anticipated. Uh if we go down to to solid waste recycling again our our uh our revenues within that department were were higher
than we had anticipated in the past several years. Recycling has uh has come with challenges and cost but we were able to see some higher higher than anticipated revenues last year. And then the existed uh landfill we saw an
increase of revenues of roughly 114% uh and again that came with a higher anticipated level of garbage collection. And with that I would yield for any any additional questions on this 2025. Commissioner Campbell >> Lori is um for when Corey is doing his
budget on that recycling, can you you you break out for him how much is score funding versus how much is generated from other um re recycling revenues? >> Yes. And the addition for this for last year was actually some metal recycling
and so that's where we saw the big increase >> and that was outside of the square funding. Correct. >> Okay. Thank you. additional questions. I think as you can see and again we'll we'll be moving to the next uh the next document is our fund balance document
but as you can see from uh from a summary of revenues uh in most of our most cases that that uh overall from the budget perspective in general reserve our revenues were 100% 100 excuse me 10% higher than what we had anticipated. uh
and our our budget items overall uh were were right uh right right where we where we kind of anticipated again with with some adjustments for from different departments. So the next document that if there are no additional questions there the next document that I would
would like to touch on would be your fund balance. Uh again your fund balance gives you a snapshot at the end of uh each year uh from December 31st to 254 to 25. Uh when we look at our general fund account, uh you can see that we had
an an adjustment from $18,121,635 uh to 20,713,929 uh which was an increase of $2,592,2994. Um, as we discussed uh earlier with the treasures, up a significant portion of that uh was a market value adjustment of $1.278 million. Uh and as this board may
may recall, one of the things that as we get into budgets, uh budgets and and revenues over expenditures at the end of the year, uh this board uh has chosen uh for the 2026 bud budget to use $ 1.5 million of this $20,713
uh 92 towards the 2026 budget. Commissioner Kavanagh, >> can you uh just briefly what do you mean by market adjustment? >> A number of years ago, we lost approximately $3.5 million due to the to
the value of our investments. So like our face value was say they had 100% but the value of them were 95%. So we have to actually make an adjustment for that. And like Steve said earlier, we've started to claw that back a little bit. So in 2025 we we got back 1.278 million
of that and last year we did the same thing. >> Okay. Thank you. >> So is that like the is that like money in like a form fund or something or would it >> it's some um FDIC backed and some step up things that we've got mostly with
Wells Fargo. Um but but it's just it's it wouldn't be a loss until you sell it, >> right? >> And which we don't ever do. So, it's just just a >> it would it'd be no different than myself looking at my 401k and seeing one year it's down and another year it's up. >> Correct. Y
>> same type of thing. >> I hate it when it's down. >> Same. >> Any other questions? If if there's no other questions on the the general general fund balance, I'll move to road and bridge. Again, as we
talked about, we saw a a adjustment from 24 to 257,391,978 down to $4,521,89, a difference of $2,870,165. Uh and again as we shared uh in the previous document uh that uh that is waiting for a federal reimbursement uh
and basically that covers covers that difference. Um any questions with Ron Bridge? Uh social service. Uh again uh we saw a decrease in social service uh this year.
Uh we uh we had uh in 2024 we had a fund balance of 11,772,123. Uh at the end of last year we had $10,165 uh excuse me 10,165,781. Uh the driver the driver there uh as
Quinn has talked to this board about was out of home placements. Uh we had an increase unplanned of about 1.1 million. Uh of that 1.1 million about 800,000 can be attributed to youth that are in need of med mental health services or a PRTL PRTF level of care. Uh and we also saw
last year some federal administrative aid uh dollars that decreased uh roughly about 300,000 and that so that was the uh just about the entire increase or decrease of of fund balance there. Any questions?
>> Additional questions. >> I think it helps folks understand why we've been so adamant about finding additional care opportunities. Um, the next item is building. Again, this pertains to Joe's area. We went from 134,045
down to 19,393. And again, has to do with the the number of projects that Joe completed uh over the last over the last year. Uh, internal service, again, this board uh takes a position rather than waiting
and p purchasing a $1.2 $2 million bulg in one year. You save save on an annual basis, budget basis over the life of that uh pro that uh piece of machinery and other examples like that. Uh and so we saw a fund balance increase of 12
from 12,516,570 uh to 13,586,75. Uh again, there were no real significant purchases. Uh as highway tracking uh has maybe mentioned in previous years, there's going to be a request uh coming uh later this year. Uh that will certainly impact that, but the increase
is really based on the fact that there are no significant purchases there. The next item, if there's no question, is public health. Uh we saw a increase of $192,672 uh in this account. Uh the we started a
fund balance of $18,711,753. Uh we ended last year at $18,000 or excuse me 18,94,425 for the increase that I mentioned. Again, the driver the real driver of that is is was the withdrawal management
detox facility. Um the uh the starting in 2026 that budget will be broken out uh by itself but from from this purposes here it was still captured within the public health uh public health realm
>> questions. All right, if no other questions, we'll move to solid waste. Again, uh in the solid waste department 2024 and to 24, we had a fund balance of $23,561,221. Uh we saw a decrease uh from 24 to 25 of
22,946,879 or roughly $614,342. Um, any questions? >> Questions? >> Another question, Madam Chair? >> If we could go back to public health. >> Sure. >> What does it look like once we take
detox out of that equation roughly? >> Yeah. I mean, at this point, you know, Lori has Lori has identified in previous years, last year, she identified that of that fund balance. um in 2024 at the end
of 2024 um less detox was was about 3,973,522. Um and so that will look a little bit different. >> Yeah, that fund balance. So you can see just from um uh when we reported earlier there's about uh $15 million worth of
building that will come out of that fund balance because that's included in the fund balance. We'll move over to the detoxes. the building is included in the fund balance of public health >> under public health. Okay. >> Yeah. Just to just to clarify though, so when when we're talking about
the general fund balance, we're talking about dollars that are in an account, right? >> Uh mostly. Yeah. There's we don't account for fixed assets in the general fund fund. >> There's no fixed assets. >> It's Yeah. >> Yeah. >> And Roaden Bridge has some fixed assets.
Uh it does not >> but it's that one is a either a delay in payment or um >> project out. Yeah. >> Social services. There's no >> no fixed assets. >> No fixed access building.
>> No. >> How come we how come we don't put the value of the family service center in under built? How come we don't >> The family service center does include assets. It's an enterprise fund. So we've got public health, landfill, family service center, and internal services. Okay,
>> those all do have the assets shown in their fund balance. >> Okay. >> And then the um internal service fund, of course, there's no >> it no it does show assets there. >> Well, show assets, >> but it also shows the accumulated depreciation. So, it nets out.
>> Okay. So, it's the net value >> as well. The others do as well, but they're new buildings. You know, for the detox is a brand new building, so there wouldn't be much. Why won't the detox be in internal services then on that building? >> Internal service is a it's a fund that
services the rest of the funds by accumulating money for the fixed assets. Detox is its own fund. It's a revenue generator. So it's a it functions on its own as a business type. >> Okay. >> Is that like an enterprise fund then? >> That's what an enterprise fund is. It's a business type fund.
>> Okay. >> Additional questions. >> And then the solid waste. Um, now there's some fixed assets in there, right? >> Yes. Yeah. The landfill and the solid waste building or the resource recovery building.
>> So, if we're look if if we were to look at a cash fund balance, we can't look at this document. >> Not this one. You could look at um if you subtract the the the bottom half of that print out. If you remove all of those, the top fund balances, that's
more so what we have. It's not liquid cash, right? >> We don't have access to it, but Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Could you get us a document that shows that? >> Sure. Yes, I can. Yeah. >> Thank you. >> And it's something that I've always thought interesting. So, so we always
see these things based on um year-end numbers. Sometimes when we to me it would be it'd be interesting interesting to see what these numbers would look like at for example the end of April and the end of
September. Uh because you know that's that's when we're getting towards our low point. It just be interesting to see how where we end up being. And this goes to the argument about what the state has, you know, in terms of 50% of, you know, that's what that would be
interesting to see how that lines up, >> right? Well, just talking cashwise, I just looked at it the other day. Our, you know, liquid cash ranges anywhere from 7 million, which would be in March, >> to 50 million, >> right?
>> Which would be, you know, in this week, this week. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Yeah. But that that 50 million disappears quickly because I have to send that out to the school districts and settle that fairly quickly, you know. So it does range with those numbers in the in our liquid
cash >> questions, good discussion, additional questions. >> All right. Thank you, Madam Chair. just the two two columns we've touched on a little bit already, but family service center. Uh from 2024 to 25, we saw a
decrease from $1,666,83 to1,539,127. Uh again, a decrease of 126,956. Um and uh then the juvenile facility uh had a had a decrease of from 6,297,890 uh to 6 uh6,5,617
uh or a revenues under expenditures of 297 uh 297,273. The good news is there is James budgeted uh for a million dollar loss. Uh and so again that facility is operating uh
operating in the positive uh providing that that operating loss a million dollars offers members a decrease on their bed rate. Uh and so uh so certainly certainly see a benefit. The driver continues to be uh from
non-member usage. Uh and that's where that million dollars was offset uh to 292,273. >> Commissioner. >> Yeah. So Lori um on the family service center that one million that that that includes
fixed fixed assets, right? >> Yeah. And and obviously that's a depreciated fun balance. I I would I would I would hope that our value in that fivetory family service center building would be more than $ 1.5
million. >> Most of it would be >> right. Okay. So the you know from from a actual u market value type of deal >> zero I mean we're not recognizing any
market value in that building I don't believe. So not much. I mean >> and and you're not in the in the supposed to in this >> in the fund balance. >> But if you were if you were going to do a net worth type of deal, that that'd be a different thing, wouldn't it? Right. >> Yeah. >> Okay.
>> Thank you. >> Additional questions? Questions? Lots to process. Any other questions for Steve or Lori? Continue. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. The next item that we're going to look at is really
focused on 2026 year-to- date. Our our real goal is to focus on on uh on the expenditures. Uh realistically at this time, our revenues uh fall behind or come with the tax piece and so are not
captured in here. Uh this is through 33% of the year. Uh if you look at uh if you look at both of these first two pages um there's really there's from an expense standpoint every everything is uh within the uh within the area or uh includes a
includes part of that includes a one-time payment. Uh you'll see back uh in Road and Bridge uh there's some insurance and liability payments that that had to go in at 100%. that put us at the 43% range rather than 33%. Uh but
uh if you look at the rest of the items, the other items that are in the higher range are are positions that we pay one time a month or or a portion of the year, a significant portion of the year. Otherwise, from a from a department
standpoint, uh our our expenses are within the range that they should be. questions. >> One question, Madam Chair. >> Commissioner Bear, >> debt retirement county projects. What is that county project? >> Uh we issued some bonds uh for a number
of projects throughout throughout the county. Kind Joe put together a list. Yeah. >> And so it's to cover most of those. >> Most of those. Right. >> That was in 20 I think we have three years. There's three years left on it. I think so.
>> Commissioner Kavanagh, your microphone. >> We look at that budget just to make sure it that's through the end of April. >> Uh yes, through the end of Madam Chair, >> Commissioner Campbell >> on social services. When we see those
numbers, is there more likely to be more of a delay in um both payment of expenditures and receipts of revenues? >> Mostly in the receipts. >> Mostly in the receipts. >> Okay. >> Yeah. It's an extra at least an extra
month of delay for the revenue >> for the for the revenues. Okay. Additional questions questions on >> right the the final document that I have for for this board to to look at is the updated updated information on the
halfsent sales tax collection. Uh as you recall um several years ago because of the the increased collections that we've seen over the year, we were able to remove uh remove levy dollars from the repayment of our bonds uh for the for the correctional facility and law
enforcement center. Uh we ended up uh as of last year uh with with collections of $4,698,68866, which was a 3% increase. uh over last over over the previous year uh the we've
kind of plateaued uh from over the last two years after seeing uh four or five years of increase uh increased sales tax collection. Uh if you take a look at our first three collections of this year uh
we we have collected 1,130,6367.3. uh in each of those years we were at or above uh what we had collected previous years. If we continue at our projections uh of even allotting the same dollar amount uh from the previous year uh we would be looking at collecting roughly a
million dollars more uh in 20 in 2026 than we did in 2025. Uh again, we provide try to provide these updates to this board uh two to three times a year uh and or if there's anything that pops up from a collection standpoint that
would for some reason be of concern. Um but with that, I'd yield for any questions. >> Questions? Well, I think this is a really helpful look back. Um, having served through some different disruptions in our economy, I guess, is the best way to to
say that, it's interesting to see how these numbers have been coming in and where the trends are. I still maintain that it it has been a really critical financing component to that project. I really appreciate the community's support there. I will tell
you that, you know, I'm very aware that we have inflation pieces and and, you know, that kind of accelerates how collections come in. cautiously um observing um you know the business climate in Minnesota is challenging and
we're seeing some unfortunate moves and shakes around that piece and as this board has a discussion later on today about economic development I think it's a really helpful tool that we continue to be aware of
questions additional questions questions. Well, I really appreciate the presentation and the data today. Uh, this gives us a lot to comb through as we um talk about your next item. If there are no other
questions, should we go to item number seven then? >> Sure. Thank you, Madam Chair. Each May we come before this board uh and give target dates uh for the adoption and preparation of of the 2027 budget. Um if you take a look at our list here, uh
preliminary budget discussions taking place obviously uh today uh we we are going to be providing or Lauria will be providing the budget sheets to our department department heads on May 27th. uh and we are going to uh have them
provide them about 3 weeks uh to prepare their budgets for collection to to Lor's office. She generally takes till right around the 4th of July uh to get them all compiled uh and then we begin uh we begin to go through uh each of those
budget packets with the department heads uh on a line by line uh review uh and then they come before this board uh for initial presentation. Again, we've already had conversations with our department heads this year, understanding the challenges that uh
that we certainly are facing again both from the state and the federal uh legislative changes. Uh again, encouraging uh as we do every year, but specifically the last couple years to uh to limit any kind of new requests uh to
absolute necessities. Uh and so that message has been shared, will continue to be shared. We're looking this year to set our preliminary levy um uh on the 22nd. Uh September is one of the months that does have five Tuesdays. We're not scheduled to meet on the 30th. Uh but uh
in the event that uh there is any concerns uh on the 22nd, we would technically have one one additional week to make adjustments uh if the board wished to schedule a meeting on the 30th. Uh we're looking to have our truth and taxation uh meeting uh board meeting
uh actually on the at 5:00 pm and then truth and taxation uh will follow that uh at 6:00 p p.m. and uh with a with a final adoption uh of December 22nd. I think there was some discussion about
the potential of doing that a week earlier. Uh but uh but with that madam chair I would yield for any questions. questions. >> Well, I want to go back to our um
spring retreat with department heads and there were some pretty alarming statistics on what we're at with a levy with just the barebones piece. And I do really feel like um the folks that were in that meeting understand the
constraints that we're under. Part of the reason why we've been in St. Paul so much is because we're just facing historic cost shifts to all of us and um I think we've been more vocal about that uh because it is going to be a challenge. Um I you know it's not an
insurmountable challenge. We can figure out um all of those pieces. But as you communicate that to the other departments, um I think it's really important that they are aware of of the the difficulties that we're um we will
have and just making sure that we get the numbers to where they need to be. Additional questions or comments, perspectives for one, let's talk about the timeline. Does the timeline look? >> Yeah. Okay.
>> So, we all appreciate the timeline. In regards to the communication to the departments, I I believe Steve knows where we're at. Is there any other perspectives that you'd like to offer to that communication? >> Madam Chair, I'll make a motion to approve the proposed 2027 budget
timeline. >> Second. >> We have a motion offered from Commissioner Bear to approve the timeline, a second from Commissioner Ebinger. Further discussion? >> One question, Madam Chair. Commissioner Bear, >> we do have until the last Tuesday, December, correct, to set the final
budget? >> Yes, that's >> be the 30th, right? >> Yep. >> Questions. >> All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. I. >> Same sign. Carried. Feel like we should
have this titled Lor's last. Any lasts coming up? I've been documenting every one of them. Uh really grateful for your leadership. Any additional comments? All right, we will move into committee reports. Thank you both for the in-depth
information today. Commissioner Ebinger, you're up. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh last week on the 7th Thursday I virtually attended the um SECB legislative committee.
Uh we spent most of the time reviewing and giving feedback on the uh statewide communication interoperabil interoperability plan skip. Uh it had been prepared by a private vendor as an
analysis of where we needed to go with the improvements to the statewide system. U the uh 911 improvements uh a number of things. Uh it's about 30
pages long and we've been given a month to review it and frankly the reviews are in from this committee uh are that it is not it accomplishes nothing and the chair is going to take it further up the food chain and see what
we're going to do. But um I read it and I thought what am I missing? and I got in there with the experts and they were wondering what's in this that that meets the objectives. So, I guess I didn't miss anything. Uh but we that was what the
majority of the meeting was spent was that review. Um on the uh or later that day I attended the project uh project partnership amendment commemorative
ceremony that the metro flood diversion had. It's very uh very gratifying. Uh, one of the I guess the high point of it was that uh we had uh Adam Tail who's assistant secretary in the army there
with Major General Kelly and uh Colonel Chase uh from the uh core of engineers and we were celebrating the funding in the metro diversion project of hund00 million
that is uh left over from the operation that the core of engineers came in early and came in under budget and thanks to Senator Hovind and Senator Clolobishar that money they got legislation through to where it was transferred to the diversion authority
and is now available for finishing projects and getting some work done. It was uh a very good ceremony and was good to to uh be part of that. Let's see on the 11th
Uh we all attended an emergency board meeting and then later that day I attended the um RPAC uh restorative practices group for our quarterly meeting. Uh there was a lot of
good discussion in it. uh the uh folks that are working in Morehead schools with the restorative uh justice program did a a lot of the uh presentation for us. Very impressive group. They are functioning at a high
level right now. They're dealing with a lot of kids. Um just on the quarterly reports uh they there's a minimum of uh 87 kids that were dealt with a maximum
of 118. uh they they are dealing with a lot of referrals for that would otherwise go to juvenile court and they're getting fewer and fewer of those as it moves along because they're getting kids in there
before the juvenile system actually gets involved and they're dealing with it from a uh received referral which is not a one that comes out through the court system. So very good meeting. The grant
funding there is being well used. Michelle's running good program. And that completes my report. >> Thank you, Commissioner Ebinger. Commissioner Kavanagh. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Um
I my first report is from um May 6 at Wednesday at our PRTF nonsecure facility uh planning meeting with our lobbyists. Um really look forward to the or talked
about the work we just done the prior week and what's ahead for this week. So, um, coming ahead with that, the as out of that meeting, uh, more letters were sent to, uh, people we've been working
with in both the House and Senate, um, thanking them for their work and, um, uh, further advocacy of what need we hope will need to be done uh, by the end of next week. The last day of session
will be um Monday or Monday the um help me um >> Sunday at midnight. >> Sunday at midnight. Okay, thank you. And uh so we have one week to go. Uh Commissioner Mojo will be going down I
believe on Thursday and then be there with Friday again with our uh legislators on on the floor. um on the 7th on Thursday um kind of going back to our meeting last week
here. we had the uh presentation by our um children's mental health lac. Um so as we had our monthly meeting here that was on Thursday um we went through kind of what was uh
talked about at our presentation and then into our new business. Um another mini grant was put out to access Red River Valley. Again, this would be a program for 8 to 10 k 10 kids during the
summertime where uh we talked about the miss I'm going to use that word by the lack of um the morning police not having their summer programs and yet at the same time what can we do to help fill
that gap. So that was a big discussion. Um again, thanks to our county for um giving them money uh every year that they've really saved up uh in down this critical need and making these small
grants to help these kids through the summer. Um also I think everything else um we talked about was pretty much already presented. So I think yeah I think that's pretty much it about
that meeting other than agency reports and again we had you saw the list last week and I think there were around 20 groups groups that we work with. So given our individual reports uh that evening
uh the horse story from culture society uh of Klay County had their annual meeting. Uh we had that at the imprompt center. Um guessing around 60 people were there. We had uh um refreshments at the beginning,
some pie actually. And then we went into our meeting. Uh we had a um uh director's report from our from Laura Ford, our um new executive director of about six months and she gave a good
review of 2025. Then we had board elections. Uh we had three board uh members reelected for another term and then two new ones came on, Dan Gunderson and Vicky Hogan. Dan
from uh Morehead and Vicki from uh the Delhi area. So, we'll enjoy having them jump on board. And then after that, we had our presentation of the 2025 LA County Heritage Award. And uh it was
given to our long-term past executive director, Marine Kelly Joonison. And uh it was wonderful. Uh Dr. ABA who was our board member gave the presentation and did a really nice
job and uh just our gratitude and all the work that Marine did for this organization for many years. And then after that we had a little trivia game with the group and and it was about national and state local questions and
with a lot of those people they're pretty uh in tune to a lot of history. So it was uh fun to do. Um on Monday uh yesterday uh I had my adult mental
health monthly planning meeting uh for board meeting next week uh development of a annual report that I believe is going to be given here on May 19th next week. Uh, and then in in the evening,
um, I had, uh, the Buffalo Red, excuse me, the Buffalo Red board meeting and, uh, that was last night. Uh the big discussion there was um just for an update uh from when we talked last week
uh CW had talked to the U CW I got to say this right I find anyway the furner plant >> right >> down by Wolverton I had a discussion with the DA and uh anyway Ross was on on
on the call last night into the meeting And that group has decided that they were going to build their own levy. And so they'll be working with the Houston engineering and and just get it done. They've gone through uh permit approvals
already. One with the Department of A and MPCA that's been approved and they're just waiting on a DNR um approval uh approval which they should have shortly and they'll get it going. Uh Houston is working on the
engineering on that one on the um on the specs. Um then after that and help me with this Commissioner Mojo the hearing for now we got the U hearing for project um 34 for the restoration of Ris Whiskey
Creek. There was a hearing on what day? Do you remember? >> The hearing was the hearing was on May 4th. >> May 4th. Okay. So here we are only a few days later at the next meeting and then there was supposed to be uh a final
presentation and then uh motions moving forward whether to uh move on with the pro uh project or not. Uh there was an hour and a half of uh discussion by landowners um concerns about the project. At the
end of the all that um it was decided and a motion passed passed that uh in order to uh uh at this point discontinue the project uh and I suppose there'll probably come back to it at some point
but at this point they were seeing it was emphasized and shown too much u damage is being done at the end of the Stony Creek project and let's get it figured out what's happening on the water coming down the ridge and the
effects on these projects um that are just spreading into further into the county. So, uh at the very least I'll call it a pause. Um >> can I ask a question? And I think there's some un So they were the recipients of a $3.7 million Lassard
Sams >> and my understanding was that they could still make changes to the project but they needed to act so they wouldn't lose that 3.7. They could do you know what the >> I don't know and that wasn't uh any part
of the discussion last night. >> Okay. Thank you. Um yeah. Uh other than that, just a few things on ditch repairs and um new contract uh liners needing to be
replaced in ditch 50 in county. And that's my report. >> Thank you, Commissioner uh Kraban. Before Commissioner Campbell goes, I think it's important um I am not on the diversion authority, but I have served uh in a variety of different capacities with Commissioner Campbell on the
diversion lands components. And on May 7th, Commissioner Campbell was bestowed a quite an honor uh from the US Army Corps of Engineers, a service army civilian service commenation award medal for all of the work and contributions
that Kevin has um committed to the diversion project. Uh his time uh fighting floods goes far beyond his work on the county board. certainly when he was a township official uh trying to save his neighborhoods in North Morehead
and Oakport. And I just really want from this entire board to also extend our gratitude, Kevin. Uh that is quite an honor and we're really proud of you. >> Thank you. >> I knew you weren't going to report on it so I had to.
>> I wasn't there. That award will be presented at the next board uh >> diversion authority meeting. >> All right. On uh Tuesday, May 5th, we had a uh quickly held um
pick meeting p personnel issues. Uh Lori Johnson had a couple things that uh she from a timing standpoint she really felt important for us to hear. And of course those two item two of the items that were there were on our consent agenda for today after being um approved
through pick. Uh we also had some uh discussions about uh timelines with upcoming retirements. I'm I'm not going to mention any names. Um this one doesn't have anything to do with me. Um
but um yeah, so there's some uh critical timelines coming up um in regarding regarding retirements. That same day, we also had a highway tracking committee meeting. Um
on that we're was reported on that date that Cassad 12 and 52 the first phase detour will begin the Tuesday after Memorial Day and then maybe Commissioner Mojo can give some updates since then too on on some of these things. But CASA
2 was closed and they are reclaiming that roadway. And then um and then also um CASA 26 uh that work from Highway 75 to the Red River. Uh that now is scheduled for late
July and August. And so be can be somewhat hopeful that maybe most of those trucks that are dealing with that project over in North Dakota will be a little closer to finished so that we don't beat up that road once we finish it.
Um and then there was a um gravel pre-construction meeting that afternoon and we had some discussion about future graveling contracts
and then also uh CASA 21 working with MDOT. There were no bond funds available on that and so they're working on a shoulder closure and I think we're going to um
Justin will be coming forward with a plan for a a bridge plan and hiring a consultant to design that uh coming up. So, um, and then, uh, just a note of note, um, Dustin is working on, uh,
pickup purchases and auctioning off, um, three pickups, uh, the need of another plow truck and a toner replacement, contractor body, and a sign truck. So,
those are things that he's going to be bringing bringing forward and additional equipment purchases will be um updated soon. And he's hoping to bring
the updated five-year plan to the board in the near future. Uh then on the excuse me I gotta get my on May 7th we did have a um Zoom teams
meeting regarding the with the chamber regarding our flood mitigation work group dealing with the legislation issues. uh as it's been we've been talking about here today the uh we're we're getting down to the wire and
uh I know that there's some plans for some members I think maybe Jason or somebody is going to be down there later this week >> I'm picking them up I'm picking them up Wednesday night and I'll hand deliver that Thursday >> so Jason Benson and Commissioner Mojo
and I I believe we're going to be delivering some little sandbags to >> sandbags a lot of uh >> sandbag stress relievers. >> Yeah. To a lot of our legislators down there. So, as they're getting frustrated with the have these
>> these things that they can squeeze and >> Where's ours? >> Just We should have had that before the budgets >> as long as they fund the projects. >> Yeah. >> Pass the bonding bill. So that uh so that was that and then uh there's really uh the only other plans
for that group will be to um meet post um closure of the legislative session to see how things have worked out and hopefully we'll get some good news. That concludes my report. >> Thank you Commissioner Campbell and
Commissioner Bear. >> Thank you Madam Chair. On May 6, we had a county owned lands committee where we discussed the Riverton Township property that the county owns. One of the things out there that law enforcement wants to
they they use the SWAT uses it right now, but they wanted to build up a burm which they lay on for their sharpshooters to use for more practice so it's safer out there. And then we also discussed on that same property the national North Dakota National Guard
wants to do some training out there through June 6th through the 10th deductive training. Both those move through the county owned lands committee and should be coming to the board for our approval. We also had a third item on the list with a
company that would wanted to use some of our property off County Road 26 for a scale which we did not move forward. And then yesterday I went to Dworth for the groundbreaking uh ceremony for their new uh community center that's being built
out there and there was a quite a few people there. So yeah, that is all my reports. Commissioner. >> Thank you, Commissioner Bayer. Commissioner Campbell. >> Yeah, I have one one last thing here. I just want to point out something here. I I received a letter here. And if it's
not very long, if you don't mind, I I'd like to read it here. Uh my name is Flora Nelson. I am a 16 I am 16 and a sophomore at Morhead High School as well as a resident of Oakport Township. I am writing to you today regarding the condition of County Road 9, which is
currently in poor condition. This issue is affecting me and others who drive down this road to get their homes or use it to travel. When driving down County Road 9 at the speed limit, the vehicle is thrown about by the holes and
cracks present on the road. A repair for this road would greatly benefit not just the driver, but also driver and vehicle safety. I would greatly appreciate consideration of this issue as it impacts the county and driver safety.
A possible solution would be road road construction to repair its current condition. Addressing this issue would be greatly benefit all who drive down this road, providing a safe journey to their destination. Thank you for your
consideration. I just want to I just want to congratulate this young lady for for for writing this uh to us and I can tell her help is on the way. >> Thank you for reading that. I do really appreciate especially when we see
younger folks taking uh an interest in uh the civics around them. So appreciate congratulations Flora. We'll work on it. >> Uh May 4th. I neglected to report last week on one of my committees and talked to Sarah about it, but also um I was at
the the ditch here or not the ditch, the Whiskey Creek project hearing at the Buffalo Red WHED meeting on the on May 4th. Um there were an an enormous amount of folks that had questions about pieces of that project. There really was concerns with the Stony Creek project
and some blowouts that they're working on. and then I think uh a hope that there would be some sort of retention incorporated into both of those projects. So uh Commissioner Kamnot uh reported on what where it stands um as
of last night May 5th. I also attended the highway tracking committee meeting that Commissioner Campbell uh updated very well on. Um I also observed uh I know we are moving forward with our roundabout on Highway 52. Unfortunately,
there was a pretty nasty car accident there yesterday. So, as we uh look at public safety and road improvements for public safety, we can that continues to be one where I'm hopeful we can get that done and and save some future accidents. May 6th, I attended the Klay County
Lands Committee meeting that Commissioner Bear reported on. Really good updates on that. Um, also of note is we've had two separate National Guard uh training units that have reached out to us because they feel like that is such a great uh space for training
opportunity. Um, boy, if you look at the amount of different uh organizations that are reaching out to Klay County to use some space as training, I'm really proud of that. That's a great opportunity. And after that, I had the Klay County Legislative Planning Committee meeting
where we continued to triage, reaching out to key members of the legislature for all of our projects that we're working on, but also members of the capital investment committee meeting. I just got an uh a message from uh Haley,
who is our lobbyist, and it's uh a I don't want to say desperate, but the call to action for all of us to reach out to our legislators today about the need for a bonding bill. It's um not looking great, but so we we do need to
one Steve all of the folks that we had send letters out last week to all of those addresses. We need to do that today to encourage bonding bill passage. And then all of you have um Senator Johnson, Coop, uh Representative Keeler,
Representative Joy Gander as well. We need to uh all individually reach out to them to encourage passage of a bonding bill. that's um imperative today. And uh also had um discussion in regards to um the other projects, how we'll triage uh
reaching out to them later on this week. Um that evening I attended a retirement celebration for Larry Kudson, who's been the voice of the Spuds for a seriously long time. It's pretty crazy that uh um I recall him uh announcing Spuds games when I was an athlete, but now I have
kiddos that are doing that, too. And I know there's often three generations that talk about uh I Larry is is not the only individual in our community that uh leads and offers their skills to all of our different school districts, but really appreciative of the work than the
time that he's given specifically to Morid Area Public Schools. May 7th, I attended the public public policy committee meeting for the chamber. We met at Even Tides downtown corporate offices. really great updates
on the national economic outlook from uh leaders in uh with the national chamber. Um interesting to uh you know they really talked about the difference in policies in Minnesota and North Dakota and how we can uh work to to change
change that but also what we're seeing in trends nationally. Um, one statistic that um, Shirley uh, Hughes uh, from Fargo or the the is it the chamber, not the chamber, hospitality, commerce.
Anyways, we talked about what uh, tourism means to Cass and Klay County and what those numbers are. And in 2025, tourism brought in 1 billion dollar to Cass County and 80 million to Klay County. And while that is a huge and
wonderful number, we certainly have some things we can do to help make uh tourism in Klay County uh more vibrant business. But uh that was a staggering difference. I believe I attended the flood workg group mitigation meeting that Commissioner Campbell discussed and how
we will triage that messaging in St. Paul this week, particularly with the reminder of um what that uh dollar amount means to wrap things up. uh that I observe the pro project partnership agreement. Uh having the $und00 million
secured is really an important step for uh the ability to finish up the projects on the Klay County side that are really imperative not only to the agreement but the folks that will be uh affected on our side. I attended an Alliance
Township meeting in Baker on the project concerns followup from the hearing at the Buffalo Red WHED meeting May 8th. I had the coffee with the commissioner in Dworth and then a discussion with the county attorney and administrator on legal issues that we're working on. And
then uh yesterday also attended the Dworth groundbreaking and exciting opportunity for Dworth. I've said many times the besides this building, the only other building in my time on the county board that I've had the most meetings in is the Dworth Community
Center. That really is a regional hub for uh strategy and meetings and exciting for that community as well. That concludes my reports. >> Uh thank you, Madam Chair. Most of the items were covered but participated on the 5th. I
sent several letters out to legislators in regards to uh the PRTF and bonding. Uh also on the 5th participate in the pick uh meeting that uh pick meeting that's been addressed uh highway tracking uh that's been addressed. also the county owned lands and legislative
planning and also the May May public policy meeting uh chamber uh participated in the fund mitigation work group on the 7th and then in the afternoon along with several of our members from our risk management committee sat with Joseky from MCIT uh
to go through our annual update on the 7th also I'll had a department head evaluation uh on the 8th participate in the MACA legislative update and then also our non-secured detention uh meeting uh on the ETH. I met also met with Crystal
Cadri uh from the drug court program uh and received an update. They're going to be coming next week with a proclamation uh for for the courts, specialty courts. Uh and uh and then uh just to note, we
did have a we have a ED CEDA meeting uh later today at 1. That concludes my report. >> Thank you, Steve. Katie, do you have anything? >> Okay. Anything else, Darren? >> Um, most of my stuff has already been covered. I attended the pick meeting on
the 5th, Lance Committee meeting on the 6th, legislative planning committee. Uh, all have been covered already. I did have a meeting with chief deputy on some personnel issues of which Anna also participated. And then after that, I had a meeting with Anna kind of catching her
up for her return on the 18th on next Monday. If on the May 7th I responded some data requests and worked on the data practices project. On the 8th I attended the MACA legislative update as well, BRTF update meeting and then uh
yesterday I had a meeting with Steve and Lori. That's concludes my report. >> Thank you Darren. Anything else? As noted we do have the EDA EDC meeting this afternoon. Uh we have covered all items on the agenda today. Okay. Our
next board meeting will be May 19th at 8:30. We are adjourned. Part: 2
Hello. Today is uh Tuesday, May 12th. It's 8:30. I'll go ahead and call today's meeting of the Klay County Board of Commissioners to order. Our first item on the agenda is an approval of the agenda. We do have an agenda addition. Uh Steve, were we wanting was Quinn
going to come to cover this or was this >> Um Madam Chair, Quinn will be here this morning for uh for that that item? >> We'll add add those after the proclamations. >> Second. >> Have a motion offered to approve the
agenda with the addition. Uh, Commissioner Campbell, Commissioner Abinger, sorry. Any further discussion? Any further discussion? Any further discussion? >> All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I.
>> Oppose. Same sign. Carries. The next item on the agenda today is the citizens to be heard. Are there any citizens in the audience wishing to address the county board on any item that is not on the agenda? Any
citizens to be heard? Steve, have we had any requests online? >> Uh, nothing, Madam Chair. >> Thank you. Next item today is approval of the payment of bills and vouchers. >> Madam Chair, I'll make a motion to pay the bills and vouchers. >> Motion offered from Commissioner Bear, a second from Commissioner Kenhoff.
Further discussion? Further discussion? Discussion. All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. I. >> Oppose. Same signed carried in our packets. We had the minutes from
April 28th. >> Madam Chair, I'll make a motion to approve the minutes from April 28th, 2026. >> We have a motion offered from Commissioner Bayer to approve the minutes. >> Second. >> Second from Commissioner Abinger. Any further discussion? Any further discussion?
All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. Oppose. Same sign. >> Period. Item two today is a request approval of the amended language for the abatement policy. Good morning. Good morning, Madam Chair and
commissioners. Um, annually the Department of Revenue meets with county assessors and does an office review. They look at about 20 different categories uh for compliance. And one item they looked at recently was the abatement policy. It was found that
um in there the policy references that homestead application deadlines is not a reason an approved reason for abatement. Um however the in the past um prior to 2021 the abatement or the homestead
deadline was December 15th and in the 2021 legislative session that was changed to December 31st as the application deadline. So this is kind of a technical update needed on the abatement policy to bring it into
compliance. Thank you for the presentation on that and the clarifications. Any questions? Yes, Commissioner. >> Madam Chair, one question in all the changes are what is in red, I assume. >> Yeah. Yep. It's just two changes of the
date from the December 15th to December 31st under the application for homestead or exemption paragraph. >> Madam Chair, I move to approve the amended language to the Clay County abatement policy. >> A motion offered from Commissioner Campbell to approve the abatement policy
language. >> Second. Second from Commissioner Bear. Further discussion. I think this is a positive change. Uh certainly from the legislature, it seems to make sense to align with the dates. Any other discussion?
All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. I. >> Same sign. Carried. Thank you. Thank you. Item three today is a proclamation for family child care appreciation month. >> Good morning.
Thanks for joining us today. Quinn, you'll kick it off. >> I sure will. >> All right. Got Julian Gail with me here today from our licensing team. Karen says hi. She was going to come as well. Just had a few things to take care of this morning, so couldn't make it. Okay. Um, that said, the first uh first reason
we're here this morning is I'm requesting a motion to approve May as uh family child care appreciation month. I do have an attached proclamation as well. Um, family childcare providers are trusted partners in supporting children, strengthening working families, and
contributing to our local economy by providing safe, nurturing, and highquality care in homebased settings in Klay County. Uh this proclamation would recognize the dedication, compassion, and important contributions of family child care providers throughout Klay County and honors the vital role that they play in promoting
healthy child development, family stability, and strong communities. Uh I think anybody that's got kids that would would acknowledge or recognize how important daycare is for Klay County. So we just wanted to um really have a proclamation that that shows how much we appreciate what they do um and our
recruitment efforts as well. So with that, I would yield to any questions that the board would have about family childcare. >> Yes. Any questions? Is Karen getting ready for a party on Friday? >> Sure is. >> Sure is. >> Any other questions?
Well, uh certainly uh we all know how vital child care is for folks. We've a lot of us that have uh raised kids while working know the challenges that that can uh mean. Uh sometimes bringing kiddos. I know this board has been uh patient with me on times where I've had
to bring a kiddo along to this board, but uh really really appreciate the work that you do in our county. Uh I can't even underscore how important it is. So thank you. Uh we will go ahead and read the proclamation starting with Commissioner Campbell. Whereas family
child care providers offer safe, nurturing and de developmentally supportive environmental for ch environments for children throughout Klay County. And >> whereas family child care professionals support the healthy growth, learning,
and social development of young children during the critical years of life. And whereas family child care care providers play a vital role in supporting working families by providing dependable and accessible care options with local communities. And whereas family child
care businesses contribute significantly to the economic stability and well-being of families and employers throughout Klay County. And >> whereas fam family child care providers demonstrate ongoing dedication, professionalism, and commitment to
serving children and families through high quality care and early learning experiences. And >> now therefore, be it resolved that the Klay County Board of Commissioners recognizes the important contributions of family child care providers and their
lasting impact on children, families, and the community as a whole and hereby proclaims the month of May 2026 as family child care appreciation month and encourages all residents to recognize and thank family child care providers
for their dedication and service to children and families in our community. >> Madam Chair, I move the proclamation. >> We have a motion offered from Commissioner Campbell to move the proclamation. >> Second. >> A second from Commissioner Ebinger. Any further discussion?
Discussion. Discussion. All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. Same. Sign. Carry. You. >> Thank you for all you do. >> Thank you. Item four is another exciting
recognition, the proclamation for foster parent a appreciation month. >> Yes, exactly. Um wanted to bring these at the same time. Um just from a timing perspective, but also the interplay between both of these providers is really really crucial for the community and for the kids that we serve. Um so
with that, I would also request a proclamation designating May as foster parent appreciation month in Klay County as well. um we wouldn't get very far doing the work that we did without our foster parents um or our daycare providers to be honest, but foster parents in particular. They provide
safe, stable and supportive homes for children and youth experiencing out of home placements. Oftentimes this is the most difficult time in a child's life and these foster parents provide that stability and support for kiddos that are really having a tough time. Um this proclamation recognize our foster
parents commitment, compassion and partnership um demonstrated by them throughout the county and highlights the importance of community support for our foster care services. So I have an attached proclamation for that as well, but would yield for any questions that the board would have. >> Madam Chair, one question.
So, with with us always looking for more foster families, could you give a little little uh wopsis of how someone would become a foster parent? Who would they have to reach out to to >> Absolutely. >> Right here. >> That is myself. I'm Gail and I license
our children's foster homes, our non-relative homes. Um, we have an application packet I walk people through directly. It's both online, so they can access it online as well on our county website or calling me directly and I will sit down with them and meet with them and go through that process step by
step with them. >> Perfect. >> Gail will eliminate as many barriers as we legally and financially can eliminate in order to get licensed providers. Absolutely. And we do Alex is her counterpart and Alex licenses all of our uh family and kinship homes. So if uh
child protection placement occurs, the first people that we're asking is other relatives. And if those relatives decide to be licensed, we have Alex that will help kind of go through the exact same process but with the relatives and kin. >> Thank you very much. >> You're asking that question.
>> Yeah. And follow. So um in in finding people, are there um I think we've talked about this in the past, but a refresher. Um certain challenges of ages um in finding care. You know, I think um
oftentimes it's harder to find homes for our sibling groups, our larger sibling groups and also our teen, our older kids that are going through the system. Um I think that's always a challenging um aspect. We have a lot of great foster parents that are open to that and they
may start with a younger age and then just feel drawn to these older kiddos. So, it's really great that >> they're open to that um and willing to do that. So I think that's the challenge the two challenging groups. Yeah. >> Um that are a little bit harder for >> know. Thank you.
>> Additional questions. >> Go ahead and read the proclamation. >> Whereas children and youth in foster care need safe, stable, and nurturing homes during times of uncertainty and transition. And whereas foster parents
provide compassionate care, guidance, support, and advocacy for children and youth placed in their homes. And whereas foster parents play an essential role in helping children maintain connection to family, school, culture, and community while supporting permanency and
reunification efforts whenever possible. And >> whereas foster families in Klay County open their homes and hearts to ch, excuse me, to children and youth facing difficult circumstances and help create opportunities for healing, growth, and
stability. And >> whereas the the partnership between foster parents, kinship caregivers, social workers, schools, healthc care providers, and community organizations strengthens outcomes for children and
families throughout Klay County. And >> now therefore, be it resolved that the Klay County Board of Commissioners recognizes the extraordinary commitment and service of foster parents as well as the positive impact they make in the lives of children and families every day
and hereby proclaims the month of May 2026 as foster parent appreciation month and encourage all residents to recognize and thank foster parents for their dedication, compassion, and service to children and families in our community.
Madam chair, I move the proclamation. >> Motion offered from Commissioner Campbell to move the proclamation. A second from Commissioner Bear. >> Further discussion. >> Further discussion. >> Discussion. All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I.
>> Same sign carried. >> Thank you. >> Thank you so much. >> Please make sure and thank your teams and also the families from us. >> Absolutely. >> Thank you guys. >> Thank you. When would you like to do the agenda edition? >> That would be great. Thank you. >> Almost forgot about it, didn't you?
>> I wasn't sure exactly where you wanted to throw it on the agenda, so I was going to hang around. >> Uh well, I you know, we are in the last week of session, so I really appreciate uh continuing to bring awareness to this piece uh as we've testified and it's a priority for AMC as well, but certainly
we'll hand it to you to discuss. >> Thank you, Madam Chair and commissioners. I'm here requesting a motion to send uh the attached advocacy letter uh to the House leadership uh regarding SNAP administrative cost shifts and the error rate fiscal penalty. Uh so Senate file 4612 is a
Minnesota Senate bill intended to address these major SNAP cost shifts that are expected to impact all counties due to upcoming federal funding and fiscal error rate changes. The bill includes provisions designed to prevent these new costs from being shifted directly onto our county property
taxpayers. Uh the Minnesota Senate passed Senate File 4612 on April 29th, uh the House later amended and passed its own version of the bill, but because the House version differs from the Senate version, the legislation is now proceeding through conference committee negotiations where the House and Senate must agree on a final version before the
bill can can become law. Uh, I am requesting this county board uh approve me to send this advocacy letter to the house leadership encouraging support for retaining and strengthening these county protection provisions uh during those uh negotiations. Uh just to uh highlight
the importance why uh without this legislative action, Klay County is projected to experience a SNAP admin funding loss of $392,137 and a projected SNAP error rate penalty exposure of 1,532,831. About a quarter of that we will see in
uh quarter 4 of 2027 without any action by the state. So those those two combined just in 2027 would be approximately $800,000. Um so combined overall uh these two impacts represent nearly $2 million in
potential direct cost shifts to local county property taxpayers. And the importance the the reason that I'm kind of concerned and bringing it to board is that doesn't get us any additional services. That doesn't improve what we're doing. It doesn't help the residents on the other side. Those are
just cost shifts to counties without any improved service delivery or benefit for our residents. Um, so this letter emphasizes the importance of preserving these county protections uh with the final negotiated version of Senate File 4612 to reduce the local impact on our
taxpayers. With that, I'd yield for any questions that this board would have. >> Thank you, Commissioner or Thank you, Quinn. Commissioner, >> good morning, Quinn. Um can you go into a little bit of detail regarding the SNAP error rate penalty
exposure? >> Yes, absolutely. So the the federal the big beautiful bill uh is assessing a a percentage of a fee based on the overall state's error rate. Um if it's 5% or lower, there wouldn't be any fiscal
penalty at all. If it's up to 10%, uh it changes what the state is owed. And it's up to if you have your error rate of 15% or higher, it changes what it's owed there, too. So the worse your error rate is, the more that a state is going to owe the federal government. So right now, Minnesota's error rate is hovering
right at that 10% range. So Minnesota would owe money to the federal government for errors in administering the SNAP program. Right now, there is no legislation to equally or to like prorate how the state would divvy out
that error rate to counties. So right now it would just be equal across the board. It would be whatever that percentage of air rate is based on how much your county administers in SNAP aid. So the uh the 1.5 million is based
on last year's SNAP expenditures. So Klay County administered about $15 million worth of SNAP to our residents. And as a result of that, that's where the 1.532 million comes from because even though our error rate is 1.68% 68%
uh we I guess would chip in because there isn't any legislation that says otherwise. >> So So if we would have been getting direct federal assistance to Klay County, we wouldn't have any penalty. >> You'd have no penalty at all. Yeah. based on these
>> because it goes through the state and then the state is basically um having all 87 counties regardless of what each county's error rate is uh take part of that 10% >> penalty.
>> That's correct. Yes, that's correct. my my >> and then so that one that 1,532,000 portion of it um who misses out on that is that is that the SNAP recipients >> their benefits would not be impacted.
The issue comes that's a penalty that we've never paid for before and so the county social services is going to have to figure out how to budget that money to provide to the state. That's that's not an expenditure line that we have right now. That would be 1.5 million of
brand new expenditures that has never happened before. >> And then and then the loss of revenue that we would used to get at 392,000. So you're so it's about $2 million that goes to the levy. >> Correct. Yes. My concern is that's a gigantic number to go onto the levy and
it also loses the or we lose a chunk of the funding that helps support the staff that administers the program. So if if we don't choose to put it all in a levy, we're looking at a reduction in staffing which could then ultimately result in delays in processing snap.
>> But also if you don't get the delay adds into >> component of an error. >> Correct. >> And the important part is that we are getting penalized even though we had a very low error rate which resulted in $59
worth of benefit being calculated differently. That wasn't $59 of fraud. It was in the calculation. >> Correct. >> We are getting penalized at a far higher rate than people that had doubledigit errors because of the way >> correct >> in the infinite wisdom of legislators.
>> My my concern with how this exists today is counties that have a very good error rate, a very low error rate, that do a great job administering are actually subsidizing counties that don't have a good >> a better error rate. >> Yes.
Do you have a followup, Commissioner? Commissioner Kavanagh. >> So, um, give a little background, if you will, where this conversation has been, uh, when it went through the Senate, did it pass with any opposition?
>> I'm I'm not sure on the opposition. I just know that both protections for the federal admin as well as the fiscal error rate uh in the Senate file that was initially passed, both of those protections were passed in there. Okay.
Both of them. The governor's budget has uh protections for counties for the error rate but not for the admin loss. And I'm I'm not sure what the house amended. And on the admin piece, that was part before that was covered by the
state. Is that correct? The admin part. >> So how it works is the this is where when I say FFP, federal financial participation specifically for the SNAP program. Yeah. >> That's the 50% revenue that comes in from the federal government. So for easy math, if an eligibility worker that
administers SNAP, if our expenditures are 100,000, we would get 50,000 in FFP from the federal government. Do I >> as this stands today, if this passes without any protections, we would only receive 25,000 from the federal government in FFP or the SNAP program,
not for MA? >> And uh any background or knowledge of where the House was at on their part as it went into conference committee? And last question, that conference committee, is that already started or is
that yet later this week? >> I Yeah, I don't know. I >> I can answer. So the this the first the Senate piece was the Wickland bill. Y >> uh and so that went along party lines 3432 and the Senate the House rendering passed 6963
and then conference committee uh started on the 11th. So um obviously this all has to if it's going to pass get done by Sunday. Uh, sorry, really quick. I one really appreciate this. This is um imperative
that we continue to talk about that story. The only piece that's not in here that I would want to have in there is what Klay Countyy's error rate percentage is. I think it's important. I'm really really it's I think it's actually less than 2%. It's like 1 >> 1.68% was our last
>> 1.6. I think it's important that we put that in there. And I would um also like this letter to go to the members of the conference conference committee. Commissioner Campbell. >> So these the between these two these are
these are revenue loss or cost shifts to Klay County. >> Correct. Um I I was al I also heard that there would be reduction in SNAP benefits to people. Is that that's not even part of this?
>> I'm no I'm not aware of >> not aware of any. Okay. >> The concern would more be on the admin side of when people come in and they need to meet with their eligibility worker, report those income changes, stay true to what the program designs.
If we have less people to do it, it's going to be longer wait times which then incur more errors, >> right? There it's going to go up, not down, >> which then incurs more of a cost shift, which exacerbates the problem. >> Uh Steve,
>> thank you, Madam Chair. Last Friday, we uh had a MCA meeting with AMC. Matt Hillgard spoke spoke specifically on this issue. uh the AMC has been putting a significant amount of effort uh into bringing forward uh this. We were able to share information uh from the
counties on the impacts that this is going to have on on levies across the state of Minnesota. And so I just want the board to know that AMC is actively actively working this here till the end of the session. >> Thank you. >> I'm just curious what's the state doing
to reduce their 10% error rate? >> I guess I don't know that I can answer that. I'm assuming they would say sis their efforts in system modernization would help. Um but that's been a huge lift by all of you and I know AMC as well. Uh we have pretty complicated
policies in these program areas and it's kind of been my opinion as I've learned over the years that we need to really shore up some of these policies and uh make them easier and streamline them. I appreciate him asking that question because countless times we've told the
legislature the number one way to reduce these error rates has to do with the modernization piece. And then to continue to hear them say, "Well, we'll see. We'll see if we have the money. It costs a lot of money." So does this. This is a $2 million unfunded mandate for Klay County. >> Just for Klay County,
>> $2 million. >> And we're going to have a discussion a little bit later about what our budget looks like. And what will happen is that we will need to make hard decisions on the programs and services that our county residents have directly told us,
which are very important to us, how we triage what that need is. Not saying that there's not a huge huge uh need in the SNAP area, but this is not a $2 million unfunded mandate that will go to benefit families that are facing hunger.
Uh again, as soon as we can get this sent today, I certainly support it. Board wishes. >> Madam Chair, I'll make a motion to approve to send the letter to advocacy the letter regarding SNAP, administrative cost shifts, and penalty impacts to state legislators. Madam
chair, I'll second it with the uh stipulation that we include the two items you identified to Quinn that need to be added to this letter for sent. >> Uh y >> Commissioner Bayer makes the motion with the additions. A second from
Commissioner Ebinger. Further discussion. >> I just want to give kudos to Quinn and his staff for the error rate that Klay County does have. Under 2% is tremendous. And if the state's averaging 10, I mean, we're bringing down that average. So, some counties are way over
that. >> Commissioner Heinger, >> I want to echo that. We have uh a textbook example of what good administration and good staff can do. and instead of uh shifting burdens onto us, they need to maybe take a few lessons from people like Quinn that
understand the system, see the flaws, and they need to be heard and and uh leads a way in addressing the needs of our community without uh the some of the fraud and the the incompetence we've seen. We have not seen it here in Klay
County. And I don't think anybody on this commission wants to take credit for that. We know where the credit is. It's a welladministered, well- led team and you've got that and we're grateful for it. >> Thank you. We have great staff in financial. I mean, um, as you heard in
the department updates, we we carry pretty high case loads and so my concern with that has always been our error rate handling those high case loads, but I've been impressed at least in the last two years, year after year, at how low that error rate is, knowing that we run higher on case loads. So, our staff are
pretty amazing. Thank you. >> Thank you. All those in favor of Did we vote? >> Not yet. >> All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. A vote. Same sign. Carried. This is one of those things that I think voting twice would not hurt. So appreciate it.
>> Thanks, Quinn. Okay. Item five today is a request for out of state travel for the 2026 Niko conference. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. As you mentioned, Commissioner Mojo is requesting to attend a Niko conference in the Orleans Parish in New Orleans,
Louisiana on from July 16th through the 21st. Uh the uh the funding for that would come from our general revenue training budget. uh uh the cost right now w without your board
approval uh commissioner Mojo has been unable to secure some of the some of the exact costs but uh believes that uh the the total cost would be up to up to $3,000. With that, I'd yield for any questions. >> Thank you. I requested this be put on
the board. uh uh one given the fact that we just talked about an item that came from uh Washington DC that's filtering down to us in an amount of up to $2 million feel like it's really important that this board continue to advocate at the um in DC as well. Uh the other
reason that I brought this forward is uh as you know AMC has covered some of my trips to St. Paul to continue to advocate on our behalf. And those trips have already secured almost $2,000 in savings for Klay County, knowing that that will another trip to St. Paul this
week. We'll continue to add an additional $500 to Klay County and felt like it was within uh reason. Uh certainly willing to um field any questions on this piece. Uh if anyone has anything, >> Commissioner Abinger.
Yeah, I just um it's a shame this is New Orleans because some people may think that uh she's going to have some fun there, but I've watched Commissioner Mojo over the last couple of sessions and I haven't seen any recreational activities when we go up to uh to our
AMC conferences. We usually go out someplace and have dinner and Commissioner Mojo is with the other executive board people working into the evening. And I want to express as a taxpayer my appreciation for the value
we get out of what she and what she commissioner Krabanov have done. Try going and dealing with St. Paul is not a a a recreational activity and it brings money and it keeps money in Klay County and brings money back. So I appreciate
the efforts. Mr. >> Kavanagh. >> Yeah, I'd like to add to that. Um, Commissioner Mojo is uh, in my opinion a um, high level advocate for not only the state for Klay
County. um when we're at that state level. The other thing, I agree with everything that Dave said, but I'd also add that being as top leadership within AMC, that's a bigger voice yet and and
um having walked the halls with you and speaking with legislators in Minnesota, I know your um ability to um convey messages in a way that is receptive to people. I
I certainly hope that when you have this message uh and you're in DC, what's the dates again? July. you know, you're uh able to talk to our two senators and and I'll put a lot of pressure on
Senator Clubar in particular and so that she understands uh what's going on especially from things we just heard about with that which is horrible. So I mean I strongly support this.
Next year, if if reelected to this board uh in November as being part of the leadership team, AMC would cover a 100% of the first vice president to go. Uh we've talked a lot about uh the ability to maybe have someone you talked to
Grant Whand a long time ago and what the value was to have someone do that. And so if this is something that we feel is a benefit, uh, and then having me go with AMC's payment next year would potentially open it up for someone else to to go as well if it's a budget item
we see benefit. >> Any Yes, Commissioner. >> I It's always been this board's position that to allow one board member from our county to attend the National NL conference. So I this is right in line
with that. questions. >> Yes, Commissioner >> Aber. >> Sorry, my mic's off. Uh, I want to move the motion that we approve funding for you to attend the NAO comp. >> Oh, second. >> Thank you. I think for clarification we
need to have the up to amount and then the dates >> and the out of state portion. Okay. Um already put this here we are um up to $3,000 which is currently estimated
uh for the conference which will be in New Orleans, Louisiana July 16th through the 21st. Thank >> Thank you. We have a motion offered to approve >> a second >> and a second from Commissioner Kavanaghoft. Any further discussion?
Discussion discussion. All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. Same sign carried. Thank you all of you. I appreciate it. >> Item six today is the Klay County budget
update presentation. >> Oh, thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. As we uh next two items are budget related. As we move towards uh 2026, we always like to come before the board and provide a recap one of of 2025. Uh and then also a snapshot of looking at our
our expenses uh mo mostly focused on for 2026. And so within your packet, you have uh several documents. The first document that we're going to address is is taking a look at the revenues and expenditures by departments. Uh again, the focus uh that we have generally
looked at during this process uh is those items that are 110% uh out of alignment uh or higher or if there's something that's significantly lower, we'll also address that. Uh Miss Johnson is here today. Uh and so if there's different questions that you have that
we do not necessarily have highlighted uh or highlighted through this presentation, uh we do have the ability to to look up some of those additional uh questions that you may have. Uh and so what I would like to do is first focus on uh the expense side of the of
the general revenue uh document. Uh the first item that would focus on is court administration. uh we we saw uh an expense of 114% uh out of the 100% that was anticipated. What we're starting to see too is this
this addresses uh two of our two of our contracts for contracted uh legal fees. Uh and within that we also have a dollar amount uh to deal with additional uh additional costs that the the attorneys
may need for testifying purposes, different testing of for their clients. Uh and so with the complexity of cases that we continue to hear and see, uh we saw an increase demand for services there. Uh in the next item I would address is the the county administrator
budget. As you can see, that's 141%. If you recall, this board approved after the levy was set to to make the county administrator position from a half-time uh position to a full-time. And so that is where uh that adjustment is at. Uh
the next item uh that I'd focus on is is the internal accounting that is at 111% of expenses. Uh again, some of that is the timing of paying bills. Uh but in speaking with Lori, there's also uh some additional costs that we do have to look at that we'll have to make minor
adjustments for the 2027 budget. Uh the next item that I want to focus on about uh halfway down there down the column is the building ground and buildings. It's at 116%. Uh again, the the transactions uh this
includes transactions for detox. uh those have not been in included yet either in the uh either in the revenues or the uh the expenses in this case and so that uh uh Troy will be covering those costs that will I'll bring that
that percentage down. The next item after that is planning and zoning. Uh the big push there is repairarian aid. That's at 113%. If you recall this past year, this board looked at the repairarian aid and made
allocations uh to to specific areas and some of those dollars were not just expended from this year but expended from previous years uh from from that balance. And so uh we saw an increase uh there. The next item is the narcotics tax task
force. The only amount there it's all staffing staffing related. So it would be salary and overtime that is included in that line item. Medical examiner of course that uh that line item is out of our control. Uh again that we utilize the medical examiner down the twin
cities and so uh that is just subject to basically to need. The next item after that would be the juvenile detention that was at 115 uh%. Uh just to kind of give some clarification. Uh this as this board
knows the juvenile juvenile center uh the secure unit has a pays for bed purchasing on a two-year look back. Uh and so that is included uh in this figure. Uh that would get us to the 100 110%. Um, this year, for the first time
in several years, uh, when a youth is in need of placement at at Redwing, the Redwing facility, Klay County is still responsible to make the payment for that facility. Comes through Quinn's budget. Uh, but it shows up in this line item. We really, in looking back, we haven't
had a significant significant uh, amount of expenditures in this item since probably 2017. Uh but we have had a couple youth that have been in that facility uh and it averages between $9 and $10,000 a month to house them in
that facility. And so um uh again this isn't something that that historically we've budgeted for uh because it's not something that happens on a routine basis but uh something that we can certainly look at uh from the board's wishes standpoint.
Next item is emergency management. Uh again that would 138% in expenses. Uh the both the expense and the revenue here is is wrapping up the ARPA expenditures. Uh should be the last time we see some of those dollars uh in uh in
in our expenses and revenues. But that's uh that is the the adjustment there. And so that concludes that concludes on the general revenues expense side. Are there any questions of any of the other areas that we did not address that the board
would have any questions on? >> Questions from the board on any pieces? >> One question, Madam Chair. >> Commissioner Bear, >> dispatch is at 109%. Is that contract related with >> that's just the amount that we pay the
city of Fargo or dis uh pay for our portion of the dispatch >> dispatch >> and the revenues are also up yeah >> 3% more additional questions as we work through this if not madam chair I will switch to the Next page, the expense expense column.
There's much many fewer items here on this list, but want to uh touch base first on road and bridge. Uh the expenses in in highway administration uh the uh uh is at 105%.
Generally, again, we don't generally try to touch in that in thatund 110% or higher, but just want to to touch base again that this this one has to do with the gravel tax small amount small town aotments. Um, as this board is aware, uh, each year the small town
aotments go to, uh, go to the cities. They don't always spend those funds. Uh, and so, uh, sometimes they a lot of times they save them up and utilize them at a higher rate. And so that's where you where you saw the increase this year. Uh county buildings. Uh again,
this is where these next two items are fund n fund 13 and fund 19. Uh again, the board sets aside uh roughly $50,000. Again, up for Joe to to look at different county projects. Uh again, some years that all that money isn't
spends available to utilize. other years. This past year, uh we did uh projects uh in the jury box. We had probation updates. Uh we made changes to the fourth floor of the family service center, the attorney's office, uh just
to just to name a few. And that's where we saw a significant uh increase of 330%. Again, the funding for those projects were there. Uh it's just that they were the the funding for the projects were uh saved from previous previous budgets. The next item is
county uh buildings major. Uh that'd be fund 19. And again, this portion is uh the the high joint highway facility roof project uh that this board approved this past year. And so that's where that showed up at 159%.
Uh we we move down to uh solid waste. Uh solid waste there there's a few different drivers here at 187%. Uh again, you see the revenues are also uh there's an increase there that we'll talk about in a little bit. But uh the
the main issues that we had here is a a depreciation was about $1.2 million. Uh this board approved an additional new staff uh to work in the scale house uh and and then with some other position salary adjustments. Uh that was about
300,000. There were uh additional uh fees for consultants and other professional services of 139,000. And if you recall, we had uh two uh semis uh that uh ended up needing transmissions
uh and that was over $100,000. And so, uh when you look at when you look at the the budget as an overall uh while we did see increases there, uh the expenses were lower in the other areas. And so we still uh came in under budget
at 98% but did want to highlight uh highlight that that >> Commissioner Campbell. >> What's this depreciation business on here? What's that about? >> But when we do these things, aren't we aren't we dealing with actual
expenses where you pay and receive? Correct. But you also have to recognize the depreciation and and it looks to me here it looks like that depreciation probably it should have been put into 399 and it was put in 392. So but it was
still about $100,000 more than we had budgeted. >> So in so in terms of when they when they budget they put in a budget for >> Yeah. We we put in a budget of 1.1 million >> in uh the solid waste facility
>> and that's that's basically a paper entry. >> Correct. >> But when we go to establish how we're going to determine our tipping fee revenues and those types of things, we don't take that into account in terms of what we need to generate. >> We do not.
>> Okay. That's I think that's important to recognize that difference. additional questions, >> anything, do you want to move on? >> All right, Madam Chair, I I'll continue back. If you go to the first page, back to the general revenues, I'll I would I'll highlight uh call out a few
different areas in the general revenue area. Uh the auditor's office was collected 117% of of the anticipated budget. Uh the driver there was additional mortgage registrations and deed tax increases.
The motor vehicle department uh had an incre was budgeted at 142% uh incre 42% increase. Uh the main drivers there uh were $113,000 in drivers uh driver's licenses mostly
focused on real ID people coming in out of the year as to what we were anticipating coming in. Uh, and then we also saw $90,000 in tab increases. And, um, I think that that's I, you know, I think that from this board's perspective, they put a great deal of,
uh, time and effort into making sure that the the DMV is a is a place to do business and and you can go in there quickly and get the work done. Uh, and and I think that, you know, TABS is a pretty simple thing that in years past we heard people be very frustrated with.
And so I think this is just one of the signs along with the decreased weight times but I think uh you know the increase in tabs show uh that our our customers are being able to be serviced and service quickly and so that was really good to see. uh treasurer. Uh the
next area is an increase uh is 319%. Again, if you recall back in 200 2022, uh we saw quite an a decrease in the market value of our investments. Uh over the last uh several budget cycles, we've
seen those investments kind of claw back. Uh and so we saw quite a quite an increase uh there. We'll talk a little bit more about that when we get to the fund balance document. Uh but that was really the driver uh driver there. The next area is victim witness. Uh that had
160 that was 163% of the budget. Uh and uh again that was from a new grant funding resource that they received. The next area again is the ground and ground building grounds and buildings. We touched based on the expense. Again,
this has has to do again with the election of of the detox or addition of the detox facility. Uh the riparian aid, a very similar situation again uh that riparian aid that we spoke about spoke about. Uh and
there was an error that Lori identified as we went through this process that also would uh impact uh impact that percentage. Uh the next area is is corrections. uh uh that's 288%. We've seen an increase
uh we saw an increase in the number of uh people that were booked into the facility uh from other other non-cllay county facilities. We also saw a significant increase in the commissary account uh and and that was a driver for that 288%.
Emergency management again came in at 100 100 or thousand excuse me,78% and again uh that that was all ARPA related. This is where the uh emergency manager grant comes in. Uh generally
that's at 37,992 and the remainder was was ARPA. And so, uh, with that on the general revenue document, are there any questions on on the any of the revenues that we spoke about or didn't speak about? >> Questions?
I just have a question on the uh, Metro Council. Um, have we not paid the 2026 bill? My understanding is those bills went out in January. I show here that we did
>> okay on the 26 year to date. It's >> if it's not on there, we haven't paid it yet. >> Yeah, it's says that it's not. >> If there's no other questions. >> No, it does. I'm sorry. I was looking at
a different variance. They requested a higher amount. Apparently >> they did. It's based on formula. So we >> got it. Yep. That's where Sorry, I was looking at the wrong thing. Additional questions. >> If if not jump to that second page again
highlight the road and bridge do want to highlight uh within highway construction uh from a from a revenue standpoint, it shows that we are at 49% of that 100% but what was budgeted. I just want to reassure the board that at this point uh the project hasn't been closed out and
so we haven't received our federal dollars uh for that project yet. And that's that essentially is the the difference uh of the 49% to 100%. Uh highway administration uh also uh is higher than expected and as uh Commissioner Campbell and Commissioner
Mojo talked about from year to year we don't know what our aotment is going to be uh our construction allotment from the state of Minnesota. We've been fortunate in over the last couple years that we have a higher uh number than the preceding year and so uh subsequently
that encapsulated 116% of what we anticipated. Uh if we go down to to solid waste recycling again our our uh our revenues within that department were were higher than we had anticipated in the past
several years. Recycling has uh has come with challenges and cost, but we were able to see some higher higher than anticipated revenues last year. And then the existed uh landfill, we saw an increase of revenues of roughly 114%. Uh
and again, that came with a higher anticipated level of garbage collection. And with that, I would yield for any any additional questions on this 2025. >> Commissioner Campbell. Lori is um for when Corey is doing his budget on that
recycling, can you you you break out for him how much is score funding versus how much is generated from other um re recycling revenues? >> Yes. And the addition for this for last year was actually some metal recycling
and so that's where we saw the big increase >> and that was outside of the square funding. Correct. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Additional questions. I think as you can see and again we'll we'll be moving to the next uh the next document is our fund balance document
but as you can see from uh from a summary of revenues uh in most of our most cases that that uh overall from the budget perspective in general reserve our revenues were 100% 100 excuse me 10% higher than what we had anticipated. uh
and our our budget items overall uh were were right uh right right where we where we kind of anticipated again with with some adjustments for from different departments. So the next document that if there are no additional questions there the next document that I would
would like to touch on would be your fund balance. Uh again your fund balance gives you a snapshot at the end of uh each year uh from December 31st to 254 to 25. Uh when we look at our general fund account, uh you can see that we had
an an adjustment from $18,121,635 uh to 20,713929 uh which was an increase of $2,592,2994. Um, as we discussed uh earlier with the treasures, up a significant portion of that uh was a market value adjustment of 1.278 million. Uh and as this board may
may recall, one of the things that as we get into budgets, uh budgets and and revenues over expenditures at the end of the year, uh this board uh has chosen uh for the 2026 bud budget to use $ 1.5 million of this $20,713
uh 92 towards the 2026 budget. Commissioner Kavanagh, >> can you uh just briefly what do you mean by market adjustment? >> A number of years ago, we lost approximately $3.5 million due to the to
the value of our investments. So like our face value was say at 100% but the value of them were 95%. So we have to actually make an adjustment for that. And like Steve said earlier, we've started to claw that back a little bit. So in 2025 we we got back 1.278 million
of that and last year we did the same thing. >> Okay. Thank you. >> So is that like the is that like money in like a form fund or something or would it >> it's some um FDIC backed and some step up things that we've got mostly with
Wells Fargo. Um but but it's just it's it wouldn't be a loss until you sell it, >> right? >> And which we don't ever do. So it's just just a pain. It it would it'd be no different than myself looking at my 401k and seeing one year it's down and another year it's up. >> Correct. Y
>> same type of thing. >> I hate it when it's down. >> Same. >> Any other questions? >> If if there's no other questions on the the general general fund balance, I'll move to Road and Bridge. Again, as we
talked about, we saw a a adjustment from 24 to 25,7,391,978 down to 4,521,89, a difference of $2,870,165. Uh, and again, as we shared in the previous document, uh, that uh that is waiting for a federal reimbursement. Uh
and basically that covers covers that difference. Um any questions with Ronin Bridge uh social service uh again uh we saw a decrease in social service uh this year.
Uh we uh we had uh in at 2024 we had a fund balance of 11,772,123. Uh at the end of last year we had $10,165 uh excuse me 10,165,781. Uh the driver the driver there uh as
Quinn has talked to this board about was out of home placements. Uh we had an increase unplanned of about 1.1 million. Uh of that 1.1 million about 800,000 can be attributed to youth that are in need of med mental health services or a PRTL PRTF level of care. Uh and we also saw
last year some federal administrative aid uh dollars that decreased uh roughly about 300,000 and that so that was the uh just about the entire increase or decrease of of fund balance there. >> Any questions?
>> Additional questions. >> I think it helps folks understand why we've been so adamant about finding additional care opportunities. Um, the next item is building. Again, this pertains to Joe's area. We went from 134,045
down to 19,393. And again, has to do with the the number of projects that Joe completed uh over the last over the last year. Uh, internal service, again, this board takes a position rather than waiting in
p purchasing a $1.2 $2 million bulg in one year, you save save on an annual basis, budget basis over the life of that uh pro that uh piece of machinery and other examples like that. Uh and so we saw a fund balance increase of 12
from 12,516,570 uh to 13,586,75. Uh again, there were no real significant purchases. Uh as highway tracking uh has maybe mentioned in previous years, there's going to be a request uh coming uh later this year. Uh that will certainly impact that, but the increase
is really based on the fact that there are no significant purchases there. The next item, if there's no question, is public health. Uh we saw a increase of $192,672 uh in this account. Uh the we started a
fund balance of $18,711,753. Uh we ended last year at $18,000 or excuse me 18,94,425 for the increase that I mentioned. Again, the driver the real driver of that is is was the withdrawal management
detox facility. Um the uh the starting in 2026 that budget will be broken out uh by itself but from from this purposes here it was still captured within the public health uh public health realm
>> questions. All right, if no other questions, we'll move to solid waste. Again, uh in the solid waste department 2024 and to 24, we had a fund balance of $23,561,221. Uh we saw a decrease uh from 24 to 25 of
22,946,879 or roughly $614,342. Um, any questions? >> Questions? >> Another question, Madam Chair? >> If we could go back to public health. >> Sure. >> What does it look like once we take
detox out of that equation >> roughly? >> Yeah. I mean, at this point, you know, Lori has Lori has identified in previous years, last year, she identified that of that fund balance. um in 2024 at the end
of 2024 um less detox was was about 3,973,522. Um and so that will look a little bit different. >> Yeah, that fund balance. So you can see just from um uh when we reported earlier there's about uh $15 million worth of
building that will come out of that fund balance because that's included in the fund balance. We'll move over to the detoxes. the building is included in the fund balance of public health >> under public health. Okay. >> Yeah. Just to just to clarify though, so when when we're talking about
the general fund balance, we're talking about dollars that are in an account, right? >> Uh mostly. Yeah. There's we don't account for fixed assets in the general fund fund. >> There's no fixed assets. >> It's it's >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> And Roaden Bridge has some fixed assets.
uh does not >> but it's that one is a either a delay in payment or um >> project out >> social services there's no >> no fixed assets >> no fixed access building >> no
>> how come we how come we don't put the value of the family service center in under built how come we don't >> the family service center does include assets as an enterprise fund so we've got public health landfill family service center and internal services Okay. >> Those all do have the assets shown in
their fund balance. >> Okay. >> And then the um internal service fund, of course, there's no >> it does show assets there. >> Well, show assets, >> but it also shows the accumulated depreciation. So, it nets out. >> Okay. So, it's the net value
>> as well. The others do as well, but they're new buildings. You know, for the detox is a brand new building, so there wouldn't be much. Why won't the detox be in internal services on the building? >> Internal service is a it's a fund that services the rest of the funds by
accumulating money for the fixed assets. Detox is its own fund. It's a revenue generator. So it's a it functions on its own as a business type. >> Okay. >> Is that like an enterprise fund then? >> That's what an enterprise fund is. It's a business type fund. >> Okay. >> Additional questions.
>> And then the solid waste. Um, now there's some fixed assets in there, right? >> Yes. Yeah. The landfill and the solid waste building or the resource recovery building. >> So, if we're look if if we were to look at a cash fund balance, we can't look at
this document. >> Not this one. You could look at um if you subtract the the the bottom half of that printout. If you remove all of those the top fund balances, that's more so what we have. It's not liquid cash, right?
>> I don't have access to it, but Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Could you get us a document that shows that? >> Sure. Yes, I can. Yeah. >> Thank you. >> And it's something that I've always thought interesting. So, so we always see these things based on um year-end
numbers. Sometimes when we to me it would be it'd be interesting interesting to see what these numbers would look like at for example the end of April and the end of September. Uh because you know that's that's when we're getting towards our
low point. It just be interesting to see how where we end up being. And this goes to the argument about what the state has, you know, in terms of 50% of, you know, that's what that would be interesting to see how that lines up. >> Right. Well, just talking cashwise, I
just looked at it the other day. Our, you know, liquid cash ranges anywhere from 7 million, which would be in March, >> to 50 million, >> right? >> Which would be, you know, in this week, this week. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Yeah. But that that 50 million
disappears quickly because I have to send that out to the school districts and settle that fairly quickly, you know. So it does range with those numbers in the in our liquid cash >> questions,
good discussion, additional questions. >> All right. Thank you, Madam Chair. just the two two columns we've touched on a little bit already, but family service center uh from 2024 to 25 we saw a decrease from $1,666,83 to1,539,127.
Uh again, a decrease of 126,956. Um and uh then the juvenile facility uh had a had a decrease of from $6,297,890 uh to 6 uh6,5,617 uh or a revenues under expenditures of 297
uh 297,273. The good news is there is James budgeted uh for a million dollar loss. Uh and so again that facility is operating uh operating in the positive. Uh providing
that that operating loss a million dollars offers members a decrease on their bed rate. Uh and so uh so certainly certainly see a benefit. The driver continues to be uh from non-member usage. Uh and that's where
that million dollars was offset uh to 292,273. >> Commissioner. >> Yeah. So Lori um on the family service center that one mean that that that includes fixed fixed assets, right?
>> Yeah. And and obviously that's a depreciated fun balance. I I would I would I would hope that our value in that fivetory family service center building would be more than $ 1.5 million.
>> Most of it would be >> right. Okay. So the you know from from a actual u market value type of deal >> zero. I mean we're not recognizing any market value in that building. I don't
believe so. Not much. I mean >> and and you're not in the in the supposed to in this >> in the fund balance. >> But if you were if you were going to do a net worth type of deal, that that'd be a different thing, wouldn't it? Right. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Thank you.
>> Additional questions? Questions? Lots to process. Any other questions for Steve Lori? Continue. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. The next item that we're going to look at is really focused on 2026 year-to- date. Our our
real goal is to focus on on uh on the expenditures. Uh realistically at this time, our revenues uh fall behind or come with the tax piece and so are not captured in here. Uh this is through 33% of the year. Uh if you look at uh if you
look at both of these first two pages um there's really there's from an expense standpoint every everything is uh within the uh within the area or uh includes a includes part of that includes a one-time payment. Uh you'll see back uh
in Road and Bridge uh there's some insurance and liability payments that that had to go in at 100%. that put us at the 43% range rather than 33%. Uh but uh if you look at the rest of the items, the other items that are in the higher
range are are positions that we pay one time a month or or a portion of the year, a significant portion of the year. Otherwise, from a from a department standpoint, uh our our expenses are within the range that they should be.
>> Questions? >> Questions? One question, Madam Chair. >> Commissioner Bear, >> debt retirement county projects. What is that county project? >> Uh we issued some bonds uh for a number of projects throughout throughout the county. Kind Joe put together a list.
Yeah. And so it's to cover most of those. >> Most of those. >> That was in 20 I >> think we have three years. >> Three years left on it. Yeah. I >> think so. Commissioner Kavanagh, your microphone.
>> We look at that budget just to make sure it that's through the end of April. >> Uh yes, through the end of >> Madam Chair, >> Commissioner Campbell >> on social services. When we see those numbers, is there more likely to be more
of a delay in um both payment of expenditures and receipts of revenues? >> Mostly in the receipts. mostly in their sheets. >> Okay. >> Yeah, it's an extra at least an extra month of delay for the revenue
>> for the for the revenues. Okay. >> Additional questions questions. >> Right. The the final document that I have for for this board to to look at is the updated updated information on the halfsent sales tax collection. Uh as you
recall um several years ago because of the the increased collections that we've seen over the year, we were able to remove uh remove levy dollars from the repayment of our bonds uh for the for the correctional facility and law enforcement center. Uh we ended up uh as
of of last year uh with with collections of $4,698,688 and66 which was a 3% increase uh over last over over the previous year. uh the we've kind of plateaued uh from over the
last two years after seeing uh four or five years of increase uh increased sales tax collection. Uh if you take a look at our first three collections of this year uh we we have collected 1,130,600
$367.3. Uh in each of those years we were at or above uh what we had collected previous years. If we continue at our projections uh of even allotting the same dollar amount uh from the previous year uh we
would be looking at collecting roughly a million dollars more uh in 20 in 2026 than we did in 2025. Uh again we provide try to provide these updates to this board uh two to three times a year uh andor if there's anything that pops up
from a collection standpoint that would for some reason be of concern. Um but with that I'd yield for any questions. questions. Well, I think this is a really helpful look back. Um, having served through some different disruptions in our
economy, I guess, is the best way to to say that. It's interesting to see how these numbers have been coming in and where the trends are. I still maintain that it it has been a really critical financing component to that
project. I really appreciate the community's support there. I will tell you that, you know, I'm very aware that we have inflation pieces and and you know, that kind of accelerates how collections come in. cautiously
um observing um you know the business climate in Minnesota is challenging and we're seeing some unfortunate moves and shakes around that piece and as this board has a discussion later on today about economic development I think it's
a really helpful tool that we continue to be aware of questions additional questions questions. Well, I really appreciate the presentation and the data today. Uh, this gives us a lot to comb through as
we um talk about your next item. If there are no other questions, should we go to item number seven then? >> Sure. Thank you, Madam Chair. Each May we come before this board uh and give target dates uh for the adoption and
preparation of of the 2027 budget. Um if you take a look at our list here, uh preliminary budget discussions taking place obviously uh today uh we we are going to be providing or Lauria will be providing the budget sheets to our
department department heads on May 27th. uh and we are going to uh have them provide them about 3 weeks uh to prepare their budgets for collection to to Lor's office. She generally takes till right around the 4th of July uh to get them
all compiled uh and then we begin uh we begin to go through uh each of those budget packets with the department heads uh on a line by line uh review uh and then they come before this board uh for initial presentation. Again, we've already had conversations with our
department heads this year, understanding the challenges that that we certainly are facing again, both from the state and the federal uh legislative changes. Uh again, encouraging uh as we do every year, but specifically the last
couple years to uh to limit any kind of new requests uh to absolute necessities. Uh and so that message has been shared, will continue to be shared. We're looking this year to set our preliminary levy um on the 22nd. Uh September is one
of the months that does have five Tuesdays. We're not scheduled to meet on the 30th. Uh but uh in the event that uh there is any concerns uh on the 22nd, we would technically have one one additional week to make adjustments. Uh if the board wished to schedule a
meeting on the 30th, uh we're looking to have our truth and taxation uh meeting uh board meeting uh actually on the at 5:00 pm and then truth and taxation uh will follow that uh at 6:00 pm
and uh with a with a final adoption uh of December 22nd. I think there was some discussion about the potential of doing that a week earlier. Uh but uh but with that uh Madam Chair, I would yield for any questions.
>> Questions? >> Well, I want to go back to our um spring retreat with department heads and there were some pretty alarming statistics on what we're at with a levy with just the bare bones piece. And I do
really feel like um the folks that were in that meeting understand the constraints that we're under. Part of the reason why we've been in St. Paul so much is because we're just facing historic cost shifts to all of us. And um I think we've been more vocal about
that uh because it is going to be a challenge. Um I you know it's not an insurmountable challenge. We can figure out um all of those pieces. But as you communicate that to the other departments, um I think it's really important that they are aware of of the
the difficulties that we're um we will have and just making sure that we get the numbers to where they need to be. Additional questions or comments, perspectives for one, let's talk about the timeline. Does the timeline look?
>> Yeah. Okay. >> So, we all appreciate the timeline. In regards to the communication to the departments, I I believe Steve knows where we're at. Is there any other perspectives that you'd like to offer to that communication?
>> Madam Chair, I'll make a motion to approve the proposed 2027 budget timeline. >> Second. >> We have a motion offered from Commissioner Bear to approve the timeline, a second from Commissioner Ebinger. Further discussion. >> One question, Madam Chair. Commissioner Bear,
>> we do have until the last Tuesday, December, correct, to set the final budget. >> Yes, that's >> be the 30th, right? >> Yep. >> Questions. >> All those in favor of the motion signify by saying I. >> I. I.
>> Those same sign carried. Feel like we should have this titled Lor's last. any lasts coming up? I've been documenting every one of them. Uh really grateful for your leadership. Any additional comments?
All right, we will move into committee reports. Thank you both for the in-depth information today. Commissioner Ebinger, you're up. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh last week on the 7th Thursday I virtually attended
the um SECB legislative committee. Uh we spent most of the time reviewing and giving feedback on the uh statewide communication interoperabil interoperability plan skip. Uh it had
been prepared by a private vendor as an analysis of where we needed to go with the improvements to the statewide system. Uh the uh 911 improvements, uh
a number of things. Uh it's about 30 pages long and we've been given a month to review it and frankly the reviews are in from this committee uh are that it is not it accomplishes nothing and the chair is going to take it
further up the food chain and see what we're going to do. But um I read it and I thought what am I missing? and I got in there with the experts and they were wondering what's in this that that meets the objectives. So, I guess I didn't miss
anything. Uh but we that was what the majority of the meeting was spent was that review. Um on the uh or later that day I attended the project uh project partnership amendment commemorative
ceremony that the metro flood diversion had. It's very uh very gratifying. Uh, one of the I guess the high point of it was that uh we had uh Adam Tail who's assistant secretary in the army there
with Major General Kelly and uh Colonel Chase uh from the uh core of engineers and we were celebrating the funding in the Metro diversion project of hund00 million
that is uh left over from the operation that the core of engineers came in early and came in under budget and thanks to Senator Hovind and Senator Clolobishar that money they got legislation through to where it was transferred to the diversion authority
and is now available for finishing projects and getting some work done. It was uh a very good ceremony and was good to to uh be part of that. I see on the 11th
uh we all attended an emergency board meeting and then later that day I attended the um RPAC uh restorative practices group for our quarterly meeting. Uh there was a lot of
good discussion in it. uh the uh folks that are working in Morehead schools with the restorative uh justice program did a a lot of the uh presentation for us. Very impressive group. They are functioning at a high level right now.
They're dealing with a lot of kids. Um just on the quarterly reports uh they there's a minimum of uh 87 kids that were dealt with a maximum
of 118. uh they they are dealing with a lot of referrals for that would otherwise go to juvenile court and they're getting fewer and fewer of those as it moves along because they're getting kids in there
before the juvenile system actually gets involved and they're dealing with it from a uh received referral which is not a one that comes out through the court system. So very good meeting. The grant
funding there is being well used. Michelle's running good program. And that completes my report. >> Thank you, Commissioner Ebinger. Commissioner Kavanagh. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Um
I my first report is from um May 6 that Wednesday at our PRTF nonsecure facility uh planning meeting with our lobbyists. Um really look forward to the or talked
about the work we just done the prior week and what's ahead for this week. So um coming ahead with that the as out of that meeting uh more letters were sent to uh people we've been working with in
both the house and senate um thanking them for their work and um uh further advocacy of what need we hope will need to be done uh by the end of next week. The last day of session will be um
Monday or Monday the um help me um >> Sunday at midnight. >> Huh? Sunday at midnight. Okay, thank you. And uh so we have one week to go. Uh Commissioner Mojo will be going down I believe on Thursday and then be there
with Friday again with our uh legislators on on the floor. Um on the 7th on Thursday um kind of going back to our meeting last week here we had the uh presentation by our um
children's mental health LA lac um so as we had our monthly meeting here that was on Thursday um we went through kind of what was uh talked about at our presentation
and then into our new business. Um, another mini grant was put out to access Red River Valley. Again, this would be a program for 8 to 10 kids during the summertime where uh we talked about the
myths, I'm going to use that word, by the lack of um the more police not having their summer programs and yet at the same time, what can we do to help fill that gap? So that was a big discussion. Um again, thanks to our
county for um giving them money uh every year that they've really saved up uh in down this critical need and making these small grants to help these kids through the summer. Um
also I think everything else um we talked about was pretty much already presented to us. So I think Yeah, I think that's pretty much it about that meeting other than agency reports and again we had you saw the
list last week and I think there were around 20 groups groups that we work with. So given our individual reports uh that evening uh the horse story from the culture society u of Klay County had their annual
meeting. Uh we had that at the imprompt center. Um guessing around 60 people were there. We had uh um refreshments at the beginning, some pie actually. And then we went into
our meeting. Uh we had a um uh director's report from our from Laura Ford, our um new executive director of about six months. and she gave a good review of 2025.
Then we had board elections. Uh we had three board uh members reelected for another term and then two new ones came on, Dan Gunderson and Vicky Hogan, Dan from Morehead and Vicki from uh the
Holly area. So we'll enjoy having them jump on board. And then after that, we had our presentation of the 2025 Klay County Heritage Award. And uh it was given to our long-term past executive
director Marine Kelly Jonison. And uh it was wonderful. Uh Dr. ABA who was our board member gave the presentation and did a really nice job and uh just our gratitude and all
the work that Marine did for this organization for many years. And then after that we had a little trivia game with the group and and it was about national and state local questions and with a lot of those people they're
pretty uh in tune to a lot of history. So it was uh fun to do. Um on Monday uh yesterday uh I had my adult mental health monthly planning meeting uh for a
board meeting next week uh development of a annual report that I believe is going to be given here on May 19th next week. Uh, and then in in the evening,
um, I had, uh, the Buffalo Red, excuse me, the Buffalo Red board meeting and, uh, that was last night. Uh the big discussion there was um just for an update uh from when we talked last week
uh CW had talked to the U CW I got to say this right I got to find anyway the furner plant >> right >> down by Wolverton I had a discussion with the DA and uh anyway Ross was on on
on the call last night into the meeting And that group has decided that they were going to build their own levy. And so they'll be working with the Houston engineering and and just get it done. They've gone through uh permit approvals
already. One with the Department of A and MPCA that's been approved and they're just waiting on a DNR um appro uh approval which they should have shortly and they'll get it going. Uh Houston is working on the engineering
on that one on the um on the specs. Um then after that and help me with this Commissioner Mojo the hearing for now we got the U hearing for project um 34 for the restoration of Ris Whiskey Creek.
There was a hearing on what day? Do you remember? >> The hearing was the hearing was on May 4th. >> May 4th. Okay. So here we are only a few days later at the next meeting and then there was supposed to be uh a final
presentation and then uh motions moving forward whether to uh move on with the pro uh project or not. Uh there was an hour and a half of uh discussion by landowners um concerns about the project. At the
end of the all that um it was decided and a motion passed passed that uh in order to uh uh at this point discontinue the project uh and I suppose there'll probably come back to it at some point
but at this point they were seeing it was emphasized and shown too much u damage is being done at the end of the Stony Creek project and let's get it figured out what's happening on the water coming down the ridge and the
effects on these projects um that are just spreading into further into the county. So, uh at the very least I'll call it a pause. Um >> can I ask a question? And I think there's some un So they were the recipients of a $3.7 million Lassard
Sams >> and my understanding was that they could still make changes to the project but they needed to act so they wouldn't lose that 3.7. They could do you know what the >> I don't know and that wasn't uh any part
of the discussion last night. >> Okay. Thank you. Um yeah. Uh other than that, just a few things on ditch repairs and um new contract uh liners needing to be
replaced in ditch 50 in county. And that's my report. >> Thank you, Commissioner uh Kraban. Before Commissioner Campbell goes, I think it's important um I am not on the diversion authority, but I have served uh in a variety of different capacities with Commissioner Campbell on the
diversion lands components. And on May 7th, Commissioner Campbell was bestowed a quite an honor uh from the US Army Corps of Engineers, a service army civilian service commenation award medal for all of the work and contributions
that Kevin has um committed to the diversion project. Uh his time uh fighting floods goes far beyond his work on the county board. certainly when he was a township official uh trying to save his neighborhoods in North Morehead
and Oakport and I just really want from this entire board to also extend our gratitude Kevin uh that is quite an honor and we're really proud of you. >> Thank you. >> Y >> I knew you weren't going to report on it so I had to
>> I wasn't there. That award will be presented at the next board uh >> diversion authority meeting. >> All right. On uh Tuesday, May 5th, we had a uh quickly held um
pick meeting personnel issues. Uh Lori Johnson had a couple things that uh she from a timing standpoint she really felt important for us to hear. And of course those two item two of the items that were there were on our consent agenda for today after being um approved
through pick. Uh we also had some uh discussions about uh timelines with upcoming retirements. I'm I'm not going to mention any names. Um this one doesn't have anything to do with me. Um
but um yeah, so there's some uh critical timelines coming up um in regarding regarding retirements. That same day, we also had a highway tracking committee meeting. Um
on that we're was reported on that date that Cassad 12 and 52 the first phase detour will begin the Tuesday after Memorial Day. And then maybe Commissioner Mojo can give some updates since then too on on some of these
things. But Cassad 2 was closed and they are reclaiming that roadway. Um and then u and then also um CASA 26 uh that work from Highway 75 to the Red
River. Uh that now is scheduled for late July and August. And so be can be somewhat hopeful that maybe most of those trucks that are dealing with that project over in North Dakota will be a little closer to finished so that we
don't beat up that road once we finish it. Um and then there was a um gravel pre-construction meeting that afternoon and we had some discussion about future
graveling contracts and then also uh CASA 21 working with mind. There were no bond funds available on that and so they're working on a shoulder closure
and I think we're gonna um Justin will be coming forward with a plan for a a bridge plan and hiring a consultant to design that uh coming up. So, um, and then, uh, just a note of
note, um, Justin is working on, uh, pickup purchases and auctioning off, um, three pickups, uh, the need of another plow truck and a toner replacement,
contractor body, and a sign truck. So, those are things that he's going to be bringing bringing forward and additional equipment purchases will be updated soon. And he's hoping to bring
the updated five-year plan to the board in the near future. Uh then on the excuse me, I gotta get my on May 7th, we did have a um Zoom Teams
meeting regarding the with the chamber regarding our flood mitigation work group dealing with the legislation issues. uh as it's been we've been talking about here today the uh we're we're getting down to the wire and
uh I know that there's some plans for some members. I think maybe Jason or somebody is going to be down there later this week. >> I'm picking them up. >> I'm picking them up Wednesday night and I'll hand deliver them Thursday. So, Jason Benson and Commissioner Mojo and I
I believe we're going to be delivering some little sandbags to >> sandbags. A lot of uh >> sandbag stress relievers. >> Yeah. To a lot of our legislators down there. So, as they're getting frustrated with the have these >> these things that they can squeeze and
>> where's ours? We should have had that before the budgets >> as long as they fund the projects. >> Pass the bonding bill. So that uh so that was that and then uh there's really uh the only other plans
for that group will be to um meet post um closure of the legislative session to see how things have worked out and hopefully we'll get some good news. That concludes my report. >> Thank you Commissioner Campbell and
Commissioner Bear. >> Thank you Madam Chair. On May 6, we had a county owned lands committee where we discussed the Riverton Township property that the county owns. One of the things out there that law enforcement wants to
they they use the SWAT uses it right now, but they wanted to build up a burm which they lay on for their sharpshooters to use for more practice so it's safer out there. And then we also discussed on that same property the n North Dakota National Guard wants to
do some training out there through June 6th through the 10th deductive training. Both those move through the county owned lands committee and should be coming to the board for our approval. We also had a third item on the list with a
company that would wanted to use some of our property off County Road 26 for a scale which we did not move forward. And then yesterday I went to Dworth for the groundbreaking uh ceremony for their new uh community center that's being built
out there and there was a quite a few people there. So yeah, that is all my reports. Commissioner. >> Thank you, Commissioner Bayer. Commissioner Campbell. >> Yeah, I have one one last thing here. I just want to point out something here. I I received a letter here and if it's not
very long, if you don't mind, I I'd like to read it here. Uh my name is Floren Nelson. I am a 16 I am 16 and a sophomore at Moret High School as well as a resident of Oakport Township. I am writing to you today regarding the condition of County Road 9, which is
currently in poor condition. This issue is affecting me and others who drive down this road to get their homes or use it to travel. When driving down County Road 9 at the speed limit, the vehicle is thrown about by the holes and
cracks present on the road. A repair for this road would greatly benefit not just the driver, but also driver and vehicle safety. I would greatly appreciate consideration of this issue as it impacts the county and driver safety.
Possible solution would be road road construction to repair its current condition. Addressing this issue would be greatly benefit all who drive down this road, providing a safe journey to their destination. Thank you for your
consideration. And I just want to I just want to congratulate this young lady for for for writing this uh to us and I can tell her help is on the way. >> Thank you for reading that. I do really appreciate especially when we see
younger folks taking uh an interest in uh the civics around them. So appreciate congratulations Flora. We'll work on it. >> Uh May 4th. I neglected to report last week on one of my committees and talked to Sarah about it, but also um I was at
the the ditch here or not the ditch the Whiskey Creek project hearing at the Buffalo Red WHED meeting on the on May 4th. Um there were an an enormous amount of folks that had questions about pieces of that project. there really was concerns with the Stony Creek project
and some blowouts that they're working on and then I think uh a hope that there would be some sort of retention incorporated into both of those projects. So, uh Commissioner Kron uh reported on what where it stands um as
of last night, May 5th, I also attended the highway tracking committee meeting that Commissioner Campbell uh updated very well on. Um, I also observed uh I know we are moving forward with our uh roundabout on Highway 52. Unfortunately,
there was a pretty nasty car accident there yesterday. So, as we uh look at public safety and road improvements for our public safety, we can that continues to be one where I'm hopeful we can get that done and and save some future accidents. May 6th, I attended the Klay
County Lands Committee meeting that Commissioner Bear reported on. Really good updates on that. Um, also of note is we've had two separate National Guard uh training units that have reached out to us because they feel like that is such a great uh space for training
opportunity. Uh boy, if you look at the amount of different uh organizations that are reaching out to Klay County to use some space as training, I'm really proud of that. That's a great opportunity. And after that, I had the Klay County Legislative Planning Committee meeting
where we continued to triage, reaching out to key members of the legislature for all of our projects that we're working on, but also members of the capital investment committee meeting. I just got in uh a message from uh Haley,
who is our lobbyist, and it's uh a I don't want to say desperate, but the call to action for all of us to reach out to our legislators today about the need for a bonding bill. It's um not looking great, but so we we do need to
one, Steve, all of the folks that we had send letters out last week to all of those addresses. We need to do that today to encourage bonding bill passage. And then all of you have um Senator Johnson, Coop, uh Representative Keeler,
Representative Joy Gander as well. We need to uh all individually reach out to them to encourage passage of a bonding bill. that's um imperative today. And uh also had um discussion in regards to um the other projects, how we'll triage uh
reaching out to them later on this week. Um that evening I attended a retirement celebration for Larry Kudson who's been the voice of the Spuds for a seriously long time. It's pretty crazy that uh um I recall him uh announcing Spuds games when I was an athlete, but now I have
kiddos that are doing that too. And I know there's often three generations that talk about uh I Larry is is not the only individual in our community that uh leads and offers their skills to all of our different school districts, but really appreciative of the work and the
time that he's given specifically to Morid Area Public Schools. May 7th, I attended the public public policy committee meeting for the chamber. We met at Even Tides downtown corporate offices. really great updates
on the national economic outlook from uh leaders in uh with the national chamber. Um interesting to uh you know they really talked about the difference in policies in Minnesota and North Dakota and how we can uh work to to change change that but also what we're seeing
in trends nationally. Um, one statistic that um, Shirley uh, Hughes uh, from Fargo or the ch the is it the chamber, not the chamber, hospitality, commerce. Anyways, we talked about what uh,
tourism means to Cass and Klay County and what those numbers are. And in 2025, tourism brought in 1 billion dollar to Cass County and 80 million to Klay County. And while that is a huge and wonderful number, we certainly have some
things we can do to help make uh tourism in Klay County more vibrant business. But uh that was a staggering difference. I believe I attended the flood workg groupoup mitigation meeting that Commissioner Campbell discussed and how we will triage that messaging in St.
Paul this week, particularly with the reminder of um what that uh dollar amount means to wrap things up. uh that I observe the pro project partnership agreement. Uh having the hund00 million secured is really an important step for
uh the ability to finish up the projects on the Klay County side that are really imperative not only to the agreement but the folks that will be uh affected on our side. I attended an Alliance Township meeting in Baker on the project
concerns followup from the hearing at the Buffalo Red WHED meeting May 8th. I had the coffee with the commissioner in Dworth and then a discussion with the county attorney and administrator on legal issues that we're working on. And then uh yesterday also attended the
Dworth groundbreaking and exciting opportunity for Dworth. I've said many times the besides this building, the only other building in my time on the county board that I've had the most meetings in is the Dworth Community Center. That really is a regional hub
for uh strategy and meetings and exciting for that community as well. That concludes my reports. >> Uh thank you, Madam Chair. Most of the items were covered but participated on the 5th. I sent several letters out to legislators
in regards to uh the PRTF and bonding. Uh also on the 5th participate in the pick uh meeting that uh pick meeting that's been addressed uh highway tracking uh that's been addressed. also the county owned lands and legislative planning and also the May May public
policy meeting uh chamber uh participated in the fund mitigation work group on the 7th and then in the afternoon along with several of our members from our risk management committee sat with Joe Minsky from MCIT uh to go through our annual update on
the 7th also I'll had a department head evaluation uh on the 8th participating in the MAC legislative update and then also our non-scared detention uh meeting uh on the 8th. I met also met with Crystal
Cadri uh from the drug court program uh and received an update. They're going to be coming next week with the proclamation uh for for the courts, specialty courts. Uh and uh and then uh just to note, we did have a we have a ED
CEDA meeting uh later today at one that concludes our report. >> Thank you, Steve. Katie, do you have anything? >> Okay. Anything else, Darren? >> Um, most of my stuff has already been covered. I attended the pick meeting on
the 5th, lands committee meeting on the 6th, legislative planning committee. Uh, all have been covered already. I did have a meeting with chief deputy on some personnel issues of which Anna also participated. And then after that, I had a meeting with Anna kind of catching her
up for her return on the 18th on next Monday. On the May 7th, I responded some data requests and worked on the data practices project. On the 8th, I attended the MACA legislative update as well, PRTF update meeting, and then uh
yesterday I had a meeting with Steve and Lori. That's concludes my report. >> Thank you, Darren. Anything else? As noted, we do have the EDA EDC meeting this afternoon. Uh we have covered all items on the agenda today. Our next
board meeting will be May 19th at 8:30. We are adjourned.