At a June 3 budget workshop, Grand County commissioners confronted mounting exhaustion and persistent uncertainty as they worked to amend the 2025 budget and address ongoing scrutiny from the State Auditor.
Gabriel Woytek:
Hi Bill, you're good.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, I will open this budget workshop.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's 3 p.m on Tuesday, the 3rd of June.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Present are Commissioner Hedin, Commissioner Hadler, Commissioner McCurdy,
Commissioner McGann, Commissioner Martinez, Commissioner McCandless, and myself,
Commissioner Winfield.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And we will start this off with some discussion and even to opening this maybe
with some updates from Gabe regarding some of the numbers and where we're at.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But I would like to just kind of come out here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know that most of us as commissioners have seen Brian's email about moving
on.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I want to state that after we had our meeting yesterday, I believe it was,
Chair Bill Winfield:
that I also then went in and talked to Mark and Quinn about something very
similar that it would
Chair Bill Winfield:
be nice to try and get the commission to the end of this, get to the bottom
line of where we are
Chair Bill Winfield:
financially and attempt to move on to some other things that I think that this
might be keeping us
Chair Bill Winfield:
from being able to deal with.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so I would just like to see commissioners today try and get to the bottom
line of these finances.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So we know where we're at with a very accurate number, and then we can make
some decisions about what we need to do to come into compliance, to bring
ourselves into a budget that isn't out of balance.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so that's just where I thought I would start out with this and then I'll
turn it over to Gabe.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Gabriel Woytek:
So I'm going to just start by going over the document that had been presented
at last budget workshop meeting on the 27th and just go over some updates to
that document.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's what I'm sharing right now on the screen.
Gabriel Woytek:
It is titled 6325 Budget Workshop.
Gabriel Woytek:
Just a little item, the Museum of Moab Contribution.
Gabriel Woytek:
I had that quoted in this document as 144,525.
Gabriel Woytek:
That was just a simple typo.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's actually 114,525.
Gabriel Woytek:
I just wanted to make that very clear.
Gabriel Woytek:
And then the following update would be to the remaining budgeted expenses for
the use of 2AII, that's TRT, Establish, Promote, Recreation, Film Production,
and Conventions.
Gabriel Woytek:
So that number has been updated to 328,974.
Gabriel Woytek:
And that is made up of from two sources or from two different departments, one
of which is the Film Commission that remains unchanged.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's the same as it was displayed previously.
Gabriel Woytek:
And then there's the budgeted contributions to the Grand County Active Trails
and Transportation Program.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so this 328,974 is the summation of 106,632 and 222,342.
Gabriel Woytek:
And contained within this 106,632 is the use of these funds to support the
Volunteer and Business Coordinator position, the amount of $31,091.
Gabriel Woytek:
And remaining programming budgeted, already budgeted this year to be used by
the Active Trails and Transportation Department in the amount of $75,541.
Gabriel Woytek:
And this was programming that was deemed to be considered promotion in a
meeting that was held yesterday amongst a few of the commissioners.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so that's the update on this top, this first section here.
Gabriel Woytek:
There's another document in the packet.
Gabriel Woytek:
And that derives that $75,541, which it's close.
Gabriel Woytek:
There are a few still items that need more information.
Gabriel Woytek:
So there could still be a relatively small amount added to that number.
Gabriel Woytek:
But in another document that's in the packet, which is an overview of budgeted
2AII uses by Grand County Active Trails and Transportation, looks like that is
called, at least right now as I have it, 2025 budget line items.
Gabriel Woytek:
I don't think it has that title in the packet.
Gabriel Woytek:
But this is a breakdown of those remaining budgeted 2AII expenses allocated to
the Active Trails and Transportation Program.
Gabriel Woytek:
And it's just the sum up of determinations that were made amongst those
budgeted expenses.
Gabriel Woytek:
Those that were set in red, as you can see from the key here, were not
considered promotion, and therefore at this time are being held out from what
will be the amended budget.
Gabriel Woytek:
There's a handful of items in purple that where more information will be needed
before they would be included.
Gabriel Woytek:
And there's items in green that are considered promotion and deemed allowable
to remain in the 2025 budget.
Mary McGann:
And that's under 6.3. Oh, I see.
Jacques Hadler:
Give me the attachment.
Mary McGann:
I got it.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's 2025 TRT 2AII budget GCAP programming is the name of the document in the
packet.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so the summary of unplanned general fund expenses to date include trail
ambassador compliance reimbursements and the amounts for 2025.
Gabriel Woytek:
There's a to date number that would comprise trail ambassador salaries.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's the running total at this point that would be updated depending on
whatever actions are proceed.
Gabriel Woytek:
And then in addition to trail ambassador salary reimbursements from 2024 and
2023, that would be made from the originally budgeted amount of 2AII expenses,
TRT 2AII expenses.
Gabriel Woytek:
Again, that's establishing and promoting recreation, film production, and
conventions that has been historically allocated to the recreation special
service district.
Gabriel Woytek:
The entire amount of allocations from 2021 to 2024 amounts to $476,000.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's my understanding that this amount, that there's going to be an examination
of these allocations to whatever agencies were ultimately recipients.
Gabriel Woytek:
And it'll be determined if any of that is qualifiable as promotion.
Gabriel Woytek:
Therefore, it's possible that this entire $476,000 would not have to be
reimbursed based on that determination.
Gabriel Woytek:
And then the remainder of the figures here remain unchanged from the document
that was presented last week, bringing us to a grand total of 2025 unplanned
general fund expenses that'll have to be worked into a budget amendment in the
amount of $1,670,325.
Gabriel Woytek:
Oh, what's that?
Gabriel Woytek:
1.67. Moving down the rest of the list, I made a...
Jacques Hadler:
Sorry.
Gabriel Woytek:
I corrected the amount for the Osta cattle panels.
Gabriel Woytek:
It was my understanding that $180,000 was the total cost of those panels.
Gabriel Woytek:
$85,000 was was given in by the Recreation Special Service District, leaving
$75,000 to the to Grand County.
Gabriel Woytek:
And there was a small cost overrun of approximately $1,500.
Gabriel Woytek:
I quoted that I believe is $90,000 in the previous document.
Gabriel Woytek:
So that's been updated.
Gabriel Woytek:
Furthermore, there was a question regarding vehicle leases that were on this
list.
Gabriel Woytek:
I was able to verify with the help of budget officer Stephen Bowles that there,
with the exception of two sheriff vehicles, which were included and approved in
the preauthorized expenditure list, there were no new vehicle, unique new
vehicle leases that were included in the 2025 budget.
Gabriel Woytek:
There were, however, some leases that had been previously approved.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so I didn't go back over the workshop meetings themselves and go back to
the tape.
Gabriel Woytek:
But that leads me to believe at this time that the commission had decided that
there would be no new leases introduced over what had already been approved.
Gabriel Woytek:
There might have been, there were some that were approved, but the leases never
initiated.
Gabriel Woytek:
And in those cases, they were included in the budget.
Gabriel Woytek:
There were two new leases.
Gabriel Woytek:
One was a search and rescue vehicle, and one was the, was a vehicle for the new
pretrial services deputy position.
Gabriel Woytek:
I believe I had those, can't, not sure if I had those in the separate list that
I had, which was a preauthorized expenditures over $5,000 that weren't capital
projects.
Gabriel Woytek:
I decided to leave that off of this version of the document.
Gabriel Woytek:
I didn't, after the, after presenting it in the last meeting, I didn't feel
like it was helpful to the conversation to pull in other, you know, a handful of
other expenses.
Gabriel Woytek:
Those definitely do still exist in the document that existed in the workshop
for last week.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so they're still obviously there for reference as needed.
Gabriel Woytek:
But I wanted to just tighten this up to capital projects, general fund expenses
that are planned for this year.
Gabriel Woytek:
Some of which, you know, came up during the year, others that were already
preauthorized, namely the CJC facility purchase, and I believe the cattle panel
order as well.
Gabriel Woytek:
But these roof and HVAC replacements, which are largely funded by insurance.
Gabriel Woytek:
And I think there might be some more follow-up needed with regards to insurance
coverage on some of these, but it is, it's the general scale of any corrections
that would be included in the, that would be budgeted for, certainly will be
accurately accounted for.
Gabriel Woytek:
But sort of coming to a summary, if the Pickleball Court playground, the
county's contribution, I believe it's a 50% match for that project of $600,000
on a $1.2 million project as it currently stands.
Gabriel Woytek:
If that were to be included in approved capital fund, capital project general
fund expenditures, it runs a total of $1,472,991.
Gabriel Woytek:
So with those general fund expenses and those capital
Gabriel Woytek:
project general fund expenses, I just wanted to give it, provide an update here
where the general
Gabriel Woytek:
fund balance, the most updated general fund or the general fund balance figure
that we had in
Gabriel Woytek:
the budget at close of 2024, as well as the capital project fund balance at the
close of 2024
Gabriel Woytek:
and the impact that would be associated and the impact of those funds, what
would be left in those
Gabriel Woytek:
funds, less total unplanned expenses, less total capital expenses as displayed
with 8.9 million in
Gabriel Woytek:
the general fund reserve balance, 5.4 million in the capital expense reserve
balance.
Gabriel Woytek:
And one last summary.
Brian Martinez:
Can you repeat those numbers real quick?
Trish Hedin:
Right on there.
Trish Hedin:
It's right on there.
Gabriel Woytek:
8.9 million, 8,949,123 dollars would be the estimated remainder of the general
fund balance and 5,491,700 dollars for the capital project balance.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And the screens will come back on if they sometimes go down.
Jacques Hadler:
Can I ask you a question real quick?
Jacques Hadler:
What statutorily, what is the most that we can carry as a general fund balance?
Gabriel Woytek:
I don't want to quote something if I'm not right.
Jacques Hadler:
That's fine.
Jacques Hadler:
Yeah, we can probably.
Jacques Hadler:
Just for clarity, we generally do move stuff into the capital project balance
from the general fund so that you're remaining compliant with that, right?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's the main, or you know, I think that that largely belies the reason why
the capital project balance is as large as it is.
Gabriel Woytek:
And it's been a way to keep the general fund balance appropriately lean
according to the code.
Gabriel Woytek:
And then I provided a short summary here for the TRT2AII.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's the Recreation, Film, and Conventions TRT.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so there's an amount of these funds that still have this tag on them that
we know, you know, will be through this series of actions will be contained
within the fund balance of Fund 23, where the TRT non-mitigation funds are
administered.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so if you sum up the total trail ambassador reimbursements, so that's the
three figures up here plus the $182,000 that was already reimbursed as a result
of the state auditor's findings comes to $772,000.
Gabriel Woytek:
There is an amount that has been identified in Fund 47.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's the fund that operates the Grand County Active Trails and Transportation
Program, as well as Pave Path Maintenance and the Spanish Valley Drive Trail
project.
Gabriel Woytek:
But there are TRT funds that are in that fund balance and TRT funds that are
unspent have to be kept in a restricted fund where those funds are administered.
Gabriel Woytek:
So those should be appropriately accounted for in Fund 23, as well as the
estimated reimbursement of Recreation Special Service District's fund
allocations.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so I think it's important to highlight that there's an amount of
$1,413,000.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's an estimated amount at this point, $1,413,596.
Gabriel Woytek:
That will be in the Fund 23 fund balance that have an allowable use associated
with the code as it relates to TRT2AII.
Mike McCurdy:
Quick question with that.
Mike McCurdy:
Along with that $1,413,000, going back in the account, does it also apply more
to the mitigation side, seeing that that's a percentage of the total amount?
Mike McCurdy:
Does it go to mitigate a small amount because it's a percentage of the total
amount?
Jacques Hadler:
There's no mitigation in that.
Gabriel Woytek:
That was money that was already split out for that 2AII use.
Mike McCurdy:
It'll be on the promotion side?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Gabriel Woytek:
It'll be on the establishment side.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's not just promotion.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Jacques Hadler:
And then, Gabe, so the 2AII would be lumped in with the 2AII, with just the
establishment remotes, the two different tags on them.
Brian Martinez:
That's what I was asking at the beginning, is we need a breakdown of Fund 23 to
make sure that we have, you know, it's 2AII and it's 2AII.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And as I read it, 2AII is tourism and II is production and conventions,
correct?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And just mostly for the public and others here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know most of us are somewhat familiar with what those buckets are.
Gabriel Woytek:
So, yeah, I'll go ahead.
Gabriel Woytek:
I have the code open here.
Gabriel Woytek:
As we're saying, 2AII highlights requirements to establish and promote tourism.
Gabriel Woytek:
Tourism defined as an activity to develop, encourage, solicit, or market
tourism that attracts transient guests to the county.
Gabriel Woytek:
2AII is establish and promote recreation, film production, and conventions.
Gabriel Woytek:
And the clause here, you know, calls out 2AII.
Gabriel Woytek:
It definitely doesn't call out 2AII, 2AII, 2AII.
Jacques Hadler:
That's the rub.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, I've got a couple of questions back to your other document, Gabe, if we
could.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We're looking back at the Trail Ambassadors 23 forward and the REC SSD, we're
looking back 21 through 24.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, my questions are kind of double-sided.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we take the Trail Ambassadors back to 21?
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know that that's probably in that 182, correct?
Chair Bill Winfield:
And the REC SSD, do we not need to move that forward to whatever our current
date is?
Gabriel Woytek:
Just 24, but through half of 25?
Gabriel Woytek:
That allocation or that transfer of those funds hasn't been made in 2025.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Gabriel Woytek:
So, it would be assumed that that wouldn't be made and these are just
reimbursements of those transfers already made.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And the Trail Ambassadors portion of the 21 moving forward to the 23 is the
182K that's at the very bottom fourth line from the bottom.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Is that correct?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Brian Martinez:
Hold on.
Brian Martinez:
I'm going on that though, but there's two of them, right?
Brian Martinez:
There's the there's the program, there's the programming, and then there's the
salaries.
Brian Martinez:
So, we've taken the program, we've only gone through the programming of 25,
right?
Brian Martinez:
But we did not go through the programming then of 24, 23, 22, and 21.
Gabriel Woytek:
The state of hours findings letter doesn't articulate that.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's very clear that it applies to Trail Ambassadors salaries.
Gabriel Woytek:
I guess there's a situation now where we're, I guess, because there's a new
auditor where we're, you know, I guess I'll just speak to the misunderstanding
that we had that I brought that I brought forward.
Gabriel Woytek:
I no longer feel like the misunderstanding has anything to do with the Grand
County's compliance.
Gabriel Woytek:
The misunderstanding has to do with the fact that we misunderstood that we
would have to be applying a standard to these funds based on an interpretation
of code that, in my estimation, doesn't follow the way the code is written.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so, it basically, it seems like this whole situation has changed, and I
definitely don't, you know, I no longer feel that Grand County has been out of
compliance.
Gabriel Woytek:
And with these budgeted expenses for 2025, I feel like our 2025 budget is fully
compliant, and I don't think that's a creative or strange interpretation of the
code.
Gabriel Woytek:
But I'll just need to say that.
Trish Hedin:
Stephen, what is your opinion on that?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So, I think whenever we look at expenditures, go back to that same code, we
have a twofold thing that we have to do when we spend rec film and convention
funds.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's promote and establish.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you can meet those prongs, that's what we're looking at.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If we are establishing and promoting rec film production and conventions,
that's what we need to look at.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Obviously, when we go through the expenditures, there are things that are going
to be much more, and again, attorneys, we talk about defensible, much more
defensible, and there are things that might be less defensible.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's where I go through.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We had a meeting, and the Commissioner's got a link to that, and we went
through that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's my stance on it, is that there are things that are defensible, and there
are things that are less defensible.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Now, if Commissioners want to ask me particular things, I can go through that,
but realistically, where we are at now is we've gotten a follow-up from the
State Auditor.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We reached out requesting additional assistance on these topics, and they have
indicated that they would like the county to come into compliance, and the
language that they utilized was that they'd like the county to be away from the
line.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Like, if there's a question of ability or not, or if one feels the need to kind
of justify or argue it, they said the county shouldn't find themselves in that
position.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's the conversation that they indicated to me on a phone call.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I shared that with Commissioner Hadler, McCandless, and Winfield.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Previously, they were upset.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They indicated that they felt like the county was not staying away from the
line, is how they put it, and so that's triggered the visiting or revisiting of
this issue and this item, and so that's where the scrutiny is being applied, and
that's why we met yesterday and talked about these different items.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So ultimately, it's the Commissioner's responsibility to go through and select
the items that they want to say falls within that criteria, and I can tell you
what's more defensible and less defensible.
Gabriel Woytek:
Any follow-ups on that?
Gabriel Woytek:
Defensible based on establish and promote, or just promote, is my question.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Establish and promote.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
From the position of the state auditor, she indicated that the funds from the
TRT were to be utilized for promotion.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's the pushback that she gave to me, was that the funds were designed for
promotion, that's what the underlying item of TRT is for promotion.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Those were her words when we reached out to her.
Trish Hedin:
Even though it says establish?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'm repeating the language that was told to me.
Trish Hedin:
So she's not reading the code?
Trish Hedin:
She's not relaying the code?
Trish Hedin:
I get that?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
From their portion of it, they're saying establish and promoting as conjoined,
as conjunctive, requirable.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
You establish and promote recreation, film, production.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So when we see an expenditure, there should be a promotion element to it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Now, one thing that we differentiate slightly is we look at the definition of
tourism, and I think we would look at promotion under this current bill, or this
current form of it, not each work 56.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But there was previously a requirement when we talked about tourism, you had to
bring people from the outside in.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's different than establishing and promoting.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you have a promotion element, I think it's going to be, again, more
defensible.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you have expenditure that is establishing and promoting, one of the caveats
or a Roman numeral III, I think that's going to be easier to defend.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But that's where they were pushing back and indicated that from the position of
the state auditor's office, that it needed to be more promotion focused.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And that's what their position was.
Brian Martinez:
Mary, go ahead.
Mary McGann:
A couple of things.
Mary McGann:
I would like to keep everything in that's defensible.
Mary McGann:
If we're able to defend it, I think it's important to protect the taxpayers'
money.
Mary McGann:
It is property taxes that be taken away from.
Mary McGann:
And so if it's defendable, I definitely think we should keep it.
Mary McGann:
We should keep it where it's at.
Mary McGann:
And the things that are not dependent are on the gray area.
Mary McGann:
I would be very interested to see other counties.
Mary McGann:
I would really be interested in seeing other counties to see if they're being
as scrutinized as we are.
Mary McGann:
But there are other counties that are using money similarly to this that aren't
being questioned.
Mary McGann:
I think that's something we need to find out.
Mary McGann:
Those are the two things I would like to see.
Mary McGann:
I would like to see other counties that have TRT and are underneath this type
of criteria to see where they are and how they're using it.
Mary McGann:
And if they're using it in any ways that are similar to what we are, I think
that's important for us to know.
Mary McGann:
And I think if anything is defensible, then we should keep it in.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, Mike.
Mike McCurdy:
A lot of totals, but we obviously caught the eye again of the state auditor.
Mike McCurdy:
What is the total that aligns with getting that eye off of us?
Mike McCurdy:
What number am I looking at?
Mike McCurdy:
The $1.67 million on planned general fund expenses today or just the TRT-2A
updates, $1.413 involved completely in the compliance via the state auditor?
Mike McCurdy:
Where would we be looking?
Gabriel Woytek:
These are the compliance reimbursements.
Gabriel Woytek:
They're labeled as compliance reimbursements.
Trish Hedin:
Excuse me?
Trish Hedin:
I'm going to say they're labeled reimbursements.
Gabriel Woytek:
They're labeled compliance reimbursements.
Gabriel Woytek:
I believe that those are the funds that you're referring to.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Brian, go ahead and then I'll move around.
Brian Martinez:
Some of this is kind of from the email that I had here, so I just got that in
front of me.
Brian Martinez:
After that meeting, I had some time to reflect on a path of compliance.
Brian Martinez:
And I just want to be clear.
Brian Martinez:
I have no appetite to be anywhere near the line.
Brian Martinez:
I have no appetite to be anywhere near that line.
Brian Martinez:
The state auditor impressed upon us the need for a change of the tone at the
top.
Brian Martinez:
My priority is that we get compliant and that we stay compliant without any
ambiguity.
Brian Martinez:
And this, I think, is going to demand a strict approach to our TRT
expenditures.
Brian Martinez:
You know, arguing over what makes, amounts to what, it's like $75,000 in
transfers, pales into comparison to critical importance of securing these
mitigation grants for our essential services and, more importantly,
re-establishing confidence that the commission will do the right thing.
Brian Martinez:
You know, time, well, hold on a second.
Brian Martinez:
There's a couple of things that kind of came up, you know.
Brian Martinez:
You're good, Bill.
Brian Martinez:
I just wanted to take a break real quick, you know.
Brian Martinez:
The time for arguing for the state has passed, right?
Brian Martinez:
On December 11th, this county wrote to the state auditor's office and said,
quote, the Grand County Commission has formally agreed to comply with the state
auditor's letter, issue 1224, right?
Brian Martinez:
That's the letter.
Brian Martinez:
I mean, I still haven't gotten a copy of the letter.
Brian Martinez:
I had to find it in a TI post, which I'm upset about.
Brian Martinez:
You know, I'm fed up with dealing with this right now.
Brian Martinez:
You know, the reason that we find ourselves non-compliant again is the failure
to take a responsible approach to TRT spending, even if some believe that
certain expenditures are justifiable.
Brian Martinez:
It's these very games right here that lack adherence to the rules that put the
Grand County taxpayers on the hook for the cleanup, like Mary was talking about.
Brian Martinez:
You know, this is not about meeting a mandate, right?
Brian Martinez:
We need to do the right thing by the Grand County, right?
Brian Martinez:
The path forward, I think, is clear.
Brian Martinez:
The commission needs to lead by example.
Brian Martinez:
I won't accept an approach to compliance that circumvents the audit findings.
Brian Martinez:
When it comes to compliance, I think our guiding principles need to be beyond
reproach.
Speaker 15:
Thanks, Bill.
Jacques Hadler:
I mean, I honestly think, I don't think that we're the ones playing the games
here, I think the goalposts keep getting moved on us.
Jacques Hadler:
Oh, I said I feel like the goalposts keep getting moved on us in the game, but
that aside, so it seems like Gabe, from what the dictates that we've been handed
down, that 2AI and 2AII, basically, I don't know.
Jacques Hadler:
I mean, that's how it's coming across.
Jacques Hadler:
And so, I'm just wondering what, you could come up, or maybe someone could come
up, what would an example of 2AII expenditure be that would just qualify as
that?
Jacques Hadler:
I mean, I think all these things do in my mind, but I'd be curious as to what
might be.
Gabriel Woytek:
Well, what has been agreed to be kept in the budget?
Gabriel Woytek:
Are these items in green?
Jacques Hadler:
I think that's, and Brian just questioned all that, right, Brian?
Brian Martinez:
Yeah, that's what I thought.
Gabriel Woytek:
Okay, then I have no idea.
Jacques Hadler:
Does anyone have an idea?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, I think the language, if we go back to the statute, the language carves
out that tourism has to have an element of bringing people outside in.
Jacques Hadler:
I mean, a lot of these items in green that we discussed yesterday have that
element.
Jacques Hadler:
I'm not questioning you.
Jacques Hadler:
I'm not arguing with you.
Jacques Hadler:
So there's basically, we don't know.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Well, no.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, the word tourism, they defined the word tourism.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It required an element that brings, that you promoted such in a way that brings
people from the outside in.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's different than if they don't define the term, like establish and
promote.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Promote means what an ordinary Merriam-Webster dictionary of the word promote
means.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So you can promote that, for example, in the meeting yesterday, right?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That could be a local promotion that didn't necessarily bring them outside in.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Jacques Hadler:
Because tourism doesn't apply to AII.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So there were some differences.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So as I was answering that portion of the question, not the bigger policy part
that you guys are discussing, but there are, I think you can make some nuances
between the two.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I know that's, it's frustrating.
Jacques Hadler:
It's frustrating.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, Trish, go ahead.
Trish Hedin:
I'm going to kind of reiterate what Jacques said and Brian, when you were
speaking, and I'm not, this is not, I'm not in opposition to what you were
saying.
Trish Hedin:
I'm just kind of pinging off a few of the comments, but like you said, the line
is moving.
Trish Hedin:
It's like, so how do we stay away from a line that is constantly in flux?
Trish Hedin:
We have a new auditor, and now the line has changed again.
Trish Hedin:
And we're trying to, you know, trying to be in step.
Trish Hedin:
It's just like, and then to not have ambiguity.
Trish Hedin:
To me, the ambiguity does not come from us.
Trish Hedin:
It's coming from the state auditor.
Trish Hedin:
And it's like, how do we're trying to be in compliance?
Trish Hedin:
Nobody was ever nefarious in their actions here ever.
Trish Hedin:
I'm going to, I'm trying not to get really angry because I don't know how many
times I heard that specifically in the campaign last year.
Trish Hedin:
And it's just a load of shit, to be honest.
Trish Hedin:
Nobody ever had nefarious actions.
Trish Hedin:
We have always tried to be in compliance with the state auditor.
Trish Hedin:
You know, they are just, we are, we're the whipping boy.
Trish Hedin:
And so we, I agree with you, Brian, we want to be in compliance.
Trish Hedin:
We are trying to do that.
Trish Hedin:
You know, but it's so, it's just, it's a crapshoot.
Trish Hedin:
It's a total crapshoot.
Trish Hedin:
And Steven, I'm going to ask you, and I'm going to be very firm in this, we
rely heavily on you.
Trish Hedin:
And I understand you ping it back to us and say, you're the commissioners, you
make the decisions, but you're our legal counsel.
Trish Hedin:
And when we're interpreting code, and we're doing our best to do that, I don't
know why I'm, I'm just shaking.
Trish Hedin:
We need your help.
Trish Hedin:
You know, and specifically back in the day when the auditor was like, what did
your county attorney say?
Trish Hedin:
Our county attorney gave us counsel, we followed that counsel, and they still
hammered us, even though they said, listen to your counsel.
Trish Hedin:
So we need you.
Trish Hedin:
We need your, we need your help.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And we went through an hour and a half long meeting.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't know if you had an opportunity to view that meeting that we recorded,
we'll send it out to all the commissioners.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Did you have an opportunity to see that?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
No, I'm sorry.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
No, I appreciate it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I appreciate it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We did go through that at the time, walked through it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And so I can only do as much as you guys.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I understand.
Trish Hedin:
I'm just, I'm just making sure that you understand that we need your counsel.
Trish Hedin:
You know, maybe next year, now that the commission is predominantly
conservative, they'll leave us alone.
Trish Hedin:
I hope so.
Trish Hedin:
But I doubt it.
Trish Hedin:
I think Grand County is a whipping boy, and it will continue to be far into the
future.
Trish Hedin:
That's just my opinion.
Trish Hedin:
I have no, you know, we're doing our best to be in compliance, but they change
the rules constantly, constantly.
Trish Hedin:
Our state legislature is just like the amount of bills that are being passed,
and we're supposed to, you know, it's just, it's, it's, it's really difficult.
Trish Hedin:
I think anybody would agree with that.
Trish Hedin:
I sat there and listened to Representative Monson say that.
Trish Hedin:
He's like, it's, it's really hard to follow what's going on.
Trish Hedin:
And to be, you know, he said exactly that.
Trish Hedin:
So we are doing the best we can.
Trish Hedin:
And I think, you know, we collectively, we don't disagree with you, Brian.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
You know.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Mike, I'll get to you, but give me a moment here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I would like to remind all commissioners, keep in mind your language that
you're using up here, your professionalism.
Trish Hedin:
That's probably the only time I've ever cut in five years.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And also let's try and be better at interrupting others when they're speaking
and they have the dais and the microphone, please.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so Mike, I'll move on to you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Lot to break down here.
Mike McCurdy:
In parts, I do agree.
Mike McCurdy:
We have, we are the whipping boy.
Mike McCurdy:
We were out of compliance one time already.
Mike McCurdy:
They literally wrote legislation at us.
Mike McCurdy:
We're time number two now.
Mike McCurdy:
It's really time we, I mean, strive to become compliant or else if the third
time around perceptions, the demons I hear the third time around, it will be
quote nefarious.
Mike McCurdy:
It's, it comes out of pure perception on that.
Mike McCurdy:
And it's the perception that the state auditor, that we are being nefarious if
it gets through a third time of being out of compliance.
Mike McCurdy:
Again, I reiterate, pay the bill and get under compliance as quickly as
possible.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Can you make some recommendations to how we can do that?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Where are you see that going forward here?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Because clearly we've got to start making some decisions around this budget to
get ourselves back in a position that we're not overspending as we are.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And we have to make some hard decisions to do that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And it's still just a little murky where we want to start with that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so I understand that your position and where you're at.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I also understand Mike and Brian and their position.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I even understand Trish and wanting to bend frustration.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But what I think need to do is get to a bottom line here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
What do we have to do so that we can make some decisions rather than the back
and forth.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I think that in my mind, there's no way to get there without you making
some hard calls on numbers that this is what it's going to take if we take this
route.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The $75,000, I'm with Brian and Mike.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We're talking several million dollars here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't care which side of the line we fall on.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't want to be in an argument with the state auditor.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Whether the goal posts are moving or she's frustrated with what we're doing
doesn't matter.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Let's just get to the end of this.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And this is what it's going to take to do it is what I'm looking for.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I'm not trying to share my frustrations or project them on to you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But I do have some frustrations.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I want to be done where we can move on.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Gabriel Woytek:
So there's some new information today and some updated information with regard
to the Recreation Special Service District.
Gabriel Woytek:
It appears now that the $75,541 that's displayed in this document will no
longer be projected into this budget.
Gabriel Woytek:
Ultimately, I've made my position clear, but I don't stand in the way of the
will of the commission to craft this budget in the way that they wish.
Gabriel Woytek:
So I think right now, I think what I envision the next steps being would be to
hold a public hearing for the first meeting in July and to tee up an official
amendment for the second meeting in July.
Gabriel Woytek:
That would give enough time to be able to make adjustments to the budget.
Gabriel Woytek:
I mean, ultimately, what it's going to amount to is the budget amendment is
going to reflect an increased contribution from the fund balance to be able to
amend the budget in a balanced fashion.
Gabriel Woytek:
At this point, if the commission wishes to open up the entire budget and
introduce cost-cutting measures elsewhere across the budget, that is certainly
your prerogative.
Gabriel Woytek:
You know, I would ask you to lean on your office to identify those items and go
about forwarding me whatever requests you would like to see.
Gabriel Woytek:
But ultimately, that's what I can present at this moment.
Gabriel Woytek:
I have information regarding the will of the commission to make adjustments to
the budget, and I will present an amended budget to our public hearing with
those amendments.
Gabriel Woytek:
With, you know, obviously, whatever discussion included.
Gabriel Woytek:
So, that's a sum up of what I would say.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
With the county attorney wanted to say something.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Well, I'm just trying to make sure that whatever the commission is wanting to
have happen, because this was set for workshop, I don't know how much we, apart
from the one item, we haven't discussed any of the other items.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't know if any of those are contested or not, or if everybody is good with
everything else, because without that, that was just one piece of the bigger
puzzle.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And so, what staff is going to have to do, what the auditor's office, and
they're going to have to come back and all of a sudden have all these items that
we may or may not want to have adjustments to, and I don't know, on that one
issue, I think there's been some information, but on the remaining issues, I
don't know if there's a clear picture there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And if not, it's really hard to jump from a workshop of this size that I don't
know, apart from that one item, to the substantial change that needs to happen.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I agree.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Before I move on to you, Mary, I've got a couple items that, Gabe, I'd like to
clarify.
Chair Bill Winfield:
One of them is, let's see, where do I have it in my notes here?
Chair Bill Winfield:
The cattle panels you show at 75, or 76.5K and the 80K from the rec district.
Chair Bill Winfield:
My question is, is the 80K restricted funds, or are we fine with that line item
there?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Is it something that we need to consider that we, it's, we're using money from
the rec fund there, but we haven't, I haven't a clear understanding of if that
money is appropriately being used.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So that's just one question.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't need an answer right now.
Gabriel Woytek:
Can I just ask one clarifying question?
Gabriel Woytek:
So you mean like the rec district's portion of the cattle panel purchase, if
that is derived from our allocation of TRT?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm asking if we make sure that that use is an appropriate use there.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And then I have one other one, and it isn't anywhere on your sheet, but I know
that we have discussed the amount of money that's being spent on the library
HVAC.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And there was originally an 80K line item on there that I believe was coming
out of the county budget.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I think at some point we discussed they had a budget of their own that
could cover that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I realize it's only 80K, but as we're going through here, trying to balance
what looks like several million dollars, I just want to get everything on your
sheet that we don't come back and catch something in arrears later.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And then I will go, Mary had her hand up.
Mary McGann:
I just want to reiterate that, you know, and I don't know how the budget is
going to look or how it's going to be presented, but I would like to see at
least a budget where the things that are defensible are left in.
Mary McGann:
And if we present two, fine.
Mary McGann:
But I do think if it's defensible, I believe, Stephen, that you have the
respect of the auditor's office.
Mary McGann:
And I think if you said it was defensible, that would go a long ways.
Mary McGann:
Secondly, I know there's people in the audience here who are concerned about
the pickleball court and playground.
Mary McGann:
And I think I just want to say that I feel the pickleball courts have been part
of the long-term plan for the program.
Mary McGann:
These weren't something that all of a sudden brought in.
Mary McGann:
It's been on the long-term plan.
Mary McGann:
If Angie was here, I would find out how long, but I know it's been at least
seven years that they have been drawn on the future plan.
Mary McGann:
And I know there is an incredible number of people in the community that really
want to see this come to fruition.
Mary McGann:
So I think it would be nice to let the public know if we are going to continue
to support the establishment of the call.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't think we can make that decision tonight.
Mary McGann:
I know, but I just say that it's an important part.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Talking millions, I agree.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And we might have to consider downsizing that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We might have to consider looking for some other funds.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those are part of the hard discussions that we really aren't ready to make.
Mary McGann:
Paid for by grants.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm aware of a portion of it, but the 600,000 is not a grant.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's coming out of this budget.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So again, I think that I'm not ready to make those hard decisions until we get
to a hard number here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And Brian, did you?
Brian Martinez:
I just wanted to, David asked if we had questions on any of these other
expenses right here.
Brian Martinez:
I was looking at that we went back on the REC SSD to 2021, but the TRT code
that's inside here right now is from 7-1-2023.
Brian Martinez:
Were there any changes or updates prior to that?
Brian Martinez:
And the reason that we the other, like we had done with the other accounts
there?
Gabriel Woytek:
So the REC Filming Convention, that was introduced into the code in 2021, and
that's when Grand County started making that allocation.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So when I look at the green, purple, and red in the Special Ambassador budget,
did you, and then you had had an amended amount.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Is that amended amount not including the purple or the red?
Gabriel Woytek:
It just is the green.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's only the green.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Speaker 15:
Anybody else?
Brian Martinez:
Brian.
Brian Martinez:
Just one more comment.
Brian Martinez:
You know, at our budget workshop, we did kind of decide that we would go try to
seek some clarification from the State Auditor.
Brian Martinez:
And the State Auditor came back, and I don't think that anybody likes what we
were told, but I mean, she told us to stay away from the line.
Brian Martinez:
And I think that, that to me right there is enough.
Brian Martinez:
You know, that's it right there.
Brian Martinez:
The fact that we were told to stay away from the line, we went and sought, we
sought clarification, and then we don't like what the clarification was.
Trish Hedin:
Did you feel, Brian, that you have clarity as to what the line is?
Trish Hedin:
Do you know what the line is?
Brian Martinez:
I think I can tell what is, everything that we're talking about, is it
defensible?
Brian Martinez:
Is it not defensible?
Brian Martinez:
Right?
Brian Martinez:
That's right there on the line.
Brian Martinez:
We are not 20,000 miles away from the line.
Brian Martinez:
We are right up next to the line.
Brian Martinez:
If we're asking, is this defensible, or is it not defensible?
Bill Winfield:
Mary, go ahead.
Mary McGann:
I was going to say, I'd go if it's defensible, if it's far away from the line.
Mary McGann:
I think if our county attorney can say we can defend this, then it's not next
to the line.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I think the green is defensible and acceptable in this budget.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, purple, I can see why you guys questioned it, and the red.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So as far as that goes, I don't know if that's the $70,000 that Brian's talking
about or not, because I didn't add them all up.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But I do think, you know, for example, stickers, I do think they get people to
come back, like everything you buy these days has a sticker.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
You buy a Yeti, and they send you a bunch of stickers, because they want you to
think about them.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
The next time you buy something, they want you to buy that.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So same as with the water bottles and things that they're handing out, and
they're not mailing them away.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They're reminding people to book their next trip in Moab.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And so I don't necessarily think it's defensible at all, or like not
defensible.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But so as I look through these things, and I think you guys did a good job.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And so you have the purple that's questionable.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And so I'm happy with Gabe's assessment of these items, or you know, the amount
that he's got here.
Gabriel Woytek:
Sorry, I just need to clarify, and it's not as a point of argument at all.
Gabriel Woytek:
I just want to make clear that that assessment of red, purple, and green was
made by commissioners.
Gabriel Woytek:
And my assessment is that the entire list is very clearly an allowable use, as
written in the code.
Gabriel Woytek:
Just want to make that clear.
Gabriel Woytek:
I'm not trying to argue.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think that it sounds like they all total up to about $75,000.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So I think that we can still get to the bottom, the end result of what we need
here, with a solid determination of where we've got to look at cuts or not cuts
to make this adjustment.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's what we need at the end of the day.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And if that requires another workshop, then I would propose put one together so
that we can come there and then decide what are we going to do with these
questions.
Chair Bill Winfield:
One around the pickle ball, one around some of the other departments that need
to be reimbursed here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
What are we going to do?
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I don't think we can yet make that determination.
Mike McCurdy:
Mike, go ahead.
Mike McCurdy:
In all of this, state auditor's office kept on, we are working on this, just to
get a random report on the fly that we're out of compliance and we'll pull taxes
again.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I was relying on the county attorney and clerk auditor for that relationship.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'll use a stronger word.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I've had one phone call with Tina.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It wasn't a call expressing frustration on the county circumstances and that
the county was pushing the limits with it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That was the conversation.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
My understanding is that they would be watching and following up with the
conversation.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We reached out for a meeting that was declined.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And so, I don't know the level of relationship that we have.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think they've indicated to us that they don't want to babysit us on this
issue and that from their perspective, it was more apparent than the commission
is making it was the stance of the auditor's office.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So, I know Gabe has worked with Seth Roberson quite a bit.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
This is not my realm.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'm happy to facilitate the auditor in this circumstance, but the conversation
and the communication is probably best served through likely the clerk auditor's
office with assistance with Seth Roberson, if he'll have that communication.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But are they going to check in and review these?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, the phone call did not reassure me that there would be a continuing
working circumstances.
Mike McCurdy:
So, not to fear taxation being withheld again, do we send a letter that says,
hey, we're working on it?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I would assume they're probably watching that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I would assume that's where we're at.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We don't currently have a wonderful relationship because from their
perspective, the county is not in compliance and from their perspective, is
having a difficulty coming into compliance.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's different perspectives.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So, when the commission says reach out to them and have communication with
them, I can try.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But it's it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The last request for a meeting wasn't granted.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And was that you that made that request?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I got a phone call in return.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
A lot to say about that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
David, you had any communication at all with Seth?
Chair Bill Winfield:
What's your feelings as far as presenting him with a plan that we're moving
forward with A, B, and C?
Chair Bill Winfield:
And if we get a response from him, do we want to go that route?
Chair Bill Winfield:
What are you recommending at this point?
Gabriel Woytek:
My feeling is that, you know, since the commission is at this point, you know,
wanting to follow what their current stance is, my position would be that we
would, you know, present a comprehensive, you know, make comprehensive
adjustments to this budget as applicable.
Gabriel Woytek:
And when that is already prepared, rather than relying on them or expecting
them to give comments during the process of making those, you know, making those
corrections and adjustments, it feels at this point, you know, since there is a
strong desire to follow what they're currently desiring from us, that we go
ahead and follow that and present to them as such.
Gabriel Woytek:
I don't know if, you know, I can certainly, I can certainly do my best to, you
know, leverage the positive working relationship I've had with Seth to garner as
much, you know, patience and understanding as I might be able to for him to, you
know, give it some sort of blessing.
Gabriel Woytek:
But, you know, I can certainly try that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Or do we just do as we're discussing here and then file the reports that I
believe come due and is it July 1st?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Correct me if I'm wrong, or do those come due at the end of the year?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we just make the adjustments?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we have a responsibility to reach out to the state auditor at this point?
Chair Bill Winfield:
If we make all of these corrections and clean all this up, is there a response
necessary to them?
Chair Bill Winfield:
I guess I'm asking, or do we wait and do that with our filings at the end of
the year?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Because there are new filings in place that are required moving forward.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Are they not due to HB 456?
Gabriel Woytek:
Yeah, and we're, there's going to be discussions.
Gabriel Woytek:
I don't know what the date deadlines are on those, and we haven't seen what
those reports look like.
Gabriel Woytek:
Certainly, that could be one route.
Gabriel Woytek:
I mean, and if it seems like this is, you know, all going to be opened up and
very, you know, carefully scrutinized in terms of what's budgeted and what's
reported, you know, the county could feel that that is sufficient, share that in
advance with the state auditor's office, and they could decide to respond or
not.
Gabriel Woytek:
And we could continue to move forward with the approach that's being chosen.
Gabriel Woytek:
And it sounds like that approach would be confidently compliant.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, I'm going to go to Brian, and then Mike, I guess I'd really like to get
wrapped up, because we need to start our regular meeting.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah, just real quick, you know, it does say in the new HB 456 that part of
that reporting will be a breakdown of promotion expenditures.
Brian Martinez:
So they will be, they will be reviewing that right now.
Brian Martinez:
That's part of the code sitting right there.
Brian Martinez:
And also, just for everybody, you know, what we have online is mitigation
grants.
Brian Martinez:
If we're found non-compliant, right, then we will not be eligible for those
mitigation grants for the emergency services, for search and rescue, or for road
repairs.
Mike McCurdy:
Mike, go ahead.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to, I know this is a workshop discussion, but I would like to go
forward and fixing this, or following through with what we say in action,
instead of telling the State Auditor's Office that we're trying, or we're coming
up with it.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to start with the action first, sooner than later.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All right, I will go ahead, Melodien.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Well, I also thought it
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
was interesting, I don't know where this letter came from, but it was in the
TI, and it said that
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
the State Auditor, Tina Cannon, said that the emphasis and intent of this
portion of the code
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
is to bring people from the outside of the county into the county for tourism,
recreation, film,
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
and conventions, and then expenditures for trail ambassador programs should be
funded from the
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
mitigation funding, except for those activities that have supporting
documentation that they are
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
to solicit, advertise, or market, or enhance transient guest spending in a
county.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, I think that is, I mean, if this is from her, then I think that she's
pretty clear, is as long as we have supporting documentation that the
activities, whether it's a trail ambassador, or the recreation special service
district, or wherever else we are going to use money in the future, has
supporting documentation.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, that's, I think, what we need to request
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
from our departments, is to make, and that's going to be what we need for these
grant,
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
for the grants, because the grants are going to have those, I mean, we don't
know what they
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
look like yet, but I imagine something in there that we're going to want to
have,
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
any supporting documentation that are to solicit, advertise, or market,
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
enhance transient guest spending in a county.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And I don't know where that letter came from, maybe you can tell us, but I
thought that was interesting when I was reading the paper, I was like, we
haven't seen that letter.
Jacques Hadler:
All right, John.
Jacques Hadler:
I'm sorry, this would be perhaps, but I imagine the new HB 456 legislation is,
it wouldn't be going back to the previous legislation to qualify grants that are
under the current legislation, right, Stephen?
Jacques Hadler:
You're correct.
Jacques Hadler:
Okay, so you'd just be looking at it from July 1st on.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, the strings, the strings are, your remarks are up to the time period that
they are.
Jacques Hadler:
Perfect, thank you.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And we talked with, again, that there's going to be a portion of funds, because
my understanding is we've received the receipts of those funds two months later
after they're collected.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So we'll still have additional funds that'll be subject to the older.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Thank you, Bill.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Again, I'll reiterate the importance of those grants and the millions of
dollars that I think that we need to be making sure that we're definitely in
line to receive, and pushing that line, I think would bring that into question
with the state auditor, but I will close this meeting, this workshop at 4.02,
and I will say let's take a five-minute break before we resume another
commissioners.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All right, I will call this regular commission meeting to order on Tuesday,
June 3rd at 4.07 p.m. All present, Commissioner Zedine, Commissioner Hadler,
Commissioner McCurdy, Commissioner McGann, Commissioner Martinez, Commissioner
McCandless, and myself, Commissioner Wingfield, with our county attorney and
clerk auditor soon to be with us.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so we'll all stand now for the pledge of allegiance.
Mike McCurdy:
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the
republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty
and justice for all.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I will start us off with citizens to be heard.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know we've got some folks here in the audience.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Please come up, state your names.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Normally, we do three minutes.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Just identify yourself for those people who are watching later on YouTube or
whatever.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And yes, you're welcome to start us off.
Sara Melnicoff:
Hi, everybody.
Sara Melnicoff:
I'm Sara Melnicoff with the Nonprofit Mob Solution.
Sara Melnicoff:
So I know most of you, but welcome to the ones I never met before.
Sara Melnicoff:
I developed a bit of turnout burnout, so I haven't been bugging you guys that
much, but I wanted to bug you, not bug you, just share something with you.
Sara Melnicoff:
Since November 2003, I have spent a lot of my life in either Mill Creek at
Powerhouse or Potato Salad Hill, doing a lot of hauling out thousands of pounds
of trash and recycling, doing trail maintenance.
Sara Melnicoff:
It's been expanding, and now I'm a funded partner of the BLM, and I go in there
every day.
Sara Melnicoff:
In that time, I've seen things you wouldn't believe, like I pulled out a
trampoline someone put at the left-hand waterfall at the bottom.
Sara Melnicoff:
I carried it out.
Sara Melnicoff:
Two pieces, Bill will understand this, of OSB board that must have weighed a
thousand pounds.
Sara Melnicoff:
We had to go home with the rangers and cut it up with a suffocating saw and
carry it out.
Sara Melnicoff:
That and lots of dog poop and human poop and all kinds of interesting things,
but that's one of the cleanest canyons I've walked today from the lot to the
confluence, totally clean.
Sara Melnicoff:
One thing I've seen over the years in the early days, what I would find when I
got there in the morning was drunk people from the night before or people that
were tripping and they were staggering around still.
Sara Melnicoff:
I swear to God.
Sara Melnicoff:
One day, I saw three beautiful women.
Sara Melnicoff:
They walked behind me just totally naked.
Sara Melnicoff:
It's in the morning, pretty hot out.
Sara Melnicoff:
One was a blonde, one was a redhead, and one was brunette.
Sara Melnicoff:
I'm like, am I the one tripping?
Sara Melnicoff:
No, they were real.
Sara Melnicoff:
This was like 20 years ago.
Sara Melnicoff:
Over time, I've noticed because I used to be able to spend hours there without
seeing anybody except the people from the morning.
Sara Melnicoff:
Over the years with the internet and people learning about things and
discovering our beautiful community of natural wonders, it's just overwhelming
with people.
Sara Melnicoff:
We worked with the sheriff to get the road, no parking either side, because
buses were coming up and dropping off 200 people in a fragile, delicate
environmental area.
Sara Melnicoff:
The last couple of days, I've seen ducklings with their mom and dad.
Sara Melnicoff:
I saw a blue heron two days in a row, so I must have a nest.
Sara Melnicoff:
I saw ravens chasing just at the beach right down from the parking lot, two
ravens chasing a coyote away.
Sara Melnicoff:
The coyote looks scared.
Sara Melnicoff:
These ravens were just about to run.
Sara Melnicoff:
What I did notice, the idea of the Trail Ambassadors, it took a while for me to
understand it because I've been in there working all the time and trying to make
the parking lot to the waterfall clear as a bell so people don't go off trail
and do damage.
Sara Melnicoff:
When they started, I did notice that because of their educational abilities and
because they could sit in one place and talk to everyone who comes in while
having someone row occasionally, it made a huge difference in the off-trail
damage.
Sara Melnicoff:
This is habitat for a lot of other creatures that we encroach on regularly.
Sara Melnicoff:
I think the program could be streamlined a little bit to be a little more
feasible.
Sara Melnicoff:
I do think it's really important.
Sara Melnicoff:
I only wish they were there in the summer too, because in the summer, they go
up into the mountains.
Sara Melnicoff:
That's when I see the trail damage starting out.
Sara Melnicoff:
I just wanted to tell you it's a beautiful place.
Sara Melnicoff:
I'm honored to be able to go in there every day and deal with it, except the
OSB board and cash register I found once behind one of the pump houses that had
been stolen from one of the businesses.
Sara Melnicoff:
A toaster oven dumped over.
Sara Melnicoff:
Those things aside, it's a beautiful place.
Sara Melnicoff:
If we want people to enjoy it, we have to protect it.
Sara Melnicoff:
Then the experience is so much more valuable.
Sara Melnicoff:
That's all I wanted to say.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Sara Melnicoff:
Thank you very much.
Sara Melnicoff:
Should I bug you more often?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, Sarah.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We appreciate your contribution to our community.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know maybe not everybody is aware of it, but Sarah is also a big part of the
homelessness and stuff that goes on in our community.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We do appreciate what you do for this community.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Sara Melnicoff:
Thank you very much, Sarah.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we have anybody else here in the chambers?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Please come forward.
Speaker 13:
Dave Glosser.
Speaker 13:
Say something about Cane Creek development.
Speaker 13:
I'm aware that the Cane Creek project received preliminary platters several
months ago.
Speaker 13:
I'd like to speak to the matter that will become a substantial safety issue as
soon as the construction starts, if not addressed ahead of time.
Speaker 13:
The proposed development will have roughly 3.7 miles of paved surface within
the project boundaries.
Speaker 13:
To support the traffic demand of the final population of 1100, the developer
has agreed to improve and widen the 1.4 miles of K3 boulevard running through
the development to a 50-foot wide minor collector.
Speaker 13:
The remaining 2.3 miles of side road will also meet county requirements for
lower traffic volumes with widths from 24 to 34 feet.
Speaker 13:
But the only initial requirement the county appears to have placed on the
developer for the 2.5 miles of Cane Creek boulevard between 500 west and the
development is that it be wiped at 20 feet before construction begins.
Speaker 13:
But something didn't really make sense here to me because the road will be this
road will provide the only access to the entire development in all areas beyond
and only need to meet the county width requirement for an alley 20 feet is what
is required for an alley.
Speaker 13:
It's well known that the growing traffic volume on this worn out 18-foot width
of pavement is already already on city.
Speaker 13:
It makes sense to widen this section of the road to accommodate the dramatic
increase of traffic you'll see when construction begins doing it up front
especially given that much of it will be heavy truck traffic.
Speaker 13:
The developer is unlikely to take the initiative to widen these 2.5 miles
unless required to do so.
Speaker 13:
Can you envision what it will look like with cement trucks, large lumber
trucks, UTVs, camper vans and cyclists trying to squeeze by each other on a
corner with 18 feet of pavement, no shoulders and a guardrail that is starting
to fall into the Colorado River?
Speaker 13:
I can't and it's not really a pretty sight.
Speaker 13:
The development gets the green light the 2.5 miles of Cane Creek Boulevard will
have to be widened eventually.
Speaker 13:
I hope there is some way the county can place this responsibility on that
developer by imposing an exaction as a condition of final plat approval or some
other means to have the road widened before construction begins.
Speaker 13:
Not doing so will almost certainly put our citizens and visitors at great risk.
Speaker 13:
It would also make sense to determine in advance if it's even technically
feasible in that treacherous corner that we all know and if the necessary
approvals can be obtained from the Nature Conservancy and the BLM to
dramatically widen Cane Creek Boulevard through their properties.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you sir.
Brian Martinez:
You don't want to AJ.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay do we have anybody else in the chambers?
Speaker 12:
All right we can go to online AJ please.
Speaker 12:
Hey good afternoon.
Speaker 12:
My name is AJ Throgmorton, Grand County constituent.
Speaker 12:
I wanted to speak on a few things today primarily agenda items six and seven.
Speaker 12:
For agenda item six the airport grant letter.
Speaker 12:
I applied for the airport board on the recent vacancy.
Speaker 12:
I'm working on my private pilot's license.
Speaker 12:
Personally I spend a lot of time out there and I definitely see the value in
investment at the airport.
Speaker 12:
It's a wonderful resource that I think we're extremely fortunate to have and
I'm thrilled to see investment in it.
Speaker 12:
The bang for buck on this grant match seems to be a no-brainer.
Speaker 12:
125k of our money versus almost 2.4 from the FAA.
Speaker 12:
I think that's a pretty solid deal.
Speaker 12:
As I believe it is any additional taxiway costs for something like this if
you're going to build a new hangar would be charged to the hangar owner or the
builder which just seems counterproductive.
Speaker 12:
So this looks like a great avenue to increase access to storage for both local
aviators and transients alike.
Speaker 12:
While the additional taxi lanes are a huge improvement when I'm out there I
walk through the walkways in between the hangars and I notice that there's
usually a lot of trash in there kind of some scattered stuff that I think we
could do well to improve on and just the walkways between the hangars too.
Speaker 12:
So it's just kind of a quick plug on any improvements in that area as well.
Speaker 12:
Lastly with the departure of our previous airport director I am definitely
optimistic about the replacement and looking forward to that.
Speaker 12:
Next thing I wanted to hit on was agenda item 7 and the economic advisory board
grant application.
Speaker 12:
Two of them kind of stuck out to me.
Speaker 12:
I'm a big fan of the golf course line item.
Speaker 12:
I think that's just a big sensible yes.
Speaker 12:
Golf course is a wonderful asset but it definitely needs help.
Speaker 12:
Rob does what he can out there to keep things up.
Speaker 12:
He kind of had a run in last year with some leaky water systems and it kind of
got beat up.
Speaker 12:
So anything we could do to help out on that is a definitely a worthwhile
endeavor.
Speaker 12:
I'll say I am opposed to the 25k of the chamber of commerce.
Speaker 12:
I think a large chunk of that goes to the grand summit last year and if I'm not
mistaken there's about 5k of that used to throw a private booze party that a
select few got to partake in.
Speaker 12:
The grand summit was also pretty conveniently timed seemingly to boost chamber
president Kornblatt's commission campaign which doesn't appear to have worked.
Speaker 12:
Lastly I'm thinking the current chamber might be a bit captured by non-profits
versus locally owned taxpaying revenue generating businesses.
Speaker 12:
So again I'm for the grant for the golf course specifically and opposed to the
chamber of commerce.
Speaker 12:
That's all I got.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we have anyone else on line Quim?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Anyone else one last time for the chamber?
Chair Bill Winfield:
All right we will move forward.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I believe at this point our commission member disclosures.
Mike McCurdy:
Is that the timer?
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Mike McCurdy:
So Mike.
Mike McCurdy:
Mike works for the sheriff's department.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All right so thank you both and we can start with our general commission
reports.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Trish do you want to start us off?
Trish Hedin:
Yeah on the 21st I met with Ryan Jones from UDAF just talking more about
conservation easements.
Trish Hedin:
As you may know we gather rollback tax from greenbelt and ag delineations and I
think there's about sixty thousand dollars in that and that money is supposed to
be used specifically for conservation easements.
Trish Hedin:
So one of the things we did is had our GIS expert take those parcels and just
delineate them and then Ryan and I are going to kind of go back through those
and eventually UDAF the goal is to invite larger landowners that may fall into
this concept of putting their land into conservation easement invite them to a
UDAF meeting just to see what their interests are.
Trish Hedin:
So something that has been inspired by UDAF they reached out to me to do that.
Trish Hedin:
Had another fair board meeting on the 22nd they're just rolling along.
Trish Hedin:
On the 23rd which more of you will speak to we had the ribbon cutting at the
Utah Raptor State Park which was wonderful and Mary we cannot thank you enough
for working on that.
Trish Hedin:
What a what a cool addition to our community so and that was a wonderful event.
Trish Hedin:
Everybody was there and very yeah a wonderful event.
Trish Hedin:
On the 27th we had a planning meeting we were looking at the HDHO revisions
hopefully I mean and I can always send that meeting out to you guys but they
ended up I thought it was really vibrant conversation.
Trish Hedin:
I want to thank Ben Riley and Caitlin Byers and Ronnie Schwartz for speaking
extensively and and building their willingness to work with the planning
commission.
Trish Hedin:
They did table Tony was gone and Megan was online and they really wanted those
two face-to-face to to kind of complete their banter and then make a
recommendation to the commissions.
Trish Hedin:
So I thought it was you guys are welcome to again watch it.
Trish Hedin:
I thought it was a really great conversation.
Trish Hedin:
I think we have a really diverse planning commission and I really really always
appreciate their banter.
Trish Hedin:
On the 28th went with Brian for site visits out to the Dolores area the hideout
area.
Trish Hedin:
That was cool.
Trish Hedin:
I think I think it was really good to spend time with you and Kendall and and
just kind of go through that inventorying process.
Trish Hedin:
Yeah that was cool.
Trish Hedin:
I'd like to do more of that and I met with Ian Machard which is cut in the
paramotor community.
Trish Hedin:
We've kind of had these discussions in the past like how do we deal with those
aerial conflicts and he's kind of taking the lead and I said the county's here
as support to develop a website to develop a Facebook page.
Trish Hedin:
It's really kind of reaching out to that community and like what are the areas
kind of not off limits but you know areas they should avoid to avoid conflict
and then just kind of appropriate you know procedures when using paramotor.
Trish Hedin:
So it was awesome to meet with him and really have him take the reins on that.
Trish Hedin:
I think that's a great first step and if we continue to have conflict maybe we
can look at something else but he's he's taking the reins on that which is
awesome.
Trish Hedin:
For three days this last weekend I volunteered at the rodeo the PRCA
Canyonlands rodeo.
Trish Hedin:
I cannot speak highly enough of our OSTA staff.
Trish Hedin:
I mean it really kind of hits home when you're there and how long and hot those
days are
Trish Hedin:
and how hard they work and I get to leave right at a certain point and they
stay through the concert
Trish Hedin:
and all that and they're just it's it's amazing what she does out there and how
dedicated that
Trish Hedin:
entire staff is to what they're doing but and I got to see Stella Wright which
is my you know my
Trish Hedin:
from Milford so that was a really big deal for me but anyways it's a great
great event great just
Trish Hedin:
brings oodles of people to our community and we're really lucky.
Trish Hedin:
Mosquito abatement last night they just kind of the thing that stood up said
they're wrapping up their audit procedures so that was great and then this
morning I actually met with Carrie from the BLM.
Trish Hedin:
I'm sorry Brian it
Trish Hedin:
was just kind of a last minute it was more she reached out to me to talk about
shooting range
Trish Hedin:
so if we I told her if we'd move forward I'll get a hold of you but you know
they I've mentioned
Trish Hedin:
repeatedly with Maddie like that's where people shoot their guns where we're
going to put them
Trish Hedin:
right and so I'm just talking about the signage that they'll initially do but I
said really
Trish Hedin:
Carrie what we really need which I've actually tried to get for about 10 years
is a shooting
Trish Hedin:
range.
Trish Hedin:
So we kind of looked at an area that had been kind of kind of set aside a long
time ago and she said she'll kind of keep moving in that direction because to me
that would really kind of hopefully one clean up all the shooting ranges in the
south end of the valley which they're all over and and hopefully mitigate any
conflict you would have with guns and mountain bikers which don't really blend.
Trish Hedin:
No I think I've mentioned I have been shot at at pipe three and so back in the
day when it was new right and somebody was just like this is where I used to and
I literally had bullets waiting past my head so it was a great meeting and like
I said Brian when she she said if she will start following up we'll we'll engage
everybody.
Trish Hedin:
So Carrie got very blessed.
Speaker 15:
She didn't tell me that.
Jacques Hadler:
Yeah anyway let's see am I next folks sorry I just believe thank you thank you.
Jacques Hadler:
I most of what I attended other folks have also the ribbon cutting at the Utah
Rapid State Park is amazing.
Jacques Hadler:
It's so cool to have so many dignitaries from upstate there including the
governor is always impressive but you feel like he's just winging his speeches
and they're so good.
Jacques Hadler:
So that's always always it was nice to hear from Governor Cox.
Jacques Hadler:
I was on a couple interview committees and we I don't think anything's come out
of that so I won't speak to that.
Jacques Hadler:
The Representative Kennedy meeting I did I was only able to attend about five
to ten minutes of that but I was really impressed at the end of it.
Jacques Hadler:
He made a point of coming up and and he seemed very interested in my opinion on
some of the things that the issues that he could potentially help out with.
Jacques Hadler:
So it was it was nice to get his ear in that sense and it was really nice to
meet him.
Jacques Hadler:
It's the first time I met our representative and then yeah yesterday I attended
the TRT discussion along with Brian and Bill and Stephen and Gabe that helped to
inform our discussion here and yesterday afternoon we had a very preliminary
discussion between Bill and Stephen and I about making some changes or just
clarifying positions on our governing policy and procedures.
Jacques Hadler:
I thought that was a great start and I look forward to continuing to work on
that.
Jacques Hadler:
So that's just housekeeping.
Jacques Hadler:
Others are things that we've kind of had on the burner for a while so thank you
for getting that ball rolling Stephen.
Jacques Hadler:
And future considerations I would very respectfully ask our chair to please put
the GCAT presentation on our next commission meeting.
Jacques Hadler:
I would have loved to have heard that last meeting we had the presentation
present in the packet and I think it would be great to see that at the next
meeting.
Mike McCurdy:
So thank you.
Mike McCurdy:
Michael.
Mike McCurdy:
I attended the representative Kennedy's meeting also.
Mike McCurdy:
I had a chance after to direct the entire team up at Horsepoint and toward the
Bay Area.
Mike McCurdy:
Most of my special service district meetings are directly hand-in-hand
following the budgeting meetings we have been having and see how this pans out a
little farther on that.
Mike McCurdy:
I want to reiterate part of what Trish brought to us.
Mike McCurdy:
Everyone, I don't know if you saw the email, it actually asked for a little
volunteer time going into Grand County Fair over July 4th.
Mike McCurdy:
It asked all county employees and elected officials.
Mike McCurdy:
Everyone got to see it.
Mike McCurdy:
We would like to see a little more.
Mike McCurdy:
If you have an hour to spare we really could use it out there.
Mike McCurdy:
Trish is on the on the fair board and she knows we've only been having the fair
for a short time but it has it is grown and grown and grown in a good way.
Mike McCurdy:
There is so much local buy-in to the fair and even to the point of we're
starting to attract, and I can speak just to the volleyball part of it, but
we're starting to attract players from Colorado and teams from Colorado.
Mike McCurdy:
We even picked up a team last year from California that came through.
Mike McCurdy:
That's just one small part of the totality of the fair.
Mike McCurdy:
Please, if you have an hour to spare or more time, reply to that email.
Mike McCurdy:
That's all I have.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Speaker 15:
Mary, please.
Mary McGann:
On Wednesday after our last meeting, I had a solid waste special service
district board meeting.
Mary McGann:
I mentioned a couple meetings ago that we leased the land next to us.
Mary McGann:
You've been over to the transfer station.
Mary McGann:
You've probably seen the huge improvement, how much safer it is, how much
nicer.
Mary McGann:
Another thing that part of that leasing was we got to lease the building, which
has made it possible for us to do.
Mary McGann:
Again, they've created a welding shop there and hired a welder so that we're
going to be able to do our in-house welding, which is a huge, very, very good
thing because all of the different roll-offs and the different containers, so
many of them are metal and they rust.
Mary McGann:
Then it's a process to get it fixed and it costs money.
Mary McGann:
We're always trying to catch up with having this in-house and a place to work.
Mary McGann:
We should be able to really enhance the ability to get roll-offs and such to
people in a more timely fashion and to save some money.
Mary McGann:
That's really exciting that that happened.
Mary McGann:
I mentioned before that we had that interlocal grant that we got with the City,
USU, and Solid Waste Special Service District for in-vessel composting, mostly
for food.
Mary McGann:
Because of the situation with our federal government now, it's like we were
given the grant and the grant was taken away.
Mary McGann:
Then now we have it back.
Mary McGann:
That's really good news and we hope that we don't go through another cycle of
up and down with it.
Mary McGann:
It is going to put a little more crunch on doing the tying element that was
mentioned in the grant, but we're very excited and very happy that that looks
now like it's going to come to fruition.
Mary McGann:
We hosted the Recycling Coalition of Utah Spring Conference and the attendees
toured the Community Recycle Center and were very well attended and very well
received.
Mary McGann:
We completed the Green Waste Reclamation Program grind with unscreened mulch,
which is now available for sale for people who want it, with a portion of the
material now being allocated to help you to put into the compost system that's
coming up.
Mary McGann:
The Moab Landfill permit renewal, nearly ready to submit, and the Klondike a
new cell data and design, early ready for application, which is exciting and
good news.
Mary McGann:
Because we're coming to a close with one of the cells.
Mary McGann:
We're ahead of schedule.
Mary McGann:
We're not in that crunch period.
Mary McGann:
That's nice.
Mary McGann:
We reclaimed 691 tons of metal and generated $74,000 in revenue.
Mary McGann:
Our software is up.
Mary McGann:
The latest version is up and running and working very well, which is our
software program has been a real challenge up to recently.
Mary McGann:
We've approved a contract to lease a 20-yard rear motor and we discussed the
potential of alternative daily covering products that they're using in
Monticello.
Mary McGann:
At the Monticello.
Mary McGann:
We think we're all around this dirt.
Mary McGann:
Everywhere we look, there's dirt.
Mary McGann:
Getting dirt is a real big deal to cover the landfill.
Mary McGann:
If we can have this alternative cover, it will end up saving money.
Mary McGann:
It would be a good thing.
Mary McGann:
We're looking into doing that.
Mary McGann:
Then again, I attended the ribbon cutting at the Utah Raptor State Park.
Mary McGann:
The thing that I was the most excited about was I was able to meet a gentleman
that was an ancestor of the people who were in the internment camp.
Mary McGann:
He came from Hawaii.
Mary McGann:
I won't even try to pronounce the gentleman's name because I will mess it up.
Mary McGann:
It was a really moving and sad story.
Mary McGann:
This gentleman that was in that isolation camp was a decorated hero in World
War I, had worked as a medic.
Mary McGann:
When World War II broke out, he hurried to sign up again because he had all
these skills.
Mary McGann:
Instead of getting to serve in the forces, he was put into this internment camp
in California.
Mary McGann:
There was a riot there.
Mary McGann:
It was a demonstration.
Mary McGann:
He was thought to be one of the instigators.
Mary McGann:
In his diaries, it seemed like he was more of a man who just wanted their civil
rights respected.
Mary McGann:
This was considered an isolation camp, which was more intense than internment
camps themselves.
Mary McGann:
He gave up his citizenship and moved to Japan where he wasn't accepted.
Mary McGann:
It was six months after the end of the war that they were dissolved.
Mary McGann:
Everybody that was in there had the right to choose to remain in the United
States and go back to their home, or go back to Japan.
Mary McGann:
He spent his time in the internment camp learning to write and read.
Mary McGann:
He was a very intelligent man.
Mary McGann:
He decided to go back to Japan and found it if he wasn't accepted there.
Mary McGann:
It was a fairly sad story.
Mary McGann:
The gentleman that came there brought things that the person that was in the
camp owned from when he was in the World War I, that he has donated to the Utah
Raptor State Park, so it would be on sale there.
Mary McGann:
The tour around where the internment camp was was fascinating because we had a
guide that had done tremendous amount of research.
Mary McGann:
To me, that was so exciting to meet somebody and hear the story firsthand and
have him read from his diaries.
Mary McGann:
It made that whole place seem pretty present.
Brian Martinez:
So, that was exciting.
Brian Martinez:
That's my report.
Speaker 15:
Commissioner Martinez.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah, thanks.
Brian Martinez:
I'll just keep it quick.
Brian Martinez:
On the 22nd, I met with MADN, that's our new advertising agency, and I spent
the day with them here and kind of just introduced them to the area.
Brian Martinez:
We went out and had lunch with them.
Brian Martinez:
We had a real nice session where we kind of focused on what the goals were,
what they're going to be using for their KPIs and some of the history of Moab,
and then what kind of our competition looks like other places.
Brian Martinez:
We spent a couple of hours doing a creative exercise, kind of going through how
to play the game and kind of what we want.
Brian Martinez:
Then we spent the afternoon out in Arches.
Brian Martinez:
We took them out to Arches National Park so they could see Arches and kind of
see what this little place is about.
Brian Martinez:
We had dinner with them and they were really nice.
Brian Martinez:
We met with Kaitlin, Leslie, Matt, and Brea.
Brian Martinez:
So, those are our new people there.
Brian Martinez:
They're going to kind of open up with that.
Brian Martinez:
On the 23rd, I was with everybody else at the Raptor State Park opening, and it
was fantastic.
Brian Martinez:
It was a good time.
Brian Martinez:
On the 27th, I was at the budget workshop, which we kind of just discussed
earlier.
Brian Martinez:
On the 28th, the Dolores Travel Management Plan site visit with Trish.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah, it was great going out there and going out and checking out some of those
roads and seeing all those places.
Brian Martinez:
It was fun.
Brian Martinez:
I agree with Trish, you know, that the process was neat.
Brian Martinez:
You have a kind of how they rank everything and then how everything kind of
gets put from the alternative.
Brian Martinez:
So, it was fun doing that.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah, we were out there by the hideout, you know, just up on top of Onion Creek
and then overlooking Fisher Canyon.
Brian Martinez:
It's a beautiful spot.
Brian Martinez:
On the 29th, I met with Representative Kennedy, and then on the 2nd, I was with
John and Bill for the GCAT.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Okay, so Friday morning after the commission meeting, I spent some time out at
Corona Arch with the Trail Ambassadors.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Many of you know because I was dressed very informally at the Raptor State
Park, but I just didn't have a lot of time to change.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We were out there, they didn't classify it as a busy time, but I felt like we
had a lot of great encounters and a lot of people that are really happy to see
him out there.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, then I grabbed my son, which was exciting because he got to meet the
governor, and that was the first time I think that my 13-year-old son was really
in a position as me as a commissioner, so it's really cool to have him along
with me.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I got to meet a lot of you as well.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
On Tuesday, we had the special budget workshop meeting.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Last Wednesday morning, we had our agenda review with Jacques, Bill, Stephen,
Mark, and Quinn, Dana, and it's really nice to have Mary and Jacques at those
meetings.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I really appreciate the experience that they have and thoughts that they add to
those meetings.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
That afternoon, we had the Economic Advisory Board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They've also done an amazing job with RCG and RCOG recommendations.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They were going to be discussing an agenda item seven.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Then on Thursday, I didn't make it to Kennedy's meeting because I met with
SITLA Director McConkie and Brian Torgeson.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We were able to talk about the Colorado River access spots, whether wanting to
withdraw water from the Colorado.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It was a really good learning experience for me and also some possible future
land exchange discussions.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Friday, I got to go to the Chamber Golf Tournament, which they do a great job
putting on a fundraiser for local high school scholarships, and then I was able
to go out to the rodeo and saw the volunteers out there.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I was just enjoying it with my family.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's an awesome thing that we do.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's so great.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We have such a great rodeo in this town.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I had some other friends with me from out of town, and they really appreciated
it.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Then yesterday, I had the Community Renewable Resources meeting, and it was the
first time that something really exciting happened.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We received word that the Public Service Commission approved Utah Renewable
Community's solicitation.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
A key line from the ruling was that the Public Service Commission grants Rocky
Mountain Power's application and approves the Utah Renewable Community's RFP.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Additionally, the Public Service Commission grants Rocky Mountain Power's
motion and requested waiver with the qualifications discussed in this order, and
so the solicitation has been sent out and bids are due back by July 10th to move
along with this process.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
There is some setbacks.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Rocky Mountain Power has delayed their plans to file the remainder of the
program application testimony four times.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
The now projecting that will happen maybe early next week, and these delays
jeopardize the program's ability to stick to contracting and resource funding
timelines.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Even though I'm new to that board, I feel like there's just been a lot of
hurdles that they are coming across.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's another one, so it's moving slow, but it's moving, so it's moving along,
so hopefully that we get some bids.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And then the future consideration,
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
and this really came out of the Economic Opportunity Advisory Board, is one of
the
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
requests was funding from the Moab Area Housing Task Force that they're
requesting $8,500
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
to complete the development of a Moab housing dashboard, and so I thought it'd
be good to
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
discuss possibly using some of that $100,000 set aside for housing that you
guys set out
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
budget last year, and I know it wasn't chosen to fund from the RCG, but it's in
the packet
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
under number seven you guys can look at.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We can discuss that another time.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, Melodie.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I will start off with I had a meeting with Todd Thompson up at USU, who was a
small business consultant that we ended up funding the position for three years,
and he is going to reach out and come in and do a presentation to us.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I was very impressed, I think, in the neighborhood of 30 different individuals
that have been in to see him, and in an attempt to come up with business ideas.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Some of them, he said, are way out there.
Chair Bill Winfield:
He has had some good ones, and he's referred multiple people to our RLF and
Price, and he also has several different micro loans, and he went into great
length and depth on those, but I'll let him save it for his presentation here,
but it's very clear that people are utilizing his position a lot there at USU.
Chair Bill Winfield:
He's not lacking for clients, so that was a good thing.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We used to go through that with him and get the update, and I think he's
already reached out to Dana to move forward.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I was also part of the UAC Natural Resources and Public Lands Committee
meeting.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We heard from Kelly Pearson at UDAF, I'm the new commissioner.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We've heard on multiple projects around the state with the rural
Chair Bill Winfield:
jobs, actually, and Kelly was the one that brought that out, that UDAF is
trying to move
Chair Bill Winfield:
many of their jobs into rural Utah to where those folks can help add to our
economy,
Chair Bill Winfield:
rather than all be centered at an office in Salt Lake City, so I thought that
was pretty
Chair Bill Winfield:
interesting that he's looking to move some of his staff out where he can, and
that's already taking
Sara Melnicoff:
place.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We also heard from Zeke, who's part of Public Lands and the WIR, which we
funded out of the LACTF funds that we received, and then Brandy Grace kind of
finished us off on that meeting.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I also was in the TRT discussion with Jox and Brian and Gabe.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Let's see, a couple other things.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Back to Trish and the shooting range thing, I've also been in talks with the
BLM, and I think her name is Carrie, correct?
Chair Bill Winfield:
There's a lot of cleanup that needs to take place where the old shooting range
is, and so there might be some possibility for our trail crew when the time
comes to be able to help out with that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The Raptor, I was also at the Raptor grand opening.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Mary gave a great speech.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I really appreciated the fact that she called out the older gentleman, and I
don't remember his name, but he was very happy to be called up.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It was very clear he appreciated the recognition.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I was also on an UMTRA tour with Congressman Kennedy.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Also, just a little update.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think I attempted to get this on the agenda, but I forgot about it, but I
think most of you have heard that we had problems with our fire truck at the
airport, and in the process of all that, I applied to the CIB for an emergency
loan.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's totally separate from the regular list of the CIB applicants, and so I
know that Quinn and Dana are working on that, but we'll have to have a public
hearing.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We'll have to approve that if we do receive the emergency loan from CIB, so I
should have got that ahead sooner so I was on this meeting, but I'm just letting
you know that that's coming up.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It'll be a future discussion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Is that for a new truck, Bill, or for repairs to the car?
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's for a new truck.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Repairs, I will say that Mark is heavily involved in those, and we don't know
yet who's going to do those, but we have had an assessment of the truck done, so
just getting that on the emergency loan list that the CIB was important in that
meeting will take place, and we'll know if we're approved on Thursday or Friday.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We have a two-day CIB retreat this week, and so we'll know if they're going to
approve that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The thought is,
Chair Bill Winfield:
and Judd was part of this, our engineer as well, is that by getting the truck
ordered,
Chair Bill Winfield:
there's about a two-year lag to order a new truck, and this will move that
forward about a year and
Chair Bill Winfield:
a half rather than wait for FAA in the future to fund that, but when FAA does
fund it, then we'll
Chair Bill Winfield:
repay that loan back, and so it's a juggle, and we'll have to, number one, vote
on the CIB loan
Chair Bill Winfield:
if we're approved for it, and then in the future vote what we're going to
participate.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm sure the FAA will require participation.
Mary McGann:
So it'll be a loan, not grant.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It'll be a loan.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's the emergency portion of it, so I think that's all that I've got.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The shooting range I mentioned.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think that's all I've got.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We will move on to our electeds, and Gabe, I'll let you start if you'd like.
Gabriel Woytek:
I guess I'll just say the candidate declaration period is open for Moab City
open offices.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's two city council positions and mayor position, and that'll close up this
Friday at 5 p.m. Other than that, I'm interviewing for vacancy in my office, and
yeah, I'm plenty busy with a number of other things, so that'll be all for now.
Gabriel Woytek:
Thank you, Gabe.
Gabriel Woytek:
County Attorney?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, so I had the opportunity, as I mentioned last time, I was at the
Institute for the Community Coordinated Response for Domestic Violence.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That was the week-long training that came at no cost to the county.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They've closed out at 4 p.m. for our hotels and our attendants.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Detective Sterritt was the one that spearheaded that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Phenomenal training.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
This is industry standard, best practices, wonderful training.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They're really pushing a new style of prosecution, which is called
evidence-based prosecution.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
A lot of domestic violence cases
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
you look at and you try to prosecute with the help of the victim, and where
they're looking at it,
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
they said, look, we've done, you know, you always prosecute homicide cases, and
we never have a
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
victim, you know, because they're deceased, and so they're starting to take
best practices and
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
utilize those and try to do domestic violence prosecutions without victim or
when the victim is
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
sometimes adverse to the prosecution.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So that training has been phenomenal.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The ICCR will be with us throughout the year.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They spend the whole year with us giving training, quarterly trainings.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If commissioners are interested, we'll have some presenters.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They'll bring them to the town.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, all of this is provided.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All this cost is paid for.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It was a wonderful, wonderful presentation.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The keynote speaker at that event was the Petito family, and so it was a very
well-done event.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They're going to be bringing a lot of resources and tools to the community, and
so that'll go on through each quarter, and then next year I'll go to that same
conference for another week and give an update on the things that we've learned.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So that's really exciting.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I had an opportunity to meet with Commissioner Winfield and Commissioner
Hadler.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We are looking at the governing policies or the policies and procedures for the
governing body.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think that's the correct name of the document, and we're making some
adjustments.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
This was not a study committee.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It was some committee that was created back in January, and I spoke, and we got
a meeting on the books.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We're going to be looking at some adjustments, changing the language, of
course, from council to commission, and making some other changes.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
One of the things that we brought up, and different commissioners have
approached me about the role of the commissioner is, and I've looked at other
councils, for example, and other commissions, and they have limitations on a
commissioner's request to staff and what that looks like, and going through a
lot of different topics.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
What we're thinking of doing is I'm going
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
to kind of chunk it out into different pieces with the help of the chair and
Commissioner Hadler,
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
go through it, and put it all together, and eventually bring to you all a
redlined version
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
of it, and it's going to be substantive, and so we'll probably have to do a
number of different
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
workshops to go over that, because the policy hasn't been changed for, I think,
2020 might have
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
been the last, or 2021, the last change on it, so I'm going to just let you
know maybe in the fall
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
that I'm going to be bothering you guys for a number of workshops, and it's
going to be
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
very dense, so we'll have coffee, and we'll make it more entertaining and
enjoyable as best we can
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
when we're talking about best practices and mission statements and all this
stuff.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Lastly, just kind of noting, I brought these cases and this type of case up to
you folks before.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
From all the trainings I've gone through with the CJC and the ICCR, I've become
pretty passionate about cases that involve CSAM, and CSAM stands for sexual
abuse materials.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Some people know it as child pornography, and these are really tough cases, and
I just want to let you know that I've looked and I'm pushing for a change at the
legislature level, that if there is a type of CSAM that depicts child rape or
child sodomy, that there should be a one-year mandatory minimum in prison, and
I've come out and I've talked with some legislators about that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's something that is appropriate.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
These are some really egregious circumstances.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They're not public dinner conversation.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It's the type of conversation that no one wants to have, and I don't know if
it's because I've gone to a bunch of training recently.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I've become much more sentimental about those things, but when you handle those
cases and you see those things, it is dreadful, and so I've kind of started to
do a push on that, so that's everything.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, sir.
Speaker 15:
Admin?
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Mr. Tyner?
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
I want to thank Stephen, even though he was out of town in training.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
He's always accessible, and I don't know how he did both as well as he did, but
he did, so I appreciate that.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
We're working on filling some department head slots.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Hopefully, that will be done within the next couple of weeks.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
We'll have to process ongoing for another planning and zoning, hopefully, so
those things are underway, and also, I thought the host employees did a great
job with the rodeo, and I want to congratulate them on that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, sir.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Quinn, you have anything?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes, covered it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I am going to let Melodie take the agenda as I sneak out.
Gabriel Woytek:
Oh, I'm sorry, Gabe.
Gabriel Woytek:
I just wanted to say I didn't have minutes in the packet, so I shouldn't
approve A, and if there would be a commissioner that would be to pull items E
and F on my behalf, if I would appreciate it.
Speaker 15:
Which?
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Then do I go ahead and read them, and then say it pulls them off afterwards,
see how that works?
Jacques Hadler:
Or it can happen anytime.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Jacques Hadler:
I'd like to pull items E and F from the consent agenda.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Jacques Hadler:
Thanks, Melodie.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Approval of the consent agenda items is we're going to skip A.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We're going to go to ratification of the payment of bills.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Total bills of $760,953.05. Total payroll of $529,372.38. So total bills and
payroll is $1,290,325.43. And then we're going to the C is ratification of the
Slaven contract for recruitment of planning and zoning director and county
engineer.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
D, ratification of extension letter for all American Wash NRSCS funding.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And we're going to take E and F off of the consent agenda.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Commissioner McAnlis, I'm sorry.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
I could just point out the number C, ratification for the recruitment of
planning and zoning director and county engineer.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
The county engineer may or may not be needed.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Later you can go ahead and approve it, but we may not need to pursue that one.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's just the contract.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, Mary?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I move to accept the consent agenda as presented.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I have a motion by Commissioner McGann to approve the consent agenda and a
second from Mike.
Trish Hedin:
All in favor?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
None opposed.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And we'll move on to, so E is that we put E and F off of the consent agenda.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So we're going to move on to discussion of item E.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Do you want to talk about that?
Gabriel Woytek:
Yes, please.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Gabriel Woytek:
So these are two agreements that are for the Graham County Fair, and they are
spent with TRT funds and more specifically TRT to AI, single I.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so through the negotiations with the state auditor's office last year, I
love the county fair and I want to see it thrive in this community.
Gabriel Woytek:
And I think it's a great way to use TRT to support our community.
Gabriel Woytek:
And I fought, not fought, but I was involved in negotiations and provided
materials and provided justification to justify the use of these funds to
support the Graham County Fair.
Gabriel Woytek:
And it was left alone.
Gabriel Woytek:
The auditor determined that those funds would be, that would be an allowable
use for the Graham County Fair.
Gabriel Woytek:
Now that the rules have changed and, and we're going along with this, this new
interpretation, I, I don't, I just, I don't see how those TRT funds can be used
in the same way for the support of these.
Gabriel Woytek:
So I think if these are going to be approved, it would have to be approved to
be funded out of general funds.
Gabriel Woytek:
And do you have the dollar amount for the 1665 for the bomb town and then 2,500
for the photo booth?
Gabriel Woytek:
Those are the two.
Gabriel Woytek:
And to be clear, it's, there was some $50,000 last year and $100,000 budgeted
this year plus funds.
Gabriel Woytek:
And I would assume that, you know, given the new, you know, following of these
rules, that, that would all have to be opened up.
Gabriel Woytek:
So do we want to move these to a vote at the next meeting?
Chair Bill Winfield:
What, what are we recommending here?
Mike McCurdy:
Mike, pushing them to the next meeting, would be ill-advised because the
contracts need to be billed to actually have them at the County Fair on July
4th.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Mike McCurdy:
John?
Trish Hedin:
Okay, now.
Jacques Hadler:
Oh, really?
Jacques Hadler:
So, but I'm just trying to get understanding of this.
Jacques Hadler:
So this, these are just a drop in the bucket compared to, or we, do we fund the
fair of the $100,000?
Jacques Hadler:
It's all at a tier two promotion, the whole thing, getting caboodle.
Jacques Hadler:
All of it.
Jacques Hadler:
So now we're going to say, all right, no, no problem with it.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Jacques Hadler:
And now under the new interpretation or whatever we want to call it, we should,
so we should go back and look at all these fair expenses along with the rec SSD
and the other expenses.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The one caveat on this one is the fair is something that I think the County
puts on and advertises and promotes.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think Mike said that there have been individuals that are outside the
community that are going, going to utilize it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think when we went through the analysis and again, commissioners, I think
commissioner McCandless went through and said that, I don't know if this is
misstating position of the commission, but my understanding is we were looking
at the green, the reviewed expenditures.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Is that where we ended up?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That it was the green ones that were accepted on that list?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't think we ended up.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Well, there was no vote taken yet.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Well, there was opinion.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But there were three people that indicated that they were likely going to want
to put all of the items there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And there was one person that said that they were willing to put the green
items there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So if we, you know, I don't know what that thing's called, what the things that
have the overlapping area, but it sounds like if we're there, then I don't know
that if you guys would be on board with these, again, this is something that is
it promoting and establishing this thing's blown up.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It's got photographs.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you're looking at one, I mean, that's kind of the analysis that we did on
our meeting with Jacques as we kind of walked through each individual item and
said, is this promotion?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Is this in the establishment promote?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I don't know if this is something you guys want to do for all the items.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think we can.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think the fair is unique-ish in the sense that it is the, it is its own
event.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It is the creation of an event that exists to promote and bring people in.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And there could be a different argument than the Trail Ambassador Program,
which is trails plus, you know, you're having the trails exist there and you're
getting an add-on to that trail experience.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Whereas people are literally, they would not come out to OSTA but for this
event and these add-ons.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So it's up to you guys what you want to do.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think, again, if we go into the range of things that are more defensible to
not, I think putting on a fair and inviting people and promoting it and pushing
it out there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I mean, again, defensible, likely yes.
Speaker 15:
Mike, please.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Mike McCurdy:
I figure most of what we were about to say is going to parallel.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Mike McCurdy:
In previous, the event has advertised outside of Grand County to, I mean, our
local area, Grand Junction, Emory County, inside of Green River, San Juan
County, bring people to the Grand County Fair.
Mike McCurdy:
Not that we don't love the San Juan Fair, but we want to, we are promoting down
there for the Grand County Fair.
Speaker 15:
Trish, go ahead.
Trish Hedin:
I actually have, I've kind of just gone to the fair just really quickly but
haven't, you know, sat.
Trish Hedin:
One thing I'll say about the rodeo, because I always work the ticket booth, is
it's about half and half if I were to like make a general assessment.
Trish Hedin:
It's about half locals and half, you know, tourists, which is really cool.
Trish Hedin:
And I would assume there'd be a similar kind of turnout for the fair.
Trish Hedin:
Who knows?
Trish Hedin:
But I mean, you know, a county fair is for its residents.
Trish Hedin:
You know, I mean, my county fair was so that we could, I could show my hog, to
be honest, right?
Trish Hedin:
Like it was a way to display what you had grown that year.
Trish Hedin:
So we can make an assumption that, you know, there it's, it is for our
residents, but that it also, in an aside, it's attracting tourists.
Trish Hedin:
So I don't know where you guys want to sit on that.
Trish Hedin:
I mean, maybe we do it and we'll have to know that we have to pay it back.
Trish Hedin:
But as Brian said, and this isn't, I'm not punching it, you know, is it too
close to the line, right?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie, please.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I, yeah, I'm going to classify right there in that green bucket with Trail
Ambassador stuff.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I know that I was, you know, Brian and I discussed a little bit about use of
like the recreation service district.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
You know, it's like we have ballparks and those ballparks used.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And if we were to do an event that we went and push to the outside group, we
could use that money for advertising, even though the local kids or adults or
whatever are going to be using those fields and they're going to be going to
that event as well.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
You're also pushing it outside.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I think this would be similar.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, this county fair is a little different.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's not really a 4-H county fair showing animals.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's really, you know, it's got that in there, but it's kind of like a, it's
kind of like an amusement park and it's got a lot of other things going on.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's got concerts and things.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I think that it would fit in that, where I would put a defensible use of TRT
money.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But that's my opinion on this, on this particular piece.
Speaker 15:
Hey, go ahead, please.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Sorry if I missed you.
Gabriel Woytek:
So, yeah, I agree.
Gabriel Woytek:
I think it's defensible.
Gabriel Woytek:
You know, the conversation about the GCAP programming that was really centered
around solicitation, materials that are solicitations, materials that are taken
away by, by tourists.
Gabriel Woytek:
There was like, it's very clearly promotion as it's currently being considered.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so I don't doubt if there's advertising going out of town.
Gabriel Woytek:
Absolutely.
Gabriel Woytek:
That seems clear and square, but a rock crawling group and a photo booth, if
we're, if that's the, if that's the measure we're using, it's completely
inconsistent with what we're adapting right now.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I disagree.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And the reason why we're disagreeing and why I disagree is because some of the
things that we went through and I'd encourage the commissioners to run through
the play by play on the breakdown.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I mean, and the reason why I'm cautioning the clerk auditor on the language on
this is I think for us to categorize these different things in the way that we
did, there were some give and takes on them and some adjustments to change.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think it's fair.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think it's probably an overstatement to say that we didn't go through and
discuss those things and have more of a more reasonable basis to flag something
as green versus red versus purple.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And so the other nuances, when people are coming to these events, they're going
to these specific individual separate booths for that entertainment, that
recreation purpose.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's different than in a trail program if we're, I'd put it back on that
assessment.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll go to Brian and then Mike or make motion.
Mike McCurdy:
That's where I was going, unless you're going next.
Mike McCurdy:
No, I was going to start with Brian so that.
Brian Martinez:
Just real quick.
Brian Martinez:
I think that a lot of this could have been avoided if it had gone to the tax
advisory board prior to this.
Brian Martinez:
We have a tax advisory board for this tax right now.
Brian Martinez:
So had this gone to our tax advisory board and had been part of a marketing
plan, I think that it would be a little bit clearer.
Brian Martinez:
I think one of our mistakes right now is this is kind of sitting out here on
its own.
Brian Martinez:
Same way with the trail ambassador expenditures that we were talking about
earlier.
Brian Martinez:
They're out there on their own department, which makes it less likely that it's
tourism.
Brian Martinez:
We have a tax advisory board that's by statute to provide recommendations for
spending of that tax.
Brian Martinez:
Had this been sitting in front of them and they said, yes, this is a way that
we'd like to spend this.
Brian Martinez:
It's part of our marketing plan or it's part of our long-term goal.
Brian Martinez:
I think that that would be a little bit closer.
Speaker 15:
Mike, please.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make a motion to approve the independent contract agreement for the
2025 grand planning fair with Bombtown.
Chair Bill Winfield:
You want to just lump them both in together?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Mike McCurdy:
I'll second.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Second by Commissioner McCandless.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we have any other discussion?
Trish Hedin:
No.
Jacques Hadler:
I think all this falls under promotion.
Jacques Hadler:
I'll just say that.
Jacques Hadler:
I think everything we've discussed up until now have made my position
exceptionally clear.
Jacques Hadler:
I also think what's good for the goose is good for the gander.
Jacques Hadler:
If we're going to be taking a really hard under the microscope look at every
other expense, I think this deserves the same scrutiny.
Jacques Hadler:
I'll just go ahead and say that.
Speaker 15:
Anybody else?
Speaker 15:
Mary?
Mary McGann:
I'm going to be real quick.
Mary McGann:
I feel like this is a grey area in bold in some ways.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes, Commissioner McCandless.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Just to clarify, are we paying it out of TRT funds or are we paying it out of
this person's TRT funds?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Then I would like to make a recommendation that next goes in front of the
Travel Advisory Board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Tax Advisory Board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Yes, Tax Advisory Board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
That's what it is.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's the Travel Council Advisory Board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
MTAP.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So that they can approve it in advance.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We didn't get to have that control last year.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So this year we can request that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll go for a vote.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All those in favor of approving this to come out of the TRT promotion money?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those in favor?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those against?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion fails with Commissioner.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm abstaining.
Trish Hedin:
I'm abstaining too.
Trish Hedin:
I'm getting snail-eyed here.
Trish Hedin:
I never abstain.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So again, the motion fails with two abstaining.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
What's that?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
You need four to vote.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So the vote fails with Commissioners who were against.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So the two against Commissioner McGann and Commissioner McCurdy and then two
abstentions, Commissioner Hather and Commissioner Hedeen.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Correct, as you stated.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, moving forward.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We are on to L.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
You could have a replacement motion if you'd like.
Mary McGann:
A replacement motion perhaps.
Speaker 15:
Okay, please.
Mary McGann:
We approve this expenditure for the bomb town now to determine where the
funding comes from after clarification.
Mary McGann:
But that we approve it so you can get the contract but to work out.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's a very fast motion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McGann, seconded by Commissioner Martinez.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie, please start the discussion.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know when the clarification is going to come.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, ultimately, we discussed that earlier today about budget.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Okay, so we're going to have the same conversation again with the budget
amendments.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I'm just curious if people are going to abstain from those as well because
we can't make a vote today at this moment in time.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We're going to make a vote then on the exact same situation.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So we have to like, that's where we're going to start.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'd like to let our county attorney weigh in real quick.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you guys want clarification, again, previously in the meeting, the clerk
auditor indicated that all the expenses were approved in his mind.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So where are we looking for clarification on this particular item?
Mary McGann:
Well, does it fall into the same area that our trail ambassadors are?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Would you like to make that determination?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Because our clerk auditor said that all the expenses would be in this would be
as well.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Would you like other commissioners?
Mary McGann:
We'll make the decision when we do our budget event.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
In the meantime, do you guys have that to be paid for out of your general fund?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Do you not want to approve it at this time?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
What do you guys want to do?
Mike McCurdy:
Because otherwise, we can't fund a contract without knowing where the money is
coming from.
Mike McCurdy:
The motion would need to include the motion.
Mike McCurdy:
And can I do that being from the previous bill?
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, you can put one on your discretionary fund.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If this is what you guys want to spend that money on.
Trish Hedin:
Sounds like a good debate.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So do we need a substitute motion?
Trish Hedin:
Yeah, on a discretionary fund.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That puts it in kind of a gray area.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make it a substitute motion to approve the independent contract
agreement for the 2025 Grand County Fair with Boomtown out of commission
discretionary funds.
Mike McCurdy:
I'll second that.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy and seconded by Commissioner Hedin to pull this
money out of the commission discretionary funds for Bombtown at the county fair.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All those in favor?
Speaker 15:
Oh, excuse me, John.
Jacques Hadler:
I just hit it.
Jacques Hadler:
I'm sorry.
Jacques Hadler:
I want to clarify.
Jacques Hadler:
Do we know how much is in our discretionary funds?
Jacques Hadler:
It's north of 50.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Jacques Hadler:
I'll look.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Jacques Hadler:
That's fine.
Jacques Hadler:
I just wanted to estimate.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any further discussion?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll call for a vote.
Trish Hedin:
All in favor?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That passes unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
None opposed.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner McCurdy?
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make a motion to approve the independent contract agreement for the
2025 Grand County Fair with Moab Photo Booth, and it was $2,500?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Mike McCurdy:
For $2,500 out of commission discretionary fund.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Discussion?
Mike McCurdy:
If I get a second.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy to approve this one out of the commission
discretionary funds.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do I have a second?
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner Martinez seconds.
Mike McCurdy:
Mike's discussion.
Mike McCurdy:
I really feel like if anything could fall in that gray area, and I don't want
stuff to fall in that gray area, it would be a service at the fair, and this is
a service at the fair instead of an attraction bringing outside tourism in, such
as our previous approval of the entertainment, Bombtown, that this is a photo
booth at the fair.
Mike McCurdy:
I really feel like if it was to fall in the indefensible, that would be the
photo booth far more than the entertainment for the fair, so I'd like to pay it
out of discretionary funds.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any further discussion?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll call for a vote.
Trish Hedin:
All in favor?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion passes unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We will move on.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Was that the only two items that were pulled out?
Chair Bill Winfield:
A was not addressed because they're in the minutes.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, then we will move on to item number three, the non-conversion agreement.
Chair Bill Winfield:
This has Commissioner Hedin and Ms. Hofhein.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
So, this was brought to my attention in my temporary role.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Staff in the planning office was asked to sign off on this, and she chose not
to, so that it came to me.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
This is something that shouldn't be a problem going forward, and it's because
of staffing changes in the planning office and zoning or the building
department, but it was already on here, so I thought I'd discuss it with you
guys a little bit.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
This is the kind of agreement that should always go through our county
attorney's office.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Apparently, these have been sort of being done outside of that, so the reason
that it's being brought to you now is because only the commission should have
signatory authority on something that the county has agreed to, and it should
always be done through the county attorney's office, which is why it was being
brought to you guys.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
It shouldn't be an issue going forward because we're entering into a new sort
of phase of planning and zoning and building, but that's why it's on here, and
that's why I need a motion from you guys today.
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner McCurdy.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make the motion.
Mike McCurdy:
I move to approve the ratification of the non-conversion agreement between the
county and the owner of real property located at 3106 South Spanish Valley
Drive.
Mike McCurdy:
Second.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy, seconded by Commissioner Tinus.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Further discussion?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Seeing none, I'll call for a vote.
Trish Hedin:
All in favor?
Trish Hedin:
But just real quick, and so you guys kind of just read that background.
Trish Hedin:
Did you guys read the background just to kind of have an understanding?
Mike McCurdy:
And small, small discussion.
Mike McCurdy:
Please.
Mike McCurdy:
I see why it happened now.
Mike McCurdy:
Will this decision continue to fall to commission in the end?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
This decision should always fall to the commission after going through the
county attorney's office.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
This should never be something that would be decided by staff.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
That was one of the reasons that it's being brought to you now, because this is
something that is a, it was first brought to the county attorney's office back
in 2020, and it had been sort of, I don't want to say pirated, but it's been
sort of taken on by staff as something that they're doing, but it's not
something that should be happening that way.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And when it came to my attention, I pulled it.
Mike McCurdy:
And it doesn't fall under the zoning administrator's purview?
Trish Hedin:
No.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
So the zoning administrator can only sign off on things that are approved by
ordinance by you guys, blessed by you guys.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Each of these is an independent agreement.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
So they would need to go through the county attorney's office.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And Stephen could probably speak to this more technically than I can, but it
would need to go through a legal review.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
These are legally binding.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
They're recorded on property in perpetuity.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And so, and all of these need to be looked at independently within the county
attorney's office.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
How many of these we see here?
Trish Hedin:
I have no idea.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
This is my, this was, no, they were cleaning it up.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Trish Hedin:
I don't like that it was happening.
Trish Hedin:
So I see it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If the county attorney agrees with that, I would appreciate a comment.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I agree with that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think the only, whenever, whenever the entity finds something that likely
should have been corrected or isn't done appropriately, best practice would be
to go, to dig up within reason and find, because these, these, I don't know who
were done and I don't know if they've gone through and filed deed restrictions
on them.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Deed restrictions would be done depending on whether it's considered an AD or
not.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And so most of them, it's a deed restriction is removed.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
It's another thing that was kind of weird to me about this whole agreement.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I mean, and best practice would be to track these, have these be some method
and mechanisms for tracking them, making sure the signatory authority, because
we're, we're responsible for ensuring that the agreement goes through.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And we, basically we, we had a lot of agreements that we didn't necessarily
know.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And when I say we, I mean the county commission and that, and we didn't set
this up in a mechanism.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you guys don't want to see these, definitely you can pass some, some
documents to give that authority through the ordinance, but that's not what was
done.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
When I say a lot, I mean, it's a handful.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
I don't think that this was, this is like a common occurrence.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
I don't want you guys to think that this.
Mike McCurdy:
Probably less than 10.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Mike McCurdy:
Just to follow this decision goes to the recorder's office and it's recorded
along with the document could, yeah, the document would go there, but it's not
their decision, just the document.
Mike McCurdy:
So then the, I'm just saying in the future purchaser of this, when they will
title this comes right up.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
It's not something that's happening.
Trish Hedin:
It's perpetuity with the, with the property property.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Trish Hedin:
Commissioner Dean, um, I guess, and, and this kind of relates to Brian's that
you're on the whistle board, but you know, when you have an ADU, I have an ADU
on my property.
Trish Hedin:
I pay impact fees.
Trish Hedin:
I think I paid 12 and an impact fees.
Trish Hedin:
This, that was kind of, you know, if you think about somebody leaving in this
case, leaving a structure, they built a house and then that structure was
supposed to go away.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Trish Hedin:
And it's still there in theory, they should have had two impact fees applied to
that property.
Trish Hedin:
And this is a way to kind of say, well, we're not going to use that property as
a house, right.
Trish Hedin:
As an ADU, it's just additional living space.
Trish Hedin:
But, but, you know, the issue with something like this is, you know, with us
should be getting impact fees on two structures, right.
Trish Hedin:
Um, being paid to them.
Trish Hedin:
So just kind of how it applies to that.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Trish Hedin:
And so you don't want to bypass that.
Trish Hedin:
Want to make sure that those impact fees are being paid because they have an
impact on the infrastructure, water and sewers.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
While we're in further discussion, I will call for a vote.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All in favor of the motion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion passes unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We'll move on to item number four, which is the approval of media production
services for who is Moab campaign videos.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Ms. Hartford.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Hello.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Moab office of tourism.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Hi.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Um, so we have been wanting to do a project like this, or I have since I
started in this office.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Um, and so the project was approved to solicit quotes at the February of tab
meeting.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And then those quotes were reviewed, uh, during the most recent meeting.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And so I'm here today with the quotes and the recommendation from the end tab
to, um, do this project with real creative.
Brian Martinez:
Brian, please.
Brian Martinez:
I moved to approve the media production project with real creative and
authorize the chair to sign the associated agreement upon completion of legal
review.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by commissioner Martinez.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Second by commissioner McCurdy discussion by commissioner McCurdy.
Mike McCurdy:
How the board see it.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
They like it.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Um, really what we're buying with this project and what I told the board to is,
uh, licenses to the videos that these guys are going to make.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And so, um, the documentaries will be great for media and they'll be really
fun, but really what I'm excited about is like B roll footage of people rafting
and climbing.
Mike McCurdy:
Oh, okay.
Mike McCurdy:
Along with that, uh, two part there.
Mike McCurdy:
Uh, now we own in this, we own this zero, et cetera.
Mike McCurdy:
So we can, I mean, later on forever.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
It's going into a physical hard drive.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
It's going to go online.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
We'll own it.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Barring further discussion, I will call for a vote all in favor motion passes
unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We can move on to thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Ms. Hartford move on to number five and ordinance establishing a grand County
tax cell procedure.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
This is Mr. Clerk.
Gabriel Woytek:
Thanks chair.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, so we were pretty close to, um, potentially having a actual tax sale come
up this year.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, and fortunately that that was resolved and, uh, the owner was able to find
a buyer.
Gabriel Woytek:
So not quite finalized, but it's almost certain that that, uh, the back taxes
will be paid and all the balance.
Gabriel Woytek:
He's my interest.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, there hasn't been a tax sale in almost 20 years.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's quoted in the packets.
Gabriel Woytek:
I think it's 2006 was the last time it happened.
Gabriel Woytek:
Obviously property values and demand are quite high here.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, so even when folks, uh, are behind, um, they're usually able to, to find
someone to buy and settle up.
Gabriel Woytek:
So it's not really much of an issue.
Gabriel Woytek:
I'm glad it isn't one of these things that, um, you know, in other companies
there, there are several tax sale sales and it's quite an administrative
process.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, and so anyway, the, uh, administrative rules state that the County should
have an ordinance on the books, uh, to, to be able to handle the procedures, uh,
of those sales.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, and so just clarifying, I did cancel the public notice associated with the
tax sale, but we're going to just move in this forward and put it on the books,
um, in case in the future it were to come up.
Gabriel Woytek:
And I, I really think, uh, treasurer Bachman for his help in setting this up
and also for his health, um, taking great, uh, you know, personal care and
working with, uh, any property owners that are in danger of tax sale, um, and
helping navigate with them, uh, options for deferral and other ways to avoid
that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I echo the thanks.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think it's, it's great that we get to address these things and appreciate the
work and the treasurer on, on bringing this together and making sure that we
have these things, um, ready to go so that we don't have to address them after
the fact.
Mike McCurdy:
So I appreciate both their work on this.
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner McCurdy.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make the motion.
Mike McCurdy:
I move to approve the ordinance, establishing the Grand County tax sale
procedure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy, seconded by Commissioner McCandless.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any further discussion?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Seeing none, I will call for a vote.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All in favor.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Passes unanimously.
Gabriel Woytek:
We will now move on to number six.
Gabriel Woytek:
Approval.
Gabriel Woytek:
I will note that when it goes out on the screen, it stays on YouTube fine.
Gabriel Woytek:
So we're not losing the whole thing.
Speaker 15:
Cool.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Approval of the fiscal year 2025 airport infrastructure grant agreement part
one offer contract 349-02-0-048-2025 could construct taxi lanes E, G, and J.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I believe that this is probably me.
Trish Hedin:
No.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll give a little bit of background on this.
Chair Bill Winfield:
This is a grant from the FAA that amounts to $2,032,062.48 with a match fund
from Grand County.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I'm not seeing the dollar amount.
Chair Bill Winfield:
$125,064.48. And so this is an item that we would need to approve the match
funds for this item.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And although I don't know the total dollar amount that will be moved back into
the airport budget, but there is money moving into the airport budget sometime
here in the near future that was removed during the COVID years when we were
receiving CARES funds and different funds.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So this 125K could possibly come out of that as my guess.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So Commissioner McCurdy.
Mike McCurdy:
I move to accept the Federal Aviation Administration grant number 48 in the
amount of $2,376,208 for the construction of taxi lanes at Canyonlands Regional
Airport and authorize the chair to sign all associated documents and contracts.
Mike McCurdy:
I'll second.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy, second by Commissioner McCandless.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Start us off, Trish, and then I'll come over to you.
Trish Hedin:
So sorry.
Trish Hedin:
And maybe you don't know, Bill.
Trish Hedin:
So when you say that money was moved, so maybe you're saying it's somewhere in
the general fund and then it's going to be moved.
Trish Hedin:
But in theory, it's still a part of that when we're looking at those numbers
today, it's within those numbers.
Trish Hedin:
Does that make sense?
Trish Hedin:
So meaning these are additional expenditures that we're adding.
Trish Hedin:
Make sense or is it?
Chair Bill Winfield:
This is some money that was taken out of the airport budget.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All money that's earned at the airport stays at the airport per FAA
regulations.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The number has been somewhat of a moving target and Gabe, who has exited, has
not finalized what that dollar amount is.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It was at 1.1 million dollars that needed to go back to the airport.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't know where we will end up because that number seems to be changing for
Gabe.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So I can't speak to it.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So it is not coming out of this budget.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's money that has to go back to the airport per FAA.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I understand.
Trish Hedin:
I guess what I'm saying is is it somewhere in our general fund?
Trish Hedin:
I mean, it's coming from somewhere, right?
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I guess I'm just coming from earnings at the airport.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
If that money is due back to the airport, it's money that was earned at the
airport.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Trish Hedin:
I'm just okay.
Trish Hedin:
I guess I'm just not I'm still not understanding Commissioner McGannon.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I wish that we had the I think you answered it.
Mary McGann:
So it's really going to be when you said approved within budget, it will be cut
from the airport budget.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Mary McGann:
That's what I want to know.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I know that Mark has been a part of those conversations and can support
what I'm saying.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The clerk auditor clearly isn't here to speak to it.
Brian Martinez:
Can I just ask a question?
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Brian Martinez:
Can you enlighten me a little bit on this Taxi Lane F for $666,000?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Taxi Lane F is not fundable by the FAA.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so that is a third taxiway.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Actually, it would be considered a fourth because the first part of the grant.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so that's an additional quote from the contractor that will be doing the
other Taxiways on FAA funding.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So this additional $600,000 would also have to come out of airport budget or
county budget if we want to move forward on it.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I can't speak to that dollar amount.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would imagine that that has to come before the commission in a separate
agenda item.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner McCurdy.
Mike McCurdy:
To shorten this down, we put in $125,000.
Mike McCurdy:
We get $2.4 million?
Mike McCurdy:
Basically, yes.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Mike McCurdy:
That man and I like them odds.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any further discussion?
Trish Hedin:
Steven, do you have anything you want to add?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't know exactly how those funds work.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But if only we had somebody to answer that question.
Chair Bill Winfield:
No further discussion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Call for a vote.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those in favor of supporting the FAA grant at the airport?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those opposed?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion passes six to three.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Six to one.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Excuse me.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't know where that math came from.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner Hedin again.
Trish Hedin:
And I just want to move on.
Trish Hedin:
Do you mind if I just state that I just didn't feel like I have complete
clarification as to where that money is coming from.
Trish Hedin:
And in these times, I'm not real comfortable spending that.
Trish Hedin:
I think it's a great match.
Trish Hedin:
It just freaked me out.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The last thing we want is you freaked out.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We'll move on to item number seven.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Consideration of economic advisory board grant application recommendations for
state rural grants.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I would like to state that I think there was a lot of effort went into this
from our board.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think that they did a good job of sorting out.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think there were 57 applicants.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I'm appreciative of the fact that the transparency and the openness of
these grants that we received out of this and that we were able to open this up
out into the community further.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so I think that was a big push of mine from the very beginning when I came
on as a commissioner that these grants would be much more open to the public and
transparent on what we were doing with them.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so as we move forward, I would like to comment that I would like to see a
slight change in this and that I would like to see the grant for the Chamber of
Commerce reduced to $10,000 and the remaining $15,000 split between the two
child care applicants that didn't receive anything here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I do think that the Chamber has received money in the past.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would justify this based off of that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But I also would say that we have put a ton of money into just one individual
on child care and that I think that we need to open this up a little bit.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Although it's hard to see child care as an economic development, I think that
they carry a huge burden for the working class in this community that allows
them to have jobs, which is a big part of our economy and economics here,
whether it's tourism or other related.
Chair Bill Winfield:
These daycares are a huge part of what we're doing, in my mind.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner McCurdy?
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make the motion to approve the consideration of economic advisory
board grant applicant recommendations as stated, not as listed.
Mike McCurdy:
Can I do that?
Mike McCurdy:
He hasn't named the entities.
Mike McCurdy:
Child care.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I will state those two child care.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
You need to state all of them.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Whoever he's suggesting putting funds to, we just need the names.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Jasper daycare is one of them, and I forget.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I had these written down in my notebook, but I apologize.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Jasper daycare and the second one is, oh, there it is, Rock Tots.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so that 15,000 would be split evenly between those two child care entities.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So just to make it clean for the record, you're saying Gold Horse, 75,000,
Artesian, 45,000, Chamber of Commerce, 10,000, Delaware Brewery, 25,000, Molten
Mini Mount, 30,000, Rock Tots, $7,500, and Jasper daycare, $7,500.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I want to make it stated so it's clear.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's my motion.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Second, anyone?
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll second, but I want to discuss too.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think Brian beat you to it, so I'll let him have the second, and then you can
open up the discussion.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We also didn't accept the rural communities opportunity grant of the $600,000,
so we'll have to do that in a different motion.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But they worked really, really hard on this, and it is going against what they
recommended, and I'm that liaison for them.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But I think the majority of that group would agree with that split.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Had it been brought up, again, just based on the discussions, and you can go
back and watch the last meeting.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They've been working on this since February, put a lot of effort, a lot of
work, reviewed those.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
At the very end, I think they were kind of like, well, is there anybody we were
forgetting?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And we didn't go back into that list of the 57, and so I appreciate you guys
going back to that list because I do think that it's fair to give those two
daycares some money based on the fact that we've given a lot of money to a
daycare out there.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So anyways, I feel like I just wanted to put that out there because we are
going against the recommendation, but I think it's a really good recommendation.
Jacques Hadler:
I've got further discussion.
Jacques Hadler:
Jacques, go ahead, please.
Jacques Hadler:
I just didn't.
Jacques Hadler:
I don't know about the other daycares.
Jacques Hadler:
Actually, my daughter had one of the daycares that was recommended, so I know
she runs a quality operation, but I think this board does a great job.
Jacques Hadler:
I think they worked super hard on this.
Jacques Hadler:
They didn't have a staff member working on them this year because they didn't
have that position.
Jacques Hadler:
We just approved that position, but it hasn't been hired yet.
Jacques Hadler:
So my inclination would be just to defer to their recommendations.
Jacques Hadler:
As for the Chamber of Commerce, I'm no longer the liaison to that board, but I
was for the last four years, and I was last year when they ran their business
summit, and I just wanted to disagree with one of the citizens to be heard.
Jacques Hadler:
I think he stated that that business summit was just an election vehicle for
the current chamber president, who was actually not the chamber president last
year.
Jacques Hadler:
That was Shaley Bryant, and I attended that business summit.
Jacques Hadler:
I thought the chamber did a good job with that, and I think they did a good job
before also.
Jacques Hadler:
I believe this $25,000 was to be used for the business summit.
Jacques Hadler:
At least that's what it said in the materials, I think.
Jacques Hadler:
So I would wonder if that would even be happening this year, because I know it
cost $110,000 to fund that.
Jacques Hadler:
So that would be a concern of mine.
Jacques Hadler:
Otherwise, I'm very happy with all the other decisions they made.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any other comments?
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would like to make a comment.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I guess the further discussion that I'd like to have around this is we're
asking citizens to put money forward here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Actually, we're using grant money to go towards the golf course, the Moab
brewery, and multi-mini-mount.
Chair Bill Winfield:
What I would like to see on these grants moving forward is that there's
something in the contract that asks them to come back for final payment.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We don't just hand out a lump sum, but we break that up, and then they come
back with some sort of an update on what they use the money for.
Chair Bill Winfield:
For instance, the multi-mini-mount, I'm a little bit aware of that one, because
I know this gentleman.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'd like to know, are we creating jobs?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Where does this money take us?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Because economic development, we should see something for our money that
benefits this community and a tax base.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So is it employment, Moab brewery?
Chair Bill Winfield:
What are we getting from Moab brewery for this money?
Chair Bill Winfield:
So I'd just like to see the contracts tightened up a little bit, so that maybe
it's 75-25, and maybe it's too late for that on this one, that we need to look
at something in the future, and I'll let the county attorney speak to that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But having some accountability to come back and get the rest of that money at
the end, to me, seems like an incentive to come back with a great report or a
report on what actually happened.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So when the state came down and walked us through, and they did a good
presentation, they said that the contract and your additional terms are ensuring
that the expenditure is provided appropriately.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We can create contracts with them.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's what they did indicate.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Here's kind of the route or the difficulty for me.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I can draft a contract.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I can put kind of the same things that you get that we've had previously with
the start grant or the special event grant, and they've done in the past a 90-10
split that shows that you've expended 90% of the funds on the particular thing
that you were spending on, and then come back to do a final report and get the
last 10%.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's been helpful in the past.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
People have completed the reports and documents and come back for that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Additional conditions makes it a little trickier, because I don't know what you
guys want.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So if you guys said, like, something that's within the scope, you said, hey, we
want a report that you've spent all the funds or the 90% of the funds on the
items that the EOAB dated or that's in your application or things like that, and
document that, I think that's a very reasonable request.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And to have them do a report that shows that it's creating jobs or things like
that, again, reasonable request.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Where I think it becomes harder is kind of micromanaging a little bit deeper
into what they're going to spend it on.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Like, I don't know if we have the manpower to say, oh, the golf course is going
to spend it on watering.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Like, are we going to go out there and watch them put in the PVC pipes?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Are we not?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I can put together a sample contract for us to look through and make sure
that the expenses are done in the correct way.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Happy to do that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's something that we've done with all of our grants that we've done from
the star grants to special event grants and so on and so forth.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'm happy to do that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think it'd be cleanest if we could spend the money within six months, but I
don't know the depths of the applications.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I that's, again, some of the issues that I would have for drafting contracts
now.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'll start with Mike and then go to Melodie.
Mike McCurdy:
This kind of goes towards Mark and Stephen.
Mike McCurdy:
Like I stated previously with HR, wouldn't this fall under the purview of the
economic development position to follow through on contracts?
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
I mean, this is what they would be looking at.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Yeah, certainly.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
And in the absence of that, I think it would be perfectly reasonable for com
admin to communicate with the county attorney's office.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And one thing before I forget, I want to thank Chris Wilson and Melissa
Jeffers, and I don't know who else, and Commissioner McCandless and who else,
designed the form.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It did the intake.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They put a ton of effort into this.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They processed 50 applications instead of two.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The outreach was phenomenal.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I really appreciate the hard work.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They have long meetings to discuss this, and I think it was done in a really,
really stand-up way.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I just wanted to mention that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's all I had.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, Dana and Mark and Quinn, they helped a bunch as well.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So the money's going to come in for this RCG grant.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We're going to receive the money October, November, December-ish.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
That's when the money's going to come to us.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And then that reporting is due by July 30th, I think, of next year.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So right now, we're in the process that just opened up on May 15th, opened up
the reporting period for last year's funds, which went to child care.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So we have a copy of that.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Could you email a copy of that report to all of us just so we know what it
looks like?
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Chris had it at the meeting the other day, but I haven't seen it.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So if we get that, that reporting has to be done for each of these, and that
has to be done by July of next year.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So we would expect that the money would be spent by the time that we did that
report or reasoning why that would.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I think it all sits in that time zone.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I would also, so the Economic Opportunity Advisory Board's getting that
information back.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I think it just necessarily isn't all coming.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's not coming to the commission.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But I think that that's something that I could report back on next year, or
whoever's the board meeting is on next year for that position once that
information came back.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I think, but it'd be interesting to look at that report that they're asking
right now.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I haven't seen it yet to see if there's anything additional that we'd want to
ask.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And the other neat thing that they could do, because there's that time gap
between now and when they received the funds, they could also look at items that
we would, I think, reasonably, reasonably reimburse their fall within the
mission.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They can be reimbursed.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Yeah, they, yep, they can be reimbursed.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So that's something else when they're looking forward at their application.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I'll say this, and we've done this in the past for other grants, we have
made adjustments or amendments to what their original spend was going to be on
if it's within a reasonable range as well.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So some people might get the funds, and I don't know that anybody on this, I
mean, maybe if they didn't do a beer garden, not trying to pick on the brewery,
but maybe they wanted to not do it at the food truck park and want to do it
somewhere else or something like that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We've had circumstances where we've asked to kind of slightly pivot from the
application, but we asked them to be upfront about it, say, hey, look, we don't
want to do it this way, we want to shift slightly, and we've had that be
successful.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, further discussion?
Chair Bill Winfield:
I will call for a vote on the motion.
Trish Hedin:
Do you mind, Bill, just reviewing the motion real quick?
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The motion is to fund the golf course at $75,000, Artisan at $45,000, Chamber
of Commerce at $10,000, Moab Brewery at $25,000, Popeye Mini Mount at $30,000,
the Jasper's Day Care at $7,500, and the Rock Tots at $7,500.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner McCurdy, you made the motion, I believe Commissioner Martinez
seconded that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So those in favor of the motion as stated?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those opposed?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion passes 4 to 3 with Commissioner Hedin, Commissioner Hadler, and
Commissioner McGann opposed.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And we will move on to the state.
Mary McGann:
I just wanted to support.
Mary McGann:
I know how hard that board worked.
Mary McGann:
And I know they probably considered the Jasper Day Care and the Tots very
seriously before they came up with their decision.
Mary McGann:
So I felt it was important to go with their recommendations.
Mary McGann:
Because of all the boards I've been on in the past, that's probably what the
hardest work.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I appreciate that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They should watch the shows.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
If you haven't watched them, maybe you should watch them.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would also maybe add to the fact as we're looking at contracts and drawing
this up, if there's a promotional aspect to them, that the county retains some
of the advertising rights.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't know about the golf course or the beer garden, but if there's something
that could be done there, I would want the county to be able to utilize or to
advertise that this grant went out from the county type of thing.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But yeah.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But you're not talking about that the county is not purchasing the intellectual
property.
Trish Hedin:
No.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
You're just saying that you'd like to be able to highlight the fact that these
funds were expended.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I think that's very reasonable.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So we will move on then to number eight, the CJC advisory board liaison
assignments.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The agenda here.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Let's look at this.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Hang on.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Hang on.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
What about the $600,000?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Oh, yeah.
Jacques Hadler:
We have to make another motion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That wasn't on.
Trish Hedin:
No.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So we're adding an agenda item.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We're back to item number seven.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Back to item number seven.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I will make a motion to approve the $600,000.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Well, it's not approving $600,000.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We're just making a recommendation to support the Grand County EMS training
program, destination training program, as our rural communities opportunity
grant.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So they will go and forward that one.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And that's for the one that's contained in the second attachment.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And it looks like it's down on page two that lists recommended funding package,
rural communities opportunity grant, Grand County EMS, destination EMS training
program, recommended amount $600,000, just so that people can see it.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCandless, second by Commissioner McCurdy.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Discussion?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Melodie?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And just so everyone here in the community knows, that is not, we do not get to
choose that.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's a competitive grant that goes up to the state.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I know we all learned that in the training.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And so we are just agreeing that that's what we want to go forth for Grand
County.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And so we'll find out.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And it's really great because the Governor's Office of Economic Opportunity
will work with them and help them to get their application in and all that.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
That will go in in November.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So they have a lot of time to work on that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any further discussion?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Seeing none, I'll call for a vote.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All those in favor of the $600,000 grant, the Grand County EMS. And again, just
to clarification, this is recommending?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Recommending.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It's not, there's no fiscal impact.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It's not that we're giving them funds, that we're just supporting their
application to the rural communities grant.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's the only way they could.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Okay, perfect.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I just want to make it clear.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those in favor?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion passes unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We will move on to item number eight, the CJC board liaison assignments.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And this came about at the last meeting when I made the request of Mary and
haven't heard anything.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So I just figured we would put it on here for a vote.
Chair Bill Winfield:
This has two liaisons currently, Commissioner Hedin and Commissioner McGann.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I know that Commissioner McGann has put a lot of time and effort over the
years into this.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I'm not in any way discounting or taking that away from Mary for as far as
the efforts that she's put in there.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But I have asked that I be replaced on that board or be the replacement on that
board to participate in those CJC meetings.
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner McGann.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make the motion for these recommend motion to CJC advisory board
liaison assignments.
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner Hedin, Commissioner Winfield.
Mike McCurdy:
And as a third fill in, if either of you need a fill in, I would like to take
that place.
Mike McCurdy:
In talking with county attorney stocks, I just wanted to make sure that I
didn't have any conflicts and we're good.
Mike McCurdy:
That was my opinion.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, I've got to raise the level of it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, I think it's important to understand what the CJC advisory board does.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It's an advisory process.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't want to say anything to explain circumstances, but it's an advisory
board that meets cross-sectional community.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They do not review cases.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They do not talk about cases.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Do not handle the budget.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It is a meet and converse about goals and missions of the CJC.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It is a soft, fluffy board.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So they're not controlling any funds or making any decisions on any of the
cases, how the prosecutor proceeded.
Trish Hedin:
It's really just the sharing of, you know, so city police will share what
they're up to, right?
Trish Hedin:
UCFS will share.
Trish Hedin:
It's an hour long.
Trish Hedin:
It's pretty mellow.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So I've got a motion on the table, Commissioner McCurdy.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I will look for a second and then we can open it up for discussion if we want.
Brian Martinez:
I'll second the motion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy, seconded by Commissioner Martinez.
Mike McCurdy:
Discussion, anyone?
Mike McCurdy:
Mike?
Mike McCurdy:
Well, number one, a discount.
Mike McCurdy:
Mary put in the work for years on this.
Mike McCurdy:
And I just want to make that first and foremost.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I appreciate that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I appreciate all the effort that you've put in over the years as well, Mary.
Trish Hedin:
So can I just, why did you feel this was necessary?
Trish Hedin:
I got that.
Trish Hedin:
Oh, you're going to answer that question?
Trish Hedin:
Yeah, I can answer that one.
Trish Hedin:
Oh, but who came up with the idea?
Trish Hedin:
Did you come up with the idea?
Mike McCurdy:
No, I mean, in reading this, yes.
Trish Hedin:
You came up with the idea?
Mike McCurdy:
Just looking at this, yeah.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Trish Hedin:
This is your, okay.
Mike McCurdy:
No, my motion just came up by lip reading.
Trish Hedin:
Oh, I understand that.
Trish Hedin:
I understand that.
Trish Hedin:
No, I guess I'm just wanting to know why.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Because there's been five absences.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We're talking about a year and a quarter of not making those meetings.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I just felt like it would be a good opportunity for me to step in and be a
part of that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I was a big push to help the CJC out recently and feel like it would just be a
good fit.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't see anybody else wanting to fill that vacancy that you held there,
although I would certainly consider others if they wanted to.
Trish Hedin:
I think the assumption, and I didn't read the specifics on the bylaws, was that
one commissioner was, which I'm the chair, is needed.
Trish Hedin:
And I think Mary came and was like, you got it.
Trish Hedin:
And so if we're going to start doing two commissioners for every board, which
is fine.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We're not doing two commissioners for every board.
Chair Bill Winfield:
This board just has two commissioners.
Trish Hedin:
And that's specifically the verbiage in the bylaws?
Trish Hedin:
No.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie, please.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's not in the bylaws.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And as I was reading it over, and if we look on just back at our meeting in
January, Trisha's the liaison for that board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Mary's not listed as a liaison, but obviously she's on there somewhere.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And maybe she's one of the four community members at large, and then she's not
a commission liaison.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, I'm confused too, because I was just trying to figure it out.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, I would imagine that would be something in the bylaws, which that's not
about attendance.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Most boards that I've been on in my life have, if you miss X amount of them and
consecutively, you can be removed or replaced.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But I don't mean that inherently there.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Anyways, those are just my thoughts on meeting.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Mary McGann:
My understanding was, because I've been on the board for a long, long time, is
that it was a designee, that the Grand County Executive or a designee, that I
interpreted that as one person, and I knew, no, that Connie Hancock, when she
was the head of the CJC, that's how she thought of it.
Mary McGann:
So, my absence was because I thought that I was the backup.
Mary McGann:
It wasn't because I was being neglectful and not choosing to go.
Mary McGann:
I know Trish wanted to have the assignment, and so I said, okay, I will let
that go.
Mary McGann:
I would like to be the backup.
Mary McGann:
If you can't make it, would you get ahold of me?
Mary McGann:
So, I just want to make it very clear that it was never my intention to neglect
the board.
Mary McGann:
I've always taken my board assignments very seriously.
Mary McGann:
I just, from my understanding and from the bylaws, it said designee, and my
experience under Connie, and she did an incredible job, and then we had a couple
people who canceled almost every board until, you know, until we got Angie, and
so then, anyway, so I just was kind of blindsided by it.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Mike, I'll go to you next, and then Trish.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Mike McCurdy:
My decision coming out of this agenda item was you guys were our group's direct
contact with the CJC looking for expenditures.
Mike McCurdy:
I know the board doesn't deal with financials, but, I mean, having a, you two
having a direct tie-in currently with it, it was my idea.
Mike McCurdy:
I didn't want to get too close because I had fears of a conflict, but, I mean,
in the nearer future, I feel like I'll be fully rhythm of that, and I'd like to
work with the CJC if you'd ever took part in it, but that's an end of the year
discussion.
Mike McCurdy:
Not right now.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, Mike.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Trish.
Trish Hedin:
Stephen, can you just solidify that, or your interpretation of the bylaws, that
there should be more than one commissioner because it just does say designee, so
I view that as singular.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think the only kind of tricky point, and I don't know, this was a long time
ago,
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
we had an appointment of a chair and a vice chair, and that was back on your
guys'
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
meeting, the first one you guys went when Andrea set it up, so I don't think
there is,
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't see anything in these bylaws that say that, but right now, it just kind
of,
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
the tricky thing is right now, if one commissioner, if you don't go to the
meeting, then Andrea has
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
to run the meeting and chair the meeting.
Mary McGann:
I was always under the impression that Trish would let me know if I needed to
be there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, not in these ones.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you do a deep dive into the Grand County, it's 98 pages, the Grand County
Operating Policy and Procedure, it does say the commissioners are supposed to
report if they're absent to the chair.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Does that happen?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't believe that that happens, but not in these bylaws.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, when I look at this board, it is a soft, fluffy, fun board.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't think that it generally is the board that, it's not as exciting as P&Z
or a different board that has that, but I think that's one thing, and I want to
make it clear, Andrea and I, we're excited for anybody that wants to show up,
but there was the appointment of the chair and the vice chair.
Trish Hedin:
That's just one thing.
Trish Hedin:
Just a general comment.
Trish Hedin:
If you guys are slowly removing us off all the boards, maybe that's not the
intent.
Trish Hedin:
Maybe it is.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know.
Trish Hedin:
It just feels like that's slowly happening.
Trish Hedin:
I guess I feel a little, as far as taxpayers are concerned and my check, to be
honest, I mean, at a certain point, it's like, well, if I just keep getting
removed from boards and interviewed committees and et cetera and so on, which I
am being, I feel a little bad taking the same paycheck that you are, to be
honest, to be totally honest.
Trish Hedin:
I feel like I'm a very hard worker.
Trish Hedin:
I feel like I'm an asset to boards.
Trish Hedin:
I feel like I do my job with grace, moving back and forth between this board
and between the commission and boards, and so I guess it is what it is, but I
will tell you, I want to feel like I'm earning my paycheck.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll go to Mike.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
He's not removing you, and if somebody hasn't shown up for five meetings, they
haven't been going.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They're not part of the board a year and a quarter later, so you're not being
removed.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know how come you would feel that way, but there have to be a few
missed meetings, and if you're not notifying Mary to go, then, like he said,
someone else has done that meeting, so, and I don't know.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I know I've missed one meeting, one board meeting, and I reached out to other
commissioners to see if they could fill my spot.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Now where I've gone on Zoom, if I have to, I know I missed one that no one
could fill, but I let them know I wasn't going to make it as well, so I don't
know.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, these bylaws could be changed to make it more clear about missing
meetings, but I don't even necessarily know if this is our, I mean, Trish lists
us as the liaison as far as our meetings go.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't necessarily know if this is our discussion or if Bill could just go
because it's a, you know, it's a board that has like 18 people on it.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
That's all.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I'm just a little confused about the whole situation.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I can understand the fact that somebody's missed five meetings and should maybe
be replaced.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner McCurdy and then Jock.
Mike McCurdy:
Oh, just clarify, you're still, you're still me.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I understand.
Mike McCurdy:
Jock, but I'm around if you need to fill in.
Jacques Hadler:
I guess I don't want to come out on this particular board.
Jacques Hadler:
I honestly don't know much about it, haven't looked into it too much, but I
think in boards in general, I think the time to make changes, unless there's
been some sort of strong untoward behavior or whatever is the first year that's
to revisit all the work assignments.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Mary, I'd like to call for a vote.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Likewise.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All in favor of the motion by Commissioner McCurdy, I believe seconded by
Commissioner Martinez.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Was that correct?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All in favor.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those opposed.
Chair Bill Winfield:
One abstaining, Mary.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, four to two to one.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Four in favor.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Two opposed.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner Hadler and Commissioner Hedin with Commissioner McGann abstaining.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And we move on to what is a discussion of agenda deadlines, associated
attachments, and emergency additions to the commission agenda.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And this, this is driven by multiple people.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think I believe that Dana's had some input into this as she receives the bulk
of our requests, whether they are on time or late.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know that both Mark and Quinn also help out with that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think that we would like to get to where we have a solid deadline for these
agendas.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, the staff, once they do post this, that unless there's an emergency comes
up, we're not attempting to add things later.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I do know that state statute requires having all the documents on 24 hours
prior to our actual meeting.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I do know that we've had a few in the past here recently where we were
waiting on documents to get in here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't in any way think that any of that was intentional or due to someone
trying to be less than transparent.
Chair Bill Winfield:
If we wanted to go back to the first two years on my commission, I could show
multiple times when it was done under a different chair.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I'm not pointing out that it has anything to do with the chair.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm just saying that trying to blow this out of proportion, that it's a lack of
transparency doesn't help with trying to get this under control for staff.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And that is ultimately what the goal is, to make this easier for all of our
admin team to move forward.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, Mary, I'll let you start us off.
Mary McGann:
I guess I have questions more than anything.
Mary McGann:
What's being proposed?
Mary McGann:
What's the change?
Chair Bill Winfield:
There's no change.
Chair Bill Winfield:
There's no change.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's just trying to clarify to all commissioners that there's a hard deadline.
Mary McGann:
My understanding is the hard deadline is for the agenda, not always what will
be added to the pack.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Exactly for everything, Mary.
Mary McGann:
That's what I wanted to clarify.
Chair Bill Winfield:
If they do not get put in, then that needs to be worked out with Dana and the
chair and the vice chair, if there's a reason that those documents have not been
loaded.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The most recent one that I know of was we were waiting for documents when the
county attorney was out of town at a conference.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so, no intention to put him under the bus.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's just one of them where the documents weren't here and coming.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so, we're trying to, anybody that puts something on this agenda, we would
like those documents available as soon as possible.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And if you can't make it by the agenda deadline, then please reach out to
myself, Melodie, or admin.
Trish Hedin:
Or admin.
Mary McGann:
One of the three.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I would like to point out, I have been at fault for not having all the
documents on an agenda item.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
On this, I think that the rule should apply across the board.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I apologize for not getting all my documents on there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But having the documents uploaded for all commissioners, for all staff, for
everybody, it makes it easier on everybody for me to review documents because I
get people requesting that I review contracts and sometimes get them on late.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I will do better on my end on getting things for you guys.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And so, I do take responsibility.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't, nobody needs to I can do better and I will do better.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I wasn't trying to throw you under the bus.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It did happen.
Trish Hedin:
So, the agenda deadline is Tuesday at midnight.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
For gender review Wednesday.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Gotcha.
Trish Hedin:
Perfect.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Trish Hedin:
And, you know, I was probably one that brought this to light.
Trish Hedin:
I sent an email.
Trish Hedin:
I had quite a few constituents reach out to me, specifically about a few items
recently where, you know, the agenda summary is blank, right, when it gets
posted.
Trish Hedin:
And so, people are just like, what is this?
Trish Hedin:
You know, this is obviously something specifically when it's expenditures of
large amounts of money.
Trish Hedin:
And I'm perfectly aware of state statute and I understand we don't have to have
that in there.
Trish Hedin:
But I think we just want to be better than that, right?
Trish Hedin:
I think if we have that deadline and to the best of our ability, you know, most
people open that, I think it's Thursday evening, right?
Trish Hedin:
And so, they want to see those items and they want to see them full, not these
blank agenda summaries, right?
Trish Hedin:
Especially those constituents that we have that are very packet.
Trish Hedin:
They want to see that packet.
Trish Hedin:
So, to me, I know that everybody's doing the best that they can.
Trish Hedin:
I just think try hard.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I will state that we've never had an agenda that was completely blank.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I understand.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We were waiting on documentation.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We are doing better.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I feel like we're doing much better than the previous commission and
leadership.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would like to remind everybody that we opened up the agenda review to both
sides of this body here by allowing Mary to participate in our agenda review.
Chair Bill Winfield:
As far as better, I would say that we're working towards that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, to say that we aren't is I take offense on that and I'll go to Mike and
then Melodie.
Mike McCurdy:
We're doing better than I remember, but there's still room for improvement.
Mike McCurdy:
Let's wrap that up the best we can.
Mike McCurdy:
We're doing good.
Mike McCurdy:
Keep it up.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, Mike.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie and then Mary.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know what I was going to say.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, Tuesday at midnight and then if it's after that Wednesday, I think it's not
just calm admin.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
You should chair the vice chair and calm admin because everyone's going to be
adding it.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And, you know, if you can give her or them a precise, because sometimes when
agenda review and it's just been like, okay, I mean, for example, today it was
the thing with Chrissy and we're just like, what do we call it?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, having it more, you know, a good name for it and some information for Dana.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, she's not just making it all up.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, I need any help we can get Dana.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And then, and if you have something during a meeting, like today I had a future
record, you know, a future discussion, we need to remember to message Dana.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
She doesn't always go back and have that.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, that's one thing too, is that we are in a meeting and we say it, that
doesn't necessarily mean she's like, I'm on it.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, she tries, but we need to remember to send an email today or tonight
and say, Hey, we put that on the next agenda.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Why it's fresh on our mind and that way she doesn't miss it either.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'd really like to recognize Dana first.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, if she has anything she'd like to add, and then I do want to be fairly
brief with any other further comments because we're over the six o'clock and I
should have had the six o'clock system to be heard before I started this.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
Um, quickly to help alleviate the issues that came up last meeting with the
agenda summaries or the attachments not on there.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
The agenda summary, in my opinion, is the responsibility of the person who puts
it on the agenda.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
They should provide all that if they don't, it will be black.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
The next thing was that I put down now in that agenda summary somewhere where
it'll let me, um, that if there are documents that we're waiting on, that they
will be forthcoming and added to the packet as they are made available so that
anyone in the public who is reading that knows to come back and look for the
attachments at a later date.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
And hopefully that will make them not so upset about it, that they're not
there.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
And that happens sometimes, sometimes, you know, we're just throwing something
on there because we know we have to, you have to talk about it and all the
things, but I think, you know, putting that on there is, it seems to, I think it
might help.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
That's all.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Agreed.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you very much, Dana, Mary, and.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Discussion.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Can we come back to it, Mary?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Is that okay?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would like to recognize that it's a six 11.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm a little bit late for the citizens to be heard.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I see no one other than Andrew in the chamber here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Please feel free to come up.
Chair Bill Winfield:
If not busy, we have anybody online.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So citizens to be heard at six 11 had no citizens present to speak.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so I will come back to our discussion and lead to Mary.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And then I think Brian, if I had those backwards, I'm, I apologize.
Mary McGann:
I guess I wanted to just clarify something from the past in the past.
Mary McGann:
It was that anyone could come to the gender review that wanted to, it was just
not an assignment except for the chair and the vice chair and say, you had a
topic you wanted to talk about, or you were just interested because there was
more than once that job was chair and other people would, Evan was chair and
other people would chair.
Mary McGann:
I would put on, I would email all the commissioners and say, I, I would, I
planning on attending the gender review just so that we didn't accidentally have
it for, but so it's always, it's always been expected since I was on the board
that the chair and vice chair are, are at the agenda review.
Mary McGann:
And that's fine.
Mary McGann:
If it can't, then the other one takes over and things happen, but that the main
thing was to never have a quorum, but that anyone that wanted to attend an
agenda review, there was never any problem.
Mary McGann:
Cause I know I attended quite a few with shock and I attended quite a few under
Evan, Dave, and Jaylen and Lynn Jackson.
Mary McGann:
So I guess I just wanted to clarify that it was never, no one was ever kept
from coming to the agenda review.
Mary McGann:
It was just like, these were the two people that had, were supposed to be
there.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm going to go to the county attorney and then back to you.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'll note.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I was, I was never invited to an agenda review.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think maybe for the, for the first two years of my time, it could have come
anytime.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I would, I would disagree with that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The first time I was ever invited to an agenda review ever was when, when we
had a different chair.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And to be honest, the, when I attend the agenda reviews, I have a lot of input
on a lot of matters because I'm involved in a lot of matters.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I don't remember it the same that it was an open invitation.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't know if the other commissioners went at all,
Brian Martinez:
Brian, please.
Brian Martinez:
No, I just wanted to, you know, just recognize Dana for all the work that she's
been doing.
Brian Martinez:
She's been fantastic since she's been in this office as well as, you know, all
the admin staff, they've been just great to work with and, you know, whatever it
takes to make their jobs easier.
Brian Martinez:
That's, that's where I want to be.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Speaker 15:
Mike, please.
Mike McCurdy:
Three years.
Mike McCurdy:
I've never been invited to a gender review.
Mike McCurdy:
So it's everything and I'll get there someday.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
One, one additional note, going back kind of the item for, for the agenda
review, perhaps if there's items that are void with that have nothing on there,
perhaps there's a date and time that you purge the list.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Like if there's an item that's not on there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And then the other thing with commissioner Hadler and commissioner Winfield and
I meeting, we could also change what you guys want to see on, on the agenda
review.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Like when you guys want documents, when you guys want items, when they have to
have, we can tighten that whole policy and procedure up.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So if these things are coming up that you guys want to talk about and put more
kind of more teeth into it or more clarity into it, I think that's, this is an
item I think is a very fair one that, Hey, if you don't have all your documents
uploaded by Friday, then it's going to get kicked off.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We do have sometimes that we have documents that are uploaded on a date and
that are later changed or modified or refreshed.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So that's, I don't know.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think that's one thing that came to my mind when we're sitting here is
purging items out if they don't have those items.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So any further discussion?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I will then move this to a closed session.
Jacques Hadler:
I'll make a motion.
Jacques Hadler:
Oh, I need a motion again.
Jacques Hadler:
Sorry.
Jacques Hadler:
I moved to go to closed session to discuss pending a reasonably imminent
litigation and character and character character character character.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by commissioner Hadler's second by commissioner McCurdy.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All those in favor.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Passes unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, Andrew, for your time today.
Hi Bill, you're good.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, I will open this budget workshop.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's 3 p.m on Tuesday, the 3rd of June.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Present are Commissioner Hedin, Commissioner Hadler, Commissioner McCurdy,
Commissioner McGann, Commissioner Martinez, Commissioner McCandless, and myself,
Commissioner Winfield.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And we will start this off with some discussion and even to opening this maybe
with some updates from Gabe regarding some of the numbers and where we're at.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But I would like to just kind of come out here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know that most of us as commissioners have seen Brian's email about moving
on.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I want to state that after we had our meeting yesterday, I believe it was,
Chair Bill Winfield:
that I also then went in and talked to Mark and Quinn about something very
similar that it would
Chair Bill Winfield:
be nice to try and get the commission to the end of this, get to the bottom
line of where we are
Chair Bill Winfield:
financially and attempt to move on to some other things that I think that this
might be keeping us
Chair Bill Winfield:
from being able to deal with.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so I would just like to see commissioners today try and get to the bottom
line of these finances.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So we know where we're at with a very accurate number, and then we can make
some decisions about what we need to do to come into compliance, to bring
ourselves into a budget that isn't out of balance.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so that's just where I thought I would start out with this and then I'll
turn it over to Gabe.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Gabriel Woytek:
So I'm going to just start by going over the document that had been presented
at last budget workshop meeting on the 27th and just go over some updates to
that document.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's what I'm sharing right now on the screen.
Gabriel Woytek:
It is titled 6325 Budget Workshop.
Gabriel Woytek:
Just a little item, the Museum of Moab Contribution.
Gabriel Woytek:
I had that quoted in this document as 144,525.
Gabriel Woytek:
That was just a simple typo.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's actually 114,525.
Gabriel Woytek:
I just wanted to make that very clear.
Gabriel Woytek:
And then the following update would be to the remaining budgeted expenses for
the use of 2AII, that's TRT, Establish, Promote, Recreation, Film Production,
and Conventions.
Gabriel Woytek:
So that number has been updated to 328,974.
Gabriel Woytek:
And that is made up of from two sources or from two different departments, one
of which is the Film Commission that remains unchanged.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's the same as it was displayed previously.
Gabriel Woytek:
And then there's the budgeted contributions to the Grand County Active Trails
and Transportation Program.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so this 328,974 is the summation of 106,632 and 222,342.
Gabriel Woytek:
And contained within this 106,632 is the use of these funds to support the
Volunteer and Business Coordinator position, the amount of $31,091.
Gabriel Woytek:
And remaining programming budgeted, already budgeted this year to be used by
the Active Trails and Transportation Department in the amount of $75,541.
Gabriel Woytek:
And this was programming that was deemed to be considered promotion in a
meeting that was held yesterday amongst a few of the commissioners.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so that's the update on this top, this first section here.
Gabriel Woytek:
There's another document in the packet.
Gabriel Woytek:
And that derives that $75,541, which it's close.
Gabriel Woytek:
There are a few still items that need more information.
Gabriel Woytek:
So there could still be a relatively small amount added to that number.
Gabriel Woytek:
But in another document that's in the packet, which is an overview of budgeted
2AII uses by Grand County Active Trails and Transportation, looks like that is
called, at least right now as I have it, 2025 budget line items.
Gabriel Woytek:
I don't think it has that title in the packet.
Gabriel Woytek:
But this is a breakdown of those remaining budgeted 2AII expenses allocated to
the Active Trails and Transportation Program.
Gabriel Woytek:
And it's just the sum up of determinations that were made amongst those
budgeted expenses.
Gabriel Woytek:
Those that were set in red, as you can see from the key here, were not
considered promotion, and therefore at this time are being held out from what
will be the amended budget.
Gabriel Woytek:
There's a handful of items in purple that where more information will be needed
before they would be included.
Gabriel Woytek:
And there's items in green that are considered promotion and deemed allowable
to remain in the 2025 budget.
Mary McGann:
And that's under 6.3. Oh, I see.
Jacques Hadler:
Give me the attachment.
Mary McGann:
I got it.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's 2025 TRT 2AII budget GCAP programming is the name of the document in the
packet.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so the summary of unplanned general fund expenses to date include trail
ambassador compliance reimbursements and the amounts for 2025.
Gabriel Woytek:
There's a to date number that would comprise trail ambassador salaries.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's the running total at this point that would be updated depending on
whatever actions are proceed.
Gabriel Woytek:
And then in addition to trail ambassador salary reimbursements from 2024 and
2023, that would be made from the originally budgeted amount of 2AII expenses,
TRT 2AII expenses.
Gabriel Woytek:
Again, that's establishing and promoting recreation, film production, and
conventions that has been historically allocated to the recreation special
service district.
Gabriel Woytek:
The entire amount of allocations from 2021 to 2024 amounts to $476,000.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's my understanding that this amount, that there's going to be an examination
of these allocations to whatever agencies were ultimately recipients.
Gabriel Woytek:
And it'll be determined if any of that is qualifiable as promotion.
Gabriel Woytek:
Therefore, it's possible that this entire $476,000 would not have to be
reimbursed based on that determination.
Gabriel Woytek:
And then the remainder of the figures here remain unchanged from the document
that was presented last week, bringing us to a grand total of 2025 unplanned
general fund expenses that'll have to be worked into a budget amendment in the
amount of $1,670,325.
Gabriel Woytek:
Oh, what's that?
Gabriel Woytek:
1.67. Moving down the rest of the list, I made a...
Jacques Hadler:
Sorry.
Gabriel Woytek:
I corrected the amount for the Osta cattle panels.
Gabriel Woytek:
It was my understanding that $180,000 was the total cost of those panels.
Gabriel Woytek:
$85,000 was was given in by the Recreation Special Service District, leaving
$75,000 to the to Grand County.
Gabriel Woytek:
And there was a small cost overrun of approximately $1,500.
Gabriel Woytek:
I quoted that I believe is $90,000 in the previous document.
Gabriel Woytek:
So that's been updated.
Gabriel Woytek:
Furthermore, there was a question regarding vehicle leases that were on this
list.
Gabriel Woytek:
I was able to verify with the help of budget officer Stephen Bowles that there,
with the exception of two sheriff vehicles, which were included and approved in
the preauthorized expenditure list, there were no new vehicle, unique new
vehicle leases that were included in the 2025 budget.
Gabriel Woytek:
There were, however, some leases that had been previously approved.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so I didn't go back over the workshop meetings themselves and go back to
the tape.
Gabriel Woytek:
But that leads me to believe at this time that the commission had decided that
there would be no new leases introduced over what had already been approved.
Gabriel Woytek:
There might have been, there were some that were approved, but the leases never
initiated.
Gabriel Woytek:
And in those cases, they were included in the budget.
Gabriel Woytek:
There were two new leases.
Gabriel Woytek:
One was a search and rescue vehicle, and one was the, was a vehicle for the new
pretrial services deputy position.
Gabriel Woytek:
I believe I had those, can't, not sure if I had those in the separate list that
I had, which was a preauthorized expenditures over $5,000 that weren't capital
projects.
Gabriel Woytek:
I decided to leave that off of this version of the document.
Gabriel Woytek:
I didn't, after the, after presenting it in the last meeting, I didn't feel
like it was helpful to the conversation to pull in other, you know, a handful of
other expenses.
Gabriel Woytek:
Those definitely do still exist in the document that existed in the workshop
for last week.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so they're still obviously there for reference as needed.
Gabriel Woytek:
But I wanted to just tighten this up to capital projects, general fund expenses
that are planned for this year.
Gabriel Woytek:
Some of which, you know, came up during the year, others that were already
preauthorized, namely the CJC facility purchase, and I believe the cattle panel
order as well.
Gabriel Woytek:
But these roof and HVAC replacements, which are largely funded by insurance.
Gabriel Woytek:
And I think there might be some more follow-up needed with regards to insurance
coverage on some of these, but it is, it's the general scale of any corrections
that would be included in the, that would be budgeted for, certainly will be
accurately accounted for.
Gabriel Woytek:
But sort of coming to a summary, if the Pickleball Court playground, the
county's contribution, I believe it's a 50% match for that project of $600,000
on a $1.2 million project as it currently stands.
Gabriel Woytek:
If that were to be included in approved capital fund, capital project general
fund expenditures, it runs a total of $1,472,991.
Gabriel Woytek:
So with those general fund expenses and those capital
Gabriel Woytek:
project general fund expenses, I just wanted to give it, provide an update here
where the general
Gabriel Woytek:
fund balance, the most updated general fund or the general fund balance figure
that we had in
Gabriel Woytek:
the budget at close of 2024, as well as the capital project fund balance at the
close of 2024
Gabriel Woytek:
and the impact that would be associated and the impact of those funds, what
would be left in those
Gabriel Woytek:
funds, less total unplanned expenses, less total capital expenses as displayed
with 8.9 million in
Gabriel Woytek:
the general fund reserve balance, 5.4 million in the capital expense reserve
balance.
Gabriel Woytek:
And one last summary.
Brian Martinez:
Can you repeat those numbers real quick?
Trish Hedin:
Right on there.
Trish Hedin:
It's right on there.
Gabriel Woytek:
8.9 million, 8,949,123 dollars would be the estimated remainder of the general
fund balance and 5,491,700 dollars for the capital project balance.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And the screens will come back on if they sometimes go down.
Jacques Hadler:
Can I ask you a question real quick?
Jacques Hadler:
What statutorily, what is the most that we can carry as a general fund balance?
Gabriel Woytek:
I don't want to quote something if I'm not right.
Jacques Hadler:
That's fine.
Jacques Hadler:
Yeah, we can probably.
Jacques Hadler:
Just for clarity, we generally do move stuff into the capital project balance
from the general fund so that you're remaining compliant with that, right?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's the main, or you know, I think that that largely belies the reason why
the capital project balance is as large as it is.
Gabriel Woytek:
And it's been a way to keep the general fund balance appropriately lean
according to the code.
Gabriel Woytek:
And then I provided a short summary here for the TRT2AII.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's the Recreation, Film, and Conventions TRT.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so there's an amount of these funds that still have this tag on them that
we know, you know, will be through this series of actions will be contained
within the fund balance of Fund 23, where the TRT non-mitigation funds are
administered.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so if you sum up the total trail ambassador reimbursements, so that's the
three figures up here plus the $182,000 that was already reimbursed as a result
of the state auditor's findings comes to $772,000.
Gabriel Woytek:
There is an amount that has been identified in Fund 47.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's the fund that operates the Grand County Active Trails and Transportation
Program, as well as Pave Path Maintenance and the Spanish Valley Drive Trail
project.
Gabriel Woytek:
But there are TRT funds that are in that fund balance and TRT funds that are
unspent have to be kept in a restricted fund where those funds are administered.
Gabriel Woytek:
So those should be appropriately accounted for in Fund 23, as well as the
estimated reimbursement of Recreation Special Service District's fund
allocations.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so I think it's important to highlight that there's an amount of
$1,413,000.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's an estimated amount at this point, $1,413,596.
Gabriel Woytek:
That will be in the Fund 23 fund balance that have an allowable use associated
with the code as it relates to TRT2AII.
Mike McCurdy:
Quick question with that.
Mike McCurdy:
Along with that $1,413,000, going back in the account, does it also apply more
to the mitigation side, seeing that that's a percentage of the total amount?
Mike McCurdy:
Does it go to mitigate a small amount because it's a percentage of the total
amount?
Jacques Hadler:
There's no mitigation in that.
Gabriel Woytek:
That was money that was already split out for that 2AII use.
Mike McCurdy:
It'll be on the promotion side?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Gabriel Woytek:
It'll be on the establishment side.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's not just promotion.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Jacques Hadler:
And then, Gabe, so the 2AII would be lumped in with the 2AII, with just the
establishment remotes, the two different tags on them.
Brian Martinez:
That's what I was asking at the beginning, is we need a breakdown of Fund 23 to
make sure that we have, you know, it's 2AII and it's 2AII.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And as I read it, 2AII is tourism and II is production and conventions,
correct?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And just mostly for the public and others here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know most of us are somewhat familiar with what those buckets are.
Gabriel Woytek:
So, yeah, I'll go ahead.
Gabriel Woytek:
I have the code open here.
Gabriel Woytek:
As we're saying, 2AII highlights requirements to establish and promote tourism.
Gabriel Woytek:
Tourism defined as an activity to develop, encourage, solicit, or market
tourism that attracts transient guests to the county.
Gabriel Woytek:
2AII is establish and promote recreation, film production, and conventions.
Gabriel Woytek:
And the clause here, you know, calls out 2AII.
Gabriel Woytek:
It definitely doesn't call out 2AII, 2AII, 2AII.
Jacques Hadler:
That's the rub.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, I've got a couple of questions back to your other document, Gabe, if we
could.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We're looking back at the Trail Ambassadors 23 forward and the REC SSD, we're
looking back 21 through 24.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, my questions are kind of double-sided.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we take the Trail Ambassadors back to 21?
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know that that's probably in that 182, correct?
Chair Bill Winfield:
And the REC SSD, do we not need to move that forward to whatever our current
date is?
Gabriel Woytek:
Just 24, but through half of 25?
Gabriel Woytek:
That allocation or that transfer of those funds hasn't been made in 2025.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Gabriel Woytek:
So, it would be assumed that that wouldn't be made and these are just
reimbursements of those transfers already made.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And the Trail Ambassadors portion of the 21 moving forward to the 23 is the
182K that's at the very bottom fourth line from the bottom.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Is that correct?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Brian Martinez:
Hold on.
Brian Martinez:
I'm going on that though, but there's two of them, right?
Brian Martinez:
There's the there's the program, there's the programming, and then there's the
salaries.
Brian Martinez:
So, we've taken the program, we've only gone through the programming of 25,
right?
Brian Martinez:
But we did not go through the programming then of 24, 23, 22, and 21.
Gabriel Woytek:
The state of hours findings letter doesn't articulate that.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's very clear that it applies to Trail Ambassadors salaries.
Gabriel Woytek:
I guess there's a situation now where we're, I guess, because there's a new
auditor where we're, you know, I guess I'll just speak to the misunderstanding
that we had that I brought that I brought forward.
Gabriel Woytek:
I no longer feel like the misunderstanding has anything to do with the Grand
County's compliance.
Gabriel Woytek:
The misunderstanding has to do with the fact that we misunderstood that we
would have to be applying a standard to these funds based on an interpretation
of code that, in my estimation, doesn't follow the way the code is written.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so, it basically, it seems like this whole situation has changed, and I
definitely don't, you know, I no longer feel that Grand County has been out of
compliance.
Gabriel Woytek:
And with these budgeted expenses for 2025, I feel like our 2025 budget is fully
compliant, and I don't think that's a creative or strange interpretation of the
code.
Gabriel Woytek:
But I'll just need to say that.
Trish Hedin:
Stephen, what is your opinion on that?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So, I think whenever we look at expenditures, go back to that same code, we
have a twofold thing that we have to do when we spend rec film and convention
funds.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's promote and establish.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you can meet those prongs, that's what we're looking at.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If we are establishing and promoting rec film production and conventions,
that's what we need to look at.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Obviously, when we go through the expenditures, there are things that are going
to be much more, and again, attorneys, we talk about defensible, much more
defensible, and there are things that might be less defensible.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's where I go through.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We had a meeting, and the Commissioner's got a link to that, and we went
through that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's my stance on it, is that there are things that are defensible, and there
are things that are less defensible.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Now, if Commissioners want to ask me particular things, I can go through that,
but realistically, where we are at now is we've gotten a follow-up from the
State Auditor.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We reached out requesting additional assistance on these topics, and they have
indicated that they would like the county to come into compliance, and the
language that they utilized was that they'd like the county to be away from the
line.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Like, if there's a question of ability or not, or if one feels the need to kind
of justify or argue it, they said the county shouldn't find themselves in that
position.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's the conversation that they indicated to me on a phone call.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I shared that with Commissioner Hadler, McCandless, and Winfield.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Previously, they were upset.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They indicated that they felt like the county was not staying away from the
line, is how they put it, and so that's triggered the visiting or revisiting of
this issue and this item, and so that's where the scrutiny is being applied, and
that's why we met yesterday and talked about these different items.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So ultimately, it's the Commissioner's responsibility to go through and select
the items that they want to say falls within that criteria, and I can tell you
what's more defensible and less defensible.
Gabriel Woytek:
Any follow-ups on that?
Gabriel Woytek:
Defensible based on establish and promote, or just promote, is my question.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Establish and promote.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
From the position of the state auditor, she indicated that the funds from the
TRT were to be utilized for promotion.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's the pushback that she gave to me, was that the funds were designed for
promotion, that's what the underlying item of TRT is for promotion.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Those were her words when we reached out to her.
Trish Hedin:
Even though it says establish?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'm repeating the language that was told to me.
Trish Hedin:
So she's not reading the code?
Trish Hedin:
She's not relaying the code?
Trish Hedin:
I get that?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
From their portion of it, they're saying establish and promoting as conjoined,
as conjunctive, requirable.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
You establish and promote recreation, film, production.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So when we see an expenditure, there should be a promotion element to it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Now, one thing that we differentiate slightly is we look at the definition of
tourism, and I think we would look at promotion under this current bill, or this
current form of it, not each work 56.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But there was previously a requirement when we talked about tourism, you had to
bring people from the outside in.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's different than establishing and promoting.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you have a promotion element, I think it's going to be, again, more
defensible.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you have expenditure that is establishing and promoting, one of the caveats
or a Roman numeral III, I think that's going to be easier to defend.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But that's where they were pushing back and indicated that from the position of
the state auditor's office, that it needed to be more promotion focused.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And that's what their position was.
Brian Martinez:
Mary, go ahead.
Mary McGann:
A couple of things.
Mary McGann:
I would like to keep everything in that's defensible.
Mary McGann:
If we're able to defend it, I think it's important to protect the taxpayers'
money.
Mary McGann:
It is property taxes that be taken away from.
Mary McGann:
And so if it's defendable, I definitely think we should keep it.
Mary McGann:
We should keep it where it's at.
Mary McGann:
And the things that are not dependent are on the gray area.
Mary McGann:
I would be very interested to see other counties.
Mary McGann:
I would really be interested in seeing other counties to see if they're being
as scrutinized as we are.
Mary McGann:
But there are other counties that are using money similarly to this that aren't
being questioned.
Mary McGann:
I think that's something we need to find out.
Mary McGann:
Those are the two things I would like to see.
Mary McGann:
I would like to see other counties that have TRT and are underneath this type
of criteria to see where they are and how they're using it.
Mary McGann:
And if they're using it in any ways that are similar to what we are, I think
that's important for us to know.
Mary McGann:
And I think if anything is defensible, then we should keep it in.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, Mike.
Mike McCurdy:
A lot of totals, but we obviously caught the eye again of the state auditor.
Mike McCurdy:
What is the total that aligns with getting that eye off of us?
Mike McCurdy:
What number am I looking at?
Mike McCurdy:
The $1.67 million on planned general fund expenses today or just the TRT-2A
updates, $1.413 involved completely in the compliance via the state auditor?
Mike McCurdy:
Where would we be looking?
Gabriel Woytek:
These are the compliance reimbursements.
Gabriel Woytek:
They're labeled as compliance reimbursements.
Trish Hedin:
Excuse me?
Trish Hedin:
I'm going to say they're labeled reimbursements.
Gabriel Woytek:
They're labeled compliance reimbursements.
Gabriel Woytek:
I believe that those are the funds that you're referring to.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Brian, go ahead and then I'll move around.
Brian Martinez:
Some of this is kind of from the email that I had here, so I just got that in
front of me.
Brian Martinez:
After that meeting, I had some time to reflect on a path of compliance.
Brian Martinez:
And I just want to be clear.
Brian Martinez:
I have no appetite to be anywhere near the line.
Brian Martinez:
I have no appetite to be anywhere near that line.
Brian Martinez:
The state auditor impressed upon us the need for a change of the tone at the
top.
Brian Martinez:
My priority is that we get compliant and that we stay compliant without any
ambiguity.
Brian Martinez:
And this, I think, is going to demand a strict approach to our TRT
expenditures.
Brian Martinez:
You know, arguing over what makes, amounts to what, it's like $75,000 in
transfers, pales into comparison to critical importance of securing these
mitigation grants for our essential services and, more importantly,
re-establishing confidence that the commission will do the right thing.
Brian Martinez:
You know, time, well, hold on a second.
Brian Martinez:
There's a couple of things that kind of came up, you know.
Brian Martinez:
You're good, Bill.
Brian Martinez:
I just wanted to take a break real quick, you know.
Brian Martinez:
The time for arguing for the state has passed, right?
Brian Martinez:
On December 11th, this county wrote to the state auditor's office and said,
quote, the Grand County Commission has formally agreed to comply with the state
auditor's letter, issue 1224, right?
Brian Martinez:
That's the letter.
Brian Martinez:
I mean, I still haven't gotten a copy of the letter.
Brian Martinez:
I had to find it in a TI post, which I'm upset about.
Brian Martinez:
You know, I'm fed up with dealing with this right now.
Brian Martinez:
You know, the reason that we find ourselves non-compliant again is the failure
to take a responsible approach to TRT spending, even if some believe that
certain expenditures are justifiable.
Brian Martinez:
It's these very games right here that lack adherence to the rules that put the
Grand County taxpayers on the hook for the cleanup, like Mary was talking about.
Brian Martinez:
You know, this is not about meeting a mandate, right?
Brian Martinez:
We need to do the right thing by the Grand County, right?
Brian Martinez:
The path forward, I think, is clear.
Brian Martinez:
The commission needs to lead by example.
Brian Martinez:
I won't accept an approach to compliance that circumvents the audit findings.
Brian Martinez:
When it comes to compliance, I think our guiding principles need to be beyond
reproach.
Speaker 15:
Thanks, Bill.
Jacques Hadler:
I mean, I honestly think, I don't think that we're the ones playing the games
here, I think the goalposts keep getting moved on us.
Jacques Hadler:
Oh, I said I feel like the goalposts keep getting moved on us in the game, but
that aside, so it seems like Gabe, from what the dictates that we've been handed
down, that 2AI and 2AII, basically, I don't know.
Jacques Hadler:
I mean, that's how it's coming across.
Jacques Hadler:
And so, I'm just wondering what, you could come up, or maybe someone could come
up, what would an example of 2AII expenditure be that would just qualify as
that?
Jacques Hadler:
I mean, I think all these things do in my mind, but I'd be curious as to what
might be.
Gabriel Woytek:
Well, what has been agreed to be kept in the budget?
Gabriel Woytek:
Are these items in green?
Jacques Hadler:
I think that's, and Brian just questioned all that, right, Brian?
Brian Martinez:
Yeah, that's what I thought.
Gabriel Woytek:
Okay, then I have no idea.
Jacques Hadler:
Does anyone have an idea?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, I think the language, if we go back to the statute, the language carves
out that tourism has to have an element of bringing people outside in.
Jacques Hadler:
I mean, a lot of these items in green that we discussed yesterday have that
element.
Jacques Hadler:
I'm not questioning you.
Jacques Hadler:
I'm not arguing with you.
Jacques Hadler:
So there's basically, we don't know.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Well, no.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, the word tourism, they defined the word tourism.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It required an element that brings, that you promoted such in a way that brings
people from the outside in.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's different than if they don't define the term, like establish and
promote.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Promote means what an ordinary Merriam-Webster dictionary of the word promote
means.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So you can promote that, for example, in the meeting yesterday, right?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That could be a local promotion that didn't necessarily bring them outside in.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Jacques Hadler:
Because tourism doesn't apply to AII.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So there were some differences.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So as I was answering that portion of the question, not the bigger policy part
that you guys are discussing, but there are, I think you can make some nuances
between the two.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I know that's, it's frustrating.
Jacques Hadler:
It's frustrating.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, Trish, go ahead.
Trish Hedin:
I'm going to kind of reiterate what Jacques said and Brian, when you were
speaking, and I'm not, this is not, I'm not in opposition to what you were
saying.
Trish Hedin:
I'm just kind of pinging off a few of the comments, but like you said, the line
is moving.
Trish Hedin:
It's like, so how do we stay away from a line that is constantly in flux?
Trish Hedin:
We have a new auditor, and now the line has changed again.
Trish Hedin:
And we're trying to, you know, trying to be in step.
Trish Hedin:
It's just like, and then to not have ambiguity.
Trish Hedin:
To me, the ambiguity does not come from us.
Trish Hedin:
It's coming from the state auditor.
Trish Hedin:
And it's like, how do we're trying to be in compliance?
Trish Hedin:
Nobody was ever nefarious in their actions here ever.
Trish Hedin:
I'm going to, I'm trying not to get really angry because I don't know how many
times I heard that specifically in the campaign last year.
Trish Hedin:
And it's just a load of shit, to be honest.
Trish Hedin:
Nobody ever had nefarious actions.
Trish Hedin:
We have always tried to be in compliance with the state auditor.
Trish Hedin:
You know, they are just, we are, we're the whipping boy.
Trish Hedin:
And so we, I agree with you, Brian, we want to be in compliance.
Trish Hedin:
We are trying to do that.
Trish Hedin:
You know, but it's so, it's just, it's a crapshoot.
Trish Hedin:
It's a total crapshoot.
Trish Hedin:
And Steven, I'm going to ask you, and I'm going to be very firm in this, we
rely heavily on you.
Trish Hedin:
And I understand you ping it back to us and say, you're the commissioners, you
make the decisions, but you're our legal counsel.
Trish Hedin:
And when we're interpreting code, and we're doing our best to do that, I don't
know why I'm, I'm just shaking.
Trish Hedin:
We need your help.
Trish Hedin:
You know, and specifically back in the day when the auditor was like, what did
your county attorney say?
Trish Hedin:
Our county attorney gave us counsel, we followed that counsel, and they still
hammered us, even though they said, listen to your counsel.
Trish Hedin:
So we need you.
Trish Hedin:
We need your, we need your help.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And we went through an hour and a half long meeting.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't know if you had an opportunity to view that meeting that we recorded,
we'll send it out to all the commissioners.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Did you have an opportunity to see that?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
No, I'm sorry.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
No, I appreciate it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I appreciate it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We did go through that at the time, walked through it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And so I can only do as much as you guys.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I understand.
Trish Hedin:
I'm just, I'm just making sure that you understand that we need your counsel.
Trish Hedin:
You know, maybe next year, now that the commission is predominantly
conservative, they'll leave us alone.
Trish Hedin:
I hope so.
Trish Hedin:
But I doubt it.
Trish Hedin:
I think Grand County is a whipping boy, and it will continue to be far into the
future.
Trish Hedin:
That's just my opinion.
Trish Hedin:
I have no, you know, we're doing our best to be in compliance, but they change
the rules constantly, constantly.
Trish Hedin:
Our state legislature is just like the amount of bills that are being passed,
and we're supposed to, you know, it's just, it's, it's, it's really difficult.
Trish Hedin:
I think anybody would agree with that.
Trish Hedin:
I sat there and listened to Representative Monson say that.
Trish Hedin:
He's like, it's, it's really hard to follow what's going on.
Trish Hedin:
And to be, you know, he said exactly that.
Trish Hedin:
So we are doing the best we can.
Trish Hedin:
And I think, you know, we collectively, we don't disagree with you, Brian.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
You know.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Mike, I'll get to you, but give me a moment here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I would like to remind all commissioners, keep in mind your language that
you're using up here, your professionalism.
Trish Hedin:
That's probably the only time I've ever cut in five years.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And also let's try and be better at interrupting others when they're speaking
and they have the dais and the microphone, please.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so Mike, I'll move on to you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Lot to break down here.
Mike McCurdy:
In parts, I do agree.
Mike McCurdy:
We have, we are the whipping boy.
Mike McCurdy:
We were out of compliance one time already.
Mike McCurdy:
They literally wrote legislation at us.
Mike McCurdy:
We're time number two now.
Mike McCurdy:
It's really time we, I mean, strive to become compliant or else if the third
time around perceptions, the demons I hear the third time around, it will be
quote nefarious.
Mike McCurdy:
It's, it comes out of pure perception on that.
Mike McCurdy:
And it's the perception that the state auditor, that we are being nefarious if
it gets through a third time of being out of compliance.
Mike McCurdy:
Again, I reiterate, pay the bill and get under compliance as quickly as
possible.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Can you make some recommendations to how we can do that?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Where are you see that going forward here?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Because clearly we've got to start making some decisions around this budget to
get ourselves back in a position that we're not overspending as we are.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And we have to make some hard decisions to do that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And it's still just a little murky where we want to start with that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so I understand that your position and where you're at.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I also understand Mike and Brian and their position.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I even understand Trish and wanting to bend frustration.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But what I think need to do is get to a bottom line here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
What do we have to do so that we can make some decisions rather than the back
and forth.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I think that in my mind, there's no way to get there without you making
some hard calls on numbers that this is what it's going to take if we take this
route.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The $75,000, I'm with Brian and Mike.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We're talking several million dollars here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't care which side of the line we fall on.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't want to be in an argument with the state auditor.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Whether the goal posts are moving or she's frustrated with what we're doing
doesn't matter.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Let's just get to the end of this.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And this is what it's going to take to do it is what I'm looking for.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I'm not trying to share my frustrations or project them on to you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But I do have some frustrations.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I want to be done where we can move on.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Gabriel Woytek:
So there's some new information today and some updated information with regard
to the Recreation Special Service District.
Gabriel Woytek:
It appears now that the $75,541 that's displayed in this document will no
longer be projected into this budget.
Gabriel Woytek:
Ultimately, I've made my position clear, but I don't stand in the way of the
will of the commission to craft this budget in the way that they wish.
Gabriel Woytek:
So I think right now, I think what I envision the next steps being would be to
hold a public hearing for the first meeting in July and to tee up an official
amendment for the second meeting in July.
Gabriel Woytek:
That would give enough time to be able to make adjustments to the budget.
Gabriel Woytek:
I mean, ultimately, what it's going to amount to is the budget amendment is
going to reflect an increased contribution from the fund balance to be able to
amend the budget in a balanced fashion.
Gabriel Woytek:
At this point, if the commission wishes to open up the entire budget and
introduce cost-cutting measures elsewhere across the budget, that is certainly
your prerogative.
Gabriel Woytek:
You know, I would ask you to lean on your office to identify those items and go
about forwarding me whatever requests you would like to see.
Gabriel Woytek:
But ultimately, that's what I can present at this moment.
Gabriel Woytek:
I have information regarding the will of the commission to make adjustments to
the budget, and I will present an amended budget to our public hearing with
those amendments.
Gabriel Woytek:
With, you know, obviously, whatever discussion included.
Gabriel Woytek:
So, that's a sum up of what I would say.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
With the county attorney wanted to say something.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Well, I'm just trying to make sure that whatever the commission is wanting to
have happen, because this was set for workshop, I don't know how much we, apart
from the one item, we haven't discussed any of the other items.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't know if any of those are contested or not, or if everybody is good with
everything else, because without that, that was just one piece of the bigger
puzzle.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And so, what staff is going to have to do, what the auditor's office, and
they're going to have to come back and all of a sudden have all these items that
we may or may not want to have adjustments to, and I don't know, on that one
issue, I think there's been some information, but on the remaining issues, I
don't know if there's a clear picture there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And if not, it's really hard to jump from a workshop of this size that I don't
know, apart from that one item, to the substantial change that needs to happen.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I agree.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Before I move on to you, Mary, I've got a couple items that, Gabe, I'd like to
clarify.
Chair Bill Winfield:
One of them is, let's see, where do I have it in my notes here?
Chair Bill Winfield:
The cattle panels you show at 75, or 76.5K and the 80K from the rec district.
Chair Bill Winfield:
My question is, is the 80K restricted funds, or are we fine with that line item
there?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Is it something that we need to consider that we, it's, we're using money from
the rec fund there, but we haven't, I haven't a clear understanding of if that
money is appropriately being used.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So that's just one question.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't need an answer right now.
Gabriel Woytek:
Can I just ask one clarifying question?
Gabriel Woytek:
So you mean like the rec district's portion of the cattle panel purchase, if
that is derived from our allocation of TRT?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm asking if we make sure that that use is an appropriate use there.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And then I have one other one, and it isn't anywhere on your sheet, but I know
that we have discussed the amount of money that's being spent on the library
HVAC.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And there was originally an 80K line item on there that I believe was coming
out of the county budget.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I think at some point we discussed they had a budget of their own that
could cover that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I realize it's only 80K, but as we're going through here, trying to balance
what looks like several million dollars, I just want to get everything on your
sheet that we don't come back and catch something in arrears later.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And then I will go, Mary had her hand up.
Mary McGann:
I just want to reiterate that, you know, and I don't know how the budget is
going to look or how it's going to be presented, but I would like to see at
least a budget where the things that are defensible are left in.
Mary McGann:
And if we present two, fine.
Mary McGann:
But I do think if it's defensible, I believe, Stephen, that you have the
respect of the auditor's office.
Mary McGann:
And I think if you said it was defensible, that would go a long ways.
Mary McGann:
Secondly, I know there's people in the audience here who are concerned about
the pickleball court and playground.
Mary McGann:
And I think I just want to say that I feel the pickleball courts have been part
of the long-term plan for the program.
Mary McGann:
These weren't something that all of a sudden brought in.
Mary McGann:
It's been on the long-term plan.
Mary McGann:
If Angie was here, I would find out how long, but I know it's been at least
seven years that they have been drawn on the future plan.
Mary McGann:
And I know there is an incredible number of people in the community that really
want to see this come to fruition.
Mary McGann:
So I think it would be nice to let the public know if we are going to continue
to support the establishment of the call.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't think we can make that decision tonight.
Mary McGann:
I know, but I just say that it's an important part.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Talking millions, I agree.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And we might have to consider downsizing that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We might have to consider looking for some other funds.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those are part of the hard discussions that we really aren't ready to make.
Mary McGann:
Paid for by grants.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm aware of a portion of it, but the 600,000 is not a grant.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's coming out of this budget.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So again, I think that I'm not ready to make those hard decisions until we get
to a hard number here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And Brian, did you?
Brian Martinez:
I just wanted to, David asked if we had questions on any of these other
expenses right here.
Brian Martinez:
I was looking at that we went back on the REC SSD to 2021, but the TRT code
that's inside here right now is from 7-1-2023.
Brian Martinez:
Were there any changes or updates prior to that?
Brian Martinez:
And the reason that we the other, like we had done with the other accounts
there?
Gabriel Woytek:
So the REC Filming Convention, that was introduced into the code in 2021, and
that's when Grand County started making that allocation.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So when I look at the green, purple, and red in the Special Ambassador budget,
did you, and then you had had an amended amount.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Is that amended amount not including the purple or the red?
Gabriel Woytek:
It just is the green.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's only the green.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Speaker 15:
Anybody else?
Brian Martinez:
Brian.
Brian Martinez:
Just one more comment.
Brian Martinez:
You know, at our budget workshop, we did kind of decide that we would go try to
seek some clarification from the State Auditor.
Brian Martinez:
And the State Auditor came back, and I don't think that anybody likes what we
were told, but I mean, she told us to stay away from the line.
Brian Martinez:
And I think that, that to me right there is enough.
Brian Martinez:
You know, that's it right there.
Brian Martinez:
The fact that we were told to stay away from the line, we went and sought, we
sought clarification, and then we don't like what the clarification was.
Trish Hedin:
Did you feel, Brian, that you have clarity as to what the line is?
Trish Hedin:
Do you know what the line is?
Brian Martinez:
I think I can tell what is, everything that we're talking about, is it
defensible?
Brian Martinez:
Is it not defensible?
Brian Martinez:
Right?
Brian Martinez:
That's right there on the line.
Brian Martinez:
We are not 20,000 miles away from the line.
Brian Martinez:
We are right up next to the line.
Brian Martinez:
If we're asking, is this defensible, or is it not defensible?
Bill Winfield:
Mary, go ahead.
Mary McGann:
I was going to say, I'd go if it's defensible, if it's far away from the line.
Mary McGann:
I think if our county attorney can say we can defend this, then it's not next
to the line.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I think the green is defensible and acceptable in this budget.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, purple, I can see why you guys questioned it, and the red.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So as far as that goes, I don't know if that's the $70,000 that Brian's talking
about or not, because I didn't add them all up.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But I do think, you know, for example, stickers, I do think they get people to
come back, like everything you buy these days has a sticker.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
You buy a Yeti, and they send you a bunch of stickers, because they want you to
think about them.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
The next time you buy something, they want you to buy that.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So same as with the water bottles and things that they're handing out, and
they're not mailing them away.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They're reminding people to book their next trip in Moab.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And so I don't necessarily think it's defensible at all, or like not
defensible.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But so as I look through these things, and I think you guys did a good job.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And so you have the purple that's questionable.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And so I'm happy with Gabe's assessment of these items, or you know, the amount
that he's got here.
Gabriel Woytek:
Sorry, I just need to clarify, and it's not as a point of argument at all.
Gabriel Woytek:
I just want to make clear that that assessment of red, purple, and green was
made by commissioners.
Gabriel Woytek:
And my assessment is that the entire list is very clearly an allowable use, as
written in the code.
Gabriel Woytek:
Just want to make that clear.
Gabriel Woytek:
I'm not trying to argue.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think that it sounds like they all total up to about $75,000.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So I think that we can still get to the bottom, the end result of what we need
here, with a solid determination of where we've got to look at cuts or not cuts
to make this adjustment.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's what we need at the end of the day.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And if that requires another workshop, then I would propose put one together so
that we can come there and then decide what are we going to do with these
questions.
Chair Bill Winfield:
One around the pickle ball, one around some of the other departments that need
to be reimbursed here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
What are we going to do?
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I don't think we can yet make that determination.
Mike McCurdy:
Mike, go ahead.
Mike McCurdy:
In all of this, state auditor's office kept on, we are working on this, just to
get a random report on the fly that we're out of compliance and we'll pull taxes
again.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I was relying on the county attorney and clerk auditor for that relationship.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'll use a stronger word.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I've had one phone call with Tina.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It wasn't a call expressing frustration on the county circumstances and that
the county was pushing the limits with it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That was the conversation.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
My understanding is that they would be watching and following up with the
conversation.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We reached out for a meeting that was declined.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And so, I don't know the level of relationship that we have.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think they've indicated to us that they don't want to babysit us on this
issue and that from their perspective, it was more apparent than the commission
is making it was the stance of the auditor's office.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So, I know Gabe has worked with Seth Roberson quite a bit.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
This is not my realm.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'm happy to facilitate the auditor in this circumstance, but the conversation
and the communication is probably best served through likely the clerk auditor's
office with assistance with Seth Roberson, if he'll have that communication.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But are they going to check in and review these?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, the phone call did not reassure me that there would be a continuing
working circumstances.
Mike McCurdy:
So, not to fear taxation being withheld again, do we send a letter that says,
hey, we're working on it?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I would assume they're probably watching that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I would assume that's where we're at.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We don't currently have a wonderful relationship because from their
perspective, the county is not in compliance and from their perspective, is
having a difficulty coming into compliance.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's different perspectives.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So, when the commission says reach out to them and have communication with
them, I can try.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But it's it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The last request for a meeting wasn't granted.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And was that you that made that request?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I got a phone call in return.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
A lot to say about that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
David, you had any communication at all with Seth?
Chair Bill Winfield:
What's your feelings as far as presenting him with a plan that we're moving
forward with A, B, and C?
Chair Bill Winfield:
And if we get a response from him, do we want to go that route?
Chair Bill Winfield:
What are you recommending at this point?
Gabriel Woytek:
My feeling is that, you know, since the commission is at this point, you know,
wanting to follow what their current stance is, my position would be that we
would, you know, present a comprehensive, you know, make comprehensive
adjustments to this budget as applicable.
Gabriel Woytek:
And when that is already prepared, rather than relying on them or expecting
them to give comments during the process of making those, you know, making those
corrections and adjustments, it feels at this point, you know, since there is a
strong desire to follow what they're currently desiring from us, that we go
ahead and follow that and present to them as such.
Gabriel Woytek:
I don't know if, you know, I can certainly, I can certainly do my best to, you
know, leverage the positive working relationship I've had with Seth to garner as
much, you know, patience and understanding as I might be able to for him to, you
know, give it some sort of blessing.
Gabriel Woytek:
But, you know, I can certainly try that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Or do we just do as we're discussing here and then file the reports that I
believe come due and is it July 1st?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Correct me if I'm wrong, or do those come due at the end of the year?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we just make the adjustments?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we have a responsibility to reach out to the state auditor at this point?
Chair Bill Winfield:
If we make all of these corrections and clean all this up, is there a response
necessary to them?
Chair Bill Winfield:
I guess I'm asking, or do we wait and do that with our filings at the end of
the year?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Because there are new filings in place that are required moving forward.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Are they not due to HB 456?
Gabriel Woytek:
Yeah, and we're, there's going to be discussions.
Gabriel Woytek:
I don't know what the date deadlines are on those, and we haven't seen what
those reports look like.
Gabriel Woytek:
Certainly, that could be one route.
Gabriel Woytek:
I mean, and if it seems like this is, you know, all going to be opened up and
very, you know, carefully scrutinized in terms of what's budgeted and what's
reported, you know, the county could feel that that is sufficient, share that in
advance with the state auditor's office, and they could decide to respond or
not.
Gabriel Woytek:
And we could continue to move forward with the approach that's being chosen.
Gabriel Woytek:
And it sounds like that approach would be confidently compliant.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, I'm going to go to Brian, and then Mike, I guess I'd really like to get
wrapped up, because we need to start our regular meeting.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah, just real quick, you know, it does say in the new HB 456 that part of
that reporting will be a breakdown of promotion expenditures.
Brian Martinez:
So they will be, they will be reviewing that right now.
Brian Martinez:
That's part of the code sitting right there.
Brian Martinez:
And also, just for everybody, you know, what we have online is mitigation
grants.
Brian Martinez:
If we're found non-compliant, right, then we will not be eligible for those
mitigation grants for the emergency services, for search and rescue, or for road
repairs.
Mike McCurdy:
Mike, go ahead.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to, I know this is a workshop discussion, but I would like to go
forward and fixing this, or following through with what we say in action,
instead of telling the State Auditor's Office that we're trying, or we're coming
up with it.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to start with the action first, sooner than later.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All right, I will go ahead, Melodien.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Well, I also thought it
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
was interesting, I don't know where this letter came from, but it was in the
TI, and it said that
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
the State Auditor, Tina Cannon, said that the emphasis and intent of this
portion of the code
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
is to bring people from the outside of the county into the county for tourism,
recreation, film,
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
and conventions, and then expenditures for trail ambassador programs should be
funded from the
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
mitigation funding, except for those activities that have supporting
documentation that they are
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
to solicit, advertise, or market, or enhance transient guest spending in a
county.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, I think that is, I mean, if this is from her, then I think that she's
pretty clear, is as long as we have supporting documentation that the
activities, whether it's a trail ambassador, or the recreation special service
district, or wherever else we are going to use money in the future, has
supporting documentation.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, that's, I think, what we need to request
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
from our departments, is to make, and that's going to be what we need for these
grant,
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
for the grants, because the grants are going to have those, I mean, we don't
know what they
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
look like yet, but I imagine something in there that we're going to want to
have,
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
any supporting documentation that are to solicit, advertise, or market,
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
enhance transient guest spending in a county.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And I don't know where that letter came from, maybe you can tell us, but I
thought that was interesting when I was reading the paper, I was like, we
haven't seen that letter.
Jacques Hadler:
All right, John.
Jacques Hadler:
I'm sorry, this would be perhaps, but I imagine the new HB 456 legislation is,
it wouldn't be going back to the previous legislation to qualify grants that are
under the current legislation, right, Stephen?
Jacques Hadler:
You're correct.
Jacques Hadler:
Okay, so you'd just be looking at it from July 1st on.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, the strings, the strings are, your remarks are up to the time period that
they are.
Jacques Hadler:
Perfect, thank you.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And we talked with, again, that there's going to be a portion of funds, because
my understanding is we've received the receipts of those funds two months later
after they're collected.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So we'll still have additional funds that'll be subject to the older.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Thank you, Bill.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Again, I'll reiterate the importance of those grants and the millions of
dollars that I think that we need to be making sure that we're definitely in
line to receive, and pushing that line, I think would bring that into question
with the state auditor, but I will close this meeting, this workshop at 4.02,
and I will say let's take a five-minute break before we resume another
commissioners.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All right, I will call this regular commission meeting to order on Tuesday,
June 3rd at 4.07 p.m. All present, Commissioner Zedine, Commissioner Hadler,
Commissioner McCurdy, Commissioner McGann, Commissioner Martinez, Commissioner
McCandless, and myself, Commissioner Wingfield, with our county attorney and
clerk auditor soon to be with us.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so we'll all stand now for the pledge of allegiance.
Mike McCurdy:
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the
republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty
and justice for all.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I will start us off with citizens to be heard.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know we've got some folks here in the audience.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Please come up, state your names.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Normally, we do three minutes.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Just identify yourself for those people who are watching later on YouTube or
whatever.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And yes, you're welcome to start us off.
Sara Melnicoff:
Hi, everybody.
Sara Melnicoff:
I'm Sara Melnicoff with the Nonprofit Mob Solution.
Sara Melnicoff:
So I know most of you, but welcome to the ones I never met before.
Sara Melnicoff:
I developed a bit of turnout burnout, so I haven't been bugging you guys that
much, but I wanted to bug you, not bug you, just share something with you.
Sara Melnicoff:
Since November 2003, I have spent a lot of my life in either Mill Creek at
Powerhouse or Potato Salad Hill, doing a lot of hauling out thousands of pounds
of trash and recycling, doing trail maintenance.
Sara Melnicoff:
It's been expanding, and now I'm a funded partner of the BLM, and I go in there
every day.
Sara Melnicoff:
In that time, I've seen things you wouldn't believe, like I pulled out a
trampoline someone put at the left-hand waterfall at the bottom.
Sara Melnicoff:
I carried it out.
Sara Melnicoff:
Two pieces, Bill will understand this, of OSB board that must have weighed a
thousand pounds.
Sara Melnicoff:
We had to go home with the rangers and cut it up with a suffocating saw and
carry it out.
Sara Melnicoff:
That and lots of dog poop and human poop and all kinds of interesting things,
but that's one of the cleanest canyons I've walked today from the lot to the
confluence, totally clean.
Sara Melnicoff:
One thing I've seen over the years in the early days, what I would find when I
got there in the morning was drunk people from the night before or people that
were tripping and they were staggering around still.
Sara Melnicoff:
I swear to God.
Sara Melnicoff:
One day, I saw three beautiful women.
Sara Melnicoff:
They walked behind me just totally naked.
Sara Melnicoff:
It's in the morning, pretty hot out.
Sara Melnicoff:
One was a blonde, one was a redhead, and one was brunette.
Sara Melnicoff:
I'm like, am I the one tripping?
Sara Melnicoff:
No, they were real.
Sara Melnicoff:
This was like 20 years ago.
Sara Melnicoff:
Over time, I've noticed because I used to be able to spend hours there without
seeing anybody except the people from the morning.
Sara Melnicoff:
Over the years with the internet and people learning about things and
discovering our beautiful community of natural wonders, it's just overwhelming
with people.
Sara Melnicoff:
We worked with the sheriff to get the road, no parking either side, because
buses were coming up and dropping off 200 people in a fragile, delicate
environmental area.
Sara Melnicoff:
The last couple of days, I've seen ducklings with their mom and dad.
Sara Melnicoff:
I saw a blue heron two days in a row, so I must have a nest.
Sara Melnicoff:
I saw ravens chasing just at the beach right down from the parking lot, two
ravens chasing a coyote away.
Sara Melnicoff:
The coyote looks scared.
Sara Melnicoff:
These ravens were just about to run.
Sara Melnicoff:
What I did notice, the idea of the Trail Ambassadors, it took a while for me to
understand it because I've been in there working all the time and trying to make
the parking lot to the waterfall clear as a bell so people don't go off trail
and do damage.
Sara Melnicoff:
When they started, I did notice that because of their educational abilities and
because they could sit in one place and talk to everyone who comes in while
having someone row occasionally, it made a huge difference in the off-trail
damage.
Sara Melnicoff:
This is habitat for a lot of other creatures that we encroach on regularly.
Sara Melnicoff:
I think the program could be streamlined a little bit to be a little more
feasible.
Sara Melnicoff:
I do think it's really important.
Sara Melnicoff:
I only wish they were there in the summer too, because in the summer, they go
up into the mountains.
Sara Melnicoff:
That's when I see the trail damage starting out.
Sara Melnicoff:
I just wanted to tell you it's a beautiful place.
Sara Melnicoff:
I'm honored to be able to go in there every day and deal with it, except the
OSB board and cash register I found once behind one of the pump houses that had
been stolen from one of the businesses.
Sara Melnicoff:
A toaster oven dumped over.
Sara Melnicoff:
Those things aside, it's a beautiful place.
Sara Melnicoff:
If we want people to enjoy it, we have to protect it.
Sara Melnicoff:
Then the experience is so much more valuable.
Sara Melnicoff:
That's all I wanted to say.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Sara Melnicoff:
Thank you very much.
Sara Melnicoff:
Should I bug you more often?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, Sarah.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We appreciate your contribution to our community.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know maybe not everybody is aware of it, but Sarah is also a big part of the
homelessness and stuff that goes on in our community.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We do appreciate what you do for this community.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Sara Melnicoff:
Thank you very much, Sarah.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we have anybody else here in the chambers?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Please come forward.
Speaker 13:
Dave Glosser.
Speaker 13:
Say something about Cane Creek development.
Speaker 13:
I'm aware that the Cane Creek project received preliminary platters several
months ago.
Speaker 13:
I'd like to speak to the matter that will become a substantial safety issue as
soon as the construction starts, if not addressed ahead of time.
Speaker 13:
The proposed development will have roughly 3.7 miles of paved surface within
the project boundaries.
Speaker 13:
To support the traffic demand of the final population of 1100, the developer
has agreed to improve and widen the 1.4 miles of K3 boulevard running through
the development to a 50-foot wide minor collector.
Speaker 13:
The remaining 2.3 miles of side road will also meet county requirements for
lower traffic volumes with widths from 24 to 34 feet.
Speaker 13:
But the only initial requirement the county appears to have placed on the
developer for the 2.5 miles of Cane Creek boulevard between 500 west and the
development is that it be wiped at 20 feet before construction begins.
Speaker 13:
But something didn't really make sense here to me because the road will be this
road will provide the only access to the entire development in all areas beyond
and only need to meet the county width requirement for an alley 20 feet is what
is required for an alley.
Speaker 13:
It's well known that the growing traffic volume on this worn out 18-foot width
of pavement is already already on city.
Speaker 13:
It makes sense to widen this section of the road to accommodate the dramatic
increase of traffic you'll see when construction begins doing it up front
especially given that much of it will be heavy truck traffic.
Speaker 13:
The developer is unlikely to take the initiative to widen these 2.5 miles
unless required to do so.
Speaker 13:
Can you envision what it will look like with cement trucks, large lumber
trucks, UTVs, camper vans and cyclists trying to squeeze by each other on a
corner with 18 feet of pavement, no shoulders and a guardrail that is starting
to fall into the Colorado River?
Speaker 13:
I can't and it's not really a pretty sight.
Speaker 13:
The development gets the green light the 2.5 miles of Cane Creek Boulevard will
have to be widened eventually.
Speaker 13:
I hope there is some way the county can place this responsibility on that
developer by imposing an exaction as a condition of final plat approval or some
other means to have the road widened before construction begins.
Speaker 13:
Not doing so will almost certainly put our citizens and visitors at great risk.
Speaker 13:
It would also make sense to determine in advance if it's even technically
feasible in that treacherous corner that we all know and if the necessary
approvals can be obtained from the Nature Conservancy and the BLM to
dramatically widen Cane Creek Boulevard through their properties.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you sir.
Brian Martinez:
You don't want to AJ.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay do we have anybody else in the chambers?
Speaker 12:
All right we can go to online AJ please.
Speaker 12:
Hey good afternoon.
Speaker 12:
My name is AJ Throgmorton, Grand County constituent.
Speaker 12:
I wanted to speak on a few things today primarily agenda items six and seven.
Speaker 12:
For agenda item six the airport grant letter.
Speaker 12:
I applied for the airport board on the recent vacancy.
Speaker 12:
I'm working on my private pilot's license.
Speaker 12:
Personally I spend a lot of time out there and I definitely see the value in
investment at the airport.
Speaker 12:
It's a wonderful resource that I think we're extremely fortunate to have and
I'm thrilled to see investment in it.
Speaker 12:
The bang for buck on this grant match seems to be a no-brainer.
Speaker 12:
125k of our money versus almost 2.4 from the FAA.
Speaker 12:
I think that's a pretty solid deal.
Speaker 12:
As I believe it is any additional taxiway costs for something like this if
you're going to build a new hangar would be charged to the hangar owner or the
builder which just seems counterproductive.
Speaker 12:
So this looks like a great avenue to increase access to storage for both local
aviators and transients alike.
Speaker 12:
While the additional taxi lanes are a huge improvement when I'm out there I
walk through the walkways in between the hangars and I notice that there's
usually a lot of trash in there kind of some scattered stuff that I think we
could do well to improve on and just the walkways between the hangars too.
Speaker 12:
So it's just kind of a quick plug on any improvements in that area as well.
Speaker 12:
Lastly with the departure of our previous airport director I am definitely
optimistic about the replacement and looking forward to that.
Speaker 12:
Next thing I wanted to hit on was agenda item 7 and the economic advisory board
grant application.
Speaker 12:
Two of them kind of stuck out to me.
Speaker 12:
I'm a big fan of the golf course line item.
Speaker 12:
I think that's just a big sensible yes.
Speaker 12:
Golf course is a wonderful asset but it definitely needs help.
Speaker 12:
Rob does what he can out there to keep things up.
Speaker 12:
He kind of had a run in last year with some leaky water systems and it kind of
got beat up.
Speaker 12:
So anything we could do to help out on that is a definitely a worthwhile
endeavor.
Speaker 12:
I'll say I am opposed to the 25k of the chamber of commerce.
Speaker 12:
I think a large chunk of that goes to the grand summit last year and if I'm not
mistaken there's about 5k of that used to throw a private booze party that a
select few got to partake in.
Speaker 12:
The grand summit was also pretty conveniently timed seemingly to boost chamber
president Kornblatt's commission campaign which doesn't appear to have worked.
Speaker 12:
Lastly I'm thinking the current chamber might be a bit captured by non-profits
versus locally owned taxpaying revenue generating businesses.
Speaker 12:
So again I'm for the grant for the golf course specifically and opposed to the
chamber of commerce.
Speaker 12:
That's all I got.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we have anyone else on line Quim?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Anyone else one last time for the chamber?
Chair Bill Winfield:
All right we will move forward.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I believe at this point our commission member disclosures.
Mike McCurdy:
Is that the timer?
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Mike McCurdy:
So Mike.
Mike McCurdy:
Mike works for the sheriff's department.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All right so thank you both and we can start with our general commission
reports.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Trish do you want to start us off?
Trish Hedin:
Yeah on the 21st I met with Ryan Jones from UDAF just talking more about
conservation easements.
Trish Hedin:
As you may know we gather rollback tax from greenbelt and ag delineations and I
think there's about sixty thousand dollars in that and that money is supposed to
be used specifically for conservation easements.
Trish Hedin:
So one of the things we did is had our GIS expert take those parcels and just
delineate them and then Ryan and I are going to kind of go back through those
and eventually UDAF the goal is to invite larger landowners that may fall into
this concept of putting their land into conservation easement invite them to a
UDAF meeting just to see what their interests are.
Trish Hedin:
So something that has been inspired by UDAF they reached out to me to do that.
Trish Hedin:
Had another fair board meeting on the 22nd they're just rolling along.
Trish Hedin:
On the 23rd which more of you will speak to we had the ribbon cutting at the
Utah Raptor State Park which was wonderful and Mary we cannot thank you enough
for working on that.
Trish Hedin:
What a what a cool addition to our community so and that was a wonderful event.
Trish Hedin:
Everybody was there and very yeah a wonderful event.
Trish Hedin:
On the 27th we had a planning meeting we were looking at the HDHO revisions
hopefully I mean and I can always send that meeting out to you guys but they
ended up I thought it was really vibrant conversation.
Trish Hedin:
I want to thank Ben Riley and Caitlin Byers and Ronnie Schwartz for speaking
extensively and and building their willingness to work with the planning
commission.
Trish Hedin:
They did table Tony was gone and Megan was online and they really wanted those
two face-to-face to to kind of complete their banter and then make a
recommendation to the commissions.
Trish Hedin:
So I thought it was you guys are welcome to again watch it.
Trish Hedin:
I thought it was a really great conversation.
Trish Hedin:
I think we have a really diverse planning commission and I really really always
appreciate their banter.
Trish Hedin:
On the 28th went with Brian for site visits out to the Dolores area the hideout
area.
Trish Hedin:
That was cool.
Trish Hedin:
I think I think it was really good to spend time with you and Kendall and and
just kind of go through that inventorying process.
Trish Hedin:
Yeah that was cool.
Trish Hedin:
I'd like to do more of that and I met with Ian Machard which is cut in the
paramotor community.
Trish Hedin:
We've kind of had these discussions in the past like how do we deal with those
aerial conflicts and he's kind of taking the lead and I said the county's here
as support to develop a website to develop a Facebook page.
Trish Hedin:
It's really kind of reaching out to that community and like what are the areas
kind of not off limits but you know areas they should avoid to avoid conflict
and then just kind of appropriate you know procedures when using paramotor.
Trish Hedin:
So it was awesome to meet with him and really have him take the reins on that.
Trish Hedin:
I think that's a great first step and if we continue to have conflict maybe we
can look at something else but he's he's taking the reins on that which is
awesome.
Trish Hedin:
For three days this last weekend I volunteered at the rodeo the PRCA
Canyonlands rodeo.
Trish Hedin:
I cannot speak highly enough of our OSTA staff.
Trish Hedin:
I mean it really kind of hits home when you're there and how long and hot those
days are
Trish Hedin:
and how hard they work and I get to leave right at a certain point and they
stay through the concert
Trish Hedin:
and all that and they're just it's it's amazing what she does out there and how
dedicated that
Trish Hedin:
entire staff is to what they're doing but and I got to see Stella Wright which
is my you know my
Trish Hedin:
from Milford so that was a really big deal for me but anyways it's a great
great event great just
Trish Hedin:
brings oodles of people to our community and we're really lucky.
Trish Hedin:
Mosquito abatement last night they just kind of the thing that stood up said
they're wrapping up their audit procedures so that was great and then this
morning I actually met with Carrie from the BLM.
Trish Hedin:
I'm sorry Brian it
Trish Hedin:
was just kind of a last minute it was more she reached out to me to talk about
shooting range
Trish Hedin:
so if we I told her if we'd move forward I'll get a hold of you but you know
they I've mentioned
Trish Hedin:
repeatedly with Maddie like that's where people shoot their guns where we're
going to put them
Trish Hedin:
right and so I'm just talking about the signage that they'll initially do but I
said really
Trish Hedin:
Carrie what we really need which I've actually tried to get for about 10 years
is a shooting
Trish Hedin:
range.
Trish Hedin:
So we kind of looked at an area that had been kind of kind of set aside a long
time ago and she said she'll kind of keep moving in that direction because to me
that would really kind of hopefully one clean up all the shooting ranges in the
south end of the valley which they're all over and and hopefully mitigate any
conflict you would have with guns and mountain bikers which don't really blend.
Trish Hedin:
No I think I've mentioned I have been shot at at pipe three and so back in the
day when it was new right and somebody was just like this is where I used to and
I literally had bullets waiting past my head so it was a great meeting and like
I said Brian when she she said if she will start following up we'll we'll engage
everybody.
Trish Hedin:
So Carrie got very blessed.
Speaker 15:
She didn't tell me that.
Jacques Hadler:
Yeah anyway let's see am I next folks sorry I just believe thank you thank you.
Jacques Hadler:
I most of what I attended other folks have also the ribbon cutting at the Utah
Rapid State Park is amazing.
Jacques Hadler:
It's so cool to have so many dignitaries from upstate there including the
governor is always impressive but you feel like he's just winging his speeches
and they're so good.
Jacques Hadler:
So that's always always it was nice to hear from Governor Cox.
Jacques Hadler:
I was on a couple interview committees and we I don't think anything's come out
of that so I won't speak to that.
Jacques Hadler:
The Representative Kennedy meeting I did I was only able to attend about five
to ten minutes of that but I was really impressed at the end of it.
Jacques Hadler:
He made a point of coming up and and he seemed very interested in my opinion on
some of the things that the issues that he could potentially help out with.
Jacques Hadler:
So it was it was nice to get his ear in that sense and it was really nice to
meet him.
Jacques Hadler:
It's the first time I met our representative and then yeah yesterday I attended
the TRT discussion along with Brian and Bill and Stephen and Gabe that helped to
inform our discussion here and yesterday afternoon we had a very preliminary
discussion between Bill and Stephen and I about making some changes or just
clarifying positions on our governing policy and procedures.
Jacques Hadler:
I thought that was a great start and I look forward to continuing to work on
that.
Jacques Hadler:
So that's just housekeeping.
Jacques Hadler:
Others are things that we've kind of had on the burner for a while so thank you
for getting that ball rolling Stephen.
Jacques Hadler:
And future considerations I would very respectfully ask our chair to please put
the GCAT presentation on our next commission meeting.
Jacques Hadler:
I would have loved to have heard that last meeting we had the presentation
present in the packet and I think it would be great to see that at the next
meeting.
Mike McCurdy:
So thank you.
Mike McCurdy:
Michael.
Mike McCurdy:
I attended the representative Kennedy's meeting also.
Mike McCurdy:
I had a chance after to direct the entire team up at Horsepoint and toward the
Bay Area.
Mike McCurdy:
Most of my special service district meetings are directly hand-in-hand
following the budgeting meetings we have been having and see how this pans out a
little farther on that.
Mike McCurdy:
I want to reiterate part of what Trish brought to us.
Mike McCurdy:
Everyone, I don't know if you saw the email, it actually asked for a little
volunteer time going into Grand County Fair over July 4th.
Mike McCurdy:
It asked all county employees and elected officials.
Mike McCurdy:
Everyone got to see it.
Mike McCurdy:
We would like to see a little more.
Mike McCurdy:
If you have an hour to spare we really could use it out there.
Mike McCurdy:
Trish is on the on the fair board and she knows we've only been having the fair
for a short time but it has it is grown and grown and grown in a good way.
Mike McCurdy:
There is so much local buy-in to the fair and even to the point of we're
starting to attract, and I can speak just to the volleyball part of it, but
we're starting to attract players from Colorado and teams from Colorado.
Mike McCurdy:
We even picked up a team last year from California that came through.
Mike McCurdy:
That's just one small part of the totality of the fair.
Mike McCurdy:
Please, if you have an hour to spare or more time, reply to that email.
Mike McCurdy:
That's all I have.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Speaker 15:
Mary, please.
Mary McGann:
On Wednesday after our last meeting, I had a solid waste special service
district board meeting.
Mary McGann:
I mentioned a couple meetings ago that we leased the land next to us.
Mary McGann:
You've been over to the transfer station.
Mary McGann:
You've probably seen the huge improvement, how much safer it is, how much
nicer.
Mary McGann:
Another thing that part of that leasing was we got to lease the building, which
has made it possible for us to do.
Mary McGann:
Again, they've created a welding shop there and hired a welder so that we're
going to be able to do our in-house welding, which is a huge, very, very good
thing because all of the different roll-offs and the different containers, so
many of them are metal and they rust.
Mary McGann:
Then it's a process to get it fixed and it costs money.
Mary McGann:
We're always trying to catch up with having this in-house and a place to work.
Mary McGann:
We should be able to really enhance the ability to get roll-offs and such to
people in a more timely fashion and to save some money.
Mary McGann:
That's really exciting that that happened.
Mary McGann:
I mentioned before that we had that interlocal grant that we got with the City,
USU, and Solid Waste Special Service District for in-vessel composting, mostly
for food.
Mary McGann:
Because of the situation with our federal government now, it's like we were
given the grant and the grant was taken away.
Mary McGann:
Then now we have it back.
Mary McGann:
That's really good news and we hope that we don't go through another cycle of
up and down with it.
Mary McGann:
It is going to put a little more crunch on doing the tying element that was
mentioned in the grant, but we're very excited and very happy that that looks
now like it's going to come to fruition.
Mary McGann:
We hosted the Recycling Coalition of Utah Spring Conference and the attendees
toured the Community Recycle Center and were very well attended and very well
received.
Mary McGann:
We completed the Green Waste Reclamation Program grind with unscreened mulch,
which is now available for sale for people who want it, with a portion of the
material now being allocated to help you to put into the compost system that's
coming up.
Mary McGann:
The Moab Landfill permit renewal, nearly ready to submit, and the Klondike a
new cell data and design, early ready for application, which is exciting and
good news.
Mary McGann:
Because we're coming to a close with one of the cells.
Mary McGann:
We're ahead of schedule.
Mary McGann:
We're not in that crunch period.
Mary McGann:
That's nice.
Mary McGann:
We reclaimed 691 tons of metal and generated $74,000 in revenue.
Mary McGann:
Our software is up.
Mary McGann:
The latest version is up and running and working very well, which is our
software program has been a real challenge up to recently.
Mary McGann:
We've approved a contract to lease a 20-yard rear motor and we discussed the
potential of alternative daily covering products that they're using in
Monticello.
Mary McGann:
At the Monticello.
Mary McGann:
We think we're all around this dirt.
Mary McGann:
Everywhere we look, there's dirt.
Mary McGann:
Getting dirt is a real big deal to cover the landfill.
Mary McGann:
If we can have this alternative cover, it will end up saving money.
Mary McGann:
It would be a good thing.
Mary McGann:
We're looking into doing that.
Mary McGann:
Then again, I attended the ribbon cutting at the Utah Raptor State Park.
Mary McGann:
The thing that I was the most excited about was I was able to meet a gentleman
that was an ancestor of the people who were in the internment camp.
Mary McGann:
He came from Hawaii.
Mary McGann:
I won't even try to pronounce the gentleman's name because I will mess it up.
Mary McGann:
It was a really moving and sad story.
Mary McGann:
This gentleman that was in that isolation camp was a decorated hero in World
War I, had worked as a medic.
Mary McGann:
When World War II broke out, he hurried to sign up again because he had all
these skills.
Mary McGann:
Instead of getting to serve in the forces, he was put into this internment camp
in California.
Mary McGann:
There was a riot there.
Mary McGann:
It was a demonstration.
Mary McGann:
He was thought to be one of the instigators.
Mary McGann:
In his diaries, it seemed like he was more of a man who just wanted their civil
rights respected.
Mary McGann:
This was considered an isolation camp, which was more intense than internment
camps themselves.
Mary McGann:
He gave up his citizenship and moved to Japan where he wasn't accepted.
Mary McGann:
It was six months after the end of the war that they were dissolved.
Mary McGann:
Everybody that was in there had the right to choose to remain in the United
States and go back to their home, or go back to Japan.
Mary McGann:
He spent his time in the internment camp learning to write and read.
Mary McGann:
He was a very intelligent man.
Mary McGann:
He decided to go back to Japan and found it if he wasn't accepted there.
Mary McGann:
It was a fairly sad story.
Mary McGann:
The gentleman that came there brought things that the person that was in the
camp owned from when he was in the World War I, that he has donated to the Utah
Raptor State Park, so it would be on sale there.
Mary McGann:
The tour around where the internment camp was was fascinating because we had a
guide that had done tremendous amount of research.
Mary McGann:
To me, that was so exciting to meet somebody and hear the story firsthand and
have him read from his diaries.
Mary McGann:
It made that whole place seem pretty present.
Brian Martinez:
So, that was exciting.
Brian Martinez:
That's my report.
Speaker 15:
Commissioner Martinez.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah, thanks.
Brian Martinez:
I'll just keep it quick.
Brian Martinez:
On the 22nd, I met with MADN, that's our new advertising agency, and I spent
the day with them here and kind of just introduced them to the area.
Brian Martinez:
We went out and had lunch with them.
Brian Martinez:
We had a real nice session where we kind of focused on what the goals were,
what they're going to be using for their KPIs and some of the history of Moab,
and then what kind of our competition looks like other places.
Brian Martinez:
We spent a couple of hours doing a creative exercise, kind of going through how
to play the game and kind of what we want.
Brian Martinez:
Then we spent the afternoon out in Arches.
Brian Martinez:
We took them out to Arches National Park so they could see Arches and kind of
see what this little place is about.
Brian Martinez:
We had dinner with them and they were really nice.
Brian Martinez:
We met with Kaitlin, Leslie, Matt, and Brea.
Brian Martinez:
So, those are our new people there.
Brian Martinez:
They're going to kind of open up with that.
Brian Martinez:
On the 23rd, I was with everybody else at the Raptor State Park opening, and it
was fantastic.
Brian Martinez:
It was a good time.
Brian Martinez:
On the 27th, I was at the budget workshop, which we kind of just discussed
earlier.
Brian Martinez:
On the 28th, the Dolores Travel Management Plan site visit with Trish.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah, it was great going out there and going out and checking out some of those
roads and seeing all those places.
Brian Martinez:
It was fun.
Brian Martinez:
I agree with Trish, you know, that the process was neat.
Brian Martinez:
You have a kind of how they rank everything and then how everything kind of
gets put from the alternative.
Brian Martinez:
So, it was fun doing that.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah, we were out there by the hideout, you know, just up on top of Onion Creek
and then overlooking Fisher Canyon.
Brian Martinez:
It's a beautiful spot.
Brian Martinez:
On the 29th, I met with Representative Kennedy, and then on the 2nd, I was with
John and Bill for the GCAT.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Okay, so Friday morning after the commission meeting, I spent some time out at
Corona Arch with the Trail Ambassadors.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Many of you know because I was dressed very informally at the Raptor State
Park, but I just didn't have a lot of time to change.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We were out there, they didn't classify it as a busy time, but I felt like we
had a lot of great encounters and a lot of people that are really happy to see
him out there.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, then I grabbed my son, which was exciting because he got to meet the
governor, and that was the first time I think that my 13-year-old son was really
in a position as me as a commissioner, so it's really cool to have him along
with me.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I got to meet a lot of you as well.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
On Tuesday, we had the special budget workshop meeting.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Last Wednesday morning, we had our agenda review with Jacques, Bill, Stephen,
Mark, and Quinn, Dana, and it's really nice to have Mary and Jacques at those
meetings.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I really appreciate the experience that they have and thoughts that they add to
those meetings.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
That afternoon, we had the Economic Advisory Board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They've also done an amazing job with RCG and RCOG recommendations.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They were going to be discussing an agenda item seven.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Then on Thursday, I didn't make it to Kennedy's meeting because I met with
SITLA Director McConkie and Brian Torgeson.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We were able to talk about the Colorado River access spots, whether wanting to
withdraw water from the Colorado.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It was a really good learning experience for me and also some possible future
land exchange discussions.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Friday, I got to go to the Chamber Golf Tournament, which they do a great job
putting on a fundraiser for local high school scholarships, and then I was able
to go out to the rodeo and saw the volunteers out there.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I was just enjoying it with my family.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's an awesome thing that we do.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's so great.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We have such a great rodeo in this town.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I had some other friends with me from out of town, and they really appreciated
it.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Then yesterday, I had the Community Renewable Resources meeting, and it was the
first time that something really exciting happened.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We received word that the Public Service Commission approved Utah Renewable
Community's solicitation.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
A key line from the ruling was that the Public Service Commission grants Rocky
Mountain Power's application and approves the Utah Renewable Community's RFP.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Additionally, the Public Service Commission grants Rocky Mountain Power's
motion and requested waiver with the qualifications discussed in this order, and
so the solicitation has been sent out and bids are due back by July 10th to move
along with this process.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
There is some setbacks.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Rocky Mountain Power has delayed their plans to file the remainder of the
program application testimony four times.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
The now projecting that will happen maybe early next week, and these delays
jeopardize the program's ability to stick to contracting and resource funding
timelines.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Even though I'm new to that board, I feel like there's just been a lot of
hurdles that they are coming across.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's another one, so it's moving slow, but it's moving, so it's moving along,
so hopefully that we get some bids.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And then the future consideration,
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
and this really came out of the Economic Opportunity Advisory Board, is one of
the
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
requests was funding from the Moab Area Housing Task Force that they're
requesting $8,500
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
to complete the development of a Moab housing dashboard, and so I thought it'd
be good to
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
discuss possibly using some of that $100,000 set aside for housing that you
guys set out
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
budget last year, and I know it wasn't chosen to fund from the RCG, but it's in
the packet
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
under number seven you guys can look at.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We can discuss that another time.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, Melodie.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I will start off with I had a meeting with Todd Thompson up at USU, who was a
small business consultant that we ended up funding the position for three years,
and he is going to reach out and come in and do a presentation to us.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I was very impressed, I think, in the neighborhood of 30 different individuals
that have been in to see him, and in an attempt to come up with business ideas.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Some of them, he said, are way out there.
Chair Bill Winfield:
He has had some good ones, and he's referred multiple people to our RLF and
Price, and he also has several different micro loans, and he went into great
length and depth on those, but I'll let him save it for his presentation here,
but it's very clear that people are utilizing his position a lot there at USU.
Chair Bill Winfield:
He's not lacking for clients, so that was a good thing.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We used to go through that with him and get the update, and I think he's
already reached out to Dana to move forward.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I was also part of the UAC Natural Resources and Public Lands Committee
meeting.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We heard from Kelly Pearson at UDAF, I'm the new commissioner.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We've heard on multiple projects around the state with the rural
Chair Bill Winfield:
jobs, actually, and Kelly was the one that brought that out, that UDAF is
trying to move
Chair Bill Winfield:
many of their jobs into rural Utah to where those folks can help add to our
economy,
Chair Bill Winfield:
rather than all be centered at an office in Salt Lake City, so I thought that
was pretty
Chair Bill Winfield:
interesting that he's looking to move some of his staff out where he can, and
that's already taking
Sara Melnicoff:
place.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We also heard from Zeke, who's part of Public Lands and the WIR, which we
funded out of the LACTF funds that we received, and then Brandy Grace kind of
finished us off on that meeting.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I also was in the TRT discussion with Jox and Brian and Gabe.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Let's see, a couple other things.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Back to Trish and the shooting range thing, I've also been in talks with the
BLM, and I think her name is Carrie, correct?
Chair Bill Winfield:
There's a lot of cleanup that needs to take place where the old shooting range
is, and so there might be some possibility for our trail crew when the time
comes to be able to help out with that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The Raptor, I was also at the Raptor grand opening.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Mary gave a great speech.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I really appreciated the fact that she called out the older gentleman, and I
don't remember his name, but he was very happy to be called up.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It was very clear he appreciated the recognition.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I was also on an UMTRA tour with Congressman Kennedy.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Also, just a little update.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think I attempted to get this on the agenda, but I forgot about it, but I
think most of you have heard that we had problems with our fire truck at the
airport, and in the process of all that, I applied to the CIB for an emergency
loan.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's totally separate from the regular list of the CIB applicants, and so I
know that Quinn and Dana are working on that, but we'll have to have a public
hearing.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We'll have to approve that if we do receive the emergency loan from CIB, so I
should have got that ahead sooner so I was on this meeting, but I'm just letting
you know that that's coming up.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It'll be a future discussion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Is that for a new truck, Bill, or for repairs to the car?
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's for a new truck.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Repairs, I will say that Mark is heavily involved in those, and we don't know
yet who's going to do those, but we have had an assessment of the truck done, so
just getting that on the emergency loan list that the CIB was important in that
meeting will take place, and we'll know if we're approved on Thursday or Friday.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We have a two-day CIB retreat this week, and so we'll know if they're going to
approve that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The thought is,
Chair Bill Winfield:
and Judd was part of this, our engineer as well, is that by getting the truck
ordered,
Chair Bill Winfield:
there's about a two-year lag to order a new truck, and this will move that
forward about a year and
Chair Bill Winfield:
a half rather than wait for FAA in the future to fund that, but when FAA does
fund it, then we'll
Chair Bill Winfield:
repay that loan back, and so it's a juggle, and we'll have to, number one, vote
on the CIB loan
Chair Bill Winfield:
if we're approved for it, and then in the future vote what we're going to
participate.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm sure the FAA will require participation.
Mary McGann:
So it'll be a loan, not grant.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It'll be a loan.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's the emergency portion of it, so I think that's all that I've got.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The shooting range I mentioned.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think that's all I've got.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We will move on to our electeds, and Gabe, I'll let you start if you'd like.
Gabriel Woytek:
I guess I'll just say the candidate declaration period is open for Moab City
open offices.
Gabriel Woytek:
That's two city council positions and mayor position, and that'll close up this
Friday at 5 p.m. Other than that, I'm interviewing for vacancy in my office, and
yeah, I'm plenty busy with a number of other things, so that'll be all for now.
Gabriel Woytek:
Thank you, Gabe.
Gabriel Woytek:
County Attorney?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, so I had the opportunity, as I mentioned last time, I was at the
Institute for the Community Coordinated Response for Domestic Violence.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That was the week-long training that came at no cost to the county.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They've closed out at 4 p.m. for our hotels and our attendants.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Detective Sterritt was the one that spearheaded that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Phenomenal training.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
This is industry standard, best practices, wonderful training.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They're really pushing a new style of prosecution, which is called
evidence-based prosecution.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
A lot of domestic violence cases
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
you look at and you try to prosecute with the help of the victim, and where
they're looking at it,
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
they said, look, we've done, you know, you always prosecute homicide cases, and
we never have a
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
victim, you know, because they're deceased, and so they're starting to take
best practices and
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
utilize those and try to do domestic violence prosecutions without victim or
when the victim is
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
sometimes adverse to the prosecution.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So that training has been phenomenal.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The ICCR will be with us throughout the year.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They spend the whole year with us giving training, quarterly trainings.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If commissioners are interested, we'll have some presenters.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They'll bring them to the town.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, all of this is provided.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All this cost is paid for.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It was a wonderful, wonderful presentation.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The keynote speaker at that event was the Petito family, and so it was a very
well-done event.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They're going to be bringing a lot of resources and tools to the community, and
so that'll go on through each quarter, and then next year I'll go to that same
conference for another week and give an update on the things that we've learned.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So that's really exciting.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I had an opportunity to meet with Commissioner Winfield and Commissioner
Hadler.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We are looking at the governing policies or the policies and procedures for the
governing body.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think that's the correct name of the document, and we're making some
adjustments.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
This was not a study committee.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It was some committee that was created back in January, and I spoke, and we got
a meeting on the books.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We're going to be looking at some adjustments, changing the language, of
course, from council to commission, and making some other changes.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
One of the things that we brought up, and different commissioners have
approached me about the role of the commissioner is, and I've looked at other
councils, for example, and other commissions, and they have limitations on a
commissioner's request to staff and what that looks like, and going through a
lot of different topics.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
What we're thinking of doing is I'm going
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
to kind of chunk it out into different pieces with the help of the chair and
Commissioner Hadler,
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
go through it, and put it all together, and eventually bring to you all a
redlined version
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
of it, and it's going to be substantive, and so we'll probably have to do a
number of different
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
workshops to go over that, because the policy hasn't been changed for, I think,
2020 might have
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
been the last, or 2021, the last change on it, so I'm going to just let you
know maybe in the fall
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
that I'm going to be bothering you guys for a number of workshops, and it's
going to be
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
very dense, so we'll have coffee, and we'll make it more entertaining and
enjoyable as best we can
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
when we're talking about best practices and mission statements and all this
stuff.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Lastly, just kind of noting, I brought these cases and this type of case up to
you folks before.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
From all the trainings I've gone through with the CJC and the ICCR, I've become
pretty passionate about cases that involve CSAM, and CSAM stands for sexual
abuse materials.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Some people know it as child pornography, and these are really tough cases, and
I just want to let you know that I've looked and I'm pushing for a change at the
legislature level, that if there is a type of CSAM that depicts child rape or
child sodomy, that there should be a one-year mandatory minimum in prison, and
I've come out and I've talked with some legislators about that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's something that is appropriate.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
These are some really egregious circumstances.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They're not public dinner conversation.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It's the type of conversation that no one wants to have, and I don't know if
it's because I've gone to a bunch of training recently.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I've become much more sentimental about those things, but when you handle those
cases and you see those things, it is dreadful, and so I've kind of started to
do a push on that, so that's everything.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, sir.
Speaker 15:
Admin?
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Mr. Tyner?
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
I want to thank Stephen, even though he was out of town in training.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
He's always accessible, and I don't know how he did both as well as he did, but
he did, so I appreciate that.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
We're working on filling some department head slots.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Hopefully, that will be done within the next couple of weeks.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
We'll have to process ongoing for another planning and zoning, hopefully, so
those things are underway, and also, I thought the host employees did a great
job with the rodeo, and I want to congratulate them on that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, sir.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Quinn, you have anything?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes, covered it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I am going to let Melodie take the agenda as I sneak out.
Gabriel Woytek:
Oh, I'm sorry, Gabe.
Gabriel Woytek:
I just wanted to say I didn't have minutes in the packet, so I shouldn't
approve A, and if there would be a commissioner that would be to pull items E
and F on my behalf, if I would appreciate it.
Speaker 15:
Which?
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Then do I go ahead and read them, and then say it pulls them off afterwards,
see how that works?
Jacques Hadler:
Or it can happen anytime.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Jacques Hadler:
I'd like to pull items E and F from the consent agenda.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Jacques Hadler:
Thanks, Melodie.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Approval of the consent agenda items is we're going to skip A.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We're going to go to ratification of the payment of bills.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Total bills of $760,953.05. Total payroll of $529,372.38. So total bills and
payroll is $1,290,325.43. And then we're going to the C is ratification of the
Slaven contract for recruitment of planning and zoning director and county
engineer.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
D, ratification of extension letter for all American Wash NRSCS funding.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And we're going to take E and F off of the consent agenda.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Commissioner McAnlis, I'm sorry.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
I could just point out the number C, ratification for the recruitment of
planning and zoning director and county engineer.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
The county engineer may or may not be needed.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Later you can go ahead and approve it, but we may not need to pursue that one.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's just the contract.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, Mary?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I move to accept the consent agenda as presented.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I have a motion by Commissioner McGann to approve the consent agenda and a
second from Mike.
Trish Hedin:
All in favor?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
None opposed.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And we'll move on to, so E is that we put E and F off of the consent agenda.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So we're going to move on to discussion of item E.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Do you want to talk about that?
Gabriel Woytek:
Yes, please.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Gabriel Woytek:
So these are two agreements that are for the Graham County Fair, and they are
spent with TRT funds and more specifically TRT to AI, single I.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so through the negotiations with the state auditor's office last year, I
love the county fair and I want to see it thrive in this community.
Gabriel Woytek:
And I think it's a great way to use TRT to support our community.
Gabriel Woytek:
And I fought, not fought, but I was involved in negotiations and provided
materials and provided justification to justify the use of these funds to
support the Graham County Fair.
Gabriel Woytek:
And it was left alone.
Gabriel Woytek:
The auditor determined that those funds would be, that would be an allowable
use for the Graham County Fair.
Gabriel Woytek:
Now that the rules have changed and, and we're going along with this, this new
interpretation, I, I don't, I just, I don't see how those TRT funds can be used
in the same way for the support of these.
Gabriel Woytek:
So I think if these are going to be approved, it would have to be approved to
be funded out of general funds.
Gabriel Woytek:
And do you have the dollar amount for the 1665 for the bomb town and then 2,500
for the photo booth?
Gabriel Woytek:
Those are the two.
Gabriel Woytek:
And to be clear, it's, there was some $50,000 last year and $100,000 budgeted
this year plus funds.
Gabriel Woytek:
And I would assume that, you know, given the new, you know, following of these
rules, that, that would all have to be opened up.
Gabriel Woytek:
So do we want to move these to a vote at the next meeting?
Chair Bill Winfield:
What, what are we recommending here?
Mike McCurdy:
Mike, pushing them to the next meeting, would be ill-advised because the
contracts need to be billed to actually have them at the County Fair on July
4th.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Mike McCurdy:
John?
Trish Hedin:
Okay, now.
Jacques Hadler:
Oh, really?
Jacques Hadler:
So, but I'm just trying to get understanding of this.
Jacques Hadler:
So this, these are just a drop in the bucket compared to, or we, do we fund the
fair of the $100,000?
Jacques Hadler:
It's all at a tier two promotion, the whole thing, getting caboodle.
Jacques Hadler:
All of it.
Jacques Hadler:
So now we're going to say, all right, no, no problem with it.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Jacques Hadler:
And now under the new interpretation or whatever we want to call it, we should,
so we should go back and look at all these fair expenses along with the rec SSD
and the other expenses.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The one caveat on this one is the fair is something that I think the County
puts on and advertises and promotes.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think Mike said that there have been individuals that are outside the
community that are going, going to utilize it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think when we went through the analysis and again, commissioners, I think
commissioner McCandless went through and said that, I don't know if this is
misstating position of the commission, but my understanding is we were looking
at the green, the reviewed expenditures.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Is that where we ended up?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That it was the green ones that were accepted on that list?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't think we ended up.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Well, there was no vote taken yet.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Well, there was opinion.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But there were three people that indicated that they were likely going to want
to put all of the items there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And there was one person that said that they were willing to put the green
items there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So if we, you know, I don't know what that thing's called, what the things that
have the overlapping area, but it sounds like if we're there, then I don't know
that if you guys would be on board with these, again, this is something that is
it promoting and establishing this thing's blown up.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It's got photographs.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you're looking at one, I mean, that's kind of the analysis that we did on
our meeting with Jacques as we kind of walked through each individual item and
said, is this promotion?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Is this in the establishment promote?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I don't know if this is something you guys want to do for all the items.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think we can.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think the fair is unique-ish in the sense that it is the, it is its own
event.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It is the creation of an event that exists to promote and bring people in.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And there could be a different argument than the Trail Ambassador Program,
which is trails plus, you know, you're having the trails exist there and you're
getting an add-on to that trail experience.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Whereas people are literally, they would not come out to OSTA but for this
event and these add-ons.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So it's up to you guys what you want to do.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think, again, if we go into the range of things that are more defensible to
not, I think putting on a fair and inviting people and promoting it and pushing
it out there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I mean, again, defensible, likely yes.
Speaker 15:
Mike, please.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Mike McCurdy:
I figure most of what we were about to say is going to parallel.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Mike McCurdy:
In previous, the event has advertised outside of Grand County to, I mean, our
local area, Grand Junction, Emory County, inside of Green River, San Juan
County, bring people to the Grand County Fair.
Mike McCurdy:
Not that we don't love the San Juan Fair, but we want to, we are promoting down
there for the Grand County Fair.
Speaker 15:
Trish, go ahead.
Trish Hedin:
I actually have, I've kind of just gone to the fair just really quickly but
haven't, you know, sat.
Trish Hedin:
One thing I'll say about the rodeo, because I always work the ticket booth, is
it's about half and half if I were to like make a general assessment.
Trish Hedin:
It's about half locals and half, you know, tourists, which is really cool.
Trish Hedin:
And I would assume there'd be a similar kind of turnout for the fair.
Trish Hedin:
Who knows?
Trish Hedin:
But I mean, you know, a county fair is for its residents.
Trish Hedin:
You know, I mean, my county fair was so that we could, I could show my hog, to
be honest, right?
Trish Hedin:
Like it was a way to display what you had grown that year.
Trish Hedin:
So we can make an assumption that, you know, there it's, it is for our
residents, but that it also, in an aside, it's attracting tourists.
Trish Hedin:
So I don't know where you guys want to sit on that.
Trish Hedin:
I mean, maybe we do it and we'll have to know that we have to pay it back.
Trish Hedin:
But as Brian said, and this isn't, I'm not punching it, you know, is it too
close to the line, right?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie, please.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I, yeah, I'm going to classify right there in that green bucket with Trail
Ambassador stuff.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I know that I was, you know, Brian and I discussed a little bit about use of
like the recreation service district.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
You know, it's like we have ballparks and those ballparks used.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And if we were to do an event that we went and push to the outside group, we
could use that money for advertising, even though the local kids or adults or
whatever are going to be using those fields and they're going to be going to
that event as well.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
You're also pushing it outside.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I think this would be similar.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, this county fair is a little different.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's not really a 4-H county fair showing animals.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's really, you know, it's got that in there, but it's kind of like a, it's
kind of like an amusement park and it's got a lot of other things going on.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's got concerts and things.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I think that it would fit in that, where I would put a defensible use of TRT
money.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But that's my opinion on this, on this particular piece.
Speaker 15:
Hey, go ahead, please.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Sorry if I missed you.
Gabriel Woytek:
So, yeah, I agree.
Gabriel Woytek:
I think it's defensible.
Gabriel Woytek:
You know, the conversation about the GCAP programming that was really centered
around solicitation, materials that are solicitations, materials that are taken
away by, by tourists.
Gabriel Woytek:
There was like, it's very clearly promotion as it's currently being considered.
Gabriel Woytek:
And so I don't doubt if there's advertising going out of town.
Gabriel Woytek:
Absolutely.
Gabriel Woytek:
That seems clear and square, but a rock crawling group and a photo booth, if
we're, if that's the, if that's the measure we're using, it's completely
inconsistent with what we're adapting right now.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I disagree.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And the reason why we're disagreeing and why I disagree is because some of the
things that we went through and I'd encourage the commissioners to run through
the play by play on the breakdown.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I mean, and the reason why I'm cautioning the clerk auditor on the language on
this is I think for us to categorize these different things in the way that we
did, there were some give and takes on them and some adjustments to change.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think it's fair.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think it's probably an overstatement to say that we didn't go through and
discuss those things and have more of a more reasonable basis to flag something
as green versus red versus purple.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And so the other nuances, when people are coming to these events, they're going
to these specific individual separate booths for that entertainment, that
recreation purpose.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's different than in a trail program if we're, I'd put it back on that
assessment.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll go to Brian and then Mike or make motion.
Mike McCurdy:
That's where I was going, unless you're going next.
Mike McCurdy:
No, I was going to start with Brian so that.
Brian Martinez:
Just real quick.
Brian Martinez:
I think that a lot of this could have been avoided if it had gone to the tax
advisory board prior to this.
Brian Martinez:
We have a tax advisory board for this tax right now.
Brian Martinez:
So had this gone to our tax advisory board and had been part of a marketing
plan, I think that it would be a little bit clearer.
Brian Martinez:
I think one of our mistakes right now is this is kind of sitting out here on
its own.
Brian Martinez:
Same way with the trail ambassador expenditures that we were talking about
earlier.
Brian Martinez:
They're out there on their own department, which makes it less likely that it's
tourism.
Brian Martinez:
We have a tax advisory board that's by statute to provide recommendations for
spending of that tax.
Brian Martinez:
Had this been sitting in front of them and they said, yes, this is a way that
we'd like to spend this.
Brian Martinez:
It's part of our marketing plan or it's part of our long-term goal.
Brian Martinez:
I think that that would be a little bit closer.
Speaker 15:
Mike, please.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make a motion to approve the independent contract agreement for the
2025 grand planning fair with Bombtown.
Chair Bill Winfield:
You want to just lump them both in together?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Mike McCurdy:
I'll second.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Second by Commissioner McCandless.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do we have any other discussion?
Trish Hedin:
No.
Jacques Hadler:
I think all this falls under promotion.
Jacques Hadler:
I'll just say that.
Jacques Hadler:
I think everything we've discussed up until now have made my position
exceptionally clear.
Jacques Hadler:
I also think what's good for the goose is good for the gander.
Jacques Hadler:
If we're going to be taking a really hard under the microscope look at every
other expense, I think this deserves the same scrutiny.
Jacques Hadler:
I'll just go ahead and say that.
Speaker 15:
Anybody else?
Speaker 15:
Mary?
Mary McGann:
I'm going to be real quick.
Mary McGann:
I feel like this is a grey area in bold in some ways.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes, Commissioner McCandless.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Just to clarify, are we paying it out of TRT funds or are we paying it out of
this person's TRT funds?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Then I would like to make a recommendation that next goes in front of the
Travel Advisory Board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Tax Advisory Board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Yes, Tax Advisory Board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
That's what it is.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's the Travel Council Advisory Board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
MTAP.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So that they can approve it in advance.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We didn't get to have that control last year.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So this year we can request that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll go for a vote.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All those in favor of approving this to come out of the TRT promotion money?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those in favor?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those against?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion fails with Commissioner.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm abstaining.
Trish Hedin:
I'm abstaining too.
Trish Hedin:
I'm getting snail-eyed here.
Trish Hedin:
I never abstain.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So again, the motion fails with two abstaining.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
What's that?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
You need four to vote.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So the vote fails with Commissioners who were against.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So the two against Commissioner McGann and Commissioner McCurdy and then two
abstentions, Commissioner Hather and Commissioner Hedeen.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Correct, as you stated.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, moving forward.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We are on to L.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
You could have a replacement motion if you'd like.
Mary McGann:
A replacement motion perhaps.
Speaker 15:
Okay, please.
Mary McGann:
We approve this expenditure for the bomb town now to determine where the
funding comes from after clarification.
Mary McGann:
But that we approve it so you can get the contract but to work out.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's a very fast motion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McGann, seconded by Commissioner Martinez.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie, please start the discussion.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know when the clarification is going to come.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, ultimately, we discussed that earlier today about budget.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Okay, so we're going to have the same conversation again with the budget
amendments.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I'm just curious if people are going to abstain from those as well because
we can't make a vote today at this moment in time.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We're going to make a vote then on the exact same situation.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So we have to like, that's where we're going to start.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'd like to let our county attorney weigh in real quick.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you guys want clarification, again, previously in the meeting, the clerk
auditor indicated that all the expenses were approved in his mind.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So where are we looking for clarification on this particular item?
Mary McGann:
Well, does it fall into the same area that our trail ambassadors are?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Would you like to make that determination?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Because our clerk auditor said that all the expenses would be in this would be
as well.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Would you like other commissioners?
Mary McGann:
We'll make the decision when we do our budget event.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
In the meantime, do you guys have that to be paid for out of your general fund?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Do you not want to approve it at this time?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
What do you guys want to do?
Mike McCurdy:
Because otherwise, we can't fund a contract without knowing where the money is
coming from.
Mike McCurdy:
The motion would need to include the motion.
Mike McCurdy:
And can I do that being from the previous bill?
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, you can put one on your discretionary fund.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If this is what you guys want to spend that money on.
Trish Hedin:
Sounds like a good debate.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So do we need a substitute motion?
Trish Hedin:
Yeah, on a discretionary fund.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That puts it in kind of a gray area.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make it a substitute motion to approve the independent contract
agreement for the 2025 Grand County Fair with Boomtown out of commission
discretionary funds.
Mike McCurdy:
I'll second that.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy and seconded by Commissioner Hedin to pull this
money out of the commission discretionary funds for Bombtown at the county fair.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All those in favor?
Speaker 15:
Oh, excuse me, John.
Jacques Hadler:
I just hit it.
Jacques Hadler:
I'm sorry.
Jacques Hadler:
I want to clarify.
Jacques Hadler:
Do we know how much is in our discretionary funds?
Jacques Hadler:
It's north of 50.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Jacques Hadler:
I'll look.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Jacques Hadler:
That's fine.
Jacques Hadler:
I just wanted to estimate.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any further discussion?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll call for a vote.
Trish Hedin:
All in favor?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That passes unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
None opposed.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner McCurdy?
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make a motion to approve the independent contract agreement for the
2025 Grand County Fair with Moab Photo Booth, and it was $2,500?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Mike McCurdy:
For $2,500 out of commission discretionary fund.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Discussion?
Mike McCurdy:
If I get a second.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy to approve this one out of the commission
discretionary funds.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Do I have a second?
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner Martinez seconds.
Mike McCurdy:
Mike's discussion.
Mike McCurdy:
I really feel like if anything could fall in that gray area, and I don't want
stuff to fall in that gray area, it would be a service at the fair, and this is
a service at the fair instead of an attraction bringing outside tourism in, such
as our previous approval of the entertainment, Bombtown, that this is a photo
booth at the fair.
Mike McCurdy:
I really feel like if it was to fall in the indefensible, that would be the
photo booth far more than the entertainment for the fair, so I'd like to pay it
out of discretionary funds.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any further discussion?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll call for a vote.
Trish Hedin:
All in favor?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion passes unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We will move on.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Was that the only two items that were pulled out?
Chair Bill Winfield:
A was not addressed because they're in the minutes.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, then we will move on to item number three, the non-conversion agreement.
Chair Bill Winfield:
This has Commissioner Hedin and Ms. Hofhein.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
So, this was brought to my attention in my temporary role.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Staff in the planning office was asked to sign off on this, and she chose not
to, so that it came to me.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
This is something that shouldn't be a problem going forward, and it's because
of staffing changes in the planning office and zoning or the building
department, but it was already on here, so I thought I'd discuss it with you
guys a little bit.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
This is the kind of agreement that should always go through our county
attorney's office.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Apparently, these have been sort of being done outside of that, so the reason
that it's being brought to you now is because only the commission should have
signatory authority on something that the county has agreed to, and it should
always be done through the county attorney's office, which is why it was being
brought to you guys.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
It shouldn't be an issue going forward because we're entering into a new sort
of phase of planning and zoning and building, but that's why it's on here, and
that's why I need a motion from you guys today.
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner McCurdy.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make the motion.
Mike McCurdy:
I move to approve the ratification of the non-conversion agreement between the
county and the owner of real property located at 3106 South Spanish Valley
Drive.
Mike McCurdy:
Second.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy, seconded by Commissioner Tinus.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Further discussion?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Seeing none, I'll call for a vote.
Trish Hedin:
All in favor?
Trish Hedin:
But just real quick, and so you guys kind of just read that background.
Trish Hedin:
Did you guys read the background just to kind of have an understanding?
Mike McCurdy:
And small, small discussion.
Mike McCurdy:
Please.
Mike McCurdy:
I see why it happened now.
Mike McCurdy:
Will this decision continue to fall to commission in the end?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
This decision should always fall to the commission after going through the
county attorney's office.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
This should never be something that would be decided by staff.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
That was one of the reasons that it's being brought to you now, because this is
something that is a, it was first brought to the county attorney's office back
in 2020, and it had been sort of, I don't want to say pirated, but it's been
sort of taken on by staff as something that they're doing, but it's not
something that should be happening that way.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And when it came to my attention, I pulled it.
Mike McCurdy:
And it doesn't fall under the zoning administrator's purview?
Trish Hedin:
No.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
So the zoning administrator can only sign off on things that are approved by
ordinance by you guys, blessed by you guys.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Each of these is an independent agreement.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
So they would need to go through the county attorney's office.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And Stephen could probably speak to this more technically than I can, but it
would need to go through a legal review.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
These are legally binding.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
They're recorded on property in perpetuity.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And so, and all of these need to be looked at independently within the county
attorney's office.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
How many of these we see here?
Trish Hedin:
I have no idea.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
This is my, this was, no, they were cleaning it up.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Trish Hedin:
I don't like that it was happening.
Trish Hedin:
So I see it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If the county attorney agrees with that, I would appreciate a comment.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I agree with that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think the only, whenever, whenever the entity finds something that likely
should have been corrected or isn't done appropriately, best practice would be
to go, to dig up within reason and find, because these, these, I don't know who
were done and I don't know if they've gone through and filed deed restrictions
on them.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Deed restrictions would be done depending on whether it's considered an AD or
not.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And so most of them, it's a deed restriction is removed.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
It's another thing that was kind of weird to me about this whole agreement.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I mean, and best practice would be to track these, have these be some method
and mechanisms for tracking them, making sure the signatory authority, because
we're, we're responsible for ensuring that the agreement goes through.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And we, basically we, we had a lot of agreements that we didn't necessarily
know.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And when I say we, I mean the county commission and that, and we didn't set
this up in a mechanism.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you guys don't want to see these, definitely you can pass some, some
documents to give that authority through the ordinance, but that's not what was
done.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
When I say a lot, I mean, it's a handful.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
I don't think that this was, this is like a common occurrence.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
I don't want you guys to think that this.
Mike McCurdy:
Probably less than 10.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Mike McCurdy:
Just to follow this decision goes to the recorder's office and it's recorded
along with the document could, yeah, the document would go there, but it's not
their decision, just the document.
Mike McCurdy:
So then the, I'm just saying in the future purchaser of this, when they will
title this comes right up.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
It's not something that's happening.
Trish Hedin:
It's perpetuity with the, with the property property.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Trish Hedin:
Commissioner Dean, um, I guess, and, and this kind of relates to Brian's that
you're on the whistle board, but you know, when you have an ADU, I have an ADU
on my property.
Trish Hedin:
I pay impact fees.
Trish Hedin:
I think I paid 12 and an impact fees.
Trish Hedin:
This, that was kind of, you know, if you think about somebody leaving in this
case, leaving a structure, they built a house and then that structure was
supposed to go away.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Trish Hedin:
And it's still there in theory, they should have had two impact fees applied to
that property.
Trish Hedin:
And this is a way to kind of say, well, we're not going to use that property as
a house, right.
Trish Hedin:
As an ADU, it's just additional living space.
Trish Hedin:
But, but, you know, the issue with something like this is, you know, with us
should be getting impact fees on two structures, right.
Trish Hedin:
Um, being paid to them.
Trish Hedin:
So just kind of how it applies to that.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Trish Hedin:
And so you don't want to bypass that.
Trish Hedin:
Want to make sure that those impact fees are being paid because they have an
impact on the infrastructure, water and sewers.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
While we're in further discussion, I will call for a vote.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All in favor of the motion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion passes unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We'll move on to item number four, which is the approval of media production
services for who is Moab campaign videos.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Ms. Hartford.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Hello.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Moab office of tourism.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Hi.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Um, so we have been wanting to do a project like this, or I have since I
started in this office.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Um, and so the project was approved to solicit quotes at the February of tab
meeting.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And then those quotes were reviewed, uh, during the most recent meeting.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And so I'm here today with the quotes and the recommendation from the end tab
to, um, do this project with real creative.
Brian Martinez:
Brian, please.
Brian Martinez:
I moved to approve the media production project with real creative and
authorize the chair to sign the associated agreement upon completion of legal
review.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by commissioner Martinez.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Second by commissioner McCurdy discussion by commissioner McCurdy.
Mike McCurdy:
How the board see it.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
They like it.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
Um, really what we're buying with this project and what I told the board to is,
uh, licenses to the videos that these guys are going to make.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
And so, um, the documentaries will be great for media and they'll be really
fun, but really what I'm excited about is like B roll footage of people rafting
and climbing.
Mike McCurdy:
Oh, okay.
Mike McCurdy:
Along with that, uh, two part there.
Mike McCurdy:
Uh, now we own in this, we own this zero, et cetera.
Mike McCurdy:
So we can, I mean, later on forever.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
It's going into a physical hard drive.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
It's going to go online.
Civil Paralegal Cristin Hofhine:
We'll own it.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Barring further discussion, I will call for a vote all in favor motion passes
unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We can move on to thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Ms. Hartford move on to number five and ordinance establishing a grand County
tax cell procedure.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
This is Mr. Clerk.
Gabriel Woytek:
Thanks chair.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, so we were pretty close to, um, potentially having a actual tax sale come
up this year.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, and fortunately that that was resolved and, uh, the owner was able to find
a buyer.
Gabriel Woytek:
So not quite finalized, but it's almost certain that that, uh, the back taxes
will be paid and all the balance.
Gabriel Woytek:
He's my interest.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, there hasn't been a tax sale in almost 20 years.
Gabriel Woytek:
It's quoted in the packets.
Gabriel Woytek:
I think it's 2006 was the last time it happened.
Gabriel Woytek:
Obviously property values and demand are quite high here.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, so even when folks, uh, are behind, um, they're usually able to, to find
someone to buy and settle up.
Gabriel Woytek:
So it's not really much of an issue.
Gabriel Woytek:
I'm glad it isn't one of these things that, um, you know, in other companies
there, there are several tax sale sales and it's quite an administrative
process.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, and so anyway, the, uh, administrative rules state that the County should
have an ordinance on the books, uh, to, to be able to handle the procedures, uh,
of those sales.
Gabriel Woytek:
Um, and so just clarifying, I did cancel the public notice associated with the
tax sale, but we're going to just move in this forward and put it on the books,
um, in case in the future it were to come up.
Gabriel Woytek:
And I, I really think, uh, treasurer Bachman for his help in setting this up
and also for his health, um, taking great, uh, you know, personal care and
working with, uh, any property owners that are in danger of tax sale, um, and
helping navigate with them, uh, options for deferral and other ways to avoid
that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I echo the thanks.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think it's, it's great that we get to address these things and appreciate the
work and the treasurer on, on bringing this together and making sure that we
have these things, um, ready to go so that we don't have to address them after
the fact.
Mike McCurdy:
So I appreciate both their work on this.
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner McCurdy.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make the motion.
Mike McCurdy:
I move to approve the ordinance, establishing the Grand County tax sale
procedure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy, seconded by Commissioner McCandless.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any further discussion?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Seeing none, I will call for a vote.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All in favor.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Passes unanimously.
Gabriel Woytek:
We will now move on to number six.
Gabriel Woytek:
Approval.
Gabriel Woytek:
I will note that when it goes out on the screen, it stays on YouTube fine.
Gabriel Woytek:
So we're not losing the whole thing.
Speaker 15:
Cool.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Approval of the fiscal year 2025 airport infrastructure grant agreement part
one offer contract 349-02-0-048-2025 could construct taxi lanes E, G, and J.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I believe that this is probably me.
Trish Hedin:
No.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll give a little bit of background on this.
Chair Bill Winfield:
This is a grant from the FAA that amounts to $2,032,062.48 with a match fund
from Grand County.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I'm not seeing the dollar amount.
Chair Bill Winfield:
$125,064.48. And so this is an item that we would need to approve the match
funds for this item.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And although I don't know the total dollar amount that will be moved back into
the airport budget, but there is money moving into the airport budget sometime
here in the near future that was removed during the COVID years when we were
receiving CARES funds and different funds.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So this 125K could possibly come out of that as my guess.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So Commissioner McCurdy.
Mike McCurdy:
I move to accept the Federal Aviation Administration grant number 48 in the
amount of $2,376,208 for the construction of taxi lanes at Canyonlands Regional
Airport and authorize the chair to sign all associated documents and contracts.
Mike McCurdy:
I'll second.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy, second by Commissioner McCandless.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Start us off, Trish, and then I'll come over to you.
Trish Hedin:
So sorry.
Trish Hedin:
And maybe you don't know, Bill.
Trish Hedin:
So when you say that money was moved, so maybe you're saying it's somewhere in
the general fund and then it's going to be moved.
Trish Hedin:
But in theory, it's still a part of that when we're looking at those numbers
today, it's within those numbers.
Trish Hedin:
Does that make sense?
Trish Hedin:
So meaning these are additional expenditures that we're adding.
Trish Hedin:
Make sense or is it?
Chair Bill Winfield:
This is some money that was taken out of the airport budget.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All money that's earned at the airport stays at the airport per FAA
regulations.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The number has been somewhat of a moving target and Gabe, who has exited, has
not finalized what that dollar amount is.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It was at 1.1 million dollars that needed to go back to the airport.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't know where we will end up because that number seems to be changing for
Gabe.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So I can't speak to it.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So it is not coming out of this budget.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's money that has to go back to the airport per FAA.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I understand.
Trish Hedin:
I guess what I'm saying is is it somewhere in our general fund?
Trish Hedin:
I mean, it's coming from somewhere, right?
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I guess I'm just coming from earnings at the airport.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
If that money is due back to the airport, it's money that was earned at the
airport.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Trish Hedin:
Right.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Trish Hedin:
I'm just okay.
Trish Hedin:
I guess I'm just not I'm still not understanding Commissioner McGannon.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I wish that we had the I think you answered it.
Mary McGann:
So it's really going to be when you said approved within budget, it will be cut
from the airport budget.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Mary McGann:
That's what I want to know.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I know that Mark has been a part of those conversations and can support
what I'm saying.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The clerk auditor clearly isn't here to speak to it.
Brian Martinez:
Can I just ask a question?
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Brian Martinez:
Can you enlighten me a little bit on this Taxi Lane F for $666,000?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Taxi Lane F is not fundable by the FAA.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so that is a third taxiway.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Actually, it would be considered a fourth because the first part of the grant.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so that's an additional quote from the contractor that will be doing the
other Taxiways on FAA funding.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So this additional $600,000 would also have to come out of airport budget or
county budget if we want to move forward on it.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I can't speak to that dollar amount.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would imagine that that has to come before the commission in a separate
agenda item.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner McCurdy.
Mike McCurdy:
To shorten this down, we put in $125,000.
Mike McCurdy:
We get $2.4 million?
Mike McCurdy:
Basically, yes.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Mike McCurdy:
That man and I like them odds.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any further discussion?
Trish Hedin:
Steven, do you have anything you want to add?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't know exactly how those funds work.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But if only we had somebody to answer that question.
Chair Bill Winfield:
No further discussion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Call for a vote.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those in favor of supporting the FAA grant at the airport?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those opposed?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion passes six to three.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Six to one.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Excuse me.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't know where that math came from.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner Hedin again.
Trish Hedin:
And I just want to move on.
Trish Hedin:
Do you mind if I just state that I just didn't feel like I have complete
clarification as to where that money is coming from.
Trish Hedin:
And in these times, I'm not real comfortable spending that.
Trish Hedin:
I think it's a great match.
Trish Hedin:
It just freaked me out.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The last thing we want is you freaked out.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We'll move on to item number seven.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Consideration of economic advisory board grant application recommendations for
state rural grants.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I would like to state that I think there was a lot of effort went into this
from our board.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think that they did a good job of sorting out.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think there were 57 applicants.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I'm appreciative of the fact that the transparency and the openness of
these grants that we received out of this and that we were able to open this up
out into the community further.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so I think that was a big push of mine from the very beginning when I came
on as a commissioner that these grants would be much more open to the public and
transparent on what we were doing with them.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so as we move forward, I would like to comment that I would like to see a
slight change in this and that I would like to see the grant for the Chamber of
Commerce reduced to $10,000 and the remaining $15,000 split between the two
child care applicants that didn't receive anything here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I do think that the Chamber has received money in the past.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would justify this based off of that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But I also would say that we have put a ton of money into just one individual
on child care and that I think that we need to open this up a little bit.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Although it's hard to see child care as an economic development, I think that
they carry a huge burden for the working class in this community that allows
them to have jobs, which is a big part of our economy and economics here,
whether it's tourism or other related.
Chair Bill Winfield:
These daycares are a huge part of what we're doing, in my mind.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner McCurdy?
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make the motion to approve the consideration of economic advisory
board grant applicant recommendations as stated, not as listed.
Mike McCurdy:
Can I do that?
Mike McCurdy:
He hasn't named the entities.
Mike McCurdy:
Child care.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I will state those two child care.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
You need to state all of them.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Whoever he's suggesting putting funds to, we just need the names.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Jasper daycare is one of them, and I forget.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I had these written down in my notebook, but I apologize.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Jasper daycare and the second one is, oh, there it is, Rock Tots.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so that 15,000 would be split evenly between those two child care entities.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So just to make it clean for the record, you're saying Gold Horse, 75,000,
Artesian, 45,000, Chamber of Commerce, 10,000, Delaware Brewery, 25,000, Molten
Mini Mount, 30,000, Rock Tots, $7,500, and Jasper daycare, $7,500.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I want to make it stated so it's clear.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That's my motion.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Second, anyone?
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll second, but I want to discuss too.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think Brian beat you to it, so I'll let him have the second, and then you can
open up the discussion.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We also didn't accept the rural communities opportunity grant of the $600,000,
so we'll have to do that in a different motion.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But they worked really, really hard on this, and it is going against what they
recommended, and I'm that liaison for them.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But I think the majority of that group would agree with that split.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Had it been brought up, again, just based on the discussions, and you can go
back and watch the last meeting.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They've been working on this since February, put a lot of effort, a lot of
work, reviewed those.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
At the very end, I think they were kind of like, well, is there anybody we were
forgetting?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And we didn't go back into that list of the 57, and so I appreciate you guys
going back to that list because I do think that it's fair to give those two
daycares some money based on the fact that we've given a lot of money to a
daycare out there.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So anyways, I feel like I just wanted to put that out there because we are
going against the recommendation, but I think it's a really good recommendation.
Jacques Hadler:
I've got further discussion.
Jacques Hadler:
Jacques, go ahead, please.
Jacques Hadler:
I just didn't.
Jacques Hadler:
I don't know about the other daycares.
Jacques Hadler:
Actually, my daughter had one of the daycares that was recommended, so I know
she runs a quality operation, but I think this board does a great job.
Jacques Hadler:
I think they worked super hard on this.
Jacques Hadler:
They didn't have a staff member working on them this year because they didn't
have that position.
Jacques Hadler:
We just approved that position, but it hasn't been hired yet.
Jacques Hadler:
So my inclination would be just to defer to their recommendations.
Jacques Hadler:
As for the Chamber of Commerce, I'm no longer the liaison to that board, but I
was for the last four years, and I was last year when they ran their business
summit, and I just wanted to disagree with one of the citizens to be heard.
Jacques Hadler:
I think he stated that that business summit was just an election vehicle for
the current chamber president, who was actually not the chamber president last
year.
Jacques Hadler:
That was Shaley Bryant, and I attended that business summit.
Jacques Hadler:
I thought the chamber did a good job with that, and I think they did a good job
before also.
Jacques Hadler:
I believe this $25,000 was to be used for the business summit.
Jacques Hadler:
At least that's what it said in the materials, I think.
Jacques Hadler:
So I would wonder if that would even be happening this year, because I know it
cost $110,000 to fund that.
Jacques Hadler:
So that would be a concern of mine.
Jacques Hadler:
Otherwise, I'm very happy with all the other decisions they made.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any other comments?
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would like to make a comment.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I guess the further discussion that I'd like to have around this is we're
asking citizens to put money forward here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Actually, we're using grant money to go towards the golf course, the Moab
brewery, and multi-mini-mount.
Chair Bill Winfield:
What I would like to see on these grants moving forward is that there's
something in the contract that asks them to come back for final payment.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We don't just hand out a lump sum, but we break that up, and then they come
back with some sort of an update on what they use the money for.
Chair Bill Winfield:
For instance, the multi-mini-mount, I'm a little bit aware of that one, because
I know this gentleman.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'd like to know, are we creating jobs?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Where does this money take us?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Because economic development, we should see something for our money that
benefits this community and a tax base.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So is it employment, Moab brewery?
Chair Bill Winfield:
What are we getting from Moab brewery for this money?
Chair Bill Winfield:
So I'd just like to see the contracts tightened up a little bit, so that maybe
it's 75-25, and maybe it's too late for that on this one, that we need to look
at something in the future, and I'll let the county attorney speak to that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But having some accountability to come back and get the rest of that money at
the end, to me, seems like an incentive to come back with a great report or a
report on what actually happened.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So when the state came down and walked us through, and they did a good
presentation, they said that the contract and your additional terms are ensuring
that the expenditure is provided appropriately.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We can create contracts with them.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's what they did indicate.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Here's kind of the route or the difficulty for me.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I can draft a contract.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I can put kind of the same things that you get that we've had previously with
the start grant or the special event grant, and they've done in the past a 90-10
split that shows that you've expended 90% of the funds on the particular thing
that you were spending on, and then come back to do a final report and get the
last 10%.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's been helpful in the past.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
People have completed the reports and documents and come back for that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Additional conditions makes it a little trickier, because I don't know what you
guys want.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So if you guys said, like, something that's within the scope, you said, hey, we
want a report that you've spent all the funds or the 90% of the funds on the
items that the EOAB dated or that's in your application or things like that, and
document that, I think that's a very reasonable request.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And to have them do a report that shows that it's creating jobs or things like
that, again, reasonable request.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Where I think it becomes harder is kind of micromanaging a little bit deeper
into what they're going to spend it on.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Like, I don't know if we have the manpower to say, oh, the golf course is going
to spend it on watering.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Like, are we going to go out there and watch them put in the PVC pipes?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Are we not?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I can put together a sample contract for us to look through and make sure
that the expenses are done in the correct way.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Happy to do that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's something that we've done with all of our grants that we've done from
the star grants to special event grants and so on and so forth.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'm happy to do that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think it'd be cleanest if we could spend the money within six months, but I
don't know the depths of the applications.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I that's, again, some of the issues that I would have for drafting contracts
now.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'll start with Mike and then go to Melodie.
Mike McCurdy:
This kind of goes towards Mark and Stephen.
Mike McCurdy:
Like I stated previously with HR, wouldn't this fall under the purview of the
economic development position to follow through on contracts?
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
I mean, this is what they would be looking at.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
Yeah, certainly.
Commission Administrator Mark Tyner:
And in the absence of that, I think it would be perfectly reasonable for com
admin to communicate with the county attorney's office.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And one thing before I forget, I want to thank Chris Wilson and Melissa
Jeffers, and I don't know who else, and Commissioner McCandless and who else,
designed the form.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It did the intake.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They put a ton of effort into this.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They processed 50 applications instead of two.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The outreach was phenomenal.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I really appreciate the hard work.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They have long meetings to discuss this, and I think it was done in a really,
really stand-up way.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I just wanted to mention that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
That's all I had.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, Dana and Mark and Quinn, they helped a bunch as well.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So the money's going to come in for this RCG grant.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We're going to receive the money October, November, December-ish.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
That's when the money's going to come to us.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And then that reporting is due by July 30th, I think, of next year.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So right now, we're in the process that just opened up on May 15th, opened up
the reporting period for last year's funds, which went to child care.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So we have a copy of that.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Could you email a copy of that report to all of us just so we know what it
looks like?
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Chris had it at the meeting the other day, but I haven't seen it.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So if we get that, that reporting has to be done for each of these, and that
has to be done by July of next year.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So we would expect that the money would be spent by the time that we did that
report or reasoning why that would.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I think it all sits in that time zone.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I would also, so the Economic Opportunity Advisory Board's getting that
information back.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I think it just necessarily isn't all coming.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's not coming to the commission.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But I think that that's something that I could report back on next year, or
whoever's the board meeting is on next year for that position once that
information came back.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So I think, but it'd be interesting to look at that report that they're asking
right now.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I haven't seen it yet to see if there's anything additional that we'd want to
ask.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And the other neat thing that they could do, because there's that time gap
between now and when they received the funds, they could also look at items that
we would, I think, reasonably, reasonably reimburse their fall within the
mission.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They can be reimbursed.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Yeah, they, yep, they can be reimbursed.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So that's something else when they're looking forward at their application.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I'll say this, and we've done this in the past for other grants, we have
made adjustments or amendments to what their original spend was going to be on
if it's within a reasonable range as well.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So some people might get the funds, and I don't know that anybody on this, I
mean, maybe if they didn't do a beer garden, not trying to pick on the brewery,
but maybe they wanted to not do it at the food truck park and want to do it
somewhere else or something like that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We've had circumstances where we've asked to kind of slightly pivot from the
application, but we asked them to be upfront about it, say, hey, look, we don't
want to do it this way, we want to shift slightly, and we've had that be
successful.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Okay, further discussion?
Chair Bill Winfield:
I will call for a vote on the motion.
Trish Hedin:
Do you mind, Bill, just reviewing the motion real quick?
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The motion is to fund the golf course at $75,000, Artisan at $45,000, Chamber
of Commerce at $10,000, Moab Brewery at $25,000, Popeye Mini Mount at $30,000,
the Jasper's Day Care at $7,500, and the Rock Tots at $7,500.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner McCurdy, you made the motion, I believe Commissioner Martinez
seconded that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So those in favor of the motion as stated?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those opposed?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion passes 4 to 3 with Commissioner Hedin, Commissioner Hadler, and
Commissioner McGann opposed.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And we will move on to the state.
Mary McGann:
I just wanted to support.
Mary McGann:
I know how hard that board worked.
Mary McGann:
And I know they probably considered the Jasper Day Care and the Tots very
seriously before they came up with their decision.
Mary McGann:
So I felt it was important to go with their recommendations.
Mary McGann:
Because of all the boards I've been on in the past, that's probably what the
hardest work.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I appreciate that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They should watch the shows.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
If you haven't watched them, maybe you should watch them.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would also maybe add to the fact as we're looking at contracts and drawing
this up, if there's a promotional aspect to them, that the county retains some
of the advertising rights.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't know about the golf course or the beer garden, but if there's something
that could be done there, I would want the county to be able to utilize or to
advertise that this grant went out from the county type of thing.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But yeah.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But you're not talking about that the county is not purchasing the intellectual
property.
Trish Hedin:
No.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
You're just saying that you'd like to be able to highlight the fact that these
funds were expended.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I think that's very reasonable.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So we will move on then to number eight, the CJC advisory board liaison
assignments.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The agenda here.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Let's look at this.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Hang on.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Hang on.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
What about the $600,000?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Oh, yeah.
Jacques Hadler:
We have to make another motion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
That wasn't on.
Trish Hedin:
No.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So we're adding an agenda item.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We're back to item number seven.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Back to item number seven.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I will make a motion to approve the $600,000.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Well, it's not approving $600,000.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
We're just making a recommendation to support the Grand County EMS training
program, destination training program, as our rural communities opportunity
grant.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So they will go and forward that one.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And that's for the one that's contained in the second attachment.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And it looks like it's down on page two that lists recommended funding package,
rural communities opportunity grant, Grand County EMS, destination EMS training
program, recommended amount $600,000, just so that people can see it.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCandless, second by Commissioner McCurdy.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Discussion?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Melodie?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And just so everyone here in the community knows, that is not, we do not get to
choose that.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's a competitive grant that goes up to the state.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I know we all learned that in the training.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And so we are just agreeing that that's what we want to go forth for Grand
County.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And so we'll find out.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And it's really great because the Governor's Office of Economic Opportunity
will work with them and help them to get their application in and all that.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
That will go in in November.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So they have a lot of time to work on that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Any further discussion?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Seeing none, I'll call for a vote.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All those in favor of the $600,000 grant, the Grand County EMS. And again, just
to clarification, this is recommending?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Recommending.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It's not, there's no fiscal impact.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It's not that we're giving them funds, that we're just supporting their
application to the rural communities grant.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's the only way they could.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Okay, perfect.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I just want to make it clear.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those in favor?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion passes unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We will move on to item number eight, the CJC board liaison assignments.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And this came about at the last meeting when I made the request of Mary and
haven't heard anything.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So I just figured we would put it on here for a vote.
Chair Bill Winfield:
This has two liaisons currently, Commissioner Hedin and Commissioner McGann.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I know that Commissioner McGann has put a lot of time and effort over the
years into this.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I'm not in any way discounting or taking that away from Mary for as far as
the efforts that she's put in there.
Chair Bill Winfield:
But I have asked that I be replaced on that board or be the replacement on that
board to participate in those CJC meetings.
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner McGann.
Mike McCurdy:
I'd like to make the motion for these recommend motion to CJC advisory board
liaison assignments.
Mike McCurdy:
Commissioner Hedin, Commissioner Winfield.
Mike McCurdy:
And as a third fill in, if either of you need a fill in, I would like to take
that place.
Mike McCurdy:
In talking with county attorney stocks, I just wanted to make sure that I
didn't have any conflicts and we're good.
Mike McCurdy:
That was my opinion.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, I've got to raise the level of it.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, I think it's important to understand what the CJC advisory board does.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It's an advisory process.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't want to say anything to explain circumstances, but it's an advisory
board that meets cross-sectional community.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They do not review cases.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
They do not talk about cases.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Do not handle the budget.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It is a meet and converse about goals and missions of the CJC.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
It is a soft, fluffy board.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So they're not controlling any funds or making any decisions on any of the
cases, how the prosecutor proceeded.
Trish Hedin:
It's really just the sharing of, you know, so city police will share what
they're up to, right?
Trish Hedin:
UCFS will share.
Trish Hedin:
It's an hour long.
Trish Hedin:
It's pretty mellow.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So I've got a motion on the table, Commissioner McCurdy.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I will look for a second and then we can open it up for discussion if we want.
Brian Martinez:
I'll second the motion.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by Commissioner McCurdy, seconded by Commissioner Martinez.
Mike McCurdy:
Discussion, anyone?
Mike McCurdy:
Mike?
Mike McCurdy:
Well, number one, a discount.
Mike McCurdy:
Mary put in the work for years on this.
Mike McCurdy:
And I just want to make that first and foremost.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I appreciate that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I appreciate all the effort that you've put in over the years as well, Mary.
Trish Hedin:
So can I just, why did you feel this was necessary?
Trish Hedin:
I got that.
Trish Hedin:
Oh, you're going to answer that question?
Trish Hedin:
Yeah, I can answer that one.
Trish Hedin:
Oh, but who came up with the idea?
Trish Hedin:
Did you come up with the idea?
Mike McCurdy:
No, I mean, in reading this, yes.
Trish Hedin:
You came up with the idea?
Mike McCurdy:
Just looking at this, yeah.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Trish Hedin:
This is your, okay.
Mike McCurdy:
No, my motion just came up by lip reading.
Trish Hedin:
Oh, I understand that.
Trish Hedin:
I understand that.
Trish Hedin:
No, I guess I'm just wanting to know why.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Because there's been five absences.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We're talking about a year and a quarter of not making those meetings.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I just felt like it would be a good opportunity for me to step in and be a
part of that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I was a big push to help the CJC out recently and feel like it would just be a
good fit.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't see anybody else wanting to fill that vacancy that you held there,
although I would certainly consider others if they wanted to.
Trish Hedin:
I think the assumption, and I didn't read the specifics on the bylaws, was that
one commissioner was, which I'm the chair, is needed.
Trish Hedin:
And I think Mary came and was like, you got it.
Trish Hedin:
And so if we're going to start doing two commissioners for every board, which
is fine.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We're not doing two commissioners for every board.
Chair Bill Winfield:
This board just has two commissioners.
Trish Hedin:
And that's specifically the verbiage in the bylaws?
Trish Hedin:
No.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie, please.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
It's not in the bylaws.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And as I was reading it over, and if we look on just back at our meeting in
January, Trisha's the liaison for that board.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Mary's not listed as a liaison, but obviously she's on there somewhere.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And maybe she's one of the four community members at large, and then she's not
a commission liaison.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, I'm confused too, because I was just trying to figure it out.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, I would imagine that would be something in the bylaws, which that's not
about attendance.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Most boards that I've been on in my life have, if you miss X amount of them and
consecutively, you can be removed or replaced.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
But I don't mean that inherently there.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Anyways, those are just my thoughts on meeting.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Mary McGann:
My understanding was, because I've been on the board for a long, long time, is
that it was a designee, that the Grand County Executive or a designee, that I
interpreted that as one person, and I knew, no, that Connie Hancock, when she
was the head of the CJC, that's how she thought of it.
Mary McGann:
So, my absence was because I thought that I was the backup.
Mary McGann:
It wasn't because I was being neglectful and not choosing to go.
Mary McGann:
I know Trish wanted to have the assignment, and so I said, okay, I will let
that go.
Mary McGann:
I would like to be the backup.
Mary McGann:
If you can't make it, would you get ahold of me?
Mary McGann:
So, I just want to make it very clear that it was never my intention to neglect
the board.
Mary McGann:
I've always taken my board assignments very seriously.
Mary McGann:
I just, from my understanding and from the bylaws, it said designee, and my
experience under Connie, and she did an incredible job, and then we had a couple
people who canceled almost every board until, you know, until we got Angie, and
so then, anyway, so I just was kind of blindsided by it.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Mike, I'll go to you next, and then Trish.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Mike McCurdy:
My decision coming out of this agenda item was you guys were our group's direct
contact with the CJC looking for expenditures.
Mike McCurdy:
I know the board doesn't deal with financials, but, I mean, having a, you two
having a direct tie-in currently with it, it was my idea.
Mike McCurdy:
I didn't want to get too close because I had fears of a conflict, but, I mean,
in the nearer future, I feel like I'll be fully rhythm of that, and I'd like to
work with the CJC if you'd ever took part in it, but that's an end of the year
discussion.
Mike McCurdy:
Not right now.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, Mike.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Trish.
Trish Hedin:
Stephen, can you just solidify that, or your interpretation of the bylaws, that
there should be more than one commissioner because it just does say designee, so
I view that as singular.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think the only kind of tricky point, and I don't know, this was a long time
ago,
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
we had an appointment of a chair and a vice chair, and that was back on your
guys'
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
meeting, the first one you guys went when Andrea set it up, so I don't think
there is,
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't see anything in these bylaws that say that, but right now, it just kind
of,
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
the tricky thing is right now, if one commissioner, if you don't go to the
meeting, then Andrea has
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
to run the meeting and chair the meeting.
Mary McGann:
I was always under the impression that Trish would let me know if I needed to
be there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Yeah, not in these ones.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
If you do a deep dive into the Grand County, it's 98 pages, the Grand County
Operating Policy and Procedure, it does say the commissioners are supposed to
report if they're absent to the chair.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Does that happen?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't believe that that happens, but not in these bylaws.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Again, when I look at this board, it is a soft, fluffy, fun board.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't think that it generally is the board that, it's not as exciting as P&Z
or a different board that has that, but I think that's one thing, and I want to
make it clear, Andrea and I, we're excited for anybody that wants to show up,
but there was the appointment of the chair and the vice chair.
Trish Hedin:
That's just one thing.
Trish Hedin:
Just a general comment.
Trish Hedin:
If you guys are slowly removing us off all the boards, maybe that's not the
intent.
Trish Hedin:
Maybe it is.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know.
Trish Hedin:
It just feels like that's slowly happening.
Trish Hedin:
I guess I feel a little, as far as taxpayers are concerned and my check, to be
honest, I mean, at a certain point, it's like, well, if I just keep getting
removed from boards and interviewed committees and et cetera and so on, which I
am being, I feel a little bad taking the same paycheck that you are, to be
honest, to be totally honest.
Trish Hedin:
I feel like I'm a very hard worker.
Trish Hedin:
I feel like I'm an asset to boards.
Trish Hedin:
I feel like I do my job with grace, moving back and forth between this board
and between the commission and boards, and so I guess it is what it is, but I
will tell you, I want to feel like I'm earning my paycheck.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'll go to Mike.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
He's not removing you, and if somebody hasn't shown up for five meetings, they
haven't been going.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
They're not part of the board a year and a quarter later, so you're not being
removed.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know how come you would feel that way, but there have to be a few
missed meetings, and if you're not notifying Mary to go, then, like he said,
someone else has done that meeting, so, and I don't know.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I know I've missed one meeting, one board meeting, and I reached out to other
commissioners to see if they could fill my spot.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Now where I've gone on Zoom, if I have to, I know I missed one that no one
could fill, but I let them know I wasn't going to make it as well, so I don't
know.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, these bylaws could be changed to make it more clear about missing
meetings, but I don't even necessarily know if this is our, I mean, Trish lists
us as the liaison as far as our meetings go.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't necessarily know if this is our discussion or if Bill could just go
because it's a, you know, it's a board that has like 18 people on it.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
That's all.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I'm just a little confused about the whole situation.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I can understand the fact that somebody's missed five meetings and should maybe
be replaced.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner McCurdy and then Jock.
Mike McCurdy:
Oh, just clarify, you're still, you're still me.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I understand.
Mike McCurdy:
Jock, but I'm around if you need to fill in.
Jacques Hadler:
I guess I don't want to come out on this particular board.
Jacques Hadler:
I honestly don't know much about it, haven't looked into it too much, but I
think in boards in general, I think the time to make changes, unless there's
been some sort of strong untoward behavior or whatever is the first year that's
to revisit all the work assignments.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Mary, I'd like to call for a vote.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Likewise.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All in favor of the motion by Commissioner McCurdy, I believe seconded by
Commissioner Martinez.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Was that correct?
Speaker 15:
Correct.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All in favor.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Those opposed.
Chair Bill Winfield:
One abstaining, Mary.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, four to two to one.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Four in favor.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Two opposed.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Commissioner Hadler and Commissioner Hedin with Commissioner McGann abstaining.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And we move on to what is a discussion of agenda deadlines, associated
attachments, and emergency additions to the commission agenda.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And this, this is driven by multiple people.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think I believe that Dana's had some input into this as she receives the bulk
of our requests, whether they are on time or late.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I know that both Mark and Quinn also help out with that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I think that we would like to get to where we have a solid deadline for these
agendas.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, the staff, once they do post this, that unless there's an emergency comes
up, we're not attempting to add things later.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I do know that state statute requires having all the documents on 24 hours
prior to our actual meeting.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I do know that we've had a few in the past here recently where we were
waiting on documents to get in here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I don't in any way think that any of that was intentional or due to someone
trying to be less than transparent.
Chair Bill Winfield:
If we wanted to go back to the first two years on my commission, I could show
multiple times when it was done under a different chair.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I'm not pointing out that it has anything to do with the chair.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm just saying that trying to blow this out of proportion, that it's a lack of
transparency doesn't help with trying to get this under control for staff.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And that is ultimately what the goal is, to make this easier for all of our
admin team to move forward.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, Mary, I'll let you start us off.
Mary McGann:
I guess I have questions more than anything.
Mary McGann:
What's being proposed?
Mary McGann:
What's the change?
Chair Bill Winfield:
There's no change.
Chair Bill Winfield:
There's no change.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's just trying to clarify to all commissioners that there's a hard deadline.
Mary McGann:
My understanding is the hard deadline is for the agenda, not always what will
be added to the pack.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Exactly for everything, Mary.
Mary McGann:
That's what I wanted to clarify.
Chair Bill Winfield:
If they do not get put in, then that needs to be worked out with Dana and the
chair and the vice chair, if there's a reason that those documents have not been
loaded.
Chair Bill Winfield:
The most recent one that I know of was we were waiting for documents when the
county attorney was out of town at a conference.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so, no intention to put him under the bus.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It's just one of them where the documents weren't here and coming.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so, we're trying to, anybody that puts something on this agenda, we would
like those documents available as soon as possible.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And if you can't make it by the agenda deadline, then please reach out to
myself, Melodie, or admin.
Trish Hedin:
Or admin.
Mary McGann:
One of the three.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And I would like to point out, I have been at fault for not having all the
documents on an agenda item.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
On this, I think that the rule should apply across the board.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I apologize for not getting all my documents on there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
But having the documents uploaded for all commissioners, for all staff, for
everybody, it makes it easier on everybody for me to review documents because I
get people requesting that I review contracts and sometimes get them on late.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I will do better on my end on getting things for you guys.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And so, I do take responsibility.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't, nobody needs to I can do better and I will do better.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And I wasn't trying to throw you under the bus.
Chair Bill Winfield:
It did happen.
Trish Hedin:
So, the agenda deadline is Tuesday at midnight.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Yes.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
For gender review Wednesday.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Gotcha.
Trish Hedin:
Perfect.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Trish Hedin:
And, you know, I was probably one that brought this to light.
Trish Hedin:
I sent an email.
Trish Hedin:
I had quite a few constituents reach out to me, specifically about a few items
recently where, you know, the agenda summary is blank, right, when it gets
posted.
Trish Hedin:
And so, people are just like, what is this?
Trish Hedin:
You know, this is obviously something specifically when it's expenditures of
large amounts of money.
Trish Hedin:
And I'm perfectly aware of state statute and I understand we don't have to have
that in there.
Trish Hedin:
But I think we just want to be better than that, right?
Trish Hedin:
I think if we have that deadline and to the best of our ability, you know, most
people open that, I think it's Thursday evening, right?
Trish Hedin:
And so, they want to see those items and they want to see them full, not these
blank agenda summaries, right?
Trish Hedin:
Especially those constituents that we have that are very packet.
Trish Hedin:
They want to see that packet.
Trish Hedin:
So, to me, I know that everybody's doing the best that they can.
Trish Hedin:
I just think try hard.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I will state that we've never had an agenda that was completely blank.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I understand.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We were waiting on documentation.
Chair Bill Winfield:
We are doing better.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I feel like we're doing much better than the previous commission and
leadership.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would like to remind everybody that we opened up the agenda review to both
sides of this body here by allowing Mary to participate in our agenda review.
Chair Bill Winfield:
As far as better, I would say that we're working towards that.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, to say that we aren't is I take offense on that and I'll go to Mike and
then Melodie.
Mike McCurdy:
We're doing better than I remember, but there's still room for improvement.
Mike McCurdy:
Let's wrap that up the best we can.
Mike McCurdy:
We're doing good.
Mike McCurdy:
Keep it up.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, Mike.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Melodie and then Mary.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I don't know what I was going to say.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, Tuesday at midnight and then if it's after that Wednesday, I think it's not
just calm admin.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
You should chair the vice chair and calm admin because everyone's going to be
adding it.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And, you know, if you can give her or them a precise, because sometimes when
agenda review and it's just been like, okay, I mean, for example, today it was
the thing with Chrissy and we're just like, what do we call it?
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, having it more, you know, a good name for it and some information for Dana.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, she's not just making it all up.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, I need any help we can get Dana.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
And then, and if you have something during a meeting, like today I had a future
record, you know, a future discussion, we need to remember to message Dana.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
She doesn't always go back and have that.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
So, that's one thing too, is that we are in a meeting and we say it, that
doesn't necessarily mean she's like, I'm on it.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
I mean, she tries, but we need to remember to send an email today or tonight
and say, Hey, we put that on the next agenda.
Vice-Chair Melodie McCandless:
Why it's fresh on our mind and that way she doesn't miss it either.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'd really like to recognize Dana first.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So, if she has anything she'd like to add, and then I do want to be fairly
brief with any other further comments because we're over the six o'clock and I
should have had the six o'clock system to be heard before I started this.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
Um, quickly to help alleviate the issues that came up last meeting with the
agenda summaries or the attachments not on there.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
The agenda summary, in my opinion, is the responsibility of the person who puts
it on the agenda.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
They should provide all that if they don't, it will be black.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
The next thing was that I put down now in that agenda summary somewhere where
it'll let me, um, that if there are documents that we're waiting on, that they
will be forthcoming and added to the packet as they are made available so that
anyone in the public who is reading that knows to come back and look for the
attachments at a later date.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
And hopefully that will make them not so upset about it, that they're not
there.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
And that happens sometimes, sometimes, you know, we're just throwing something
on there because we know we have to, you have to talk about it and all the
things, but I think, you know, putting that on there is, it seems to, I think it
might help.
Chief Deputy Clerk / Auditor Dana VanHorn:
That's all.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Agreed.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you very much, Dana, Mary, and.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Discussion.
Speaker 15:
Sure.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Can we come back to it, Mary?
Chair Bill Winfield:
Is that okay?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I would like to recognize that it's a six 11.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm a little bit late for the citizens to be heard.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I see no one other than Andrew in the chamber here.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Please feel free to come up.
Chair Bill Winfield:
If not busy, we have anybody online.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
So citizens to be heard at six 11 had no citizens present to speak.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And so I will come back to our discussion and lead to Mary.
Chair Bill Winfield:
And then I think Brian, if I had those backwards, I'm, I apologize.
Mary McGann:
I guess I wanted to just clarify something from the past in the past.
Mary McGann:
It was that anyone could come to the gender review that wanted to, it was just
not an assignment except for the chair and the vice chair and say, you had a
topic you wanted to talk about, or you were just interested because there was
more than once that job was chair and other people would, Evan was chair and
other people would chair.
Mary McGann:
I would put on, I would email all the commissioners and say, I, I would, I
planning on attending the gender review just so that we didn't accidentally have
it for, but so it's always, it's always been expected since I was on the board
that the chair and vice chair are, are at the agenda review.
Mary McGann:
And that's fine.
Mary McGann:
If it can't, then the other one takes over and things happen, but that the main
thing was to never have a quorum, but that anyone that wanted to attend an
agenda review, there was never any problem.
Mary McGann:
Cause I know I attended quite a few with shock and I attended quite a few under
Evan, Dave, and Jaylen and Lynn Jackson.
Mary McGann:
So I guess I just wanted to clarify that it was never, no one was ever kept
from coming to the agenda review.
Mary McGann:
It was just like, these were the two people that had, were supposed to be
there.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I'm going to go to the county attorney and then back to you.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I'll note.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I was, I was never invited to an agenda review.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think maybe for the, for the first two years of my time, it could have come
anytime.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I would, I would disagree with that.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
The first time I was ever invited to an agenda review ever was when, when we
had a different chair.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And to be honest, the, when I attend the agenda reviews, I have a lot of input
on a lot of matters because I'm involved in a lot of matters.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So I don't remember it the same that it was an open invitation.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I don't know if the other commissioners went at all,
Brian Martinez:
Brian, please.
Brian Martinez:
No, I just wanted to, you know, just recognize Dana for all the work that she's
been doing.
Brian Martinez:
She's been fantastic since she's been in this office as well as, you know, all
the admin staff, they've been just great to work with and, you know, whatever it
takes to make their jobs easier.
Brian Martinez:
That's, that's where I want to be.
Brian Martinez:
Yeah.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Speaker 15:
Mike, please.
Mike McCurdy:
Three years.
Mike McCurdy:
I've never been invited to a gender review.
Mike McCurdy:
So it's everything and I'll get there someday.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
One, one additional note, going back kind of the item for, for the agenda
review, perhaps if there's items that are void with that have nothing on there,
perhaps there's a date and time that you purge the list.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Like if there's an item that's not on there.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
And then the other thing with commissioner Hadler and commissioner Winfield and
I meeting, we could also change what you guys want to see on, on the agenda
review.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
Like when you guys want documents, when you guys want items, when they have to
have, we can tighten that whole policy and procedure up.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So if these things are coming up that you guys want to talk about and put more
kind of more teeth into it or more clarity into it, I think that's, this is an
item I think is a very fair one that, Hey, if you don't have all your documents
uploaded by Friday, then it's going to get kicked off.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
We do have sometimes that we have documents that are uploaded on a date and
that are later changed or modified or refreshed.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So that's, I don't know.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
I think that's one thing that came to my mind when we're sitting here is
purging items out if they don't have those items.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
So any further discussion?
County Attorney Stephen Stocks:
All right.
Chair Bill Winfield:
I will then move this to a closed session.
Jacques Hadler:
I'll make a motion.
Jacques Hadler:
Oh, I need a motion again.
Jacques Hadler:
Sorry.
Jacques Hadler:
I moved to go to closed session to discuss pending a reasonably imminent
litigation and character and character character character character.
Mike McCurdy:
Okay.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Motion by commissioner Hadler's second by commissioner McCurdy.
Chair Bill Winfield:
All those in favor.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Passes unanimously.
Chair Bill Winfield:
Thank you, Andrew, for your time today.
Transcript Notice: This transcript has been auto-generated then reviewed by Moab Sun News staff for clarity, but may still contain occasional errors in speaker labels or phrasing. We recommend double-checking key quotes or context against the official meeting video when accuracy is critical.
The central tension stemmed from how the county has used Transient Room Tax (TRT) funds—particularly the portion restricted to “establish and promote” recreation, film production, and conventions.
County Attorney Stephen Stocks told commissioners the auditor’s office “indicated that they would like the county to be away from the line,” cautioning against spending that might require justification.
Commissioner Brian Martinez was blunt: “I have no appetite to be anywhere near that line.”
General fund reserves stand at approximately $8.9 million, and capital project reserves at $5.4 million—but balancing the 2025 budget will require significant amendments.
Among the questioned TRT-funded expenses from were items like water bottles and stickers promoting local trails—examples some commissioners viewed as legitimate promotional tools and others saw as legally risky.
Martinez and others argued that defensibility against a potential future audit—not marketing intent—must guide budget decisions.
Commissioner Trish Hedin voiced frustration with what she described as inconsistent guidance from the state.
“The line is moving. So how do we stay away from a line that is constantly in flux?” she asked. “Nobody was ever nefarious in their actions here.”
Stocks affirmed that defensibility matters.
“There are things that are going to be much more defensible, and there are things that might be less defensible,” he said. “Ultimately, it’s the commissioners’ responsibility.”
The commission reached no final resolution but agreed to move toward a revised budget amendment.
A public hearing is expected in July.
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