Alright, let's get going with the Meeting of the Administration Legal Affairs Committee, Wednesday, June 10th at 5 p.m.
Two-point prayer.
Steve, if you want to go ahead.
Okay, thank you.
Jesus, we just thank you for this day you've given us.
We ask that you would be with us here this evening,
help us to accomplish the business of our county
in the best manner possible.
We thank you for each one of the members here
and ask that you would bless them as well.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
Thank you for the rain.
All right.
Let's go on to approval of the generous new vinyl.
Move the roof.
And accept this as to Frisch.
All those in favor say aye.
Aye.
4.0 approval of meeting minutes from May 13th, 2026.
Move to approve.
I'll second.
Say's, say's.
All those in favor say aye.
Aye.
Managers, okay, a little bit of frames.
I've got a cash requirements of $42,293.29.
And that's the total.
It's the pleasure.
and a second. All right. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Okay. So final public comments
that's saved today and let's jump down to 7.1 County Treasurer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
So that plate's number, this is my biggest month of the year. So $11,572 of that was
is just postage for tax bills.
So this biggest amount you'll see coming
from my department in a year, it will go up next year,
just laying the groundwork for that now.
Financial reports, so I hope you all had a chance
to review the financial report.
I sent that out Saturday afternoon.
If you compare month over month,
if you're looking sales and income tax receipts are steady.
As the monthly report indicates,
you were up 70,000 plus over the previous month,
and so far for the year, we're in a little over 4 million
in those season sales and income taxes.
As of the end of the month, overall funds,
county funds were down just 1.79%,
again, a tiny number,
in a month where there are no property tax distribution,
so all good news there.
So that was just a difference of 442,000 in change.
Only four investments matured in May,
18,000, almost 19,000 in interest earnings.
At the end of May, I had 17 investments in place
across nine funds,
maturing between this month and next April.
The first mill raise bond payment of the year was made
last month, it was just interest
on both of the debt certificates.
Total was a little over $31,000.
After that payment, 45.99%,
So about 50% of all the total refinance in 2020
has now been repaid.
So I was kind of looking at that number
as kind of the guidepost to look at.
Just remember that that certificate A
actually matures really soon, 2028,
and B comes into polymer only paying interest on right now.
That one matures in 2031.
Any questions about the financial report itself?
I have a comment.
Yes, ma'am. I love the tax bill. Do we? I'm going to talk about that next. Oh, okay. Yeah. My friends. I mean, people tell me, do you see for paying for school? No one really saw this before. It was really hard for them to understand when it was just a fraction. When you see it visually, because everyone is very visual. And when you see it, it's like, oh, my goodness. So I think that was a
I think it's just a move toward greater transparency, and if you'll notice too, I was going to say
that we've had outstanding feedback, so thank you for adding to that.
We did have one older woman who didn't like it, she said she had to unfold it twice, but
other than that, it was great for the reasons that you mentioned, the transparency, I mean
We've always listed where the dollars go, but it's like I said, it's a small print.
It doesn't really, but when you see it graphically represented like that, I think that's a lot
more impactful.
One of the other benefits for us is that that penalty ladder, I don't know if you ever noticed,
if you pay late, there's a ladder there that shows what your penalty would be if you pay
on a certain date.
People were always paying an amount on that instead of the amount that was due.
So by using color, we're able to highlight the actual amount due, but the other stuff
in black and white.
So this time last year, I had 35 refunds because of that.
So far this year I've had one.
And those are such a labor intensive task.
So that's saved us hours and hours and hours and hours.
So we're really happy with the redesign.
It seems like most people are too.
So we're going to keep doing it like that.
So thank you.
Also, so we are an entity into property tax collections,
traffic's constant, person by phone, mail, online,
usual mail complaints, of course.
There's been the use of color, like I said,
it allows us to highlight a lot of stuff on our bills,
so we're really happy with that.
Electronic payments, I want to mention this,
have always been, they've been steadily rising every year.
Through Monday, they had 1.3 million
submitted electronically, wow.
and thus far, EFT or electronic checks are three to one
over credit and debit,
which I thought we were on the rise there,
but I was very surprised when I ran those numbers.
I think it's probably largely due to the fee,
because if you use a card,
even a debit card is a three and a quarter percent fee,
but if you use EFT, you pay a flat $2.95
and you can pay up to 99 parcels for that fee.
So a lot of the mortgage holders have been doing that.
So people who have larger portfolios,
certain recent property owners who have acquired
more than 200 parcels have started to do that.
So that's been great, I think.
So you're not bouncing those checks.
So those are great.
So just a couple of reminders,
that first installment is due June 26th,
so I'll be able to give you a report on that next month.
Second, September 4th, and the first distribution
and all the taxing districts will be Monday, July 13th.
I am still hoping to schedule a tax cycle,
a public presentation to spend a challenge finding a date
and a place to kind of align.
But it's going to happen this time of summer,
just probably not before that first due date,
as I had hoped.
But still want to do that
because there's still a lot of questions,
a lot of misinformation,
no matter how much information you put on the bill,
there's still a lot of misunderstandings
that it would be nice to be able to help address that is all unless you have any questions.
I have a question. Sure. When did the kittens come? You know, we do not need the kittens
this year because I think for the most part, people have been very civil. Good. Although
from what I understand though, Animal Control has a lot. They do. They had another 11. So
So, you know, we might do it anyway. I mean, it was a great way to expose people to adoptable
kittens and make people really nice when they walked in the door, seeing fuzzy little animals
instead of angry.
I think Kristen would like that because she did end up with one just over the gap.
I'm all in favor of that. It's a, it's a great thinking outside the box kind of partnership.
So no,
Sure.
That three that was just first and then.
It's probably, we'll probably do it more toward the second installment. We'll see. But yeah,
Did you want to add something to the kitty condom?
Yeah, we found kittens in our garage.
Hopefully, if you remember, Mr. Zimmerman, before that we brought in kittens one year to kind of
earn the temperature down of people, because if we had a rough year,
You'll see the recordings were up on in May versus April last. Tax dollars were brought in.
So, just for comparison, we are getting more recordings that varies on the property that is being sold for the tax dollars we're bringing in there.
Tearing up for the November elections, still a little bit away, but there's a lot of preparation at times.
Election judges have been in contact with both of the party chairs.
They're aware that in July, the election judges will be before the board for approval.
and then once approved by the board and we'll go to the servant part of the judge.
So we send out over 200 letters to election judges that have served in the past or ones that may be interested in serving.
So when you get that list in July, hopefully we hear back and it's updated with people we know.
and it's updated with people we know that want to participate in the training in August but know that
if that list seems like a lot of people there's people that drop out last minute, emergencies arise
so it's not like we have a great abundance of election judges so but I think we're in good
shape if you know anyone that wants to be a judge of their reach out to our office the training will
Is it possible to do assimilation at the training of closing out at night, like physically like
who signed what where does this go how does this box go or how to just physical simulation of that
because I think that is where our group got discombobulated that night. Yeah we can do a
physical simulation a lot of it's in the instructions that usually aren't read but I understand
everyone everyone learns differently some people can read instructions some people want to physically
do it the way I learned wouldn't be best doing it so on that is something we plan to incorporate
more this year is I just think it's a call and I know at the end of the night it's been a long
day so actually going through a replication of that and where the ballots go so they are coming
back to us in the right box yes that's something important that we want to incorporate this year
I will be out of office on Friday. I'll be in late afternoon. I will be at the Zoom meeting.
Get started coming with other book-related folders within ourselves.
All right, very good. Thank you. Thank you. All right, let's move on to 7.3.
and Assessments.
I'm going to start with apologizing
of not getting our report out.
I had my zone meeting and we did zones one and three
on Friday, so I did not get my agenda to
or my little letter to Georgia.
What's happening in my office, obviously,
if I'm taking the blunt of the phone calls
of being not happy, for the most part,
It has been fairly calm.
I've only been spore out twice this year
and I've been cried on three times, so not too terrible.
A lot of people I understand are struggling,
but they understand, as long as they understand the process,
it's better that, you know, it's a whole big thing
It's a whole big thing. And the tax bills have helped immensely.
Like Stephanie says, I've gotten a lot of positive feedback from the tax bill also, not that I have anything to do with it. But it was a good thing because like people are more visual and, and things like that.
So, in doing that, unfortunately, I started the 26th tax year off, so whatever, I think we discussed this before, I have seven townships, our office, my office ended up with all seven of them instead of having Sandy Davis do four of them, which has helped immensely.
We have four of them already done, the fieldwork already done.
and three of those four have been already valued.
So we are ahead of schedule.
And so we're just plugging away at that.
And with that being said,
Freeport's going to do some of their revaluing
because unfortunately of the values and things going.
So as it stands right now, by the fall,
and I will be sending out about 13,000 assessment notices
this year.
It's about half, because the county has 27,160
or extra.
Didn't realize that.
Right, I guess, thank you.
Land Bank, there were surveys sent out to the participants for any identifiable properties
to be sent back in.
We don't have a meeting currently scheduled, but the notice came out for, you know, a survey
of when we would be available, so I assume we'll have one coming up here shortly.
I'm also working on wrapping up a lot of information and hoping to work with the nursing home on getting their information completed.
We have a call with them on Friday, so hopefully that will get wrapped up shortly.
I did attend the GFPs Rise and Shine at the Winnipeg Playhouse.
They did a presentation on some of the programming that they are rolling out.
It seems like they are really trying to get more youth programming and involvement.
So I wouldn't be surprised if we saw maybe a youth diversion application coming from them next year.
But they do have a lot of summer programming and a few things going on in the fall specifically for youth.
So it's interesting.
I learned a lot at that one because I haven't been really involved with much or knew what was going on.
So, had a conference call with a vendor that is saying they can lower our job and internet costs.
We're doing some research and maybe I'll probably talk to you before I follow up with them, but
it's that time of year when a bunch of vendors are reaching out trying to do things. Yeah.
Yeah. Our next Greater Free Partnership meeting is on the 24th. I did have the wrap-up call
from the wellness screenings. They saw some pretty good trends of things being identified
through the wellness screenings, so we went over that report that they went, that has
has been sent to Gary McBride, and we'll discuss that at Finance College.
We had representatives from Integrity Financial, which is who has two of our deferred compensation
programs for the county, that came in with Ryan and I, and are doing an onsite check-in
for any employees that maybe have questions about that, want to make any changes in their
and things. So they will be set up here all day on July 29th to meet with employees. Department
Head meeting this morning, I shared with them a benefit that is available through our health
insurance. There is every now and then members look at postcards of, you know, hey, you might
want to reply to this or scan this QR code and there's a supplemental program that can offer you.
Thank you. So I was selected as one that is called TwinHealth. And I would say a few people know what it is, but the resources that are sent to you and offered to you, if you take part in it, were really kind of amazing to me.
It came included with a biometric digital scale, activity tracker, glucose monitor, blood pressure cup that will read and send to them so they monitor everything for you.
for you. There's free app for like a food journal and logging. But you know, you can take a picture of your thing, you can confirm what it is. Usually things you would have to pay a subscription to be able to have as long as you couldn't do it through the insurance program. It is free. And then of course, the Cross Blue Shield knows that they don't get any of the information, but they know that a participant in this plan is taking part in this this
on a bed, also sent me a free subscription to the Peloton app through it too.
So there's, there's a lot of perks involved with our health insurance.
But I got that letter also, but it said you had to be diabetic in order to
take advantage of that program.
So I think you do have to go through a screen because I have talked to
a couple of people that were turned down.
I am not diabetic, but I have precursors.
So, um, and family history.
Yes, you do have to go to Rockford and they pay for it, but you do have to have that.
Yeah, that was the thing I'm like, nope, nope, I agree, but nope.
So you know, that kind of led to a discussion, but I have heard a lot of positive feedback
I thought the step problem really seemed to get people moving and we had a lot of conversation
and you know, you look outside and see.
You look outside and see someone walking. So you're like, Oh, I got to go out and walk, or I got to get my steps in. And a lot of people have said that, you know, they haven't been moving or doing that and have not that they did it for a month. It's kind of a habit. So they're trying to stay on those healthy habits. We did discuss, I had some challenges and some things that I spoke to a couple people about the logging in and syncing process. And apparently, there is a
I think the STEP program overall will be something hopefully we will continue because it did really seem to garner interest. But they have to do some research on maybe apps for that or different things. But all in all, you know, a couple of the department had shared comments from their teams for employees. And it seemed like everyone was really excited about it and interested in it. So I think that's a good thing.
So I just want to share, I took a walk last night with my family and my watch said I set
a new record, so I don't know what that means, I must not walk very else.
I was so happy with the progress, I went and celebrated with a blizzard.
Some of the projects we currently have going on, and I say we history rock ourselves with some of the stuff.
So animal control paperwork was signed today by the landlord.
So we are finally able to move forward with an install date for the fiber arrow has to get some permits and stuff approved.
Once they do, we will get an install date hammered down.
And I hope to get all that done the same day that they're installing.
We'll see if that looks like, you know, how much digging they have to do for the fiber.
The AI policy we'll talk about here in a little bit.
The ADA compliance I shared last month, they moved that out a year.
So that's just going to give us the opportunity to review multiple vendors
and try to find the best fit for the county.
So I've got a few vendors that are hitting me up, I just don't want to start the process too early here. So that's still in the works. The jail has a key box project that got added to our list this week that is they have key boxes that require network connectivity.
So there's an audit and a log of who's getting what he's out and when they're using them. That way if something goes awry they have reports and things. And I think they have to do state reporting as well that this will help with. So we're currently in the middle of that. We had to spin up a new server for that because it's going to run on its own box. So that's in the works. County Boardroom. Been working on that the last couple of months. There have been improvements.
and we haven't had the meeting drop out on video so we're making progress.
The next thing that I did is I hardwired both spots up there for the PC so they can be hardwired
that way they don't lose connectivity and I'm still trying to figure out what some of the
Wi-Fi interference is. Sometimes it works great and then other days it's just cranky so I've been
working through different frequencies and kind of testing that out and seeing if I can just stabilize
I don't know that I'm there yet, but I test it probably once or twice a week, and I just run different tests and have multiple laptops and iPads and stuff in there just to see what's going on.
So still moving forward with that. The break fix, which is our everyday stuff, was pretty quiet for a little bit, but I feel like it's being made up for now.
We've had a lot of tickets here lately, just with different things that are going on.
We had a website issue on Friday that caused some posting issues that hit me on the phone with a revise at like 10 o'clock at night trying to get something resolved.
I learned that their help desk is not very proactive on the weekends.
So I had to go through some of my email contacts and hunt people down.
And then I finally got a call back and I think we got it resolved about 7 a.m. on Saturday.
Now I did sleep. It's not like I was up all night. When I got up, they had let me know they thought
they had it. So I went out there and everything seemed to be working and we got the stuff posted.
The annual Goodins update for the courthouse was done in the last month. That's our annual
big system update for everybody that runs the PC gyms, softwares, public defender of the state's
attorney, judges, everything operates on those modules or programs over there. So we got that
there were some hiccups that came with that but was able to work through those for the most part the day after just about everything was up and going did have an issue with some of the public defender module that took us a few days because we had, it just wasn't agreeing with the update so other than that just full speed ahead with you know our normal break fix we got some health department projects coming up and things of that nature
Manager, so, seems like there's never a shortage of projects, so, any questions?
All right, let's go down to 8.1, Approval of the AI Use Policy.
Do you want to speak to that name, or was it that video, right?
Oh, yeah, according to, that's the most flawless reply I've gotten from that yet, and I do
have to thank our Treasurer here because there was another county that had this already approved.
So I was like, well, if we got approved for them, you know, and it touched all the same bullet points
that we had before. So if it's not broke, don't fix it. I went through and submitted it on our behalf
and it works. I think I had one question. Did I answer your question for the most part? Yeah. So
So to me, it's pretty flawless.
They do want me to make sure that I extenuate some of the points like in a training.
So I'm going to figure out how to roll that out or how to do that because the county is
not something that you can specifically pull everybody in for training all at once.
So I don't know if I'm going to try to do a video of some sort.
I don't know yet.
I got to figure out how to do an interactive training that everybody touches, you know,
at some point.
If that's scheduling times with each department,
then that's what it will be, but we'll figure that out.
Any questions on that?
I think the biggest thing to get people to understand
is that it's not foolproof.
And even when you get the information back,
you need to be double checking the information
and not just taking it at its word.
You know, there's still a responsibility to verify
and kind of do your homework.
So it's a very helpful tool.
And the other thing is,
is not putting any personalized information
out there whatsoever.
So it's pretty much just for generic instances
or different things,
but no personal information should ever be entered into it.
I know a lot of our previous concerns were,
where's the vagueness that can be exploited?
But like the email said,
you guys have really nice definitions there.
I think that's that more than most of this other stuff is going to be.
Well, yeah, unfortunately, you still it still comes down to the user error.
That's the biggest thing.
And there's so many different modules.
And I mean, they're all helpful.
You just have to be.
And I've been I sat in a webinar today with the state cyber unit and they were kind
of going over the different things of what I could do.
But it's all they said sometimes users are their own worst enemy.
There's just certain things they shouldn't do.
and that's why you need a policy to cover it.
So, I'll make a motion to approve it as submitted here.
One second.
It's okay.
Any further conversation?
All those in favor say aye.
Aye.
Thank you.
All right, we're visiting new business
and tends to point out any comments from the committee.
All right, let's move to promotion.
All those in favor say aye.
Thanks everyone.