Good morning everyone and welcome to the Kandandy County Board of Commissioners meeting for October 21st, 2025. Please stand for the pledgece to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it
stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Want to thank everybody for being here today. We have a number of presentations and uh uh thank everybody catching us on
YouTube. Uh at this time we will move to uh uh uh approve the uh agenda which uh uh there was a revision on this earlier uh that we sent out. Uh but I'd look for
a motion to approve today's agenda. I'll move to approve the agenda. >> Thank you. Commissioner Dwayne Anderson moves. Is there a second? >> I'll second it. >> Commissioner Bale Anderson seconds. Discussion. >> Um, is the revision
reflected on here? >> Y. >> And with that, all in favor of the agenda, uh, approving the agenda signify by saying I. >> I. Opposed. Motion passes. Thank you. Uh next item uh is the approval of the
consent agenda. Uh those uh non-controversial typically items are uh uh the approval of the October 7th, 2025 county board legal minutes, approval of the auditor's warrants and claims, approval of human services warrants and
claims, cancellation of human services warrants, either items that were wrong amounts or u uh uh that type of thing. and then a uh United Community Action Partnership contract addendum to the 2025 local
homeless prevention aid service agreement. Do any commissioners wish to pull any of these items for further discussion? Hearing none, then I would uh accept a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented. >> So move, Mr. Chair,
>> Commissioner Beck moves. Is there a second? >> Mr. Chair, I'll second that. Commissioner Burke seconds discussion. All in favor say I. I. All opposed. >> Motion passes. Thank you. It's that time of year again. And today we have Doug
Host uh with Clifton Larson Allen uh presenting uh the audit for year ending uh December 31, 2024. Doug, take it away. >> Awesome. Can everybody hear me? Okay. Well, I needed some support today. So,
with me today is Liz Mickelson. She's the director on your audit as well. She makes sure the audit goes smoothly, does tons of communication and training with our staff, and we help out your staff as well. But Liz will present part of uh
the audit results today. Um I am Doug Host. I've been a principal at Larsson Allen for Clifton Larson Allen for about 23 years now. Been auditing counties for 34 and yep, that means I started when I was 10. So just kidding. So, um, Kelsey,
or is someone driving? >> Yep. >> Fantastic. All right. Well, we're already on page three, and here's just a quick, uh, a little agenda. Um, we already did the introduction. I'll go through some required communications and internal control
items. That's required by audit standards. We'll spend about a minute on the Minnesota legal compliance testing that the state auditor's office requires us to do. Um, we'll touch on the single audit uh that we perform because the
county receives a lot of federal grants. We're required to do some testing of controls and compliance. Liz will talk about the financial results for Candy Ohio County in 2024 and then I will wrap it up. So, we can jump ahead to page
six. Um, the audit standards require us to communicate certain things to the board. Okay? And we do that in two ways. one is in a separate letter. It's about four pages long. It's very boilerplate. Um I'll just touch on the high points.
We didn't encounter any difficulties in performing the audit and we also didn't have any disagreements with management. Um this year's audit went very well. It was actually completed two weeks earlier than last year. It's been done for shoot
a month or so already now, but this was the first we could get here to present it. But um I know I mentioned this in previous years, but y'all just need to know that the staff here work very hard to get through the audit. I don't know
how many hours they put in each year and preparing and uh accumulating documentation, but each year that since that first year we were here, it's gone better and better and uh the number of adjustments that we need to make has gone down and
down each year. So, I'm super excited to be working with everyone here at Candyoi County and with your staff. So, it it's just I we really enjoy working with you as a as a team. Um, just one and we did issue a clean opinion on your financial
statements. That's the best one we can give. It means your financial statements are materially correct as presented. And then just quick reminder, there's about 150 pages in your report. And if you ever are going to use just a piece of it, just let me know because there's some te's I got to cross and
eyes to dot. So, just a quick reminder, we're already on page eight. That's like a third of the way through these slides. We're zooming, right? All right. Page eight. The audit standards require us to obtain an understanding of the county's internal controls, test them, and then
report them. Report the results of that testing. There's just two items uh in the material weakness category. One is for audit adjustments and as I mentioned um we have fewer and fewer adjustments since that first
year that we're required to make because your staff are adapting and implementing some changes. And so that's good. And then as far as preparing the financial statements, that's just a clerical function. We're required to let you know that we help with the clerical piece of
putting your financial statements together. We don't enter any entries into your accounting system. That's all done by county staff. One other required communication, it's probably been around, let's see, 34 years,
is the segregation of duties. We're just required to let the board know that there's some departments that don't have complete segregation of duties. It's common with just about every audit that gets done, I think. But just know
your overall centralized system has a lot of the segregation of duties built in. It's when there's fewer and fewer people available to uh segregate those responsibilities. Page 10. There's about 25 pages of items that we need to test
for uh the county's compliance with state statutes. And there's just one item we're required to communicate. It's probably also been around for 34 years because that statute's so old. Um but you have some individual ditches that
have deficit cash. There we've communicated it. I'm sure you all were aware of it already, but we're just required to bring it back up. All right. Page 12. mentioned the county received and spent uh federal do uh
grant dollars. So, we had to do some testing over three programs. The SLFRF, which stands for state and local fiscal recovery, F Liz wants funds. Thanks. F and medical
assistance and title 4E foster care. Uh there's about 9.5 million of federal grant total expenditures and uh in the medical assistance program we had one item we're required to communicate uh as far as case file reviews. It's a good
internal control to have like the supervisor do a periodic review on some cases to make sure that the people that are getting the uh program assistance meet all the eligibility requires. It's a really good
idea or control to do those reviews. The foster care program, um, same issue as with medical assistance and also the county does some time studies where the state checks in with people to see, uh, what they're working on and the state
uses that to sort of allocate the bucket of money to the different programs. Um there should also be a review process when uh those time study reports get submitted.
And then there's another foster care report where we it sounds like a review of the reports was done before it was submitted, but then there was a little blip in time where the normal reviewer wasn't there and like
one didn't get reviewed. So just required to communicate that. And then with ARPA, that's the CO money. Um there's some suspension and dearment requirements. Before you enter into a
contract with the vendor, there's a requirement to check this federal website to see if that vendor is suspended or debarred. Um it sounds like it was done, but we didn't see any documentation of it. So simple thing to
address and ARPA is almost done. So that's good. Also good is last year there were three different single audit required communications. We tested them this year and they are resolved. So that's good news. We like to see that for sure. Any questions on the controls
and reports that we do? Otherwise Liz will talk about the financials. >> I have a I don't know if this is >> Commissioner Anderson. >> All right. Thanks Mr. Chair. I don't know if this is the right place but uh do we have enough checks and balances so that you know we have like another setup
or eyes are signing off on stuff so that or you know enough >> so so somebody isn't writing a check you know to go to Tahiti or something like that >> uh in general yes the biggest chunk of all the transactions that flow through
the county yes there are a number of checks and balances >> sometimes you'll have maybe a separate checking account in a what we call decentralized department and the processes there don't flu flow through the county centralized accounting system
process and it's when there's these separate collection points not the centralized here is where there isn't always complete segregation of duties in the centralized part yeah it's it's pretty solid >> okay
>> um the audit standards do say in the government finance officers association too says, you know what, they're aware that the segregation of duties exists all over. And sometimes it's just okay to get this required communication
and that like governments like yourself should do a costbenefit analysis like all right, if you really wanted to get rid of this communication, you got to hire seven more people out here. Is that cost benefit there when they're only dealing with maybe 30,000 of collections
a year? No. So just keep that in mind when it comes to that segregation of duties. Cost benefit is critical. >> Commissioner Bird, >> Mr. Chair, thank you. Um going back to the results of this, you just read about medical assistance file reviews of
foster care and the AP. Um is that uh new to this past year or is that something like happens every now and then going along? I'm assuming that's the case. Uh, no. It's a great question and it just dawned on me when you were asking. I'm like, "Oh, yeah. There was a
big change." So, Liz, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think I'm right. 2024 was the first pre2024 DHS said, "You know what? Time out on all these extra reviews and periodic redeterminations
because of COVID and stuff." Right? 1124. They took that they put those requirements back on and in many of the counties that we audit these things were popping up because prior to CO they had good processes and they were doing the
reviews and then COVID hit and DHS said no don't do it for 20 and 21 22 and 23 and 24 it came back on. So yeah the the things we came across here is kind of typical but there was a shift in the requirements. >> Sure. Great question.
>> It was maybe a comment during those years there can be a lot of changes taking place in the different agencies as well. So I understandable. Thank you. >> For sure. Yeah. >> And the requirements changing as well. So finding staff that are well versed in changes that just came out a month ago becomes difficult for the counties as
well. >> All right. >> Okay. Go ahead. Oh, I'm sorry. Roger. >> Thank you, Mr. Chair. >> Commissioner MD. Um I am uh I think I know the you said ARPA but the third bullet point down is >> is that
>> SLf transpose >> uh they kind of mean interchangeable. Yeah. Yeah. I >> because I haven't seen it listed that way before and then I have a unrelated question Mr. Chair because you're talking about uh eligibility and we're
facing perhaps the intensified eligibility in the next couple of years. this audit really wouldn't help that part of it or who determines that error rate that we're going to be facing at SNAP. Uh because the year after the fact almost a year and a half by the time we
see all this. >> Yeah. Um I believe this to be the case, but DHS does some of their own internal audits and they have I think an allowable error rate that they're they're okay
with. I I can't say this is 100% true, but I believe over the years this is what I've learned. So they they expect some sort of error rate. We don't have that threshold. It's either it's all there or if there it's not even
if it's one, we got to report it. So uh who's going to oversee changes if that happens in the future? It would be more probably DHS is my speculation.
>> Thank you. >> Okay. >> Go ahead. >> All right. I'll dive into some of the financial results here for 2024. This first graph here um is one way we can look at a measure of health for the funds. This is all of your governmental funds u months of expenditures in fund
balance. Um the amount of months of expenditures and fund balance for 2024 was 8.93 months and that's up slightly from the prior year where you had 8.61 months of expenditures in fund balance and that typical benchmark we look for
across the funds is five months. You're well above that. Next we'll look at all of the governmental funds combined for revenues compared to expenditures for the last five years. kind of looking at trends over the last five years here. Revenues have exceeded expenditures in four of
the last five years presented. In general, the expenditures have been consistently trending up as we would expect for rising costs of operation, cost of living, things like that. Um, your fund balance ratio has been unchanged and that's due to those revenues trending up with these
increases in costs as well. This next graph looks at revenues by type for the last 5 years for all of your governmental funds. Taxes make up the largest type of revenue source, making up about 42% of your revenues in 2024. Um, we're seeing tax revenue trending up over the last five years
with increases in the levy. Intergovernmental revenue is your second largest type of revenue, making up about 33% in 2024. Um, this type is going to fluctuate for what kinds of funding is received. You'll see that 2024 is down slightly. That was really in the highway um, funding that came in in the year.
And when we dive further into the highway fund specifically, we'll see that um charges for service makes up the third largest type of revenue with about 15%. Uh charges for service are trending up over the last 5 years as we would expect to see as well for increasing those fees, keeping up with costs.
This next graph looks at expenditures by function for all your governmental funds over the last five years as well. um won't dive too much into the ups and downs over the years here um just given time but in general most functions have a general tend up as we would expect
with increases in cost of operations. Um the two biggest fluctuations from prior year was in public safety was up about 3 million from the prior year. Um this the big drivers of that are your payroll. Um and then also in 2024 lots a large increase in the amount of um inmates
boarded. So, we saw that number jump or a lot of those jail costs go up in 2024. Um, highways and streets were down about two and a half million again, which is consistent with the decrease in those highway fundings that we saw on the previous slide. This next graph um zeros in on just your
general fund for the last 5 years revenues compared to expenditures. Revenues are exceeding expenditures for three of the five years presented here. Um in this fund there are about 7.9 months of expenditures in fund balance also above that target of five months. Um the large increase in expenditures
from the prior year in the general fund again is that jail mostly those jail costs but overall payroll costs were up as well. All right. The next fund we're going to look at here is the road and bridge fund. Um revenues compared to expenditures for the last 5 years. Revenues have exceeded expenditures for
three of the five years presented. Um in this fund there are about 9.2 two months of expenditures in fund balance for 2024. Um and then from 2023 to 2024, both the highway user tax funding from the state and road construction projects, we saw a decrease in both. So
trending down together as we would expect. This next slide is the human services fund. Same information presented. Revenues have exceeded expenditures for the last four years. Um in this one there are about 7.6 six months of expenditures in fund balance u which is
up from the prior year. Both revenues and expenditures are trending up slightly over the last five years as we would expect with those increasing costs of operation. All right, this next graph is a trend of your county um indebtedness. So bonds payable for both business type and the
governmental funds. Business type is Glacial Lakes um are trending down for the debt payments being made. So that's your teal line and your dark blue line. Landfill closure liability and your OPED liability are going to fluctuate with assumptions. The county really has
limited control over those two estimates and the amount that goes into those. Those are your orange and light blue lines. Um the increase in the lime green line for the um glacial lakes loans payable is related to the spending of
some loans for the um I hope I get the wording right. wastewater treatment facility I believe project in 2024. Um so some of that spending was on loans. So that rolls up into your indebtedness on the financials. Um the increase in compensated absences. The gray line is
mostly related to the implementation of Gazby statement 101 really has an overall immaterial impact to the county. Um if you look at the big picture governmentwide financial statements, but it does kind of show up on the graph there that increase um changes in assumptions that go into that. We worked
with the county to implement that in the current year. >> Yes, >> Commissioner B. >> Thank you, Mr. Chair. You don't mind being interrupted in the middle? Not at all. Okay, great. Um, from financial results and the county indebtedness, I think it's looking pretty good. And my question to you, do you have any
comments about that and how do we compare to some other areas? Because I am I looking at with the right kind of glasses? I uh I have another board meeting uh later today uh for another county and they issued just in one year
like 45 million in bonds about 40 40h probably more closer to 40 which doing quick math that's less than the debt you have across glacial lakes and whether it's the clean water loans special
assessment bonds so overall I would say your debt that load. I don't have the ratio or anything, so it's just gut feel, but I'd say it's slightly below the average on the amount of debt you're carrying. >> So, it's a good position to be in nowadays.
>> Yeah, for sure. >> Okay. >> Y and uh I'm just going to piggyback on this for just a second. Uh some uh is there some of the debt that uh uh is higher in other counties, for example,
uh GEO bonds? uh because we're really low in that uh in that area. Is that typical of counties, do you think? >> I would say probably not typical. Um I would say the geo bonds is generally the
primary debt instrument utilized. Um >> and that's typically if uh say a county wants to do a building project or something like that. >> Some counties issued geo bonds to do roads to Yep. So, uh, but yeah, now that
you mentioned, it's like, >> yeah, that is low on the geo bond side. >> It's almost non-existent right now. >> Yeah, exactly. >> Okay. Uh, thank you. Anybody else with any questions at this time? >> Okay, keep going. >> All right. The last graph here um of the
financial results looks at your glacial lakes fund. So, this is presented on the full acral basis. So, a little bit different than the other funds we looked at before this. Um if I was looking at this graph and I was you, I would focus on the dark blue, the red and the orange lines. Those are your operating lines. Um I will say given the full acrrual
nature of the fund, the um net position ones. So the light gray, light blue, sorry, and gray lines are are just a little bit skewed um the way it's accounted for. So focus on the um operating lines and we'll see that operating income, operating expenses and
operating income are all trending together each of the last four years with operating income staying above operating expenses in this fund the last three years. >> All right. So you know I this was the third year we've audited Candy County.
You know we love working with you. Uh financially the county is in stable position. Um the boards over the years have made probably some tough decisions. Um but I think the results of the audit
show that uh the results of those decisions I mean financially your fund balance levels are stable. They're above the recommended minimum fund balance. Okay. Are they
excessive? I would say by no means not excessive. Here's one county I have audited. They had like 25 months of reserves in fund balance. And ironically, they had a plan for that money. So even though it sounds
like, oh, that's got to be excessive. It it it wasn't because they didn't want to issue any debt, they were saving and saving and saving and saving to do like this big building project and they weren't going to pay interest. So even though on the surface that
looked like, oh my gosh, that's ex excessive, but it really wasn't. They had a sound plan for it. So y'all can go to sleep tonight knowing that the county as of 123124 was in stable financial position. And in that chart Liz went
through, there's a little fluctuation in the number of months, but it's stable. And um that's the result of the the decisions the board makes. So, um, we mentioned we did a single audit there. We're going to have to do one in 2025 as
well. Gazsby, which stands for Governmental Accounting Standards Board number 101. Liz touched on compensated absences. You made us and the county record some more liabilities, but it's not like you're going to pay it out right now.
It's sort of a paper liability. So, uh, don't get work too worked up over that. But other than that, um, again, thank you so much for allowing us to serve you. And we got time for any other questions. >> Uh, thank you for that. And, uh, does
anybody else have any other questions? >> I I I'll just ask the one real quick. I think, uh, you know, we're it's budget season and it seems as though it's always budget season here. uh but uh more and more uh we're really looking at
the next uh four years uh as being somewhat critical. So uh in a way uh it's nice to have maybe healthy but not overly robust uh reserves uh potentially
for those future years. Can you uh uh just in case we need to offset levies or there are other uh unfunded mandates that come down the road for us? Uh is this the right type of thinking or am I
or am I looking at this a little um skewed? Well, I know I'm looking at it a little skewed. I >> I would say no, you're not. And actually you started off the question mentioning you know you're looking four years out
and my brain is quickly operating. You probably couldn't see the gears turning, but they they were I'm like, you know, I've been doing this a long time. And I couldn't come up or I don't think I've ever heard of a city or county that
looked more than one year ahead when it came to levies and stuff. And I'm like, "Oh my gosh, keeping an eye on the future is brilliant." So, I applaud you for that. And I don't I think to not just look at
26 budget but okay what happens in 27 28 29 um so if that's a new thing you're doing I'd recommend you keep doing it because to to just focus on a short period of time like one year
I don't know that that serves the county in the best best way possible and if it's okay I might bring up the idea hey look at more than just one year to the other clients. But I I seriously am very impressed with that mindset.
Um so I'd say keep doing that. Uh I have audited a government. Okay. I've been doing this a long time. I've seen the federal and state governments cut funding to counties a
number of times in them 34 years. And could that happen in the near future? You know, I think we hear some rumblings that that there could be more unfunded mandates or take funding away. If all of that comes to fruition or if
only a part of it comes to fruition, you're going to be able to weather that storm because you got some reserves built up. If you were sitting at like three and a half months of reserves and if some of those unfunded mandates
more tacked on, you're going to have a hard time rolling through and keeping operations going. Okay. Um, I have seen some of our audit clients
use some fund balance to cover some costs if the revenues that were budgeted weren't weren't going to be there. If I could uh give one word of caution and it would be in all caps. Actually,
it's two words. be careful. Um, there's one city I audited, they were sitting in about the same boat as far as the number of reserves that they have, okay? Or had. And because the audit got done 8 months after a year in,
I apologize apologize if I've told this story before, but it's just it was so impactful to me when I saw it happen. It it like sticks in my brain like crazy. But they had the year before they had solid reserves and then the next year
happened and 8 months after that year end we did the audit. Oh, and it was going down. Oh, they they used some fund balance. Okay. It was still sitting pretty good. Maybe they went from eight down to six or five.
And then that year, you know, we didn't look at any of that current year, eight months. And then we get to the next year and they're sitting at three or 2.5. And I've just never seen a government's reserves
decrease that much that fast and it was because they were using fund balance. And to try to build it back up from 2 and a half months to eight is a painful painful process. So knowing that, but also knowing that
you're looking at not just 26 and 20, you know, you're looking at 27, 28. I think that's very very important to do. But the words I'd say is be careful if if you are dipping into using some of your reserves. Um,
if you are going to do it, I would recommend that you do it on one for one time things, not something that's going to be, you know, I can't even come up with a good example right now, but if you use fund balance to fund
something and it's going to just keep rolling and rolling forward, that's going to just keep dropping the reserves. Does that >> help? That makes that makes perfect sense. Commissioner Ber, um we're going to be talking more about the budget later too as as well as between now and
December uh going forward, but from what you're saying and just really kind of simplify things. Well, first off, I want to really thank all of our staff from the administrator to uh to to the accounting staff to the
treasures office doing an excellent job. these >> they really are >> several years. Yes. But going back to what you're talking about too and maybe I'm making it really really simple is that the good news is we've going through the last several years we've
came out with a positive revenue versus >> yes >> expenditures and that's that's good and can build up that reserves with re reasonably but during those times too uh uh we also have dipped in to our
reserves for one-time budgets. >> Okay. So am I thinking then that even though we dip into those reserves, we're replacing we never really did that. We're replacing those possibly then since our total revenue uh months have gone up.
>> So really we have not used much reserves at all when it comes right down to it. >> I would if I can rephrase a little bit. Yeah. >> In the past you have dipped into reserves. Yep. >> But on the other hand, it was offset by hey, there's some additional revenue
that happened to come in. So, >> didn't end up actually dipping into it. But I based on the trend of your charts, yes, I think that's exactly it. You had a plan to dip into it and you did, but hey, there was some money we weren't
expecting that came in that offset it. When that happens, life is good. Is that always gonna happen if you dip in? No. But um yeah, >> some some of that if I may follow up,
Mr. Chair, too, is is how much we we're trying to predict revenue will be and do we predict enough or not or what the expenses are going to be? And that's that's the hard part that I think we run into. >> Yeah. That's why you all get paid the big bucks to sit there and we just sit on this side of the table. It's hard.
It's like I I can't imagine the process sitting on that side. It would definitely be a challenge and >> good news and great job. Thank you. >> All right. Any other any last questions for uh for our presenters today.
Well, thank you very much and thank and thank you for the kind comments on the uh forward-looking and uh I I think that that is a uh complete credit to the culture uh that we have within this county when it comes to our finances
both at the board but especially at the staff levels. Uh and uh uh it was kind of you to say today. >> Yeah. All right. Thank you. >> Thank you so much. At this time, uh, we'll have, uh, Karen Anderson, our chief financial officer,
uh, come up and, uh, she has a request of us. >> Good morning, Karen Anderson, chief financial officer. Um, as you're aware now, our audit is complete. The next step that we have are required to do is
have the financial statement printed in um both papers in the county West Central Tribune and Lakes Area Review. So I would like to get board approval to go ahead with that publishing. >> All right. You've heard the uh Karen's request. Is there a motion? Mr. Chair, I
move a motion made to uh approve the request to publish the financial statements. >> I'll second that. Mr. Commissioner Dwayne Anderson seconds. Discussion hearing none. All in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> All opposed. Motion passes. We're
sending around a sheet here for all of us to sign real quick so Karen can have that. Get this off to the printers. >> Okay. Thank you. It looks like Lisa has to sign off on that as well. So,
all right. >> All right. All righty. Very good. Then at this uh point in time, we will move on to our next item. will receive a report on the uh from the fair board on the 2025 annual report. Uh Katie, come
on up and introduce yourself. >> I will. Good morning. >> Good morning. >> I'm Katie Thompson. I'm the secretary for the Kandu High County Fairboard Association. Um I would first like to thank the Kanduahigh County Board of Commissioners um for your continued support and
partnership through the years. I'm just going to dump information. Feel free to interrupt, ask questions. Um, mine wasn't intense like the previous. The 2025 fair was held August 5th
through the 9th and just under 13,000 people um came through our gates for the four days of fun. Some highlights from the past year. Uh the east entrance construction is 95% complete. Um and if you haven't
noticed, the retaining wall was full of color this year thanks to the inches of rain and the warmer temps. Um we appreciate the 4 groups and the master gardeners who did and will continue to make that area beautiful. New this year,
a group of beef cattle um farmers sponsored the Candy Ohioigh open beef show and that was held on the Tuesday before the fair. Um kids from all around the county and beyond showcased their farms and animal genetics. It was a great turnout and we are already looking
forward to planning that for next year. The events in the grandstand were well attended. Wednesday and Thursday we had the great frontier bull riding company. Thursday of the week, we featured 18 barrel racers from our area. Um, the
barrel racers always brings a wild crowd to that entertainment. Friday was the antique tractor and truck pull. Numbers were slightly down this year with the threat of rain on that Friday evening. Um, since being on the board about 15 years, the poll wrapped
up before 1:00 a.m. I think we were done and out of there by 11 p.m. Unheard of. Saturday night, uh, Chaos Motorsports brought back the demo derby. Again, a packed grandstand and 40 plus demo cars
put on a great show for us to wrap up our evening grandstands on Saturday. On the free stage, we welcome two local Hispanic bands. Aaron Simmons, a Nashville singer songwriter. Robert Thompson, who is local here to Wilmer.
Chuck Theel and the Jolly Ramblers. And local well-known bands, the Damn Jammers and Bowling for John's. Magic Joe performed his magic shows throughout each day. We had the Los Moralitos Circus also performed every
day of the fair. F Fredd Freddy Justice um the planet's funniest hypnotist was on stage to kick off Wednesday and Thursday. Multiple livestock shows were held throughout the fair as well. Rabbits, poultry, horse, dairy goat, sheep, pigs,
and even llamas and alpacas took to the show rings. A total of 432 exhibitors. They are from the open and FFA. I didn't include 4 as I'm sure they'll give you their results. Showcased 1,892
exhibits in the baking, canning, crafts, quilting, painting, flowers, photographs, livestock, and more. Our Hall of Industries was filled with local businesses. um that included Pamper Chef, UKAP, Bonama Surveyors, the
Council of Disability, um the Sheriff's Department, Emergency Management, Public Health, Public Works, and a lot more. Local food vendors provided multiple options on the east entrance for food, and the most important was pork chop on
a stick and the free sweet corn feed, which of course was also very well attended. There were great turnouts for the Veterans Day program, Senior Citizens Day, and Kids Days this past year. I know I've left out so much of what has been done and held during the
fair, but we would probably be here for a very long time. So, in closing, I would like to thank the Koi County Fair Board Association. These men and women put in countless hours before, during, and after the fair. It can also be a
very thankless job at times and hours away from their families. We could ask why we volunteer so much of our time and the only answer as a board we could come up with is it's simply in our blood. So, thank you to all of you,
our sponsors and donors. And without their comm contributions, we would not be able to provide four full days of entertainment and agricultural education. And again, thank you, >> Katie. Thank you. And uh I'm going to
kind of lean over here a little bit because one of our board members lives out at the fair during that >> Yes, he does. that time and I just want to ask Commissioner Dale Anderson if he wants to piggy back in any of any of your comments. >> Well, I think Katie did a wonderful job. I I'm really impressed. That was really
good. Um, you know, the fair is in everybody's blood and and the biggest thing that that I think that's been unique about the fair in the last few years is we're really trying to improve the fairgrounds and to try to to make it a better place for people to come out and enjoy some time. And and the one
thing that I think that was the coolest this year was the the Mexican bands that we had. That was probably one of our bigger turnouts and people were just having a ball and that was really unique. Um the one thing Katie didn't say is we are definitely looking for money. Um we're going to try and get the
other um big hill issue addressed. It's on the other entrance and we need some bathrooms and probably the bathrooms are the most important thing. So um that would be the other thing is if you know anybody is organization wise or personally are willing to donate some
money um to help with us getting some bathrooms rebuilt. That would be the one big thing. But um thanks for everybody. Thanks for the board, the rest of the board, and everybody that's helped out with the fair. >> Thank you for that. Any other comments from the board?
>> Commissioner B. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Uh, very good report. >> A person forgets about all the details putting on a fair. Yeah. >> I mean, this is a complicated business when you talk about all those awards and prizes and the organization and it's a
one-time thing. But I also looking at this makes me realize this is more than just a one-time thing and that you're looking for sustainability and and your rental property and you're doing a good job on bringing that revenue in as well as I see.
>> So u and this is a major impact for our region and our and our community for economic development. Yeah. You know, I hear from other people about how great Kandui County Fair is and unfortunately we have a time of one other county and it kind of competes with them. Yeah. But
they still come here and I probably some of the people from Kandui County go there as well. So maybe it's a good deal for both of us. But yes, >> it's a great great program and we I'm so proud to be part of our canula county
that we have a fair like this and and I want to thank everybody including uh Commissioner Anderson. So, and yourself. >> Thank you. >> And all the other staff. >> Yep. It's not just for four days. I work all year. >> I am finishing up things from last year.
I'm planning for next year. It's a It's a big task. >> Yeah. I like it. Anyone else? I I'll just say I was just there one day this year, but uh my kids really enjoyed the the magic act or the magic show or whatever you want to call
it. So, they had a they had a ball watching that >> and he will be back next year. >> Okay. >> Yes. So, we're excited about that. >> All right, Katie, thank you so much and I appreciate you. >> Look forward to next year's fair. >> Thank you.
>> All right. At this time, uh, we'll have a presentation on the community health improvement plan. Uh, and that will be, uh, Forest Rice. Forest, come on up. Uh, uh, identify yourself and who you're with. And good morning. >> Good morning. Um, yeah, thank you for
having me. I'm Forest Rice, um, the public health planner with Kio High County Public Health. Um, and we just finished up our community health improvement plan. uh submitted it to the state July 31st, so it's in and everything now. Um there was a
presentation, but I can also describe it too. I don't know if it got through. All right. Um but with a community health improvement plan, it's something that is a roadmap for improving our community's public health um as we go
forward with the next handful of years. It's a fiveyear period type of plan. Um, and it's built with data, community input, and partnerships. And it is something that's required by the state, but it's owned by our communities. And since we have a community health board
with Renville, um, we share some of those responsibilities, but we also look within our local counties, too. So, that's why you will see Renville stuff pop up on some of the slides. You can ignore the right side if you want, or if you want to glance over and see our neighbors, that's fine, too. Um but
really quickly to understand our community health, it's really important to understand our community. And with that, um Candy High County has a population according to the last census of 43,732 people. And that's over 797.4
square miles. And we are the 23rd most populous county in the state of Minnesota. And we're expected to grow modestly to 46,573 by 2040. And that's according to Minnesota State Demographic Center. Um,
so we are a growing rural county. Um, which I would consider us pretty lucky, especially if you look over at the Renville one. Their population's expected to decline and a lot of rural counties, that's the trend. But Candy, Ohio is still growing, which is a good
thing. Growth is good for counties. All right, so moving on. Um, so to get to the community health improvement plan, we have to have community health assessments which is focused on the people, opportunity, nature, belonging, um, and trying to move our area to a state of well-being and community
partnerships. Um, the community health assessment was done before my time here, so I kind of got to pick up the ball and keep running with it. But during that, they did initial planning and meetings over a year compiling and analyzing and evaluating different data sources. And
they also got a lot of community input. Over 100 community members participated in small groupoup discussions to help inform this work. And through that they identified the top 10 community health um concerns for our county.
And with that the top 10 priority concerns were access to care and that included general health, mental health and dental. um adverse childhood experiences, which I'm sure everyone's heard a lot of at this point, but it predicts a lot of later health outcomes in this um in life, adolescent health,
aging population, child care access, chronic disease, food security, housing stability, mental well-being, and substance use. Um but 10 things to focus on would be a lot to do in a 5-year period. So from that, we narrow it down even further to our top three health
priorities. and we narrowed it down to aging population, mental well-being, um, specifically for youth, and then substance use as well. Um, and beyond just our community health improvement plan, it's always nice to
align it with bigger plans and bigger goals um, outside of just our counties. So our plan aligns with healthy Minnesota 2025 to 2029, healthy people 2030, national prevention strategy, Minnesota adolescent health plan, cancer
plan Minnesota 2025, and governor's task force on mental health. That's a snapshot of it. There's more plans that I'm sure plenty of the things fit into, but it's just an example. Um, and now we'll transition into getting into a little more of the data.
But before I do that, I like to do a little data 101 just to make sure everyone's on the same page. And apparently not everyone in the world focused as much in math class as I did. I liked it and I understand most people did not like math. So I like to make sure everyone understands where we're
going. Um, so with the data, we were actually able to do some forecasts based on the trend lines and kind of see where we're going to be in the future potentially. But forecasts are not fortune tellers. I'm not I don't I don't go to the fair and tell people's fortunes, but forecasts are um an
educated estimate of what's most likely to happen based on our past data and um the data we currently have. Um so it can give us a good guess of where we're going. And then within that I have confidence intervals. And the best way to describe a confidence interval, it's
wiggle room. Um the confidence intervals I used with the forecast were 95% confidence intervals. That means between these two numbers, the real number is likely to fall between them at a 95% success rate. Now, you can't always
predict everything. So, like 2020 early in the year, we would have never predicted what was going to happen later on, and that threw so many forecasts off. So, if there's big events, major events that no one could have predicted, that's going to throw things off obviously. But the narrower range, the
more certainty we have. And if it's a wider range, there's less certainty. Um, but our forecasts do improve as we get better data, as we get more data. And forecasting and confidence intervals are just one of the tools we can use for
decision-m. And the goal is to not be perfect. It's not like I'm going to give you the perfect exact number. If my forecast happens to do that, it was luck. like um but it is to get close enough to make better decisions. So we want the forecasts to be pretty accurate.
However, sometimes forecasts are wrong. Um but they are still useful because then we can investigate why they were wrong. Kind of look into why reality diverged from what was expected to happen based on the past data. Um so that's the data 101. Really quick little
data lesson before we get into it. Um so I'll go through our different um priorities. So we've got the aging population and with that I've got some visualizations on it. So this first slide is Candy Ohio's population. On the bottom it goes by fiveyear age groups.
The bottoms are younger populations and the tops are older populations. Um and there's a slight highlight on those. Those are the three age groups that actually grew the most by percentage um between um that are
expected to grow the most in percentage between 2025 and 2029. And on the right that shows those percentage changes. Um and the the largest groups were um 75 to 79 is expected to have a 17.79%
increase between 2025 and 2029. 80 to 84 is expected to have a 15.39% increase and then 45 to 49 is expected to have a 9.17% increase. So what that tells me all those age categories especially the two biggest growing ones
are in our aging groups. It's not our younger populations which is something when we're looking at populations that can kind of become a concern when you're not having the younger populations replacing the older ones. Um there's explanations for that. Like you've got
the baby boomer generations at that and like as people age they go into a new category too. So some of them are graduating to the next category. But the concern is when you look on that chart on the right those younger groups just aren't replacing the older groups as
much to where they're either declining or staying pretty stable. Um, so if we move on, you're gonna skip the next one because it's just runs. >> I just I I just want to comment that I'm gonna I'm going to strike the idea of
getting older. Uh, and I'm just going to tell people I'm graduating. >> Yeah, there we go. Yeah, you're graduating to the next age group. Yep. >> Exactly. >> Please continue. >> Yes. Um, so, um, with this, this is just some of the bullet points on what those
graphs tell us. It's got those three highest climbing groups by percentage. Um, but the concern is age groups under 20 are remaining remaining flat or decreasing. Um, and there's always going to be a combination of
factors that can contribute to that. Um, and things that you can look into and it's really hard to pinpoint one single reason that happens. But a m some of the major ones are just cost of living um and even access to child care kind of
affects that as well. Um as we know um and also one important thing to note real quick too is um Candy Ohio's groups of 65 plus are making a make up a larger share of the portion of our population
than other areas in the state. So that's another thing to pay attention to as well. And then our goal for our aging population is to support healthy aging by ensuring that older adults in our communities have the access to services, supports, and the environments they need
to maintain independence, safety, connection, and quality of life. So, it's making sure people are aging, but they're aging comfortably and having the resources they need. Then moving on to mental well-being, and this is more focused on youth. So, looking at ages 18
and under, um the left two bars are the ones that are important to us because they're candy high. Um these are the adverse childhood experiences from the Minnesota student survey that happened in 2019 and then 2022. So, the one on the left is
the 2019, the one on the right is 2022. Um, and the base of that is the children experiencing zero aces. And then the top it it goes up by ones until you get to the top towards four plus ACEs. And the four plus is where we really start to
get concerned because that's where a lot of the research shows a lot of future health outcomes are affected. And unfortunately for both counties, you can see the the children experiencing zero ACEs is decreasing, which is not a good thing. and the ones experiencing four
plus aces is increasing at a higher rate which is very concerning. However, I'll try to explain this one between 2019 and 2022 there's a major disruption that's never happened to ch school age children before and that's the co stuff and not
happening. So, I'm hoping when the 2025 data comes out, cuz they just did the survey in the spring, hopefully we have some more positive things and hopefully I can say, "Hey, look, there's some recovery happening." But I don't know that until I have the data.
>> And for the folks out there who are watching this, uh, uh, give us a couple of examples of ACEs, of adverse childhood experiences. It's it's not necessarily intuitive. >> Yeah. Yeah. So, an adverse childhood experience, um, they narrow, they have a
questionnaire of 10. Um, so, but it can really be any bad thing that happened to a child in their childhood. Um, and every child experiences them differently, but an example could be um, someone is in the household with the mental with a mental illness or a parent
was spent time in jail apart from their child or they've seen one parent hitting another parent. experiencing those things during childhood have consequences later in life and seeing some of those things. >> Thank you. >> Yes.
All right. And then moving on to the next one, the left side, they look almost identical, so it doesn't really matter, I guess, but the left side one is Candyo High. And this is the number of 11th graders that feel good about themselves. Um, and it's split up into
they almost always, most of the time, sometimes, and like rarely, or never. Um, and you can see it's pretty split on the ones that over half the time are feeling good about themselves and over half the time aren't feeling good about themselves, which is really unfortunate
to see. You would hope most children all the time are feeling good about themselves. So, this is another thing that's really concerning about the children's mental well-being and it correlates with the aces and the climbing amount of aces. Like, it's hard to feel good about yourself when you're having these bad experiences in
childhood. And then the the left is the one that matters for Candy Ohigh. This is our forecast for mental well-being. So the state of Minnesota has this really great collaborative um health trends across communities that is a collaboration with
the different health systems and not all Minnesota health systems participate but lucky for us centric does. So um it takes electronic health records and it shows us every diagnosis like counts
within our county um and it is expected to account for over 90% of our population. So that's really nice, too. Um, but that single line on the left before it spreads out is the actual counts that we've had. I adjusted for
population, but those are the actual counts we've had between 2020 and 2024. And then the ones that spread out are kind of the projections of where it could end up by 2029. Um, so these are those forecasts I was talking about. The
central line is the true forecast. If you I had to give you one number, that's the one number that the trend line shows where it should end up by then. And then the two lines um on either side of that that kind of make up that shaded area, that's that confidence interval I was
talking about. So the chance of it ending up between those two um the upper confidence and the lower confidence is set at a 95% probability of that. However, I also like to see scenarios that we might not
expect, especially since that happened to the world a few years ago. So, I like to have um a pessimistic view of it. So, that top line is mental health diagnosises just really climb in children within the next
five years. Something that we could have never predicted happened, COVID happens again. And that's what that's what happens there and it just climbs and we get a lot more diagnosis of children or there's the optimistic
one that bottom line we actually start to level it out a little bit and hopefully in the future like get it to decline. Um, one thing I also would like to say though is just because there's an increase of diagnosed mental health cases in children doesn't always mean
it's necessarily a bad thing. It could be we got better at diagnosing something. We have a better intervention. There's less stigma surrounding it. So parents are more likely to bring their kids in. So there is a positive side to it as well. I don't want it to be all doom and gloom like oh cases are always climbing. Sometimes we just get better at
identifying them. Um so with that the adverse childhood experiences are climbing and um candy rates are climbing at a higher rate than the statewide rates as well which is a little concerning. Um, the four plus ACEs grew
from 5.1% to 8.1% between 2019 and 2022. I'm hoping to see that go back down a little bit with the 25 data. Only 21.1% of 11th graders report almost always feeling good about themselves.
And then 1,13 children with mental health diagnosis in 2024. On trend to rise to around 1,718 by 2019 is where our trend's going. And with our mental well-being goal, it's to promote the mental well-being of
children and youth by accessing by increasing access to supportive environments, early intervention, and community based resources that foster resilience, emotional health, and positive development. And then our last priority is substance use. Um the taller bars on the left are the
ones that we're concerned about. Um Candy High County, it's because we have a higher population. We have more cases of substance use. Um we also use the htac data. So these are actual diagnosed cases. Um the dark bars on the bottom
are diagnosed with a substance use disorder only. The lighter bars on top are combined substance use and a mental health diagnosis. So as you can see they're usually um comorbid to where you end up with a
substance use and a mental health diagnosis um co-occurring. So the top of the bar is the substance use total and then the light blue ones are the ones that have substance use and mental health. And then again here's
>> I can just comm and thank you for let me interrupt you. I'm looking at that. That's a lot of cases of in 2024 2330A cases. >> Uh yes 20 2330 cases in 2024.
substance use >> and that jumped from 1,390 in 2020. >> Yes, that is correct. So, we've been climbing quite a bit. >> Health and Human Services and uh are very busy. Yes. Yes. And the mental
health centers and and the schools are uh struggling with a lot of different issues too. >> Wow. And then um here's the trend lines and the forecast for substance use in our county as well. Um it's a little
skinnier because as you can see on those bars before the trend was actually climbing pretty straight. So that's why that confidence interval, those ones are pretty close together, is because the trend that we have is it's climbing at a pretty consistent increment from year to
year, which is unfortunate because you don't want to say substance use cases are climbing, but they are. Um, and the reality is they probably will continue to. Um but again it's got the same like the top one is the pessimistic okay we
have something happen maybe some new synthetic drug pops into the market and we get a ton more cases. The bottom one is the optimistic like hey we got some really effective interventions and we're able to help some of these people with this. Um but those are the trends that
we're looking at. Um and what we do know substance use cases they are growing. um co-occurring substance use and mental health cases are rising faster than substance use alone. Um again, that could be we're getting better at, okay, we have a substance use case, maybe we need to screen for mental health as
well. Um it's hard to tell which one's causing which and it could just be they co-occur. Um substance use cases, like Commissioner Berg pointed out, they've increased from 1,00 >> I should have waited. It's f they increased from 1,390 in 2020 to 2330 in
2024. So over that period of time, we climbed nearly a thousand sin cases, which is really concerning to see. Um, and our substance use goal is to reduce the impact of substance use in our communities by strengthening prevention, increasing access to treatment and
recovery supports, and addressing the root causes that contribute to substance use. And then if there's any other questions at all, I welcome them. >> Um, Commissioner Mck. >> Thank you, Mr. Chair. First of all, um,
you kind of referred to yourself as a nerd about the numbers and stuff, and I love it. I, you know, the use of graphs for a lay person is a lot more effective than, okay, there's 5,000 here and there's 52 there. What does that really
look like in a in a in a trend? So your charts and your graphs are extremely helpful. I appreciate that. Uh so going all the way back to the bottom um with the substance abuse increases. One thing I don't see here is a
breakdown by age. So where is that occurring? Those abuses and the increase in the abuses are they occurring in elderly and the young and do we know? Um, we we can actually take that hack hack data and we can split it by
different age groups. Um, what I know just from like looking at it, but I don't have the concrete numbers in front of me, is it's more of your working adult age is where your biggest issues are. Um, and that can contribute just
because like they have easier access to it. Um, all sorts of different things. But yeah, it's more the working adult age group that has the highest rates. >> And with the legalization of uh cannabis, is cannabis included in one of
those substance abuses or is it I mean alcohol is legal, too, but it can be abused? >> Yep. So that that's where it's going to start getting a little bit murky and really hard because without putting a personal opinion in it makes the data really hard to analyze
when some things were put into place without a strong plan to actually support those things. Um, so for the most part, it's going to come down to the individual doctors. And if a doctor diagnosed someone with a substance use
disorder based on cannabis use, that would be it would be recorded as a substance use thing. But I'm not going to be able to break the data set we have. I'm not going to be able to break it down that much. I'm not going to be able to drill down to what the substance was
except I do think they have um alcohol abuse disorder on there. I can drill that one down, but I can't do cannabis. >> Thank you. >> I just wanted to say that uh uh this was a great process. Uh I serve on the uh uh
uh community health board and uh uh great process all the way through. uh the top 10 priority concerns. I just want to pick out three that didn't make the uh final three uh cut. Uh and that would be child care access, housing
stability, and food security. Mhm. >> Uh my gosh, if uh if people have uh safe and affordable uh housing uh and they don't have to worry where their next meal is coming from uh and they can have child care access so they can get out in
the workforce, this impacts every other item that's on this list. >> Oh yes. >> Uh and uh and in a positive way if uh if we can do that right. So that's really uh both a community health and an economic development uh uh issue where
where one area is going to uh in economic development is going to uh positively impact for for the most part u uh the community health. So >> yeah, I agree wholeheartedly and it's
unfort it's unfortunate we can't do all the priorities we possibly want. Um there's like 140 some indicators and then like narrowing it down and narrowing it down. But >> well we could >> if if if if if our if our society Yes.
decided on different priorities. >> For sure. >> We could do these things. >> Well, and a lot of them are definitely interconnected and just because we picked the three doesn't mean the other ones are not important. For sure. >> Right. Right. Exactly. Commissioner Bur, >> it's more natural in public health you'd
be picking the one to the end versus so it's our responsibility to work with the other ones even more so >> and balance it all out as much as possible. Interesting stuff. >> All right. Any uh uh any last questions?
Any last comments for us before we wrap it up? >> Ah, I think I covered all I needed. Thank you. >> All right. Well, thank you so much and thank you for your work on this and uh uh we'll we'll look forward to seeing you uh at our next meeting. >> Sounds good.
>> Thank you. Now, uh we will take a 10-minute recess. says of Kenya County Human Services Department at the top. This is our summary through quarter three. So again, to the far right, if uh if we were 100% on budget, all of these
numbers would be 75%. Uh we'll start at the top with revenues. We are over on revenues in every line almost except levy. If we took levy out of there, our total revenues would be at 83%. So, we're very healthy. And of course, we all know the levy payments
come in different times of the year. November will be our next biggest. Okay. For expenditures overall, we are at 71% again. So, that means we're under because we're at 75% of the year. So, at our subcommittee meeting that we have with Commissioner Berg and
Commissioner Anderson, we showed them a report, one that we use internally quite often and it sparked some interest and so we thought, you know what, each time I'm up here, I'm going to present some different information to keep it more interesting for you all. So, the next thing I have is the dollar bills.
Okay, I think that's in your packet. So, the most recent information we have is 2022. This uh this nice visual is something that our previous director Anstein had created and we just think again it's a nice visual tells the story pretty easily. Where this comes from is a very
large document. I have in front of me the 2020 report. So this is the this is put together by the state. Again it's if you uh have trouble sleeping some night you should pull this up and and read it. It's everything you would ever want to know about human services in the state of Minnesota. It shows how we compare
with other counties. So the 2022 is not printed yet. It's not published. It's not but I was able to get the data charts from the person who prepares it. So this is accurate information. This uh that we put on the
dollar bills. All right. So side by side the blue box for every dollar spent on human services in Kenway County. The blue box is all government funds, state, federal, and local. The bronze color is
just our Canoe County levy dollars. Okay. So, we'll talk about the the levy dollars, Canoy County, what we spend. Okay. The largest amount goes towards children's services, primarily child protection. And then it's mental health
all the way down to developmental disabilities. Okay? And again, side by side, if you look at all tax dollars, the blue medical assistance by far is the most
spending down to adult services, support programs, and the very bottom there is uh chemical dependency. Uh something Commissioner Gardner mentioned earlier about um child care. Unfortunately, you can see on both of these that child care
is next to the bottom, local and national and state. So again, a very good visual, especially now with the um the federal funding and the changes happening there. Again, we want to show you that again nationally and
statewide medical services is where most of the spending is. Again, it's been thought of as a sort of a national issue, right? where the local issues they've always said again were children's services mental health again things are changing this may look different in a few years
but I do want I want you to understand where this is coming from again 2022 is the most recent statewide data that we have so I did hand out when you were when we were on break I didn't have this done done in time for
the packets but I just want to show you another visual so human services cost by major program at the very top. Health, you can see clearly is where most of the money is spent. Long-term care, nursing homes, okay,
social service programs is the next biggest. And then support programs. And then those, you can't break out health programs any further because that is medical assistance. That is everything medical assistance pays. If we break these out further by social service costs, adult services, those are our waiver
programs, keeping people in their homes, children's services, child protection, developmental disabilities. Again, you can see those are the the three biggest support costs, and again, someone mentioned SNAP. When you talk about support costs, that's housing, that's
food, that's cash assistance. SNAP with food support is our biggest support program. with MIP which is employment and housing. So again, some good information for you all to have
and if you have any questions, >> maybe not so much a question uh but uh but as a comment uh you know if we're looking at you know these these breakouts um and you know first of all on the
social services side the waivered services the adult services that's where the state is anticipating uh explosive growth and budgetary constraints. We we we know that. But the thing over here that on the next graph that uh I'm
looking at is you know SNAP is a little over 10% maybe 11 12% at the most of the entire human services costs and by the national conversation that is being had out there uh you would think that that
is the single thing that is bankrupting this country. So that's my comment on that. I'm not going to ask you to respond to it, but um does anyone have any uh any questions for Carol? >> And if you want to tie this together with forest presentation again, adult
services you can see is growing and it's a growing cost. And again, medical assistance, a lot of that is long-term care facilities. So the two go hand in hand. >> I want to put I've already talked too much today. Mr. Chair Commissioner Ber, could you
put this on the screen? Would that be possible? Can I just do the doc? >> Do I >> for the public? And if I may just continue to follow up is um this is really well done. This is kind of information I I think is really great
for the public to be aware of where the where the dollars are going and and why. And you typically look at you know what is uh quote welfare I'll use that term. It's it's going for those services that for medical assistance and that's our
elderly and other people in need of medical assistance. Important need. >> Keep filling that gap. >> When I've talked about estate collections here, that's one of our revenue lines. >> A lot of times when we go to collect on someone who's been in a long-term care
facility, the family doesn't realize that they've had medical assistance to pay for that care. >> So that's a lot of times where they're like, "What do you mean you need to collect?" Well, someone was paying that bill. Someone had to pay for that care. So, again, that's a very large
amount. >> Well done. >> All right. Thank you. Uh, anyone else? >> All right, Carol. Thank you so much. And is that it for those reports? >> Yes. >> Okay. Very good.
At this time, then we'll call upon uh Gary Gear. Uh we have a couple of are these are these uh labeled as hearings or >> two separate sites. >> Okay. >> Yep. >> Oh, I'm sorry. Hearings, not hearings,
Mr. Chair. I'm sorry. I miss I missed. >> Very good. Uh Gary, go ahead. You got two nuisance abatement uh issues that you want to bring to us today. >> Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Gary Gear, environmental services director. And the
uh first nuisance abatement uh is for I get my paper here for the Dale Flickinger estate uh property. It's just west of New London on Minnesota State Highway 9. Uh we had received a complaint about the property in on April 14th and uh was thereafter inspected and
a letter sent to the property owner to abate it by May 18th. Uh this site was uh I've been working with a couple of the sons uh Myron and uh Joel to to work on the property. Of course it it some of the items there are theirs but it was
also their father's property and so a lot of things had accumulated over time. So they were working on it through the summer. uh you know there's pro some progress made but still uh as you can see in the October 8th photos still a
significant amount of solid waste. So that's why we moved forward to this step to ultimately request the county board uh take action to order staff to abate the nuisance at this property. There is a recommendation of staff to uh
uh have uh uh all those have staff abate all those nuisances and uh the abatement costs be assessed to the property owner. Uh is there a motion? I'll move the recommendation of staff. Is there a second chair? I'll second
that. discussion. >> All right. Hearing uh Gary, you >> would just maybe add one more positive piece of information. Since October 8th, they have uh I had visited with another family member and significant progress has made. I want to move forward with
this action today and but I'm also uh feeling confident that we will not have to go in and take care of this that it by the time that I could get it scheduled uh abatement will have happened. I'm hopeful. >> Yeah, we certainly hope hopefully it
turns out that way and in the past and other situations it has been our fingers because we don't want to do this if we don't have >> commissioner. Thank you. Uh so with this action today um triggers an
event but when so it'll be like by November 15th that the county would move in and clean up if it's not done or so how much time essentially that does the family have to >> I would say approximately 3 weeks uh if I you know get a hold of uh public works
and try and get that scheduled that's the time frame and at the So that would be standard operating procedure. If they are still working with me, I'm going to try and postpone that to to simply get it accomplished from the property owner's perspective
without us going in. >> You don't have trucks waiting to rush onto the property or anything that >> yes, but this action gives me the authority to move forward with that. Commissioner again, do you communicate
to the uh land owner property owners when >> Yes. >> when that public work? >> That is correct. >> Thank you. >> All right. Any other questions for Director Gear? If not, all in favor of
the recommendations say I. >> All opposed. Motion passes. Thank you. Uh next item, Gary. >> All right. Thank you, Mr. Chair. The next uh property is uh the Paul Kadowski property. This is on uh State Highway 40 just about a quarter mile west of the
Geno plant. And uh this again was a a site that was we received a complaint on in the spring uh in April. And I've been working with the property owner again uh throughout this summer season. uh some progress made some steps uh that you'd
not notice that progress has been made but uh again a very similar situation to the last one uh having visited with Paul today and uh just recently as well uh some significant progress has been made but there's certainly still as you can
see again in the uh October 7th photos significant amount of some unlicensed vehicles and appliances etc were on the property So, uh, staff is still recommending, uh, the same with the last one that this, uh, the county board staff to abate the nuisances and with
the cost being incurred to the property owner. >> All right. You've heard the recommendation of staff. Is there a motion? >> I'll make the motion to uh to proceed as as recommended by uh Gary Gear here.
>> Thank you. Is there a second? >> I'll second that, Mr. Chair. >> Thank you. discussion. So, relatively similar as to the uh uh last one, but there's probably more volume here. >> There's more volume. Yes.
>> Yeah. Okay. All right. Very good. Any other questions? Hearing none. All in favor of the recommendation of staff say I. >> I. I. All opposed. Motion passes. Gary, >> may I ask Gary a question?
>> You certainly may. similar to this. Um like I I got a call from somebody from a town. >> Uh do the town local towns do they handle these issues or do they come to you or how does that work? >> The the nuisance ordinance only applies to outside of city limits. So they they
would have to have something through their city council. >> Okay. I think I gave them the right information then. So it's real good. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you very much. Then at this time uh we have planning commission
recommendation. Uh Eric Van Dyken, zoning administrator will present. Eric, good morning. >> Morning, Mr. Chair, members of the board. Thank you. Eric Van Dyken, county zoning administrator here with a single action item request from the October
13th meeting of the planning commission. Um that we had a single hearing request for a conditional use permit for a hospitality event center. is on property in section 8 of Wilmer Township just northwest of um town west of the college
I guess you could say um it's property owned by the cavines and the applicant is Sarah Soulberg the um the nature of the request is around um hospitaling event center in particular with a focus on weddings but also allowing for other
potential um maybe corporate um retreats or activities things of that nature. So, kind of a um some focus, but then also a broader applicability for other things that the community might might um want. There was um a fair amount of interest in this um
application. You can see in the uh minutes a fair amount of discussion um a a fair amount of that had to do um with the road. Um for the unfortunately for the township, they've they've had a bit of an issue over over a time where there's been a fair amount of cut
through in that in that area coming off um Highway 12. There's a there's a little route where people can kind of cut through and avoid some roundabouts and stuff and they've even had some fair amount of heavy traffic there. So the citizens in that area are are starting with a level of concern over the road
and so that was that was a s a significant part of the discussion. Um as the evening went on um following discussion the planning commission did recommend approval of the request with four conditions and the findings as you
see I'll just highlight in particular condition um number two and condition number four um condition number two uh was a subject of a fair amount of discussion as well um the the idea of sound and sound carrying how much that
might that impact people around and Um, for most of the weddings that I've been to, the ceremony itself is not that boisterous. Um, and yet it's the after activities in particular, dances and and bands and that sort of thing. And so there's an effort to keep that sound in
indoors so that that doesn't have the ability to carry and impact those. Um, in some of the residential areas that you that are roughly around a quarter mile away, you can see some some concentrations of residential. And then number four is a a condition that staff
recommended and then it was altered a little bit by the township at the request of the township to make that even more. So there's a recommendation there for a miles worth of chloride application done in in consult consultation with Wilmer Township. So just highlighting those two as as kind
of attempting really to especially address some of the concerns that were raised in discussion. So with those four conditions and the findings as you see in the draft minutes, staff recommends approval. >> All right. You've heard the recommendation of staff. Uh is there a
motion? >> U Mr. Chair, I would like to make a motion to uh uh adopt this uh permit with the conditions and findings as >> can. Uh uh we're going to we're going to uh do a
motion first. I want to say something first. >> 45th Street Northwest. >> Uh, no. Uh, hang on just a minute here. We're dealing with a motion and a second and we don't and and the time the time
for the time for public input was at the planning commission meeting. >> How come I never got got told about it? >> I sir, I don't know. >> I don't know. >> Somebody is not doing their job. >> Well, it
I live right on 45th Street. >> Let's Let's We're going to We're going to We're going to take a recess. It's here. Are you ready? >> The Kandai County Board of Commissioners is back from recess. Uh, Mr. Mr. Van
Dyken. Um, you have uh made a recommendation. We were at uh Did we have a motion and a second on this already? >> Y >> and did we have a second? >> I'll second it. I don't think we did. >> Okay. So, we have a motion and a second
on the uh planning commission recommendation to uh approve the conditional use permit with the uh uh findings and conditions. Is there any discussion? Commissioner MDK. >> Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um
the uh gentleman in the audience uh is concerned that he did not receive proper notification. Did does he fall within the range of where notification would have taken place? >> I apologize, Commissioner Deck. I I'm not sure I'm familiar with the
gentleman's name and so I I I couldn't say that for sure. Um so our notification radius is um a quarter mile or the 10 nearest whichever is greater. In this case it would have been quite a ways over 10. Um I have a pretty
significant print out here. I'm just not familiar with the the gentleman's name and certainly I'd be glad to meet with him and and work through that. Well, I'm a little concerned that if it was an oversight that that needs to be
rectified that we if we go ahead and pass this today, um it might come back to bite us later if if in fact it was an oversight that was missed. So, um >> I don't I don't believe so. I have a pretty standardized >> I think we should table this action
until and keep the program moving or let them figure that out and then we'll come back and uh finish it before the day is out. that we can at least keep going with our rest of our agenda. So, I'd move to table this uh till later in the meeting so they can confer and and
clarify that. >> There's a motion to table. Is there a second? Mr. Chair, can I just have a question about that? Is that something that >> You can ask a question. Sure. >> Yeah. um that uh
can can we have more discussion and table later or is that too much of a question because there's other aspects of this whole thing that you might want to present now. I don't know. Uh well, so so the recommendation which has been
uh moved and seconded uh is to accept the uh uh commission's findings. So uh then the uh subsidiary motion was to uh table and in the absence of a second which I have yet to note um if it does
not receive a second then that motion will >> well I'll make a I'll second that motion for discussion because that's what we're doing discussing the motion >> and we're also uh trying to have a discussion about the uh main motion as well but let's we'll take we'll take
care of this one So, >> Mr. Chair, >> what are we what are we going to uh accomplish by this? Because uh from from what I think I'm hearing,
notice was mailed out to or uh uh to uh everybody within that required area. Yes. to the best of my knowledge, what what I what I certainly can do um per commissioner index um concern there is
if you did pass a motion to um to table I understand that's tableabling within the meeting or postponed within this meeting. I'd be glad to meet with the applicant to understand where he lives and then I could I could factually answer that conclusively one way or the other. I just don't I just don't have
the information to answer that. Second. >> All right. All right. Then >> Mr. Chair, I I did have Commissioner. >> Yeah. So, the distinction between tableabling and postponing is postponing would be to another meeting. Tableabling
is simply laying on the table till we can get some information. we can proceed with the rest of the agenda and we'll take it back off the table before we adjourn today. >> That's a clarification that uh that I think I can live with. So, and thank you
for that. Uh is a seconder fine with? >> Yes. Okay. Uh then uh there motion to uh table uh till the end of the meeting uh action on this item has been made and
seconded. Any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor of the motion to table say I. I. >> I. All opposed. Motion passes. We'll then move on to the uh director update. Uh and my understanding is that
uh uh director Khan is not able to be here uh today attending to a family matter. So uh we'll administrator Baker. >> Good morning. Kelsey Baker, Kandandy County Administrator. Um, like as the
board chair said, um, can't see here, Caroline is unable to be here today and so she asked me to step in. I'm also going to be asking, um, our one of our financial supervisors, Dana Wenish, to come up and talk more of the technical side, but we wanted to provide
an update um to the board of commissioners regarding some of the federal shutdown and the SNAP meip. Um DCYF uh the department of children, youth and families on within DHS, Department of Human Services has directed all counties to dis discontinue
SNAP and MIT benefits approvals for November. This includes both food and cash benefits other programs um um housing housing support, refugee cash, wick, um all of those other programs
will still continue as normal. Um, so we were first notified on October 14th, right before noon, from the DCYF commissioner of the potential impacts to SNAP and MIT benefits doing um due to
the ongoing federal shutdown. Uh, so I'm just going to give kind of an overview of the timeline. So Wednesday, October 15th, pending SNAP applications processed on or after this date cannot be approved. And then Tuesday at today, October 21st, DCYF will issue statewide
notice to SNAP and MIT recipients that November benefits will not be issued. Wednesday, October 29th, act active, reinstated or pending MIT cases processed on or after this date cannot be approved. And then Saturday, November
1st, active or reinstated SNAP cases processed on or after this date cannot be approved. And but saying all of these things, even if the government were to do um reinstate November one, these benefits will not be available come
November because of the delayed action from the federal government. So what happened on Tuesday, last Tuesday, October 14th, um the director and all of the leadership and myself attended a meeting to talk about um operational and
communi community impacts. We communicated the pending impacts to the county board and administration and we notified all health and human services staff. This triage some internal work and pending cases that were reassigned with internal workloads to accelerate
approvals and that was about approximately 45 applications that our staff were able to identify that we could get those moving prior to some of these deadlines. Um, I want to say our staff did a phenomenal job with communicating with
these recipients, with our community partners. Um, and I I think the main point that we want to make clear today is we want our constituents, our recipients, and the the county board to be informed of what is going on and that we are doing something. Um, we're not
just reaching out to community partners. We are specifically reaching out to philanthropy because we will need help where they will be able to step in and um our food access points. And so we are also thinking of ways of what our county
staff and what our county um residents can do for these individuals that would be just out of their their own heart on what we could do a canned food drive, things like that. um because this does affect and will impact people and their
lives. Um and so like I said, we began preparing support resources including staff communication guide with key talking points. I think this is a big kudos to our director um and in all reality other counties took exactly what we did and issu just changed the county
from their name to from our name to their name. Um I think one thing like I said Caroline sent out staff communication. So when we have individuals call in they have a guide and that is a consistent message that Candy County is sending to our recipients and I think that was the key
point that we wanted that consistent messaging and we needed it to start with us. Um so like I said then last Wednesday we distributed staff communication and resource materials. um the first day of the shutdown where impact um shutdown impacts were publicly reported in state
news. Um we received clarification though however from DCYF that the previous communication had an error um regarding applications and that they would take applications through the end of October 15th. Um side note on this,
many counties actually uh mandated staff to stay that Tuesday evening for over in overtime to process payment or process applications. So that was a little bit of a hiccup from DCYF, but we are we did not do that. Um so we were fortunate
there. Um and then I think we just are working to provide updated information to our community partners to to support food service ampl amplification during this time. Um, and we're working on developing coordinated internal agency response. And so I'm going to ask Dana
to come up and talk a little bit more about the technical side of things. Um, how many individuals this is impacting. Um, she'll maybe go into a little bit more of a timeline and we don't want to be doom and gloom, right? Um, so Dana will also keep it short and high level
and if you have any further questions, um, yeah, I'll the board chair can direct that. So, hello. Um, I'm Dana Wenish, financial assistant supervisor. Um, I oversee the SNAP and MIP programs and then income
maintenance. So, I just want to start with, um, stating our timeline very lightly. Um, as Miss Baker had said, Tuesday, October 14th, 11:26 a.m., we first started getting communication that we'd no
longer be able to approve SNAP benefits after 1000 p.m. on that same day. Um, as of October 15th, any cases pending for SNAP would no longer be able to be approved. My staff is very um they're very
communicative with me and they all communicated to me that they thought they could get through every pending case that would be eligible to get approvals done that day. So there was a lot of contacting of clients to see if we could get last minute verifications in and again um about 45 of those pending applications were able to be
processed so that those people would at least get the October benefits. At this time, October benefits have been paid um in full through today with any eligible applications. So, October benefits are covered. At this time, November benefits
will not be going out to enrolles. Um we have not had any further communications or heard of any um upcoming changes to that. There questions on the SNAP piece of that part. >> Commissioner, >> thank you. Um thanks, Miss Wes. Is it
Miss Wish? Is it um all applications that are going to get cut off including those that were eligible say in September and and are being renewed or is just the new application? >> No. All enrolles and applicants will not be able to be eligible for November benefits until they have released those
funds. >> Okay. And then um I'm I'm looking at ACMC AMC's uh website and it says um workers should continue to accept applications and may enter them into maxis. So that means that if the
shutdown would end then they would be ready and able to resume funding uh and and receiving of the funds. >> Correct. And um part of our timeline that comes a little bit further on
October 16th, we got um direction from DCYF that we should be entering all new applications and renewals updating cases and we can approve, but there's a five sentence um comment that we need to add to those approval memos just stating
that at this time you will not get November benefits, but this is what you're approved for. So, >> Commissioner B, just to recap all this. So, November 1st, uh, people on SNAP won't be getting any any benefits, but
we're trying to get that if it if and when things get straightened out, then we can be going forward with that. So meantime, we're if I understand administrator Baker too, you're saying we're trying to work with other resources in the community to try to fill some of those gaps. But at this
point then we're not using any county dollars. But you have not heard that the states not stepping up then at all and saying, "Hey counties, we're going to give you so many dollars to help make uh the food shelves or whatever more effective."
>> Correct. We we have not. And I think that was a really good question that Commissioner MD brought up because it doesn't mean that our staff are now just going to sit and twiddle their thumbs. They will still process applications and be ready for when that though they release their funds that will happen.
But anybody that is enrolled, anybody that is enrolled, I think that is probably the point we have to drive home. Anybody that's enrolled will not receive their November benefits. So, as to Commissioner Berg's point, that is where we're really um I think where Caroline has really stepped up and is
emailing our community partners. She emailed our department head groups like, "Hey, these are all our neighbors. How can we help chip in?" Um but to your point, as the state step has the state stepped up and said, "Hey, we can offer this." No, they have not. I don't foresee them doing that. And so that's
where when we all say counties are resilient, that's what we are because that's what we're going to we're going to do. We're going to look at our resources that we have available and see what we can come up with. >> So chair, >> yes. May I just follow up on that too?
And this is not impacting wick program, >> correct? >> Right. This is just a SNAP program, but it will impact MIP clients, >> correct? >> It's a broad a lot of Yeah. What what number of people are we talking about again? >> She'll get there. >> So, do you want me to run that now or
should you should we keep going? >> Oh, you got >> I have a bunch of statistics that have jumping ahead on people. >> I just wasn't sure if you want me bouncing back and forth. >> Where's your presentation? Yes, please. >> Um, so then October 16th, um, they had then
decided that there will not be a blocker put on for approvals. And so we're supposed to continue as we were talking about to approve these so that when the um benefits come through allegedly there is going to be a process for them to just release these funds. They have not given us any more
information than that just that they have an idea in mind. Um let's see here on October 17th that verbiage those five sentence I was talking about. I'm trying to lay out the timeline here. So, we're just kind of um doing the best we can
with um the 14th, 15th, and 16th approvals. Then, we needed to go back and add all of that verbiage to everybody's approval letters or send out memos. Does anyone have questions on the SNAP part? Because I'm just going to kind of dive into MIP real quick. All right. Um
October benefits uh have been paid. So, that includes the cash and the SNAP portions of the MIB grants. So because MIP can't be separated, they will not at this time they will not be paying the cash portion or the food portion of the
MIB grants. So as of November 1st, um clients will not be receiving their benefits for, you know, things like their rent and their housing grants, their food. I'm just going to lay out a timeline on the MIP piece as well because it did come a little differently. Um the 14th
and 15th the same communication came out but then on the 15th at 107 two hours after we got some communication from them. Um we got a mixed message about MIP applications can continue to be processed business as usual. But if the
federal shutdown goes through 1028 there's not a decision yet on whether or not they are actually going to pay benefits. So right now we have a no. Could it be a yes? Maybe. Um, we just don't have enough clarification from them to be
able to move forward with that part. >> Some of Oh, go ahead. >> Go ahead. >> I was just going to go into numbers. >> I'm jumping. Yeah. Go ahead. >> Well, you mentioned it. May I? >> Yes. >> Okay. You mentioned MIP then won't be eligible for stop SNAP, but they won't
be getting any benefits. No, >> I did not know that. >> Right. So they won't be able to pay rent and they have children and babies and >> correct. >> So some of those statistics um the SNAP
local impact um this is this includes the food portion of the MIT grant just so that you guys have know there is a separation for us. Um of the children that won't be getting um SNAP grants so no food benefits going
out. It's 1,699 children in our county. Adults is 2,252 adults for a grand total of 3,951 of our residents not being able to use their SNAP benefits.
MIP local I'll wait. All good. Any questions on that one? >> Okay. MIP local impact. um the cash only portion of the grant. 313 children, 136 adults for a total of 449 people will not be receiving their cash portion
of the MIP grants. The average grants by case is $584. Rent will go unpaid. Um and we have a prioritization um that I've come up with. And what I
looked at was if the household had other income, if they pay any shelter costs and then how much their grants were. Um the amount of rent that will go unpaid in Candyo High County if the MIP cash grant doesn't go out in November 1st is $30,92.
So those landlords will not get that amount of money. Just kind of to recap, um what my department has done uh since this is we've created that response protocol to screen and approve any of those expedited SNAP cases. We've identified our high-risisk clients that have the
potential to have no food in November. Establishing an intake process from income maintenance to refer clients to the family first with social services if an urgent need is identified. We've identified high-risisk clients that may not be able to pay housing costs in November. We've assigned outreach staff
to contact those families that are identified as priority to provide referrals. We've created and communicated internal scripts for employees to use for reference. And then the um KCHHS website is now updated also with um current
information regarding the shutdown and the benefits that may or may not be available. The other change that's happening as of November 1st, I did want to bring this up just because it is an impact um again on our residents, is changes to SNAP benefits with utility deductions. SNAP
benefits that SNAP recipients that are not disabled or elderly and receive lie heap of $20 or more during a calendar year will no longer get a utility deduction of $667 to offset any income that that unit receives. This will
impact families the hardest. An example case is a single mother with three children aged 8 to 18. Her gross income from a job is $4,221. Her shelter costs are $1,315 and she has
to pay all utilities for that rental. She receives lie heap of $500 to last 12 months. By removing this utility deduction due to the new federal policy, this household will lose $99 a month of food benefits. Along with that new
policy, the $500 to help with those utilities will now be counted as income against the household's benefits. So potentially over the whole year, $1,200 plus you're counting the income against them that they will not have access for that.
Does anyone have questions on my statistics? >> Commissioner Rimd. um not so much on the statistics although um I would be interested to know if you've added up all of the dollars impacted here for say the month of November or even on a daily
basis uh depending upon how long the shutdown takes place but um the uh if the shutdown ended say mid midway through November >> um would they backfill those payments to
the 1 of November. Do we know that or have they indicated that? >> Give an answer on that at this time. >> Because the reason I asked that question is because if we knew that they would backfill um you know, we could make some uh
suggestions, decisions on whether or not we could loan the money to the programs until until we get back filled. >> Yep. I don't know if Kelsey has anything on that, but >> and those are all conversations we are having. Um, but we're in this unique
spot that we we're trying to get that clarification and then how we communicate that to the board with that risk. Um, and so I think our first step was this today here, seeing if we can continue to get that clarification
because if this does go into November, it that just still trickles into December based off these timelines, based off when applications are due. Um, and so like I said, it's we're we're looking into that question. That is a question we're having. Um, we're talking
to our community partners, our faith-based partners, our food access points, the link in New London, uh, the food shelf here in Wilmer, our department heads, our county staff, our neighbors. How can we help assist these families in this time? Um, and so any
option is a good option. I I think we'll be doing something countywide internally um that we can help out here that will roll out probably later this week or next week. Um, and so I know Dana's working with her staff immensely. It's um but go ahead and answer that question
if you have if I didn't. No, we they have not communicated to us. Um I have >> Who is they? Is it the federal DHS or the state D? Who's who's going to make that clarification if and when they do? >> Well, hopefully both. Um when I did ask
DCYF, they had said they had not gotten any direction from the USDA. So, they're waiting for their answers to give us answers. And you know, I'm hope um to your point, Commissioner, you know, I'm hoping AMC will help provide some guidance on that because we take that
guidance from DCYF. So when I say they, it's a mixture of the state and federal government because right, who is going to make that decision and then who's going to direct the counties on what to do? And I think that's where some of that clarification needs to happen from DCYF.
Um, and so I I do wholeheartedly believe AMC is probably helping, you know, going to provide some guidance. If those reimbursements will happen, can the counties foot those bills and be reimbursed later on? Um, so all of those answers we're looking for as well. And
um, like I said at the beginning, we we are doing something. We are we are working on this. Um, but also on that flip side, it's we we want to keep staff reassured and not create chaos. And this is chaos. This is going to disrupt famil
family's lives. And so, how do we keep that constant uh communication that this we are doing something, the board is taking action, the county is taking action, and community partners are stepping up to take action as well. And and I did have that question about
whether or not you have the dollar amount on a daily basis that is not coming in >> and we wrote that down and yes we we are able to get that. Dana said she's able to get that information because we don't do you have that available today. Is it like the total benefits for cash or food
not paid that I might be able to >> Everything's been cut off right now. The MB and the and the SNAP >> the SNAP part I would have to get Can I use this really? Um it's a calculator. Oh yeah. I just I can't I can't math that far fast.
>> I know. I didn't have mine neither. So, what do we have? 150. Um 87,750 in cash >> for the month >> for the month of November. And that's using our current statistics. So I can't
anticipate. >> How much was that? I missed that. >> 87,750. >> That's a day or is that >> That's for the the month >> for the month of November. And that is all benefits that are being cut. SNAP. >> That's just cash >> currently. Um I I would need to find the
SNAP piece. >> That's just the unfit cash. >> The cash. >> Yep. And we'll be we'll um you can maybe work on that. We'll get that emailed out to the board this afternoon on the snap. Yeah. >> Okay. Thank you. >> So, to wrap this up, oh,
>> Commissioner B. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Uh, thank you for the excellent update and thank you for you and all the staff. You've been working behind the scenes on this and we figured you were and we appreciate being brought up to speed and not a lot more clarification going on. I
I am real concerned, you know, that there's a lot of public out there thinking, well, it's not really impacting us and it can impact us and it's getting and it is starting and the time frame is very narrow before it hits us and I, you know, trying to be as
proactive as possible and as a board we of course want to support that and be as proactive and going forward. But one of the things we're doing and what you're doing now is with the media as well. you know that we have to get the message out that this is a big deal. This is not
something that's they're in Washington DC having an argument or something or disagreement. It's what's that they got to make some decisions that work for us here as well. But going forward then I I see that you know what you're doing and
two weeks we're gonna have another meeting and I'm assuming that I would you know be really open to if we it'll be on the agenda again and hopefully be hearing from you and you're going to have more information, some more options, some more plans for us that we
could be uh uh having to deal with this locally to help uh make this work for people and that we don't have people out in the streets without food or or housing or whatever and and people aren't going to be evicted immediately with the landlords and that impacts a
impacts that I mean it impacts our economy here in Candyoy County big and so if we needed a special session after the regular session next meeting I I certainly would be open to that that we have to uh approve some decisions that you can bring forward to us how we can
help out individuals uh that are in need within reason, you know, I'm not saying we take our cash reserves and go do this, but where can we target if we need to and I don't and it's a since it's a big possibility, we got to be looking
this way, but hopefully between now and then something will come up. >> Thank you. We appreciate that. >> Anyone else? >> Yeah, commissioner, I'm done. >> Um, yeah, and I I think we're going to be here yet for another four or five
minutes. the way the agenda looks and I think due to the urgency and what Commissioner Berg just talked about if you could get those that SNAP month number back to us before we adjourn that would be great. >> Yep. Not a problem. >> Thank you. >> All right.
That uh chaps my hide a little bit. All right. Uh at this time we'll have uh uh Corey Smith. uh Green Lake sanitary sewer and water district director uh has
a resolution uh regarding uh rates. >> All right. Good morning. >> Good morning, Mr. Chair, members of the board. My name is Corey Smith. I'm the director out at Glacial Lakes Sanitary Sewer and Water District. I'm here before you today for resolution 2025-36,
which is for adopting the 2026 water and sewer utility rates, meter charges, usage fees, and annual operating assessments. In 2024, prior to the start of our construction to our phase 2 uh wastewater project, Iser has conducted a
rate study to ensure long-term fiscal health of our utility funds. in that for 2026 eer's recommended increase in our capital fund which is fund 29 by 4% this is for our debt services and our operating fund which is
fund 28 by 6 and a4% this is for our day-to-day operations of the water and wastewater plant and its infrastructure discussions were held with the glacial lakes budget committee and the glacial lakes commission uh following these
discussions it was agreed upon to adopt a rate increase that was proposed by ers. Uh the rates are attached in your packet and shown as exhibit A. In your packet, I have included the 2026 budget summary. It's the one with the blue header on it.
On the top left side under meter, usage and special assessment. The first line is SAC and special assessments, which um that dollar amount goes for our debt services. That total dollar amount is $732,780. The next line on there's the fixed me
meter fees which again goes to our debt service um fund 29. The dollar amount is1 million745,734.92. Uh this dollar amount is generated from the meter base fees. The next two lines on there that they go
to our day-to-day operation fund which is our fund 28. The first one is O andM usage fees on our wastewater side and that is1,598,600 and the next one is the on andm usage fee for the water side for $561,000.
Both dollar amounts are based off of usage. To arrive at this number, we look at trending over the last few years uh to estimate next year's usage. If we add all those numbers up, our 2026 projected budget is $4,638,114.92.
Under that I have the 2026 projects u which include completing phase 2 and reapplying for the CDS grants for our two remaining water towers for rehabilitation which there is a typo it would be the um Spicer and Green Lake Towers as the New
London tower was recently rehabbed a couple years ago. Um also we will be completing after um we get the final dollar amount for the phase two project we'll be completing or updating our rate study and also incorporating and completing an asset management and water
sewer model. Um below that are just some quick facts of our system that I always have on here. The next page in your packet is the exhibit A. Uh this lays out all the sewer and water charges for 2026. As you
can see, the larger the meter you have, the higher your monthly uh base fee will be. Um, a vast majority of our customers all have 3/4 or 5/8 inch meters, and the largest meter in our whole system is a 4-in meter.
On September 22nd, the Glacial Lakes Commission recommended forwarding resolution 2025-36 to the county board for approval. With that, it is staffs and commission's recommendation to approve and adopt resolution 2025-36
along with the rate schedule as shown in exhibit A. >> Mr. Chair, I'll move on resolution uh 2025-36. >> Thank you. Is there a second? >> I'll second that, Mr. Chair. >> Any discussion? I just I just want to say that, you
know, there's a a very dedicated uh commission board out there and a subcommittee that worked really hard on this budget and they don't take it lightly and and uh Corey and all Left and Mel, they do a great job of supporting the work that they do out
there. Thank you. Anyone else? Hearing none. All in favor of uh moving on resolution 2025-36 say I. >> I. >> All opposed. Motion passes. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> Can I get a motion to uh remove from the
table the uh previous matter for the planning commission? >> Also Thank you. Is there a second? >> I'll second that. >> Thank you. Uh any >> discussion? All in favor say I. >> Opposed? Motion passes. We'll have Mr.
Vend can come back to the U. Uh and we have I believe already a motion and a second to approve the recommendations of the planning commission. Yes. >> Yep. >> Yes. Um All right, then. Uh uh discussion. I
had one brief question. I'm going to get mine in first. Dwayne, uh, I couldn't tell, but it looks like, uh, there's a the sheriff drive must be on the west uh border that runs north south uh on that
uh between that property and the uh uh uh neighbor to the west. >> Um, so are you talking about the um testimony in the in the minutes where a gentleman talked about an a shared access? Yeah. How how are they accessing
this property? >> Yeah. So, that is on the west side there. There's a there's a pretty significant wetland that comes through this property, right? >> They will be accessing on the far west edge there along um along the wetland. And so, it was that access there that they that the gentleman was referring
to. >> I was just looking for that clarification. So, thank you, Commissioner Dwayne Anderson. >> Yeah. So, I have a couple questions or I I guess so the the road that the chloride is going to be applied to is 15th Avenue uh Northwest. Am I correct
on that? Correct. Okay. And then uh that's a township road. >> That's correct. >> Okay. And then uh it looks like under one of the conditions, condition number four, it says that the applicant or operator shall provide for annual application of chloride from dust
control from Crowning Road 5 to 45th Street at a rate of 38%. My question is what what do you mean by 38%? Can you >> that's a me on that? >> That's a um concentration. Um that's the township's preferred concentration. Um
there are lower levels that can be applied and higher levels. I think that's a bit of a midpoint. Um and that was uh a township request. So we did include that. >> I see. Okay. So basically any kind of road issues people would have they it's
a township issue then at that point, right? I mean if if it's not getting bladed often enough or whatever, they should be bringing their concerns to the township board because it's the township road would be my guess. Yes, I certainly they are the road
authority there. It sounds like they are aware of and were are working through some of those issues. Some of them that have been brought on um in more recent history that have been a struggle for them. That was some of the township's testimony. We had two township officials there. One of them
testified and um noted some of those areas of concern. >> Yeah. And so the township is aware of all this and they've been giving their input. So, okay. So, that that's all my concerns are answered. So, thank you. >> Anyone else?
>> Commissioner. >> Uh, thank you, Mr. Chair. There's a couple of questions. Um, with the picture you have there, the development area, that's the not only the footprint of the building, but also where the parking is going to be or am I correct on that? >> That's correct. That's correct.
>> That's okay. So, that's and there'll be ample parking. My other question too going back to the roadway going in there and is that uh is that even something that we need we would be involved in a decision you know for the approval of
this or not you know access there for emergency vehicles or what kind of roads going in there that since there's going to be possibly you know many many cars parked there uh there's actual access to get in and out. Is that something that
we would be concerned about at all or is that something you know when down the road for the building permits and all that it's addressed with? So to clarify our doing the uh our vote is that we're looking at is it appropriate for the
area? >> Is that limited to that then? Well, I mean it's a some of the condition or excuse me, some of the findings are relatively um broad. Generally, the the infrastructure that the the um
the findings are getting at are the surrounding infrastructure. So, can it be served by the road and the power and stuff and and those types of infrastructure? the building official will certainly be looking at this structure for classification and um how
many people can be there and that will that will impact things like fire safety um etc. So um I don't know if that fully gets at what you're asking but uh we generally don't um we generally don't dictate things on on private drives as
far as like maximum width or something. generally something that people could access in and out of would be would be something that an emergency vehicle could enter in on >> and that would be addressed under finding number three uh primarily which
uh uh the commission finds that adequate utilities, access roads, off- streetet parking, other necessary facilities have been or will be provided. Right. >> Yes. Okay. >> Anyone else? Mr. Chair, if I may quickly, I I would
just want to explicitly address the the reason for the the slight delay there. I was able to confirm with the landowner that he's about twice the distance of the mandatory uh notification. So, he was a ways outside of that notification radius.
>> So, there's no concern from that standpoint of moving on with a decision on this cup. Yeah, >> commissioner and that I have another follow-up question. There are some concerns about neighbors uh near there
and uh expressing some concerns according to your minutes of of the the road of course and and noises and things like that or people being so close. How close are they? I I I've looked at the g uh the map and stuff. It's kind of hard
for me to tell. >> Yeah. So most of the there's one neighbor to the northwest on the south side of the road that would be somewhere in the in the range of an eighth of a mile a little more. Most of the residential um clusters. So if you go
north of 15th there's a I don't remember what that platted area is called. I'm you'll forgive me. Um there's a little residential development there. If you go to the northwest a little bit there's a there's a little stub road with a little residential development. And if you go south, you'll enter the city of Wilmer
at some point there. Um, most of those are about a quarter mile or a quarter to a half a mile away. Just give you a little bit of a context. They're kind of located right in the middle of that that property. So, if you can relate that to another other types of separations that
we have, our standard feed lot setback for a feed lot of any size is is a quarter mile as well. So, it just gives you a little bit of idea of how we set things apart and how this is set apart from some things. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Anyone else?
All right, we have a motion and a second to u uh uh uh in regard to the u uh conditional use uh permit request. And uh
the motion and second is to uh uh concur with the uh uh uh cup request with the uh applicable uh conditions and findings. Any further discussion hearing? None. All in favor say I.
>> I. >> All opposed. Motion passes. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you very much. Uh and then we will take a fiveinut recess upon request. Just a moment Hey, are you ready?
>> Okay. >> Kind of surprising. >> Reconvening the Candy County Board of Commissioners. Uh at this time uh we'll have a presentation from uh Megan Shepard from Mandot uh regarding the
District 8 10ear capital highway plan. >> Megan, good morning. Good to see you again. >> Good morning, Mr. Chair, members of the board. I don't believe you have copies of the map in your packet. Is that correct? Okay. So, um Tony F is our our program coordinator here. He'll hand out
copies. Wait, there's more. >> We got big ones like Mel does there. overhead. >> So, there's two different things that he's handing out. One is a trifold like 11 by 17. That's our whole map. >> Yep.
>> Oh, okay. >> And then there's also a single sheet that's just a zoom in of the county. Do you have a copy of each? >> There's going to be a request to have these uh maps up on the uh overhead if at all possible.
>> Okay. for so folks in here and and the public got a camera >> straight above. >> So about Yeah. about where you have everything right now. >> If you kind of center that on the flat spot there. >> I have no idea.
>> Hang on. >> I don't know. Would this be easy? Would the zoom in on the county specifically be easier? >> Yeah, let's do that. That' be a good idea. >> Sorry. There you go. >> Right there. Down a little bit. Now I'm seeing it. Pull it. Yeah. Pull it down. >> Sorry. I didn't know where I was looking.
>> You're good. >> You guys have high tech here. Okay. Sorry about that. Okay. >> All righty. Go ahead. >> And my apologies for not having that in your packet. We had sent them, but evidently missed the cut off for your
for your um board's packet. So, my apologies on that. Um, so to introduce myself, I'm Megan D. Sheper. I'm the District 8 planning director and we handle the 12count southwest portion of Minnesota for MDOT. Um, and with me I have Tony FA who is our program
coordinator at the district. And I also brought our new uh corridor planner, Mallerie Jarvey Schaefer, who has just started with us in August. Um so before you uh the 11 by17 is the full uh district map for our 10-year
chip and then I also got which is up on the screen here the zoom in of just Candy Ohio County for our projects just for ease. Um and so thank you for having us again as as you do every year. We do appreciate that to share um our area transportation
improvement program. So the ATIP uh those are the first four years of of the draft plan here um that our ATP which Mel and and others participate in as our area transportation partnership. And so those first four years go into the STIP
with the other districts of the state and that basically formulates our whole statewide uh capital highway improvement program. So 2026 through 2029 those projects are committed projects. So they've been fully scoped. We know how
we're going to fund them and they're not as likely to change. Whereas the outer years of the capital highway improvement investment plan, so 2030 through 2035, those years are much more fluid. We don't have the legislative money um set
for those. The payment fixes could change. They aren't fully scoped. Sometimes they the start or stop point of the project might change. So those are much more fluid. Some things that you maybe saw last year, they aren't the same this year and they'll change again next year based off of our funding
allocations. So, I'll go through projects in your county and feel free to stop me or ask questions along the way. Uh the first project is in fiscal year 2026 and that is red on the map uh right here. So, that's a a TED
project in Wilmer on Highway 40 constructing right and left turn lanes into the industrial park. Next on your map is fiscal year 2027 which is orange colored and this is one you're all familiar with on Highway 23
and Highway 9 and interchange in New London there and that includes a realignment of Highway 40. Next on your map is fiscal year 2031 which is purple on on the map and we have two projects. They're hard to
differentiate here on on the map in Wilmer on Highway 12. Um, one being from 6th Street Southeast to 23rd Street Southeast. And that's a medium mill and overlay. And the second project also on Highway
12 is from 7th Street Southwest to Doulson Street Southwest. So, kind of through downtown there. That's a medium mill overlay. Uh, we'll also be replacing some signals at Second and Seventh. I'll be removing a signal at third and also repairing that retaining
wall that's on kind of the southeast side of that project. And lastly, also on Highway 12 over towards Atwater, just two miles west of Atwater. Uh there's a bridge that goes over the BNSF line. Um they're going to
scarify and overlay that bridge. Next on your map is fiscal year 2032, which is the brown color. We've got a project out on Highway 40. Uh this is west of Wilmer from County Road 4. So that's old Highway 277
all the way to Wilmer. And that's a medium mill and overlay. And another project we have is on South Highway 71. Um that's from Minnesota 7 up to Wilmer and that's a mill and overlay project.
And our last project is in fiscal year 2033. It's a Oh, that's the one that's almost off the page here on the light uh pink or salmon color on Highway 7. And so that's from the roundabout at 71 there over to
Highway 4. And that's a medium mill and overlay. And those are the projects we have on our current chip for Cano High County. >> Uh I'm going to ask a question real quick on the u uh one uh in downtown. Uh
I remember there was an open house on that and uh so the that's that that's going to be uh quite a change. There's there's not going to be uh two lanes of traffic going in each direction through there
anymore and there's going to be some room for uh pedestrians and bicycles as I recall. Uh but there's also going to be at least one rail crossing. Uh that's uh do I remember that correctly is going to be eliminated
uh on the west side? >> I don't know that for sure, Steve. But >> I can verify. Okay. So, you're saying at Lake >> at 7th, I think seventh and or 10th >> and that was that was the proposal at that time and I think there was some
input given that uh that would not be uh a good thing for access to and from the north side. >> Sure. Yeah. I I will reach out to the PM. I don't know the detail of that and I can let Mel know um >> Sure. What was the outcome of that? I
have not heard that. >> No worries. Thank you. >> Anyone else with any questions? Der >> and maybe I've asked you the last time you were here about this, but if a road starts deteriorating faster, this is a
fluid map. I would guess it moves and can move and shake. So, let's just take Highway 40. That's out there quite a ways. So if that starts to to to fall apart, so where do you get the funding from quicker or can you just adjust and
take it away from another project and bring it to that or how I mean I know there's a big process to it but >> that's generally what we do is just swap our funding for >> I need you to speak in the mic. >> Yeah, that's generally what we try to do is um take from a different project and
>> put it >> go to that one. So, >> go ahead. >> Yeah, go ahead and continue. >> Okay. I I went over all the projects on on your um county list for the 10-year chip.
>> Okay. Are there any questions? >> Good update. When you're doing this work on 40, is that going to be widened out? Additional shoulders, anything like that, or >> No additional shoulders at this time. Um, we did do a shoulder widening study
several years ago, um, to try to get a a grasp on prioritizing because we do have several highways that have narrow or no shoulders um, that are are a safety concern for us. And so, we do have a priority list. Um, we have applied for
uh, special funding for our shoulder widening on Highway 40 specifically in the past through the freight highway improvement program. We were not successful. Um they had another solicitation this summer and we submitted yet again. Um so we don't know yet if we were success successful in
obtaining any funds for that. Um but we certainly uh don't have enough funding to do that at this time. Um expanding shoulders where they don't exist on a stretch like that is is quite costly >> and uh and so is the loss of life. But
>> correct. >> Yeah. >> Yep. Uh, I guess my opinion is that if any of the decision makers on something like that want to know if it's a worthy project or not, just drive it. >> Yeah. >> So, anyone else? Commissioner MD.
>> Thank you. Two questions on the 2027 project up at New London. Um, biding I assume will be fairly early in 2026 or do you know when >> I think it's a December letting for that project, but >> this year? Yeah. >> Uh,
yeah. 46. 26 >> in December of 26. Thank you. And I already forgot my other questions. I'll ask you offline. >> No problem. >> All right. Anyone else?
All right. Well, thank you for the update. Thank you for your patience. >> Thank you. >> Appreciate it. Thanks for having us and uh you I'm sure you have somewhere else to be. So, travels. >> Thank you. >> All right. At this time, uh, we'll have
Mel Odens, uh, has resolution 2025-37, uh, for us. Uh, Mel, good morning, >> Mr. Chair, members of the board. Um, what you have in front of you is a resolution for consideration that would authorize the state to um, finalize a
grant for it's an IIJ matching grant. You might recall that the state did matching grants. If you were able to get a federal grant, they would do a matching grant of 20% of your project on anything that's eligible. Uh we did apply and we were successful in getting
in May of this year, we got a 1.929 $825 matching grant. Um, and so it's my recommendation to to uh accept the grant and pass resolution 2025-37, which would authorize the administrator
and the chair to sign on behalf of the county. >> You've heard the recommendation of staff. Is there a motion? >> Yeah, Mr. Chair Dwayne Anderson. >> Mr. Chair, I make a motion to pass resolution 2025-37. >> I'll second that. >> Thank you. We have a motion and a
second. Discussion. So, you found more money for your bridge. >> Well, that's right. I I just had to I just had to toss that one in there. So, any any questions, discussion?
>> Uh, motion made and seconded to move on the resolution. All in favor say I. >> I. I. >> All opposed. Motion passes. >> Mr. Chair, I thought of my question and Mel might be able to answer it. Could I >> You You can ask it. So the uh the
project at New London to your knowledge are there any federal funds involved in that? >> No, it's quarters that should >> All right. Very good. Uh at this time uh we're going to uh uh recess the board of
commissioners and uh move directly into the uh drainage ditch authority meeting. So, we will uh recess the Candy County Board of Commissioners and convene the drainage ditch authority and Austin has
some good stuff for us here. >> Thank you, sir. >> Morning, Mr. Chair. Drain Austin Hill branch drains manager Kandar County. Um, what's that? >> Is it on? >> Yes, on this computer. First thing I'll have is the uh drainage authority
minutes from October 7th. Mr. Chair, I move to adopt the Jones Authority meeting minutes from October 7th of 2025. Thank you. Is there a second? >> I'll second it. >> Thank you. We have a motion and a second. Uh is there any discussion?
>> All right. Uh all in favor of approving the meeting minutes from October 7, uh say I. >> I. I. >> All opposed. Motion passes. Thank you. >> So the next thing I have for you, I
would like to initiate the redetermination of benefits for county district 27 and 29. So what I will do is I'll go through um the redetermination process, then we can dive into each system. Um then in your packet there is a a draft findings in order to initiate
both systems or each system individually I should say. So the kind of in the history of drainage law in Minnesota in the 1890s in the Red River Valley is where um they engineered, constructed and financed large scale drainage projects by
assessing lands benefited. This process became state law in the 1890s and is still kind of this what um drainage law today follows for for over 135 years. So redetermination of benefits as part of that process. So when the ditch system
was dug, you know, the benefit of land owners were generally the people touching the ditch system. A lot of our ditch systems had improvements in the 1970s,60s and 80s. Um where where that after that during that time they redetermined the ditch systems and
benefits were given to people a little bit further up on the side hills. And now today under Minnesota statute 351 or 103 351 um the whole wershed is included in any redetermination of benefits. So so what
is a drainage benefit? So this would be what the land would look like before the ditch system came through. Your A acres would be the low ground that would be standing water or cattails without a public drainage system. Your B acres will be along the fringe or low ground that may have been seasonally fluttered
or considered wet pasture. C acres are wetter for a longer time um but and would delay till tillage and crop planting while the rest of the field is ready. And then D is the top of the hills. Um they don't nec they don't specifically need artificial drainage but they do contribute surface waters to
the drainage system. So now the Dacres are are um included in any redetermination. So that redetermination of benefits process follows 10 Minnesota statute 10351. If the drainage authority determines the benefit or damages do not reflect um
reasonable present- day land values or the benefit of damages areas have changed, we can initiate this process. We appoint three disinterested viewers to view all the land within the wershed of the drainage system. We that we we actually appoint a team. There's three main and then um up to two alternates.
Um, all farmland is um assigned, all land is assigned a classification per acre. Farmland is the ABCD acres that we just went over. There's also classification for road, cities, houses, forest, wetlands, grasslands, and lake cabins. Um, proximity adjustments to how
close you are to the public system. And then it'll add anyone who drains into the system that is not currently paying benefits. So, what we get from that, we get the total benefit fits for the ditch system for each acre. Um so that that sets that total benefit we use to set um repair
and maintenance or improvements. They cannot exceed that total benefit. Um it equitably divides the cost of repair and maintenance on the ditch system based on everybody's parcel every every parcel's individual benefit and it sets the limit allowed for special assessments of totals in the repair fund for each
system. The individual benefit land owners will want to look at that. You can divide your individual benefit by the total benefit to get the percentage that we um that they would pay for any repair and maintenance based off um a special assessment we set for the ditch system. After the mid1 1980s, any re
anytime we do a redetermination of benefits, if the buffer buffer damages haven't been purchased, we have to purchase purchase those as part of this. Um what that's an easement for the system or easement for the drainage authority to do repair and maintenance on the system. So that's one rod, 16 and
a half feet. So we'll jump into county dis 27 here. So county dis 27 outlets in the southwest uh corner of West Norway Lake. It's all in Arcter Township. There will be a most likely be a portion that is actually draining from Swift County.
So we will address that if the viewers determine that there is water coming from Swift County. This this system may end up becoming a joint county system. There is a court-ordered uh culvert. Um yeah, so that that was mapped. So county 27
was established in 1907. They were last redetermined in 1979. This was the last improvement. That's 46 years old. The current benefits is 600,000 9 or 600,9 just just under 700,000. >> There we go.
>> 21.45 four or five miles open ditch, 457 miles of town, >> and then buffer damages have not been purchased on this system. So, >> so what what what we have in uh listed in your draft findings in order there, the current current benefits roles um
reflect view determinations made at the time based on land use and property valuations that existed were anticipated in 1979. Since 1979, land use patterns, agriculture practices, and drainage demands within the wershed of countish 27 have continued to evolve in,
including the increased intensity of crop cropping systems, installation of private drainage infrastructure, and shifts in property development and valuation. The benefit areas and values currently on the record no longer reflect the properties that use and derive this benefit from county district 27. The nature and extent and value
value of benefits occurring to lands from county district 7 have changed due to accelerated water flow altered hydra altered hydraology and increased reliance on the public drainage system. These changes warrant a reassessment to ensure equitable allocation of benefits and compliance with statutory
requirements. So I have a list of recommended viewers. Um the lead viewer would be Ron Rinquist, Dave Schmidt, Jeff Johnson, Bradwick, and Darren Post. So I would look for a motion to initiate
the uh to initiate >> the redetermination benefits and damages appointing viewers for carnage 27 as shown in your draft findings. >> Commissioner who wants
>> Mr. Chair, I move to adopt the findings in order initiate initiating redetermination of benefits and damages and appointing viewers for county ditch 27. >> Thank you. Is there a second? >> I'll second that, Mr. Chair.
>> Thank you. Uh we have a motion made and seconded. Is there discussion? >> Just one thing. I know that there was in our ditch conversation about Lorway Lake, there was some areas that were not actually like owned by anybody. Does
this address that issue? >> Correct. There is a the uh one of our departments has those those parcels identified who pays taxes on those and the viewers would use that same information. >> Okay. Yep.
>> The assessor's office, I believe. Sure. >> Thank you. Any other discussion? All right, hearing none. Uh, all in favor of the, uh, CD27 redetermination process, say I. I.
>> All opposed. Motion passes. Austin, go ahead. >> So, county district 29 is the next one. This drains into the northwest side of West Norway Lake. Um, it's majority of it is going to be in uh Norway Norway Lake Township and a little bit in our
tander there. So, County 29 was established in 1908. The benefits were last redetermined in 1978, so they're 47 years old. There's a little bit more than 150,000. Um, for the current benefits, this includes
about 7 7.2 miles of open ditch. Buffer damages have not been purchased on this system either. So this this will match the same as what we just discussed for county district 27 that the current benefit role reflects viewer uh determinations made back in
1978. >> Thank you. And uh is there a motion? >> Mr. Chair, I move to adopt the findings and order initiating the redetermination of benefits and damages and appointing the viewers to county ditch number 29.
>> I'll second that. >> Thank you. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? >> If if I may. >> Yes. >> So, the county ditch 29 viewers, we did have to remove um Jeff Johnson because he is he does own land on that system. So, he he cannot be a viewer on this
system. So, you only have four viewers on this one. >> So, and that matches what's in your draft findings in order. >> Thank you. Any other comments, discussion? >> Hearing none. All in favor of the motion signify by saying I. I I all opposed.
Motion passes. Austin, thank you so much. Thank you again for your patience. >> Thank you for your time. >> We did, >> Mr. Chair. I move to close the drainage authority. >> Thank you. As >> I'll second that. >> Thank you. We have a motion and second
to close the drainage authority meeting. All in favor say I. >> I. All opposed? Motion passes. The drainage uh authority meeting is closed and we will reconvene the Candy County Board of Commissioners. At this point in
time, um I'm going to ask uh Administrator Baker to uh uh circle back on the Candy County Park West uh update. Mr. Chair, members of the board, Kelsey Baker, and I can finally say good
afternoon. Uh, Kelsey Baker, County Administrator. Um, let me just get set up here. I apologize for having a little laughing moment there. I, um, prior to being in Kyway County, I was in Swift County and I live close to that area. I grew up
close to that area, I should say, and it was always kind of an ongoing thing that was discussed and Austin and I have talked about it. Arcter Township uh individuals have talked about it. So, um we're actually doing something about it now. So, it was um
Okay. So before you in your packets today, you have information rec regarding somewhat of a general county park update, but more so related to Big Candy West and somewhat of a Big Candy East. Um I would like to provide like I said the update
regarding a proposed transition in park manage park management for Big Candy East and Big Candy West. Um, currently our Big Candy West managers um are retiring and ending their uh seasons as camp
managers or park managers. And so with that, this has been their last summer. They had a farewell um party out there earlier um in August uh that some of you and myself attended. was very well
attended with um campers and individuals and community members from the area. And I just want to we're going to have a park managers meeting this Friday. Um, but I think Candy County has had a phenomenal relationship with the managers, Bud and Joan, there for many
years and many individuals uh, campers have met Bud and Joan throughout the years and I just want to wish them uh, the best in their future endeavors and that we've had I had a great working relationship with them. They did many great things for the park and so we wish
them the best. Um, but because of their transition, it's causing this transition now. So, here we are. Um, and so we have park managers currently assigned to Big Candy East. Um, that I would propose that would assume responsibilities for overseeing both county parks. Um, this
would also ensure adequate on-site presence during the camping season. Um, a seasonal staff member would be hired at Big Candy West um to kind of manage the day-to-day when the managers can't be there. Um, this approach maintains
the on-site contact for campers while reducing operational costs associated um with some of the overhead costs. This isn't um a huge cost savings as of right now. Some of the ancillary cost savings are where we wouldn't be training in new
park managers. They're not lo learning new systems and software. Um our staff aren't training in some of the new park managers on what needs to be done, how do you do it. um some of those things. And so we are we would be eliminating um
the managers living at this house full-time. The managers would live there throughout the camping season of 2026 for now because this is something new that we're trying. We want to keep it as consistent as possible. And so that is where the managers would be. They have
the opportunity to live in the residence that's on site on west for 2026. We'll fe um see how the camp host goes and then depending on the end of 26, then we'll re-evaluate and pivot and adjust if need to need be. Um consistent with
past practice, when a park manager vacancy does occur, current managers within our park management system are given the opportunity opportunity. Um, and so naturally I look to Big Candy East to see if they would have been interested and they have expressed interest. Um, I have a great working
relationship with Chad and Dana as well. They are go-getters. They're hard workers. They're not afraid to work. And so by trying this option, um, I do feel confident in this proposed transition. Um, I've had already conversations with our auditor, treasurer, staff, and my
and myself on financial considerations that will need to be evaluated. Uh, like I said, including adjustments to the existing house payments that we provide to the managers. Um, compensation structure, other possible alternatives.
Um, given the broad implications of county park management overall, it may be beneficial for the board to have a work session long term. Um, I will leave that up to the board. Um, but I think shortterm right now, I would propose that we we merge, not necessarily merge
these two parks, but merge the managers. Um, and as you can see, I I'm not going to go into detail on the park uh income statements for each of them. But as you can see, Park East is always slightly under for revenue, and that it has been
for many years. Um, and so you can see where West is slightly higher. So that's where I think this transition is a good option to at least try. Um overall our parks perform very strong financially year-to- date our op operations
um we do trend above budget. Um right and rightfully so that revenue is split us under 50% it goes to the county goes to the park managers that they then maintain our parks. Um the position for
the parks, this is a long-term reinvestment capital planning and operational restructuring. I think this is something that for me has been a huge uh side project in a sense that this is such a longstanding history of Candy
County that we have these parks and how do we sustain that? Um and how do we prioritize investment into aging infrastructure? Um, like I said, east and west, um, west creates more revenue.
East is always a little bit on the slider. You'll see for Green Lake, um, we were over on the capital improvements. Uh, that was because we did the patio. That wasn't necessarily budget. And for me, that was a big thing. Um, big, but also played into a
safety factor by adding that patio. um for the campers and the park managers at Green Lake. As you'll see in the report, Games Lake is tracking a little bit higher on um our net income and other targets. And I think some of this is
notable increase in maintenance activity that um our parks are aging and how do we actively reinvest in some of the the parks and so that we can continue this consistent system that we do have. um demands continue to be high when it
comes to maintenance projects within the parks. Um and that plays into cost discipline uh when our managers are given a budget and that is the money they have to work with. Um and so it's it's it's a lot of infrastructure and
emerging needs within the parks. Um overall though our park management system is functioning very well. Like I said, I would I'm proposing this park management trans transition between Big Candy East and West. Um to continue to
look at operational efficiency, staff, and flexibility um and to continue to look into the strategic investment and maintaining our our county parks within the county. >> Thank you. So, uh this is for
information only. is or are you looking for an action of some sort? >> Well, I'm looking for a consensus to continue moving forward with this transition. We do have our park managers meeting on Friday. Typically, the contracts between the county and the park managers, the county administrator
signs. >> Um, and so those contracts will be renewed um for 111 of 26. Following the park management meeting on Friday, I'll bring back if there are any changes to our park policy and provide more of an
update at that meeting. I just wanted to really we've been working on this. I've been working with Dale and Dwayne as the park committee commissioners. We've had many conversations on this. It hasn't been kind of an easy answer um to try something like this, but I I feel really
confident in Chad and Dana uh to do this. And I do think in visiting with Chad yesterday, I think he would they would regret if they didn't try something like this. And I think it's um very forward thinking in how we could do something and having those conversations
if there could be slight cost savings overall um for the county park system. I think that would benefit us all. >> Okay. Any comments, questions? >> We could do a res >> we could do a resolution to go ahead move with this. Right. You said you just
wanted to nod, but maybe we should do a resolution. >> I would, Mr. Chair, I would agree with that. I mean, a consensus is an action. So, I I just keep it clean and do a resolution or ask for an action at a >> So, so what do you want the resolution to say? >> Um, let's figure that.
>> So, to follow recommendations as stated in in uh >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Presentation here. >> If I can clarify resolution um more so a motion >> or motion rather. Yes. Thank you. I >> I think the motion would state then to
continue for staff to move forward with the transition between Big Candy West and East Park Management. >> I will move. >> Okay. >> And is there a second? >> I'll second that, Mr. Chair. >> All right. We have a motion and a second
to uh uh continue working on uh solutions and bringing forward uh a resolution a resolution to those. >> There you go. Not a resolution. >> Been a long morning. >> It's been a long morning. U any
comments, discussion? Dwayne, >> I just have a comment. Uh, according to our administrator and I know a past administrator as well, they both have said that what we do is very unique compared to other counties in the state or anywhere that you really know of.
>> Um, so it I kind think we're kind of starting to move in the direction of aligning ourselves with maybe other counties a little bit more. So, it's a baby step, but it's kind of the way things fortunately or unfortunately, however
you want to look at it, are moving. So, >> Mr. Chair, >> Commissioner Bird. >> Yes. I have to say I'm a little uncomfortable doing this, you know, because it's not tradition, but I you said, you know, giving this a try and see if we can go forward and and and try to be proactive in this. And I think it's worth that effort.
>> I I agree. I think it's uh I think it's relatively low stakes and uh uh if uh if you try something and uh it needs just a few tweaks, great. If not, try something else. So, Dale, did you want >> Well, I just think that, you know, we
we've been worrying so much about, you know, fiscal responsibility. And to me, this is a way to do a little baby step in and try to make these parks a little more fiscally responsible, too. So, I think it's a great option option to look at. And like you said, we either can change it later or or go further with
it. So >> really looking uh at a model of sustainability long term for this is really what we're doing. So all right, anybody else? >> All right. All in favor of the motion say I.
>> I. All opposed. Motion passes. Thank you. We are now down to administrative updates, appointments, and we have one uh item uh that is the uh uh need to move the December 2nd regular board
meeting to the afternoon to align with the uh truth and taxation meeting that's going to take place that evening. Uh >> it if I may, Mr. Chair, yes, we've done that in the past. That seems to work well for you guys. Um, if you're okay
with that, we would just need a motion to move uh that board meeting and then we would um this is technically that public notice and that it would be listed on our our agendas. >> Mr. Chair. >> Yes. Yeah. I'll I'll make the motion to move our December 2nd meeting uh our
regular board meeting from 9:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. that day due to the truth and taxation meeting at 6. >> I'll second that. >> We have a motion and a second. Uh any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor say I. I.
>> All opposed. Motion passes. I'm just happy that the uh our meeting doesn't uh occur on the uh uh AMC week. >> So, >> if I may, Mr. Chair, to follow up on uh the SNAP conversation.
>> Uh our staff are amazing. Uh Dana was able to get these numbers. So, if you all want to write these down, I I think what I'll also do is um follow up with Caroline tomorrow and we'll we will get an email sent out to you later this week or next week. Um but $5 and I'm going to
pull in Austin here. $523,600 in SNAP benefits not going out for November. She had a correction to the cash not being distributed. That's a total of 49,120. These are through September 30th, 2025.
This is the most recent information that we do have. Uh to clarify where the 87,750 number came up with that number with the MIP included the SNAP benefits. So, we go back to if you need clarification, I have it and I like I said, we will also
get this out in an email. >> So, Mr. Chair. >> Yes, sir. Uh would you repeat the SNAP portion of that? So this is the month of September. So if we correlate that with the month of November, that's what the SNAP >> $523,600
in SNAP benefits not going out for November. And then the correction to the cash not being distributed is $49,120. >> The cash, Mr. Chair, >> the cash being the MIT Correct. >> Yeah.
>> Yep. >> All right. Thank you for that additional uh information. >> Um it go ahead. >> If I may do my report out quick or not necessarily report out, but I did meet with the chair and the vice chair this
morning regarding the budget. Um, I will be sending out an email to the board later this week on some expenses where there may be some opportunity and then I'm hoping to do a budget update at the November 4th meeting and then that gives you time before the TNT meeting um to
ask staff or myself any questions. >> Outstanding. Uh does anyone else have anything that they wish to uh uh bring forward uh at this time? We're just uh anything that's that's high priority
and we'll hopefully at our next committee be able to do some uh fuller report outs. All right, hearing none. Then the K County Board of Commissioners adjourn. Thank you everybody.