Androscoggin County Budget Committee reviews six-month budget requests

[1:28] Jane Penton: We have that conversation in our meeting last year when we were talking about [1:32] Speaker B (unidentified): this, right? I said I heard it. I think it was until it showed up again. Yeah. This is great. [2:00] Steve Stanton: He happens to have a bad. Wednesdays. [2:31] Jane Penton: All right, I'm going to call the meeting to order, and if everybody's going to stand, I'm going to call the [2:39] Brian Names: meeting to order, and if everybody's going to stand, [3:25] Steve Stanton: rolling for the district two on the commission Andrew Willis county commissioner [3:35] Jane Penton: hey Jane Penton in district six following the McKinnon folks [3:40] Brian Names: Brian Names this is Green Durham and Barbara [3:48] Jane Penton: And can I have a motion for the meeting minutes of September 23rd? David. David. Steve Stanton. [4:01] Steve Stanton: Steve Stanton. Steve. Please see that. And [4:09] Jane Penton: Bruce Lee. I wasn't here. [4:13] Speaker B (unidentified): Okay. All right. [4:19] Jane Penton: Before we go into presentations, is there any old business from last week that's been running the blank? to success to have questions about things well we're going to take that was it probably first [4:32] Speaker E (unidentified): before we go into the schedule of getting into that it's the district attorney that we have [4:38] Brian Names: left over okay that yes we are going to do that so i didn't send the chair a request just i thought it would be helpful if we had a position and salary account for the positions within in the county i want to ask that again i think i did ask the county administrator in the last meeting what the changes were for headcount i think it was just a misunderstanding i thought i was just talking about dispatch but then completely dropped the whole budget and now we know there's the foreign dispatch and now probate but i'm not sure there's other [Speaker F (unidentified): There is.] I thought the request was pretty standard. [5:20] Speaker F (unidentified): I'm assuming we do payroll. [5:21] Brian Names: I don't want names, but just positions and departments. That's all I was looking for. So I'll ask for that again on record as a budget committee. I think that's a pretty reasonable request. [5:37] Steve Stanton: Go ahead. I just have a concern. [5:39] Brian Names: Some of the departments have warranted people. [5:42] Steve Stanton: people would think there's no way to offstate that information. [5:45] Brian Names: It's all public information. We're all public and boarded. No, I understand. [5:47] Steve Stanton: But I don't know that we need to be someone wants to pull that information they can. But at the same time, there's a good reason pulling the information and we're [5:57] Speaker G (unidentified): allowed to pull that information out to us [6:00] Steve Stanton: area publicly to be hired. What do you mean? I read it to me. [6:05] Speaker H (unidentified): They're making a request. Oh, I hear you. I read it to me with benefit for that person, too. I misunderstand. Understand, so I read the request to also have the benefits assigned to that person when we talk [6:15] Brian Names: about adding positions and showing them the revenue will offset the position in the line item of the fund and the benefits. Is that a whole separate line? We can't compare whether or not it's covering the full cost of that position. Having that information will be helpful in making decisions for the whole agency. You should have a benefit for you. I'm going to get mine, so here for each, for each position. Yeah, I don't know, I'm just saying this here. All I'm saying, it's [6:49] Speaker H (unidentified): going to be a pretty simple reply. I don't think it is, but I don't see many departments that do that, cities that do that budgeting. But anyone is offered to do that. You mean we said that, but [7:02] Brian Names: I can get you, I provided an employee account, they have it right down and print it out, because we do payroll, so it's got to be within the pay, so nobody's sitting there writing, hammering checks. It's got to be available. That's all I was asking, because we're comparing positions and we're comparing revenue to offset those positions. It's just, it's helpful to know, is it covering the full cost or not? Because this is going to have an impact on budgets and for every municipality, so I [7:31] Speaker E (unidentified): think it's important for us to know what it looks like. But do you know the people that were bringing [7:35] Jane Penton: on, what sort of benefits packages they would be even taking? Because you don't know that until they're here, or whether they're on the lower end or a higher end. They know their salary, but you may [7:46] Speaker E (unidentified): not know what packages they might be taking. I've looked at other city budgets like Auburn and I [7:51] Speaker H (unidentified): I don't see what you're saying is on that budget, your budgets. I don't see that. [7:55] Brian Names: Well, I'm saying that I can provide that and do it almost every budget meeting. All I'm saying is that there is a number that's in this budget for those positions that are not hired yet. You put a placeholder and you've got to, right? Because you don't have that position on budget and that's what's suiting you. And so what's the placeholder? That's all I ask. [8:17] Steve Stanton: So I think you're looking for just a new position with a full burning rate of many new positions that we're at. [8:26] Brian Names: What I had asked was, in my email, I had asked for the FY26 employee list, department position, salary, and benefit. I don't need to know just a benefit total. And then an FY27. So you can see how many extra positions are we looking at? What's the total? What's the cost? Because right now we're saying that the Lisbon dispatch is $250,000. I'm assuming that we're talking about the line item within dispatch. And that's, I don't know this because I don't want to break down. What's the difference with, is that including benefits as well? [9:07] Speaker H (unidentified): We haven't talked about Lisbon's budget, dispatch budget yet. [9:09] Brian Names: So that's what I'm saying. That's why I said, I don't, I don't know that yet. Right. So, [9:13] Steve Stanton: so what you're looking for is not necessarily the every full list. You're looking for the differences. And one way to get that would be to give these a current listing. Would it be possible for us to just get the list of positions and full burning rate where we're expecting for them to pass and just that list of what we're at in 2027 in this six month budget? [9:36] Speaker H (unidentified): See, you want me to provide the list of everybody that's currently in dispatch, no. [9:39] Steve Stanton: It's not, I don't think it's, you know, I just, I think the common is would be to just provide the estimated cost of the new positions by physician, so it'll be dispatcher one costs total of nine thousand dollars, to defend two costs total of nine thousand dollars, right, you've got to agree and I'll hire you, I don't know what they are, we get to that budget. [10:02] Speaker H (unidentified): But they're not, if you want them broken, well, the representative budget can break it down for you. [10:09] Brian Names: Oh, well, I think that's your compromise, I'm so matter of record, I'm asking for the employee account just so you can see the comparison, all positions across the board, how many positions do you have in the county, 140, what's that 140, do it by department, do it, and what's the total count. You know, that's, you know, if you've got 16 deputies, just put 16 deputies, and here's that, here's the total from the benefits. That's all, Raymond. [10:41] Speaker F (unidentified): I guess where I'm coming from is, in my experience, for all the years and all the things, we needed to know all the employees, what they were getting for a salary and what they were getting for benefits. We got it. Okay, I don't understand the problem in not providing that. [11:01] Speaker H (unidentified): Public information to me. Well, I think, I think the problem is you're asking for that at the budget process is starting, and you're looking at the finance team right here. So I guess if you want us to print you something out of what they make. [11:25] Speaker I (unidentified): So it's not the employee list and their salaries that's the problem or hard to get. It's we don't break down their benefits. It goes into our benefit line. So that's the problem as far as breaking it out by employee is the benefits. I can get you what the salary, new and old, whatever. But the benefits go into the benefit month. They don't go into each department, as you all have mentioned. So it's harder for me to break it down, my employee. And I don't have the staff to do a spreadsheet and calculate it. I just don't have the staff right now. So if you want the positions that we had in the new ones, I can do that. But the benefits will be an estimate. [12:18] Speaker H (unidentified): Because I don't have, yeah, the band policy, the signage person is one flame they have. [12:23] Speaker I (unidentified): So-and-so has this health insurance and, yeah, I don't have, I don't have that in the system. [12:32] Brian Names: Are you comfortable with that? I'm comfortable with my request I made, whatever can be provided that it can be helpful, but I understand what Cleary's saying. I just don't have to budget it. Every department must have to budget this, or Larissa has a list of employees that are in each department to put that number down. That's all I'm looking for. [12:57] Jane Penton: For John, I think you had a question. I was just trying to help. That's one of that, Martina. Oh, okay, sorry, thank you. So it's asked who you are, so sorry,, I couldn't find. [13:09] Speaker J (unidentified): The meeting I was running, all right, but the district attorney don't leave me here, so thank. I apologize for my talking this. That's all. [13:17] Speaker K (unidentified): Thanks, Ben. So, Jeff, the position is based on what your email said. This is additional work is late in the process, correct? Does that have to stop my clock here? [13:26] Speaker H (unidentified): Well, the request that Phil's making is really late in the process. But that's a ton of work. I mean, to go through and go through 140 employees and assign each person exactly, you know, the salaries, the different stories and what benefit package they have. What they paid for before 7b, you know, that is just not a lift we can do right now. That would have been helpful to know before the budget process started. We talked about that actually, the commissioners, but providing that next year's budget starting to do some of that stuff, breaking down my department, which is still a pretty heavy lift, but it's right, it's so, but. [14:06] Speaker K (unidentified): That's the stumbling block right now because the process has already started, but yeah, I mean, you have to spend [14:11] Speaker H (unidentified): you know, hundred dollars, 100, 150 I guess, sitting down and just finding out, I mean, between spreadsheet, which I mean again I'm not really sure what correlation that has, I think I deal with this [14:23] Speaker E (unidentified): case, but for the general budget process, thank you. All right, any more discussion on this? We'll leave [14:29] Jane Penton: that as from the head. So just to clarify, we're adding four people between communications [14:36] Speaker B (unidentified): is that it's in the budget and we're adding one person registry probates, right? I have another [14:44] Speaker H (unidentified): person I want to talk about with you guys tonight. Okay, so there'll be six new employees [14:48] Speaker B (unidentified): for this budget, and like when you discussed registry probate last week, you said you were are only bringing that person halfway through the year, so is that another way to budget one quarter of that person's salary and estimated benefits? Yes, but we'd start with 35 percent [15:17] Speaker H (unidentified): would be your typical budget cost, not knowing who's coming on board, we would budget a fraction [15:21] Speaker B (unidentified): of that for that. Well, we take on that one employee, just so I understand this, if we say yes to this budget, we're really saying this year the back box is going to go out four times. I mean, if you allocated 10,000 just to make this simplistic, and you're really telling me that's this one quarter what you expect to spend on that employee, I really have to expect the next full year budget to be for 40,000 for that person. Is that incorrect? Well, roughly [16:01] Brian Names: I just want to make sure [16:03] Speaker B (unidentified): that we understand how that person is, like this [16:10] Speaker H (unidentified): like Tom had said, he raises revenues to cover [16:14] Speaker B (unidentified): Yeah, but I'm just trying to make sure that we understand, while the four others that are coming for invitations, those are a full six-month salary of that? Yes. Okay. So also their costs will not increase by four-fold, but will increase by quite a six-month. [16:39] County building manager: It's a fair bet. Okay. I mean, [16:41] Steve Stanton: it's going to be six-month but it goes all the way up. [16:46] Speaker B (unidentified): Yes, but when they're looking at how much an employee is going to cost them, I just want them to be sure they understand they're not getting an employee, I would say it was a few of those, but then fully at the cost of both of them. So those increases will do all. [17:09] Jane Penton: 2728 budget. All right. Are we ready to move on? [17:15] Speaker B (unidentified): Yes. Okay. All right. [17:17] Jane Penton: Just a quick note, we've had Susan and Rhett join us from the local. Do you have any more? I talked with Neil in that line. [17:52] Speaker H (unidentified): He needed some computer hardware and some printer supplies because the entry increased trials and workload they're taking on. It didn't reach the capital threshold, so that's why that money [18:05] Jane Penton: is in that line, so it's the 8038, correct? Yep. Does anybody have additional questions if they'd like to pose for that? And I know some folks weren't here, so they're who helped the motion on the expenditures on the line because there was some unanswered questions about software and hardware maintenance lines 63055 and $8,038, so we asked Jeff to come back with an activation [Speaker M (unidentified): are] there any other questions about that line item? Was it Seth? [18:57] Speaker N (unidentified): I can hardly hear what is being said. The acoustics in here are awful. I'm sorry, I'm a little bit hard of hearing. I can't hear a word that's going on here. So if I click distract, it's... [19:11] Jane Penton: I can speak louder. I don't know. [19:18] Brian Names: So I guess my question would be that I think would that mean that account number seven zero one nine zero is that a capital account or is that an operator seven one nine zero seven zero one nine zero? So that is a capital gets over, yeah. So if that's a capital account we're working within an operating account a budget to be around, you're saying that amount's going to be pulled out and added to our capital plans later on? Have you seen the capital plans looked into the so anything what's the threshold for a capital item [20:22] Jane Penton: Any other comments? Right, I would look for a motion on the expenditures for the district. [20:30] Speaker O (unidentified): The attorney's office acceptance of 526 000 is going to be yours for this recurring, right? [20:39] Jane Penton: Data that promotion is there a second? So you pass the second, all in favor version here in the feelings speaking until we've got them all. What looks like a full unanimous, anyone opposed? And no, I'm saying thank you, good on that. Yeah, who is the second, Steve? Yeah, I always go with that. All right, we're going to move on to the County Administrator and the Commissioners' line items. So, if they can talk to us through this one. [21:30] Speaker H (unidentified): Yeah, it's really very simple. It's a six-month budget, there's a big reduction here with the professional fees. I do need to keep something for attorney fees, obviously, but I pulled out the forty thousand dollars that we had budgeted last year. I hired a consultant to study a regional jail facility. I don't see that happening in the next six months. They come back to the table and get it a future date if it gets steam again, but I pulled that forty thousand dollars out. My sense from another county is that it's not gonna come to fruition, so yeah. [22:11] Jane Penton: The line item, what are we advertising? [22:14] Speaker H (unidentified): That's six three oh six. These meetings, these meetings cultured meetings, so basically might require my law. I was saying all this stuff on sundry paper. Other than that, it's just split the dues. You'll see dues haven't changed, unfortunately. They're due at the beginning of the year. So you'll see that as a zeroed out or a much lower number next budget, however, but we had to pay the dues in the first half. That's the MCCA, [22:41] Jane Penton: Maccom, etc. So I have a question for you. The $95,000 that we did budget last year, are we going to actually spend it or is that going to end up going into... [22:52] Speaker M (unidentified): Fund balance. Fund balance. Correct. [22:57] Jane Penton: Are there any questions, David? Yeah, this applies to [23:00] Speaker O (unidentified): to many of these departments with reference and standard books. Those are all available online. We're purchasing heard copies of these books, and if so, why? Why is there no? Okay, all right. I will bring it up when it's not zeroed out. [23:22] Speaker H (unidentified): Some departments you're going to find that have the how on hand. For me, I can go to the internet. Thank you for that. At least I can do, okay? [23:34] Jane Penton: Are there any other discussion points anybody would like to bring up on this line? All right. Is there anybody who'd like to motion the revenue and the expenditures? Please speak them separate. [23:47] Speaker O (unidentified): I will move that we budget $0 [23:50] Brian Names: for the revenue for the administrator and practitioners. [23:53] Jane Penton: I'd say to have a motion. Is there a second? All right, thank you. Do don't and all in favor anyone opposed and you don't want to say that happened [24:09] Speaker E (unidentified): and now the expenditures I hope there will be a room who will recommend a hundred thousand [24:15] Speaker O (unidentified): four hundred and sixty three dollars in expenditures or with our global [24:21] Jane Penton: I MADE A MOTION. THIRD SECOND. AND IT'S BEEN SECOND. ALL IN FAVOR? ANYONE OPPOSED? ALL RIGHT. WE'LL MOVE ON TO THE RESOURCE, THE NEXT TAB. IS IT BETTER NOW? BRUCE, CAN YOU HEAR BETTER NOW? [24:45] Speaker B (unidentified): MUCH BETTER. I CAN HEAR WELL. [24:48] Jane Penton: Understand, all right, thank you. So hi, I'm Heidi from your resources. [25:10] Speaker H (unidentified): Same with what with our budget represents a half a year, nothing new additions to the budget, no changes really other than just doing it in half. [25:36] Speaker F (unidentified): Do you agree? Yes. Everybody [25:41] Jane Penton: happy? Go ahead. [25:45] Speaker O (unidentified): Thank you. Psychological exams for the six month budget is the same as the entire budget for last year. That would suggest that it's front loaded, but I'm assuming, correct me if I'm wrong, that everyone who's hired by the county, or is it only the Sheriff's Department? [26:03] Speaker E (unidentified): So only new deputies complete the psychological exam, and that would be enough to do one. [26:13] Speaker O (unidentified): Okay, and we anticipate that will happen now rather than after July 1st? Yes. Okay. [26:22] Speaker H (unidentified): I mean, go ahead. [26:27] Speaker F (unidentified): I didn't really ask it in the last section, but I'll ask it now just to have a general understanding. If we look at the 2026 budget, our salary, our wages, it was $75,594. If you look at the six months, it's not half of that. So there's a change in personal changes and people at a different level. [26:50] Jane Penton: Are there any other questions? [26:52] Speaker K (unidentified): A couple positive observations, silly as they may be. I noticed the postage is down above and I also noticed the mileage as well we'll take all of [27:01] Speaker E (unidentified): the land thank you all right [27:09] Jane Penton: any other questions all right time to be looking for a promotion for [27:14] Speaker O (unidentified): david we have no revenue so it's just a motion for expenditures i'm going to prove RULE OF RECOMMENDATION ONLY RECOMMENDING $43,076 FOR HUMAN RESOURCES. [27:31] Jane Penton: NEW SPEAKER 2 SECOND. NEW SPEAKER 2 SECOND CALL IN FAVOR ANYONE OPPOSED? NEW SPEAKER 2 NOW WE'RE GOING TO MOVE TO the treasurer and finance? [27:55] Speaker I (unidentified): That's, this is my department's budget. Differences would be the big thing is salary. My, for the last three years, my salary has been covered by APA, well, some of it, and that percentage is back into this budget now. So that's why it's a little bit higher. But other than that, I did just the basics, trying to get through the six months. [28:30] Jane Penton: Pretty exciting question. From the software and hardware, last year's budget was $17,000. We've only spent $558,000, and you're still looking for $3,000 in the six months. [28:41] Speaker I (unidentified): My accounting software isn't due until October, so that's not in here for the six months. And the amount in here is the conversion from calendar year to fiscal year. So that has to be done in the six months. Okay. Yep. [29:04] Jane Penton: Are there other questions that anybody else would like to ask? Okay. I would like to hear a motion on the Finance and Finance Department. Is this expenditures only? [29:19] Speaker O (unidentified): Move, we recommend $112,357 in expenditures for the county planning program. [29:27] Jane Penton: Okay, that's a motion. Is there a second? I see. Sorry. And all in favor? Anyone in favor? That's great. We are moving on to the county budget. [29:46] Speaker I (unidentified): So, this one is really just like the miscellaneous. So, interest on our bank accounts. It used to be rent, but for the court, it's not rent on the room anymore. So, yeah, that's nearly all this department is, just interest. [30:09] Jane Penton: Anybody have any questions they'd like to ask? Pretty easy one. All right. Is there a motion on the floor for the revenue? [30:18] Speaker O (unidentified): We recommend housing revenue for the county at $25,000. [30:24] Jane Penton: All right. Dana has the motion. Is there a second? Don? All right. All in favor? And so opposed. [30:33] Speaker O (unidentified): Post, and I'll move. I'd like to move that we not let the county spend any money at all. [30:43] Jane Penton: Right, so that was zero dollar motion on the floor and a second, done. All right, all in favor of spending no money? I like that. All right, that pass as well. [30:59] Brian Names: Sorry, I think I missed this. I'm trying to go through this, but fund balance, we're not appropriating anything in the first six months, but what is the, we are, my [31:14] Speaker I (unidentified): Mission that would be on your revenue expense sheet. It's further down. [31:24] Speaker E (unidentified): All right, we'll get there. Okay, all right, next up is auditing, so [31:36] Speaker I (unidentified): This is what I anticipate needing to pay for the audit. They require a lot up front, so it's kind of a lot to do in the first part of the year. [31:50] Jane Penton: So we said a question, I know this was a big discussion point last year because they had raised the rent, so to speak, a considerable amount. Have we paid them all in full for this year? Because our year to date is not that was budgeted, it's less than. Now we still have [32:11] Speaker I (unidentified): A couple more, they're just finishing up on the on the audit and they've agreed. Oh, I see this is, it's a six month. It's a six month. Yeah. Okay. [32:21] Jane Penton: Sorry. I get confused. Which one am I looking at? [32:25] Speaker I (unidentified): And me too. Yeah. [32:29] Jane Penton: Okay. I have no questions. All right. Go ahead and see. [32:32] Speaker F (unidentified): So with that, this 20,000 is basically front loaded, if you will. Yeah. Yeah. That's my expectation. So year on year, it's actually a reduction. Is that what you're saying? No. Somebody is going to carry this. [32:46] Speaker B (unidentified): No,. It's in the hostage situation. [32:47] Speaker G (unidentified): So $20,000 is roughly $20,000 is front-loaded. [32:51] Steve Stanton: The remainder will be $1,000 next year. Let's see. [32:58] Jane Penton: If I had a kid, I'd be telling them to start not a little bit. Yeah, exactly. David, did you have a question? [33:05] Speaker O (unidentified): Well, I was going to pick up on Steve. This $20,700 is for the first six months. Do you anticipate that there being about seven thousand dollars in the next full year or the [33:18] Speaker I (unidentified): Full year will be twenty seven thousand? It should be twenty seven thousand. Well, for the, yeah, for the 12-month period beginning till I've heard. Yeah, okay, there's gonna be some. Yeah. [33:31] Jane Penton: Yes, it's, but I got caught up in the same thing. That's when I started asking the questions. [33:36] Speaker I (unidentified): So like, why isn't it half, or why isn't it, we have to pay a certain percentage up front and it's not [33:48] Speaker B (unidentified): The fact that we're going on the calendar year, this film is processable. We reported that to us earlier this year because they have too much work. [34:05] Brian Names: But this whole year versus the calendar, yeah, well, that's right. Oh yeah, and they [34:11] Speaker B (unidentified): basically tell me this is what it is. [34:15] Speaker I (unidentified): The good news is APPA is ending, so we won't have to pay to audit APPA anymore, so that would be awesome. Any [34:26] Jane Penton: other questions about this one? [34:35] Speaker O (unidentified): I'm sorry, I'm still a little confused. If we budget $20,000 for six months this year and $27,000 for 12 months, meaning the first fiscal year that the county is operating under, that's $47,000 for 18 months, essentially. Essentially. And if you multiply the 27 by one and a half, you've come up with far less than $47,000. So it seems to me that there's some over budgeting here. So I understand the front loading bit. But when you add the anticipated one year to the 20,000, it comes up more than, way more than a year and a half's worth of auditing services. [35:20] Speaker I (unidentified): Yeah. So another thing that's complicating this is because we will have to have basically two audits. We're going to have to audit January through June, and then July through June, we have to have another audit. [35:33] Speaker O (unidentified): All right. That makes sense. Thank you. [35:39] Speaker E (unidentified): Is there a motion to accept the auditing? I will move. We recommend [35:44] Speaker O (unidentified): $20,700 to accept the auditing. [35:49] Jane Penton: Okay. We have a motion. Is there a second? John has a second. All in favor? Everyone closed. Did I ask a question? Sure, go ahead. [36:01] Speaker N (unidentified): On this particular line item, it says that departing is for 1-1-26 through 6-30-26. Is it that the dates were off? We're way beyond 6-30-26 already. [36:22] Jane Penton: I think, isn't that the year-to-date actual if that date comes from? Yeah. [36:29] Speaker N (unidentified): But that's what the actual exists from. But we're proposing for the next year, for 27, for a half year, so that this revenue and expenditures auditing really should be, I guess I'm a little confused by the date. Maybe it's just me catching up. [36:55] Speaker I (unidentified): So right now, this $22,980, we're actually paying for our 2025 that they're just finishing up. So next year, we'll be paying $2026 and the January through June. Does that make sense? We're a year behind because they don't do an audit until the year is all over. Okay. All right. [37:26] Jane Penton: Are there any other questions? All right, we're going to move to the interest line, Heather. [37:45] Speaker I (unidentified): So interest, this is the interest expense for our TAN, which that's hopefully coming to an end once we get to the fiscal year. I did this before I heard the interest rates went up. So I'm hoping to keep it to what we were at this June around 40,000. That's that was mine. [38:16] Speaker N (unidentified): This reduction is the result of changing the changing the calendar year versus the fiscal year. So this takes away some of those interest expenses that we had from borrowing in anticipation. [38:32] Speaker I (unidentified): It will once we get to the past day conversion year. So this is only half. So this is what I expect from January to June. But we won't get our tax payments until September, October. And so we'll have to carry the tan at least until those payments come. So January through June we'll need interest expense. And from the July to June when we go there, we'll need some to carry us for that first part. And then after that we should be good. [39:10] Speaker N (unidentified): So even this change isn't going to eliminate the anticipation? [39:13] Speaker M (unidentified): Not the first year. Not the first year. Not the first year. [39:16] Speaker F (unidentified): yes yeah we had a little bit of discussion last week or whatever in regards to the things i think it would be really nice to i'm still a little bit confused on okay we're going to send the bills to the towns in september time frame or whatever and do and go pay i just would love to have something thing in writing if we could say this is what we're inspecting a bill when to the towns and it'd be a percentage of or it's going to be oh we're going to actually send the town an 18-month bill we're going to send it down to a six-month bill or maybe we'll get commissioners to do quarterly billing as i'm suggesting but that's i'd love to know what is and then yeah so i think [40:04] Speaker I (unidentified): that will probably be on hopefully the commissioner's agenda coming right up to make [40:10] Speaker M (unidentified): those decisions they need to vote on the payments and you know i realize that there's the arrears [40:16] Speaker F (unidentified): that the transitional things so yeah i understand this but i'm really hoping maybe that will accelerate getting rid of this type of activity because you've got a cash flow coming in but [40:27] Jane Penton: billing quarterly yeah and i agree with steve i'd rather see even from my little town At least twice a year versus once to offset our burden and give them the cash flow for us, too. [40:41] Speaker I (unidentified): I've heard, I talked to a consultant, and I've heard from this consultant that other counties have switched. They did a September and a March payment. So basically, September would be a six-month one and half of the 12-month one. So it's really a full year that the towns would pay. And then this other six months would be in March and I guess it worked well for the other counties. [41:10] Speaker F (unidentified): Yeah, I just, I'm sorry, the conversation, I'm just concerned about the towns knowing that they've actually got to come up with an 18-month budget for this county bill within their year, your budget. That's my greatest concern. This is kind of seeing the timeline right now so that we can be clear about that and we can be clear to the communities about that as well. So can you guys [41:40] Jane Penton: add that to your list? [41:42] Speaker H (unidentified): It's already on the list. [41:46] Jane Penton: So by the time we're done with this process we'll have at least an answer to program to take that, yeah, okay, yeah, right, that's satisfying, all right, any other questions on the interest line item? All right, do we have a motion? I'm [42:06] Speaker O (unidentified): supposed to be recommending spending because of 80,000 for interest for the first 16 years. [42:11] Jane Penton: Right, data, the motion is their second, dog has the second, all right, all in favor? Any other polls? All right, guys, yes. All right, the next one is Lloyd Bender. [42:29] Speaker B (unidentified): The good [42:35] Speaker H (unidentified): thing about this one is it could have been higher. We privatized our main Vietnam L.A. insurance for the private. It saved about $15,000. So that's not really reflected here but it's a positive. The negative is health insurance is going up by at least 15 percent. That's what we put as a placeholder in this budget until we get the final number from [43:05] Brian Names: people. So go ahead. Yeah, I just wonder if it's enough, but I'm looking at the numbers, it comes up going up 15 percent, we budgeted almost 2.7 million for health insurance indefinitely in the last year, only the 1.3 this year. So that's it. So that's it, and Cordy's maybe- [43:24] Speaker I (unidentified): Yep, so after some reconciliation, we're basing, I based it on actuals and not year-to-date, not the budget. I think last year's budget may have been a little bit higher due to some areas that we needed to reconcile. So I did 15% on the health insurance actuals from January to June. I thought that would be more accurate. So, [43:55] Jane Penton: let's see. I'm sorry, David. [43:57] Speaker O (unidentified): I guess I'm one compensation. Is that where we know I went, I [44:04] Speaker H (unidentified): went to mimic and they weren't interested. First of all, we thought being useful. I did look at mimic last year, and they were really interested in courting us. [44:16] Speaker I (unidentified): Unemployment, you said, right? Unemployment. We pay as we go. They bill us for anybody that claims against us. That was two employees that we laid off. [44:35] Speaker H (unidentified): I'm sorry, I thought you said what was going on. [44:37] Speaker O (unidentified): I'm sorry, I didn't hear you. [44:38] Speaker H (unidentified): I'm sorry, I thought you were talking about the last conversation. [44:42] Speaker O (unidentified): I don't know. I'm talking about unemployment compensation having gone down 500%. [44:46] Speaker I (unidentified): Yeah. That was two employees that were claiming against us. Yeah. [44:53] Speaker H (unidentified): Okay. Hopefully that's coming to an end. [44:56] Speaker O (unidentified): And when you, Mimic was not interested or we were not interested in Mimic's terms? [45:02] Speaker H (unidentified): That's what I thought you would ask for. Okay. Yes. But to answer your question on Mimic. jumped out of you sorry so [45:15] Speaker F (unidentified): we anticipate the 15 000 that we have here to be like from logan here [45:20] Speaker H (unidentified): no he's you said the same right well i mean you don't say it's not gonna happen we hope it's [45:26] Speaker I (unidentified): yeah i'm not sure how much longer they have to be able to claim the jobs so we'll be getting on the job right yeah so i just went by the [45:43] Speaker B (unidentified): Employee Medicare. Why is that? [45:46] Speaker I (unidentified): Because it's rolled up into FICA. We have that account because the jail has to have it broken out, FICA and Medicare, but the county is just all in FICA. That's how we report it out. [46:02] Speaker K (unidentified): Can you explain that a little bit better? Because that FICA number seems, what do you mean roll it out into it? Can you explain the FICA? [46:11] Speaker I (unidentified): So this FICA number includes both FICA and the Medicare, MainCare, whatever it's called. You don't have to mix it up. But yeah, it's just that the whole 7.65 instead of just, you know what I mean? Yeah. [46:27] Speaker N (unidentified): Okay. And then the Maine State retirement is on top of that? [46:33] Speaker I (unidentified): No, Maine State has its own line. [46:35] Speaker N (unidentified): Yeah, I see that. Yeah. But part of FICA typically is. [46:40] Speaker M (unidentified): no we have we have both is that because of the cba i'm sorry is that because of the contract [46:49] Speaker I (unidentified): bargaining agreement it was way back in the beginning of the county they pay both the fight and they missed a normal site it wasn't here i don't know what there is any less they do [47:06] Jane Penton: You will often take work with staff. [47:12] Steve Stanton: So in addition to our whole social security, I was the one who made good value for them? Wow. That is nice. You remove them from all provisions. That's nice to know. Yeah. Okay. [47:26] Jane Penton: Go ahead. Can you explain what Andrew's 417 is? [47:30] Speaker I (unidentified): Yeah, that's a pension. That's a full 57B. things no i remember having a lot of discussion about it last year don't bring it up please [47:43] Jane Penton: are there any other questions david oh you want to make you make the motion i'm the motion guy [47:56] Speaker O (unidentified): I would recommend one million eight hundred eighty six thousand six hundred four dollars for [48:02] Jane Penton: employee benefits. All right, David has a motion. Is there a second? Fashion has a second. All right, all in favor? Any opposed? Okay, that happens as well. Right, next up is insurance, so [48:22] Speaker I (unidentified): again I just did 15 from our actuals. We don't, I don't have what the policy will be, so it's kind of a, kind of an estimate. We don't know until like November I think it is, that would be close. So we're paying this up front. Yeah, they request like 75 of it right up front usually. Go [48:50] Brian Names: ahead and keep this in a makeable product risk as well. Yes, this [48:56] Speaker N (unidentified): include all three properties, this building, Center Street, and all the streets, all of the [49:05] Speaker E (unidentified): properties. Yeah. [49:09] Speaker F (unidentified): Let's see, just to, just clarify, so 2026, so we actually saw a huge increase in actual expenditures in this six months upcoming, or it was just front-end building [49:24] Speaker M (unidentified): with them. Are you talking more just calm? Is that, no, I'm talking about the insurance buildings [49:29] Speaker F (unidentified): as contents last year, replacing 91 000 for the whole year, and now we're saying 112 000 for six [49:36] Steve Stanton: months. Yeah, we have an extra building. Yes, the addition of Lisbon Street, that's part of it. The [49:43] Speaker H (unidentified): rates went up. The hope is that Center Street will fall off this, the full gear might be alive, but the reality is we'll be carrying insurance on that over the next six months. We'll be able to [49:55] Speaker F (unidentified): get an offer tomorrow. Any [50:03] Jane Penton: other questions? Is there a motion on the feelings? I will rewrite that name, [50:12] Speaker O (unidentified): two hundred and three thousand dollars for insurance for six months of the year. [50:20] Jane Penton: Right, David has the motion. Is there a second? John, please. And all in favor. All right. Now we're going to move to the reserve and the fund balance. I'm sorry. We don't close to this one. [50:47] Speaker I (unidentified): This is, I think, just to review and to piece past any questions. So your first is just what they are on a sign on balance history. And then the next page is a list of our reserves. We're not requesting to use any of them, but this is just an FYI so that you know what we have in reserves,. And at the bottom of that is where the fund balance will be after the $350,000 for this current budget we're in and the $300,000 that we're proposing to use for the six-month budget. And that's where we expect that will be. [51:37] Speaker O (unidentified): I want to go back a year ago. We had a long discussion about fund balance, and you told the committee last year I believe that this isn't real money, [51:52] Speaker E (unidentified): that there is no reserve, there is no balance of cash, so there are times in the year because [52:01] Speaker I (unidentified): That's why we're in a fan because we up front all our costs that we have no cash on hand at certain times of the year. That is true if we catch us right after we get all the town payments then yes we have money but we don't have it in a special bank account it's all in our jungle. [52:26] Speaker O (unidentified): So when we look at the nearly two and a half million dollars of unassigned fund balance for 2026 and I'm not even going to get into what 2026 means that two and a half million [52:40] Speaker E (unidentified): million dollars is not cash sitting anywhere it is now because we found because we've got paid [52:47] Speaker I (unidentified): from the towns we currently do have last year they were a little later paying and we did not [52:54] Speaker E (unidentified): have the cash well last year it says we had 2.7 million dollars right we didn't have that in cash [53:00] Speaker I (unidentified): because we hadn't received all of our town payment yet okay so how is this number calculated if it's [53:07] Speaker O (unidentified): not if it's not an account does that include depreciation of assets yeah it includes it's [53:17] Speaker I (unidentified): all of our revenues minus our expenses every year added to the balance so if we have a surplus then it adds to us fund balance okay so that is at one some point in time that is a cash number correct yeah but we upfront so much of it because of the town payments being in september so we have nine months that we have to upfront money that and that's why we need the tan and once we're not doing that we'll have cash in the bank okay so can you talk a little bit [53:53] Speaker O (unidentified): about once we get back on once we get on the new cycle yeah what's going to happen to the fund of balance annually when the money is coming in from the towns more in keeping the need to [54:05] Speaker I (unidentified): expend it and well it's going to sit in that cash account until we need it and [54:12] Speaker H (unidentified): the perfect world will then have a lot more yeah than that in our case you'd have at least 20 percent of your operating your yearly operating where nobody's needing to be close that's why you find counties that are having issues now after arpa so you know that cash is actually hopefully going to grow to a number versus 20 percent at that point in time we could then use it to offset the budgets [54:34] Speaker I (unidentified): with the excess and we'd have a reserve and a bank savings income at that point [54:39] Speaker M (unidentified): because we would have that 20 percent well the good stuff's going to happen you're not here [54:43] Speaker F (unidentified): back to the previous thing of interest we would expect to see greater interest because we're we're actually going to have something sitting in the bank, [54:57] Speaker M (unidentified): gathering interest rates. Correct, yeah. [55:00] Speaker H (unidentified): Not gaining interest, but making interest. [55:01] Speaker I (unidentified): Right, let's go the other way. That's when we want the interest rates to go up. Yeah, right. [55:09] Brian Names: So back to my question when I was on the wrong account. Now we're on this account. So in this six-month budget, you're not allocating any fund balance to offset the... Yes, we are. So where am I seeing that? So you're taking your audit is not complete, right? So we're going to audit right now. [55:44] Speaker I (unidentified): 25 is complete. But not 26 because we're not finished the year yet. [55:50] Brian Names: So the 12-31-2025 audit is complete. And that was your fund balance amount, the 2.7? [55:57] Speaker K (unidentified): Mm-hmm. Got it. So I mean, thank you. [56:01] Speaker F (unidentified): We've apparently not estimated any. [56:08] Jane Penton: Any other questions on the fund balance? Okay, so we don't need a motion on that. And then we move on to the capital plans. [56:19] Speaker H (unidentified): The direction from the commissioners and the community department have no capital this year. Any capital you may see is from existing payments that have already been committed [56:31] Jane Penton: on past capital expenses. Does that mean the items that we are seeing on here are already included in the budgets that we have? So these are not that they were in the state that were [56:47] Speaker H (unidentified): correct. Exactly, they're items that are in purchase that are part of the business. I want to say you have some tasers in there now. The jail is unique, you'll see there was capital in the jail, probably won't spend that, but we had to submit the jail budget to the state. Perhaps it's called before June 1st. So this is going to go away with our fiscal year, but we had to submit, so we submitted capital, the jail submitted capital for their budget to submit to the state. So although you see that number, we're not going to spend that number in the first six months, which doesn't really help this budget because the jail is such a hole, it'll help take off the top of the hole. So that's actually to explain that number. [57:32] Jane Penton: But we don't, we're not focusing on the substance information, right? I don't believe that. [57:40] Speaker M (unidentified): I don't believe that. Yeah. [57:44] Speaker H (unidentified): So yeah, you see a few items here that we can paint and so on. Other than that, there's no other [57:52] Speaker F (unidentified): Oh, we can talk about cataloging now, so we'll talk about medications later. [57:56] Brian Names: here but just remind me, I think when we when accounting conventioners assess Lisbon, I thought there was a capital amount that was also shared that would be renewed that would be needed [58:12] Speaker H (unidentified): With communications for Lisbon, I believe the sheriff will talk about that next. I believe there's a grant that we're doing in conjunction with Lisbon to offset those costs for the capital. Correct, that's correct, not the operational cost, but the capital cost in order to bring them on. The only capital for communications here is, I believe, you've got a simulcast system of payment. [58:38] Jane Penton: Any other questions or comments? All right, we are going to move to the IFMAP partners. And I believe there was also a handout that was provided earlier on breakdowns of some of the line items. Anybody have any questions or anything you'd like to say about your R2 budget? [59:50] Speaker P (unidentified): No, I tried to keep it down as low as I could for the first half of the year. The problem is mostly the service contracts that we have and paid at the beginning. [1:00:02] Speaker F (unidentified): Yeah, so when I look at salary and wages last year's full weapons, this six months 59,000, what's changed there's [1:00:14] Speaker P (unidentified): pay raise and I believe our other I figured what it was now we put one of the consultants in there, yeah, because we use them quite a bit. [1:00:30] Speaker H (unidentified): So this number comes out of that budget line as well. Yeah, we took money out of the IT consulting line we would have up at the salaries is that consultant is actually an employee of accounting. [1:00:53] Speaker O (unidentified): typically again i'm confused we're looking at salaries and wages an increase of 33 percent if i pay the six month salaries and wages and double that compared with last year that's a 33 percent increase and i'm also looking at a 40 percent increase in iu consulting services Last year it was $20,000, and we doubled the 14. It's $28,000. So I don't see that the numbers don't appear that the IT Consulting Services costs have been shifted into a series of wages. Both lines are up dramatically. [1:01:34] Speaker P (unidentified): So the person that we know is considered the employee was moved into our wages for this year. The reason why the IT consulting one didn't go down as much is because we need a pen testing and that penetration to see how easy it is to break into the county to steal our information so that it doesn't charge us later on. Not easy at all, it should be very difficult, it should be, it should be, it should be very difficult with the money we're paying for it. Right. Which is why when you get a company coming in that does it, we use an on-site company for that, and their costs have gone way up for the last few years. [1:02:09] Speaker F (unidentified): And can we anticipate that to be just something up front? Yes, that'll just be it's [1:02:14] Steve Stanton: Only it's only once every couple of years it will be there in the next budget because there's a full year, right? So if we're going to this point in the in the year again in the next project. [1:02:27] Speaker P (unidentified): The pen test is only done in the beginning of the year and then after that it's gone, that price will dramatically drop, right? So the next what I'm saying is it and that's reading it. [1:02:37] Steve Stanton: Again in the beginning of 2028, no, okay, I know we don't do it every year. [1:02:41] Speaker B (unidentified): You don't need to, okay, I'm afraid that's a bad decision. [1:02:50] Speaker P (unidentified): Now everybody knows so well we haven't had one, we haven't had one in over three years. [1:02:55] Brian Names: So you said there's a person that's assisting in ideas, another staff member from another department. The computer software hardware equipment went from $12,000 last year, $45,000, down to $13,000 for six months. Is that because we're good at updating equipment? [1:03:51] Speaker P (unidentified): Yes, a lot of the new equipment that we have now, we purchased back without going in, and it's still within five years, that we use to replace the time. [1:04:02] Speaker K (unidentified): Question. On your service contracts, can you explain down the line, we own the equipment, but in the service contracts, leasing a program. [1:04:17] Brian Names: As opposed to... Our copiers? Yeah. [1:04:23] Speaker P (unidentified): We used to purchase them outright, but we found that it's actually more cost-effective now if we lease them. And that way there, if there's something wrong with it, they just come in and replace it. Instead of us having to go out and buy another one, which we can't afford copiers all the time when they break. So it's all part of that leasing program. [1:04:42] Speaker K (unidentified): And when you do that, is this local? Yes. It's local. It's budget dog. Okay. And is this a bid thing, or do you just go out and find someone that can provide the service? [1:04:56] Speaker P (unidentified): We brought it back up to the company that we were using before, it was BEU, and they're actually based out of state, and when we looked locally, the best one that we could find was BudgetDoc for the cost. They came in with the best presentation. [1:05:12] Speaker H (unidentified): Yes, key street pressure. Yeah. [1:05:18] Jane Penton: Are there any other questions? David? [1:05:21] Speaker O (unidentified): The handout that we received this evening has two changes from what's in the mind. To me one is an increase for my magnet is to the financial budget for registrating the involvement fees and the other I don't see a justification that Hannah will receive tonight for printing and reproducing regular option so you don't know if I just responded to you okay. [1:05:59] Speaker B (unidentified): I didn't. [1:06:01] Speaker P (unidentified): Know enough, I didn't notice that one. That was my fault. Then on the explanation sheet, class I normally take is at the beginning of the year, but I can hold it off. [1:06:14] Steve Stanton: Which is which? You can hold on the registration enrollment one. I can hold that one. It's not on [1:06:20] Speaker P (unidentified): the actual budget proposal, so that's not a problem. I made this one up so that I could understand what each one was, and I know you guys had asked last week why somebody else didn't know that. [1:06:30] Speaker O (unidentified): I'm just trying to come up with the total requested expenditures. That's still going to be 119 100. [1:06:38] Speaker P (unidentified): Yes, that didn't change. Okay, I'm [1:06:44] Speaker O (unidentified): ready for my episode. I would like to go ahead and we'll move the recommended total expenditures for the united as he departed from 115,001 to college. [1:06:55] Jane Penton: All right, David has a motion to take a second. Susan, sorry, oh, David. And is there anybody that's interested? That's again, who was the second? Oh, Susan. All right, the next line item is county, domain, and facilities. Definitely, oh, there's this lady. You didn't listen. Good evening. [Speaker B (unidentified): Let's see, what'd] you come up with? We don't know enough about this one. [1:07:38] County building manager: So we'll be presenting two different budgets tonight. The first one is the county building. So this budget I've been managing for the past 19 years. It's pretty much steady growth every single year based on utility costs, water, sewer. It's pretty normal for any type of facility budget. budget. It's just a couple percent below 50% of the 12 months. I tried to zero increase all the lines. So the only thing that's really gone up is the salary and wages. That's just gone up a couple percent based on what the commissioners recommended. [Speaker F (unidentified): The overtime] went up a bit more to cover the extras that have been coming up. My staff is now on call 24-7, so they get paid a stipend to cover that. Do you just want a moment to go through or do you want me to just keep going line by line and explaining some of the stuff? [1:08:40] Jane Penton: Yeah, I'm happy with you. [1:08:41] Speaker E (unidentified): Can you tell me anything about that? Sure. [1:08:43] County building manager: Office supplies are pretty basic. I fix buildings, so I don't really need paper clips or pens, so it's very minimal stuff. If he does, he steals them. not a while miscellaneous equipment again we don't buy printers or that type of stuff very often so 100 bucks usually covers a couple keyboards or little minor pieces like that uniforms i do like to buy my guys uniforms i like them clean when they go in the courts or the four-way chambers or judges chambers i do like them look somewhere [Speaker B (unidentified): are clean.] So I can buy them shirts. They buy their own shoes and pants. I just keep them going with clean shirts. [1:09:31] Speaker H (unidentified): What a point. You don't have to go online to find out the difference between propane gas and fuel oil. That's always been a confusion. One of the lines is [1:09:42] County building manager: propane is mislabeled. It's actually natural gas. So that's for the boilers. And those are hard piped right to the street. And it's a lot cheaper than what we were a few years back when we used oil. We have one new boiler started this past year that we're hoping is going to save us a good chunk of change, but we won't know until we get a full year actually on that boiler, if not even [1:10:05] Speaker H (unidentified): six fours. Yeah, yes, we zeroed out fuel oil the first six months because I don't, so we do have [1:10:14] County building manager: fuel tanks still, and to keep the oil somewhat fresh without growing algae or mold, whatever, we have to keep the oil using in it, because it does power the generator, which is what feeds the jail in the courthouse when we lose power. So I like to keep four thousand dollars in it every year, and that's just enough to buy nowadays a thousand gallons of fuel, just to keep it fresh. [1:10:37] Speaker G (unidentified): But you haven't asked for one for the first six months, right? I still have some in the tank, I can [1:10:44] County building manager: go. So if we do lose power, I have enough in the tank to get us through, and by then it's considered an emergency. So if I have to buy fuel, I'm going to buy fuel. This is what I budget for, is to keep the tanks fresh, this offset the exercise cycle. Yeah, it's just exercise, keep it exercise. We run it for 30 minutes every month, besides a couple outages throughout the year, but otherwise all my lines are pretty much half of what it's been for the last year. I have one question [1:11:21] Jane Penton: for you. The software and hardware, is that just a billing thing, because it's a little higher? [1:11:26] County building manager: Yeah, so what that is, we use opera to pay for a good chunk of it, and then last year the money ran out, so I paid for, I don't remember, it's like four or five months worth out of my budget, and the rest was from arpa. So this is the first full year that I have to pay, and licenses do at the start of the year, so we'll pay for the full license at the start of the year. [1:11:50] Speaker O (unidentified): Yeah, can you talk about building and building improvements? Primarily I like to see no money budgeted. I don't like to see expenditures, but on the other hand, we want to make certain that we're keeping the assets that we have in good shape, so I'm [1:12:06] County building manager: Taking it as a breather, I'm sorry, I'm taking it as a breather. So with this first six months, it's gonna be the dead of winter. We don't plan on starting anything until the summer time anyways. So I think taking a six-month breather on capitals for the repair of the building, it's fine. And then [1:12:23] Speaker H (unidentified): we'll start full back up come July of next year. I can add to that, we're planning on spending, using the money from our sale of the properties on Center Streets next year in the campaign as well. So I'm the one that serves the capital lines on the anticipation we'll have that money to use. [1:12:42] Speaker G (unidentified): So is this a cap line? Yes, it's an operational, that's a capital line, the one, the 70 25 000 [1:12:49] Speaker E (unidentified): dollars last year, nothing. This is correct, that's the capital line, which one is the last seven zero [1:12:55] Speaker G (unidentified): next page? So if you look at some other ones like maintenance supplies [1:13:00] County building manager: be 64 100, that's a lot of my spending from parts, which is two by fours, just regular maintenance supplies, hinges, screws, that type of stuff. Okay, thank you, go ahead. [1:13:16] Speaker K (unidentified): So you clothe and feed. I see you have a food item there. What's that? [1:13:20] County building manager: So in the past, I used to get inmate workers, and I'd bribe them with a pizza. Actually, sales 101. They would work great for a $6 little piece of pizza. But in the past couple of years, the way things are going on with the jail, I haven't been able to get any quality inmates. [1:13:40] Brian Names: They don't deserve it. [1:13:43] Speaker K (unidentified): And a positive here that I picked this out, even though it's small, it explained to me the telephone budget there. I like that you're putting it in for $3,400 and you're under that. So what's that? [1:13:57] Steve Stanton: Just a.07 number to pay. It's [1:14:05] County building manager: awesome. It's my cell phone reimbursement. [1:14:08] Jane Penton: So those are probably monthly. Sorry, what? Those are probably monthly bills. [1:14:12] County building manager: Yes, yeah, so we pay them a stipend to use their cell phones because they're on call 24 7. I have, I paid for one guy to be on call, but essentially they're all on call. Yeah, I [1:14:28] Speaker K (unidentified): just saw that you were under bunion. [1:14:30] Jane Penton: There's a earlier question that was on this. He's going to have staff and he's going to come to his [1:14:40] Speaker B (unidentified): side. Oh yeah, that's what I like. I'm [1:14:45] Speaker O (unidentified): going to recommend 160 thousand and twenty nine dollars [1:14:49] Speaker E (unidentified): for expenses for the county building. Thank you. We have the motion that the second John decided. [1:14:54] Jane Penton: So I think that there's the first, oh, I'm thinking about it. And then we have a fellow, who's the second? John. And we're going to move on to the 184 Main City building. That's this one, right? No. [1:15:16] Speaker P (unidentified): It's the next building. [1:15:19] Speaker H (unidentified): That's simply the revenue from a rental unit and the expenses that go along with it, special services, you know, cleaning fees and whatnot, telephone, self-explanatory, prevents the rent, the revenues, the rents at [1:15:43] Speaker N (unidentified): least on a portion [1:15:45] Speaker H (unidentified): of the building. Yeah, we rent the office as soon as we call the center homes. [1:15:53] Speaker N (unidentified): So that's in addition to what the D.A. is? [1:15:59] Speaker H (unidentified): Yes. Well, the D.A. is also housed on the same floor, but we also have an office that we rent on the same floor. [1:16:06] Speaker N (unidentified): So we need the revenue. So we get the revenue with just sort of offsetting a portion of the D.A.'s base? [1:16:14] Speaker H (unidentified): Well, I'll put it as revenues, but, yeah, it's definitely been due to the county. It's like $36,000 a year to get. [1:16:25] Jane Penton: Is there any questions? The 182 makes two. [1:16:31] Speaker O (unidentified): Okay. On the move, we recommend $12,500 for revenue. [1:16:36] Jane Penton: Okay. Is there a motion? Is there a second? So moved. Okay. All in favor of the revenues? Any opposed? [1:16:51] Speaker O (unidentified): I will move $3,690 in expenditures for 184 main. All right. [1:16:58] Jane Penton: David has a motion. Is there a second? John? All in favor? And no one opposed. Okay. And the last one for tonight is $4,450. [1:17:14] County building manager: Okay. So that is a new building to us. That we just purchased, we take ownership tomorrow morning. So this budget I was able to create with the help of the financial officer of Channel 10. Michael had given me all these expenditures for the past year for all utilities, so I was able to take that and get some actual figures together. But again, the actual figures are based on them utilizing it 100, like the lights, essentially all the lights would be on because they're there. We're not going to have them all on because it's going to be, let's say 20 being used, so I did decrease some of the electricity to guesstimate what we would use, same thing with the water and sewer. But as a whole, the numbers are as close as I could get using actuates, but downsizing it a little bit to offset the less amount of time. [1:18:10] Speaker B (unidentified): Is the propane actually broken? Yes, on this one. [1:18:15] Jane Penton: Good question. I have a question. What's the salaried wage [1:18:18] Speaker G (unidentified): line for? So we are hoping to [1:18:20] County building manager: get a full-timer starting March so that they can take over the maintenance and repairs and the stuff that will go along with that building, like the outside [1:18:30] Jane Penton: shoveling. But that's in fact to that. Are you excited to do it? Sure. [1:18:39] Brian Names: So this will end up being a full-time position for that one building [1:18:42] Speaker H (unidentified): to add to the staff that one building we asked. It's going to be a combination custodial maintenance facility. We're hoping to move some removal into it next year, save costs that way. [1:18:53] County building manager: And depending on how things go, my goal in a couple of years out is to take that salary, put it back into my line to this building so I can take my staff and move them around as needed. [1:19:04] Speaker H (unidentified): Put it here to be transparent. Right. [1:19:06] County building manager: I think it's easier this year to just show what I'm doing and then the next year to make it easier for me put it all back into my line and then I'm gonna the way I like to assign my guys are if he's more experienced shoveling then he's gonna go shovel versus a guy who's better doing sheetrock then I'll schedule a guy going she doing sheetrock I like the flexibility of bringing them to mismatch my crew. [1:19:40] Speaker J (unidentified): I'm just curious, what is the building going to be used for, given you're not being caught up? [1:19:46] County building manager: The EMA department that was up last round, they're actually moving in next Wednesday, and they're going to be occupying the entire second floor for the time being. [1:19:55] Speaker H (unidentified): Over? They're not rocked by the entire cycle floor, just a portion of it. The building's eventually going to be a regional public safety center. So EMA's moving in, taking a portion of that, and then the hope is the next year, it tunes to move the sheriff's office personnel to that building. Patrol, CID, several communications [1:20:13] Speaker F (unidentified): To become a public safety center. [1:20:16] Jane Penton: So dispatch is not moving there? [1:20:18] Speaker E (unidentified): Oh, yes. Okay, I'm sorry, I missed that part. [1:20:20] Speaker H (unidentified): It may not be next year. That's probably the most expensive part of the move, [1:20:23] Speaker J (unidentified): But the plan is definitely to get them over there wasn't that with the Subaru buildings it's for sale that's for sale you want to buy I don't I'm just trying to make it all make sense it was going to be but I was told to vote no on everything here by my councilmates because our staff are losing what I'm fighting for last year so I'm just trying to make sure that can't happen yes [1:20:47] Speaker H (unidentified): I know I haven't your council needs and your city has opened up opened us would welcome this open arms so you're urging for yes on this one [1:21:02] Speaker O (unidentified): Oh I'm sorry David go ahead so thank you so this is an eighty thousand dollar position [1:21:06] Speaker G (unidentified): You said you're gonna hire until March no this is an eighty thousand dollar budget talking about the twenty thousand dollars higher in March right so if you do the simple math [1:21:19] County building manager: Right let's say you pay somebody 21 20 an hour that's gonna be 40 000 a year so my minimum pay is like 21 an hour so I just put 20 000 to get it started and then we'll see how things happen [1:21:33] Speaker O (unidentified): Next July okay and this is for the treasurer have the advantages and benefits in your line [1:21:41] Speaker E (unidentified): Been reflective of this increased personal positions are in the benefit, thank you. [1:21:49] Jane Penton: Well, there are other questions. [1:21:52] Steve Stanton: Okay, did you want to do [1:21:55] Speaker H (unidentified): finished properties tonight, 774 Center Streets? [1:21:58] Jane Penton: We can, we can, since next week is typically a long night with an app that I want or to be motioned on these, we can move to 771 Center Street. Is everybody okay with that? [1:22:13] Speaker E (unidentified): Go ahead. [1:22:14] Speaker J (unidentified): I will move to recommend [1:22:17] Speaker O (unidentified): to prevent the $81,100 in expenditures [1:22:19] Brian Names: for the 455 Elizabeth Street. [1:22:23] Jane Penton: Great, if David has the motion, is there a second? John has the second. All in favor? Is there anyone in favor? That's a no, that's a full pass. All right, we're gonna add on 774 and 7th Street this evening. [1:22:58] Speaker H (unidentified): Yeah, it's just to keep the lights on until we sell it, took out special fees because we don't, we don't need to, we're not looking to advertise or conduct anything for that anymore, so this is to keep the lights on for the next six months, and there are other costs related from the other houses in this as well, so this does have the rental income as you can see up top, there's three homes left, that rainfall income does offset this budget, the idea of it when they did that was that idea, so there's three homes, pardon me, three homes left, I thought one, so yeah, we had four ones, oh okay, yeah, we have three left now, and are those properties for sale too, [1:23:46] Jane Penton: or is that coming out of the umbrella? [1:23:48] Speaker H (unidentified): Well, I think it comes out of the umbrella of the entire parcel. We haven't like carved them out for separate sale yet. There's been discussion about, you know, people with developer wanting the whole thing or not. So we haven't got enough offers yet to really get into that. If the houses remain and everything else sells, the county will be selling those homes. [1:24:10] Jane Penton: And I'm going to open up the plan of worms and can we discuss where we're at [1:24:15] Speaker H (unidentified): with the real estate taxes and what you never asked, the city of Auburn felt it necessary to tax us this year with properties, so that's what that is, the difference between the city [1:24:30] Brian Names: of Auburn adults is necessary and the fact that we have a assessor just like every other municipality or who's an evening state who has a state statute requirement to ensure that taxes they're living against every problem, so it's not a city of our decision, it's just ending, and so [1:24:47] Speaker F (unidentified): that's what you said, I told you so, why haven't they been done first, why hasn't we're in, we're [1:24:57] Brian Names: In a revaluation period, during that process, this property, I'm sure, hit the assessor's list and it was reviewed. I think that prior to that, it was intentions for this building to be to be reused for the purpose, and when that was no longer considered, I'm sure the assessor, who was an agent of the state, made that determination. So really, at the end of the [1:25:20] Speaker F (unidentified): day, it's because it's not going to be used without purposes. It's clear, right? That's [1:25:27] Brian Names: that's the interpretation that the county assessor, that I'm sorry, the city assessor has to take [1:25:32] Speaker H (unidentified): when you're violating properties. It's we don't think it's unclear and we believe the exact problems that create the law. I know that probably surprises you, but so we have followed the payment for the city. The law is pretty clear on our end in tax government property, which results in all [1:25:49] Speaker F (unidentified): you pay on those taxes too, right? The deed says who the owner is, not what the purpose is, right? [1:25:54] Speaker H (unidentified): The deed says it's the inhabitants of Innsbruck and Cuyahoga. Yeah. So. [1:25:59] Jane Penton: I have a math question. So we get the bill from the city of Auburn, right? Don't they in turn end up paying for about 25% of this, of this budget and taxing their residents extra because we're paying. I know. Right. My math is right. I'm correct. Right. So I guess I look at this as an unfair assessment towards the county that we have to pay for this. [1:26:34] Speaker H (unidentified): I'm just taking an entire look at this. You know, we look for parking fees for being assessed. It's also what we'll be looking at next year, is you're all paying for that. We have to buy parking spots on our own street. So it's all part of a bigger issue we're seeing. I would agree with you, and we hope the update will be successful. [1:26:57] Brian Names: You know, it's about the fact that there are there are costs and there are needs, and so that's what's being lucky this month. You know it's not that the city of Auburn is saying the we're going to be paying 25% of that fee regardless. The point of the matter is that it's a state statute that relates to if the county owns property that's not being used for county purposes, there's a tax limit. That's all. And if somebody is going to be parking here, whether it's the DA's office or another business, they're going to be paying for the parking spaces. That's just the way it is. I cannot not, I'm not going to allow an entity to not pay for parking when I have a business that's right next door that's paying without parking as well. So it's just, it's consistent. But I would love to have a conversation regarding subsidizing county services for municipalities and towns as we get through this budget, because I think that it clearly demonstrates that there's been dispatch that we are subsidizing for that service that's currently being provided by the connoisseur. So I'm happy to get into that conversation, but I think that these fees are allocated [1:28:18] Speaker F (unidentified): within a plurals and stable. [1:28:20] Speaker H (unidentified): I do want the board to know that I did attempt many times to permit the property for anything for connoisseur purposes. We were using it for storage. We were using it to joint trade with the sheriff's office. The opportunity was dissipated. We were using the main accounting thing so I was especially unsuccessful when he permitted to anything ultimately with the city teaming it as either vacant property which would buy so I think you're seeing the [1:28:47] Speaker E (unidentified): results of that right questions so I mean I know it's the state but [1:28:54] Speaker K (unidentified): So there's an assumption the bill isn't going to be state okay assumption that the building it was going to be used and no taxes now still open right and then all of a sudden they're now it's not going to be used now they assess it well we're still using it well we can't permit it for anything as long as I know but to Steve's point I know it's not I mean this is an argument for you guys but it's thinking about the common sense of the arguments over which we're selling everything yeah I'm not saying it sounds silly to me I agree yeah that's [1:29:26] Speaker H (unidentified): It's part of our bigger issue with Lisbon dispatch subsidizing. Here's a great example of how you're subsidizing [1:29:32] Speaker K (unidentified): all of its taxes. I'm going to hit you with a real one here. What's up on the internet? [1:29:38] Speaker H (unidentified): Well, fire alarm system and stuff. [1:29:42] Speaker O (unidentified): Sounds good. That was good too. Sorry, David? Same question. Service contracts? [1:29:48] Speaker H (unidentified): Yeah, there's still stuff to be a deal with the fire pumps. Even though it's vacant, get you know the fire suppression systems go on getting inspected routinely you know I can't speak to exactly what they are but there's still we have to maintain the building and so we don't want to dilapidate or get ruined before we sell it you know what I mean we already have some [1:30:11] Speaker F (unidentified): water leaks over there and stuff so we're so you don't need maintaining that you can pay taxes on [1:30:16] Speaker H (unidentified): It okay the way you get to see alignment yeah you're not I'm not gonna pay taxes you guys [1:30:21] Speaker F (unidentified): A lot of things yeah I'm just saying the town of Poland I'll make that too yeah exactly [1:30:28] Speaker O (unidentified): Right, so if this building sells tomorrow and this money gets approved by the commissioners, that 46,000 would go into undesignated fund balance, right? Then even if the building sells [1:30:42] Speaker E (unidentified): tomorrow, those are expensive, those taxes are still existing. Yeah, those are the money that [1:30:49] Jane Penton: that we might not, but the taxes are going to be paid. [1:30:53] Speaker O (unidentified): Taxes are appropriated between the current owner and the future owner. [1:30:56] Speaker H (unidentified): The county's got a rock and a hard place. Do we lower our asking costs on these properties to take a loss in order to not get any more taxes from Auburn? So we're really in a critical part where now we're getting taxed $30-something thousand a year. Next year, it's going up to $60,000. We get a one-year abatement for 774, the building. That's another $30,000 that's coming. So the commissioner had to make a decision. We saw this property at a loss or less money in order to avoid a future tax credit. It's a rock and a hard place. [1:31:26] Speaker O (unidentified): That's a math question. [1:31:29] Speaker E (unidentified): Simple finance. I think the answer is August. [1:31:33] Speaker O (unidentified): As long as you're good at pricing for the market. [1:31:35] Speaker H (unidentified): There's some hesitancy to purchase the building. Well, I get that. [1:31:40] Jane Penton: Any more discussion? [1:31:42] Speaker N (unidentified): Well, it's said now. What's this going to be the tax status [1:31:46] Speaker H (unidentified): as of this incident the city I've already the state of Wilson is it's designed and taxed nor is our property on what are you for Main Street well you're moving in two weeks and there's gonna be a lot of times nobody had to two weeks right but so that would but only important it's been numerous [1:32:04] Speaker N (unidentified): times that building only a portion of it right now you're gonna be taking control of the entire building so the entire building is going off Lewiston's tax roll never was on it was owned [1:32:15] Speaker H (unidentified): by a non-profit prior to the public CD so [1:32:19] Speaker N (unidentified): you're loaning is the rain tax hope it doesn't rain [1:32:28] Brian Names: so this is going to continue to levy the rain tax against this open [1:32:33] Speaker O (unidentified): I don't know if it could be I will say that rain tax is levy rain tax is the long term The stormwater fee, be very careful about the stormwater fee, is levied on regardless of tax exempt or not. That's the purpose of the stormwater fee, is to try and extract some revenues from non-tax paying, non-profits and non-tax paying entities, yes. So I would assume that yes, the stormwater fee will be assessed on the farm. [1:33:06] Brian Names: So, if they were using Lewiston's parking spaces, my guess is you'd be paying, you'd be charging for parking spaces as well. So, you know, I just, we need to make sure that as we're talking, we're being consistent with the costs that we have. And regardless of where they reside, there will be costs. And there's costs that's being levied to the county, and that town should receive those funds for those costs. That's what I think we're saying. Well, this is certainly levying the stormwater separation tax. [1:33:41] Speaker H (unidentified): It's the same. It's only a big, what, $10,000 a year. Of course. [1:33:46] Speaker F (unidentified): And that's what I do. Oh, yeah. So we don't. With the tickets, we don't. So just to be clear, the base pay pays to the city? [1:33:59] Speaker O (unidentified): Base pays is the stormwater fee. It's assessed on the base market area. [1:34:05] Brian Names: They don't do the city department. They have their own base quality. [1:34:11] Speaker B (unidentified): Parking on the streets, there's no charge to any resident for a base quality. Obviously, they park on the streets. The city doesn't charge the residents to park on the streets. So, no, the college doesn't pay you parking on the streets. [1:34:31] Speaker H (unidentified): There's a law in the books surrounding this issue about parking. You won't find any other counties that pay parking fees in their cities. But I'll bring it back if you guys have an expedient. [1:34:40] Speaker K (unidentified): I agree with your understanding on the fact that we should let the lawyers have it. [1:34:45] Speaker H (unidentified): Well, yeah, and that's where your special fees come. If you're getting hit twice, you're getting hit on taxes. You're getting paid on a lawyer's fees. So it's all going to come around. I know you need me to stop the fire, but that's the truth of it. [1:35:27] Brian Names: I'm curious if it sounds like we're really setting the meeting. All right. Is there a second? All in favor? [1:35:36] Jane Penton: There are fellows. Stephen and I, please state. [1:35:45] Speaker F (unidentified): To give revenues, we can charge revenue to Susan County, but we can't get a text back to the city. [1:35:53] Jane Penton: Are there any other questions for a resident? News, I have a motion to return. Oh, you guys go on real quickly. She has the first and I will give Dave the second. All the papers are adjourned. All right. Thank you folks. We'll see you in three.