Hotel/Motel Money to Fair, Road Commission, Public Health Programs, Neighborhood Meeting on Saturday for Campaign

This week was relatively quiet in terms of action at the full Board of Commissioners meeting. We had just one item pulled from the consent agenda, and it was to transfer $110,000 from hotel/motel fund balance to the Fair capital improvement account for maintenance and exhibits. Commissioner Nolan mentioned that we do not have a fair director and wanted to know where this money would go. She wants the incoming interim fair director to make the decisions and indicated this could be \premature. She also indicated an interest in Commissioners having a strategic plan on facility upgrades. Commissioner Koenig, who serves on the Fair Board, said that the original amount was three times the $110,000 and that the Fair Board reduced it in order to only deal with the necessities. She said that she doesn’t want to prevent the money from going to the fair because the money is needed August is coming up quickly. Commissioner Grenbner pointed out that the new interim fair director will be able to veto this as needed. Commissioner Bahar-Cook said that we need to approve the transfer to ensure time for competitive bids. I asked if this money will affect the hotel/motel fund, and was assured that we have significant dollars in that fund. During public comment, a member of the Fair Board indicated that this money is needed for rabbit cages and sheep pens and other things need to be fixed, and said that this is about animal safety and youth safety (petting zoos). We approved the movement of the money unanimously.

We also held our second public comment period on the Road Commission Board transfer of powers. Our Controller first went through the proposed summary of transition plan, which can be viewed at www.ingham.org. She explained that existing contracts and benefits stay intact until expiration; the County Commission would create a budget and make employees and assets part of the county (they are on the financial statement currently); central services, finance, and purchasing would become part of the county; nothing would change for the public and the day to day operations would stay the same; federal dollars would continue through tri-county planning; staff would work with the townships for priorities and with citizens for complaints; and strategic planning would either happen through an independent board or by the County Commission.

Labor testified opposed to the dissolution of the road commission, including OPEIU 512 which has 2 road commission units and the AFL-CIO (and the UAW by proxy). They said that the knowledge and experience of the road commissions would go away. They asked for one year for the Road Commission to show that it has fixed the internal problems and to implement their new plan. A few employees upset about the firing of the former operations manager continued to complain about what they said was corruption on the existing board and asked to get rid of the existing board. The new Chair of the Road Commission, Jim Dravenstatt-Moceri, explained his new plan. He said that the Road Commission this year has passed resolutions asking the county to take over the HR, Finance, and IT functions of the road commission. They also passed a resolution to empower the managing director to do hiring and firing of employees. That leaves the roads up to the Road Commission Board. He asked for a year to implement this and see how it is going, and said he wants to work collaboratively for the future for the benefit of the county residents. Delhi Township testified that if there is a new consulting Board regarding roads, they want representation on the advisory board to reflect their population size and the number of roads. Another employee mentioned that a positive to elimination of the Road Commission Board would be that drain assessments, which have gone to litigation in the past to the chagrin of the County Commission, would no longer be a problem because the County Commission will be in charge. Finally, the County Road Association of Michigan testified and offered to be a resource for the County Commission either way. They pointed out that Ingham County will be a member regardless. They also said that we may want to delay a decision until July, when the liability pool will change its policies to allow for road agencies to participate. We will now start taking up the resolutions for this in County Services, which should be interesting!

On the Consent Agenda, we passed a resolution to amend our 2011-2012 Comprehensive
Planning, Budgeting and Contracting (CPBC) Agreement with the Michigan Department of Community Health (MDCH). The CPBC Agreement is the annual process whereby MDCH transmits State and Federal funds to Ingham County to support public health programs. The Amendment makes the following specific changes in the budget:
1. Increases support for Highly Targeted HIV Prevention by $52,968 - increasing the total amount to
$105,936.
2. Increases funding for HIV/AIDS Care by $137,500 – increasing the total amount to $275,000.
3. Raises funding for HIV Prevention by $87,190 – increasing the total amount to $174,380.
4. Increases funding for STD Control by $20,342 - increasing the total amount to $44,998.
5. Increases support for TB Control by $2,111 – increasing the total amount to $21,973.
6. Raises funding for WIC Resident Services by $21,300 – increasing the total amount to $1,195,132.
7. Adds new funding for the Nurse Family Partnership Services in the amount of $245,000.
8. Adds new funding for the Michigan Climate and Health Adaptation Program in the amount of $15,000.
9. Adds new funding for the PRIME Local Learning Collaborative in the amount of $5,200.
10. Adds new funding for the Asthma Control through Education and Environment project in the amount of $12,495.

On the campaign trail, things are going very well! Fundraising donations continue to come in, I am having great response at doors and neighborhood meetings, and I am happy to announce my first Neighborhood Meeting this Saturday at the home of Monica Zuchowski in downtown Lansing (320 North Walnut Road in Lansing) from 10-12. I am looking forward to sharing my thoughts about the important issues facing our area and all of Michigan, and I want to hear from Lansing and Lansing Township residents about priorities for moving us forward! I hope to see you there, and ask you to please RSVP at rsvp@andyschor.com so we can have an approximate count for food.

Have a great week!

Beer Tent at Fair, Incentive Clause for Fair Manager, Honoring MLK and Dot Wilson and Cristo Rey

Sorry to be late with this blog. As my campaign for State Representative heats up, I will be going to more and more events and have less time. But I will not neglect my county duties and will try to get this blog out as quickly as possible.

In County Services this week, we took up a resolution to permanently authorize the Fair Board to allow for an adult refreshment tent at the Ingham County Fairgrounds. A few years ago, we debated this and voted to authorize the Fair Board to allow the fair to offer alcohol in a segregated and controlled environment, but only for a two year pilot. That vote was controversial because several people gave public comment that having a beer/alcohol tent would result in all kinds of problems - drunk people letting animals out of the pens, fights, drunk driving, etc. Now that we have two years experience and have had absolutely zero problems at the fair dealing with the beer/alcohol tents, we were considering a resolution to make this permanently allowed (but still up to the discretion of the Fair Board). Commissioner Grebner commented that he wanted to be sure to alert the people who opposed this that we would be taking up this resolution before we actually vote on it. He reiterated that there have been no problems and that the concerns were unfounded, but thought we should proactively notify these residents. It was also pointed out that the fair made money on the beer/alcohol tent which kept the fair in the black. Commissioner Vickers agreed that there were no problems, but requested the financials for the last two years for the fair. Both he and Commissioner Dragonetti questioned whether the financial numbers included set-up and staffing costs for the beer tent. The resolution was tabled for a meeting in order to invite the members of the public that testified previously, and to have the financial information presented to the committee.

The second controversial resolution at County Services was the resolution to hire a new Fair Manager. The resolution was much more controversial. Instead of hiring a county employee, this would hire a gentleman who was highly qualified through a company he had formed. He wanted to forego benefits and just get paid a salary. The catch is that he also wanted incentive dollars. The resolution would have authorized a salary at $80,000, plus an additional $7,500 at the end of first year and up to $15,000 at the end of the 2nd year. It was pointed out that this is cheaper than what the county pays for a full time employee at the lowest step (because benefits are not being paid, and they could be up t0 $40,000). Incentives could include making money, increased customers at the fair, effective marketing techniques, filling the commercial sponsors by some %, filling the spaces, etc...and would be created by the Fair Board with approval from the Controller.

I had serious concerns about voting for a contract with incentive money. I was especially concerned about the idea of approving this when we don't even know what the incentives will be. Because the resolution already required the controller to approve the incentives used before incentive money is disbursed, I proposed an amendment that was passed that requires the Controller to report the conditions to the County Services Committee. This will ensure that we know what those incentives are, and that we approve. I agreed to support this resolution because Controller Lannoye and Committee Chair DeLeon said that this candidate was the best that we had and that they want to finalize this contract over the next week or two.

In Finance Committee, this resolution saw even further scrutiny. Commissioner Nolan argued that Ingham County doesn't need a full time fair director for a fair that is one week in the summer, and for other random bookings of the fair grounds. She asked about comparable fairs, and said that $80,000 is a lot of money. Honestly, she made a lot of sense. Then, Commissioner Bahar-Cook also made some great points. She asked if this is the only contract he will have. Will he be available as we need him? Is he doing other fairs? If we are contracting with him through a company, how do we know that he will be doing our work first and foremost? Other questions arose from committee members about whether he will be principally based here, and if he would be doing the day to day supervision of our county staff. It was expressed that there should be a statement of hours provided to controller, and expectation of day-to-day supervision of county staff and hours, and requirements of working on site - as would be expected of a full time county employee. Commissioner Grebner and Bahar-Cook proposed an amendment which passed requiring a statement of hours worked on a regular basis to assure that services provided are comparable to a full time employee. Additionally, an amendment was passed to eliminate the incentives. Again, several committee members mentioned that an incentive bonus is not something we do with any other employee. The parks director doesn't get this for the number of users of the parks; the health department doesn't get this for assisting clients; etc. Commissioner McGrain along with Commissioners Bahar-Cook and Nolan said that even if this way is cheaper, it is still something we don't do with our county directors. Also, it was pointed out that other employees could decide not to take benefits, and we don't offer them incentives. It was a very convincing argument and I decided to support the amendment. Commissioner McGrain pointed out that we could review the county policy and implement these countywide, but not just for the Fair Director. After these amendments were passed, the resolution was passed and will now go to the Board floor.

We also approved several resolutions, including a resolution honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., a resolution honoring Dorothy (Dot) Wilson who recently passed away, and a resolution honoring Cristo Rey Church on the event of its 50th Anniversary.

I will note that these were the last committee meetings of the year. Next year I will be on the Human Services and County Services committees, so you will hear about the issues that those two committees discuss. We have one more Board meeting, on Tuesday, where we will deal with the Intent to Dissolve the Road Commission resolution in addition to the resolutions mentioned in this blog.