Today was a general County Board meeting, the big shebang, and not to be confused with the Committee of the Whole, that is more focused on areas of responsibility of subcommittees and offices of county government. This is where a lot of the major decisions on policy are made, along with a lot of administrative decisions being voted on fairly quickly.
When are county board meetings? The County Clerk website describing the various county meetings puts it this way: "The Champaign County Board typically meets the third Thursday (following the first Monday) of each month at 6:30 p.m." So, if you look at the yearly calendar, it's probably just best to check the calendar until you're used to checking for the first Monday and not just counting Thursdays. I'd probably goof it up unless I checked which third Thursday myself, so I used their Calendar that already figured it out.
To catch an older meeting: https://www.youtube.com/user/champaigncountyclerk
Today's meeting:
A solid overview is available from the News-Gazette: http://www.news-gazette.com/news/local/2017-10-20/county-board-rejects-motion-request-bids-nursing-home.html
There was a preliminary meeting due to an increase of the tax levy at 6pm that had its own basic agenda printed out that essentially just explained the confusing state mandated announcement in the paper that required it be formatted in a way that made it sound like taxes were going to go up.
What's going on is that the court case on whether or not hospital property will be taxed is still working its way through the courts and the levy needed to be adjusted now to take into account that property being taxed if the court rules that way. If it rules the other way it's legally simple to adjust the levy back down later. The reason to be pro-active and adjust it up is that it is legally difficult (perhaps impossible) to adjust it up in hindsight if the court rules the property taxable.
The end result for the tax payer depending on the way the court rules is estimated to be about 45 cents difference on a $150,000 home. So literal pocket change after the levy is applied to estimated property values and the tax is calculated. Handy information on tax levy versus tax rates from the News-Gazette and couple other sources including a quick confirmation e-mail from County staff.
[Update: I added an addendum on the tax levy page by someone who knows what they're talking about and explained both tax levies *and* this hospital situation related to them here with a direct jump link.]
Regular meeting:
Chris Stohr was sworn in:
The agenda was a bit confusing this time around. There was the two sided County Board Agenda, that was apparently out of order and had to be re-ordered during the meeting. That was stapled to a yellow consent agenda for other items to be voted on, and a third loose addendum agenda that added three more items to other business. Makes it a bit harder to follow along.
Again, the News-Gazette article is concise for the bullet points on the contentious votes to prepare a 12 month budget too and allowing the brokerage firm to start getting bids for the Nursing Home.
Public participation included a couple people I believe I saw at the BPNJ meeting who spoke along with a few community members and a former board candidate in support of the Nursing Home being managed by the new company and not being sabotaged by signals that the Board is going to assume its sale or failure. Appeals were made for pre-trial services and not using jails as providers for rehab and mental health care.
The upcoming MLK Jr. celebration will be honoring local youth. There will be details on the website to nominate a young person to be honored at the event.
After some easily passed measures they got to the discussion on preparing the 12 month budget. The gist was that Republicans see only doom for the County Budget if they act like they're going to retain it and liberals won't be able to fund all of those marvelous programs they want if all the budget keeps going to keep the Nursing Home limping along with loans and all its debt. Democrats argued intensely that the home is still the obligation of the board and no vote has been taken to sell it by the board and it would be irresponsible to act like such a vote has already taken place when they don't even have the votes to pass the sale yet.
The chairman tried to calm tensions as it was becoming apparent in tone and demeanor that people were getting upset at accusations that Republicans were only looking for a tax cut at the expense of residents. Democrats appeared upset at the apparent disingenuous support for other services and one member using a public participant's family member to argue against their position.
All of this to merely prepare a 12 month budget to have as comparison. Not pass a budget. It passed by hand vote, a roll call request coming too late.
The discussion towards the release of RFP (essentially to allow the brokerage firm get bids for the Nursing Home under various requirements to maintain so many beds, services, etc) continued to the discussions about the tightness of the budget in hiring staff, as with a previous vote, and the proverbial money pit the Republicans believed the Nursing Home to be. They accused the Democrats of kicking the can down the road which in their estimation is why they're still dealing with a failing system. Democrats inquired where the minimum sale price and other figures came from and the Administrator said it was mostly through the brokerage firm looking at similar sales elsewhere and other factors.
In the end the vote with Republicans and Patsy Petrie against the Democrats in a failing tie vote 11-11 roll call. The following items on the agenda relied on the RFP passing and it was brought up that the lawyer recommended against having a vote on those dependent items. It was mentioned that the RFP vote could not be reconsidered at this meeting having failed as such.
Some folks lingered and talked to their board members afterward. I waited to introduce myself behind a couple other constituents, but ran out of time. I'm starting to remember some faces and names and following a couple on facebook for updates and reactions. So, I might slowly be figuring out what the county government is up to... and maybe eventually effect positive change in it. It's not so bad if you want to give it a whirl.
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