Preble County, Ohio

County Commissioners

March 31  2010

Meeting audio and review

All three County Commissioners in attendance.

File 1

 1   minute mark       Katie Worthington – Meeting opens with Katie describing incident over an employee (name given as a William Stapleton) at the Engineer's office not wearing work boots on the job. Individual was warned two days in a row and sent home on third day to get them on the third day and did not return. They figured he quit and terminated his employment; individual is now arguing he did not quit but that he was let go and entitled to unemployment. Katie does not see it that way. Now there is a need to hire outside counsel, should come out of Engineer's account. Katie thinks incident occurred in the fall of last year but the state is backed up on claims.

End 5.23 minute mark on CD – 1.23 MB

File 2

I. OPEN MEETING

II. CALL OF ROLL

III. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE

IV. PRAYER

End 7.7 minute mark on cd  

2.07 minutes – 496 kb

File 3

9:00 A.M. – JAY STEWART, KLEINGERS & ASSOCIATES- CONFERENCE CALL ()

 8   minute mark       JAY STEWART – On the local match… nervous that the $250,000 DDC grant may be considered state funds and not federal.

 9.25   minute mark       He wants to use the approximately $87,000 (hoped for) from the Conveyance Fee increase as a local match and mentions it having been earmarked for "Economic Development" (It never was). He wants to do it to help on the "debt service" on the JRS. This would encumber it.  He is basically springing this at the last moment on the Commissioners and this is not a last moment idea. It is in my opinion something that is or should have been known some time ago.  The commissioners were just played and the trap sprung.    He is telling them that this will help them get the "free road way money that is typically hard to get.

 11   minute mark    Jay   "We can make up the 80 grand difference very easily on the water and sewer side, is my point"

Bob – all I am hearing is that somebody else is wanting the $80,000.  Good because that is exactly what is happening and of course as long as you keep these guys they will steer you right.   Right in the direction they want you to go.

 11.9   minute mark    Jay – … update that just came out a day and a half ago has something on point about this and they say that state source grants can't be used. That's where we still don't have conformation that this came from the Federal government through the state. … it can show in the state column.

 13.5   minute mark    asking for $748,000 on the JRS. That comes out to$251,000 on the local match.

 13.75  minute mark    Chris Day – so you need some kind of commitment from us?

 14   minute mark    Jay – What I would feel comfortable with in the application is if we just have a very brief resolution ahhh you know stating that you know we we as county commissioners intend to encumber or you know earmark basically these funds. I know you probably have some in that fund or line item all ready but you are going to take the 251 from the Conveyance Fee that always been earmarked for ED purposes ( Again, no it was never earmarked. )  

Chris – So what you’re saying is that's giving the commitment that we have dedicated the funding source for our portion.

Jay – Yes, that's all you need to do right now….. this only gets encumbered for this if we get the money.

 15.5  minute mark    Jay – …if you are able to strike a deal with the property owner

 16   minute mark      Switch out the conveyance fee for the money spent on purchasing the land from the Kemp's. Save the Conveyance Fee and put it back over to the Water & Sewer side.

Chris –  Right, all you are really looking for, for the application is some kind of commitment for the $250,000 from our side.

Jay – "251 just to get us to the application point and then like I said if other things come up like you have to spend money in other areas for property acquisition or otherwise I would then advise you to ask the state to switch it out."

 17.25   minute mark      David Wesler –  "Jay this is David and I totally understand what you're saying. Is there anything else that could be used for a local match?

Jay – Well we could, we could use in kind… it's got to be local money that you may have spent directly benefiting the site. That's where I really couldn't think, the other thing you could do you spent some money you can go back five years and I saw in the original 2006 application where there is a letter saying; Hey, we've spent ahm $27,000 on Poggymeyer, we spent $50,000 on Pizzuti, ok? We could probably if we have time, we can add in some of that. The kicker there is two things, # 1 it has got to be five years and that was July of 06' and the ahh letter I am looking at say over the last two years we've spent the following money. So we have to determine how much of that money the first go around we spent with those two folks… you know. The other issue that makes me a little nervous on that, I don't know if they are going to get this picky is that when you spent that $77,000 you looked at a much broader area. I think you were looking at all the quadrants weren't you?  Yes they were   Or multiple quadrants?"

Dave – Yes

Jay  – You could probably say hey that was the very first conceptual look and then went with the 250 from the Dayton Development Coalition and we then zeroed in on this quadrant. I think you would probably be ok I think we can explain that but the kicker without a question is going to be A: how much of that was in the last five years that you spent and B: We would have to document that with probably invoice to prove that Pizzutti or Poggeymeyer were in that five year window. Other than that you have other stuff like in kind contributions. You know if you have used let’s say County Engineer's staff to do something out there, you could use that.

20   minute mark      Chris – So we've probably got a little time even if we would put a resolution together. If we need to go back in and tweak that some more when we sit down with them.

Jay – I think we do, I think with the ??? Period.

Chris – Ok

20.75   minute mark      Jay – …What I would like is just a brief resolution, today if possible ahm or tomorrow morning is fine. Just encumbering and committing the Conveyance Fee to the extent of $251,000.

21.2   minute mark      Dave – Over how long a period of time Jay?

Jay – Well I think that is just, I think that is in how you word it because I guess you don't know that.. Fluctuates every year right?

Dave – Oh yeah

Jay –  "because that is not going to be a set amount each year, I think you know if I was doing the whereas clauses and I'd be happy to put something together for you to save some time but…..  up to three years and or in the amount of 251 or  five years because we don't know.

Dave – Well Jay we did pass the Conveyance Fee to use for economic development and if a portion of it can be used for this I am not opposed to that but I'm not in favor of using a 100% of it the next two to three years just totally dedicated for this because ahm I think there are other areas that we would like to..that at least I would like to look at using those dollars in.

Jay – I hear you, I don't disagree with you on that ahh what we could do or what we could say in the resolution as an alternative is that ahh if if you are funded for this thing you could take out again a variety of no interest or low interest loans and just say hey we will use the Conveyance Fee..we intend to take out a five year short term loan and we will use the Conveyance Fee to meet the debt service on that…..

Dave -…like you said we've got some time and you could possibly throw us a sample resolution with maybe a couple different scenarios. Because right now we've got the Conveyance Fee ($44,000) right now. ….

25  minute mark      Chris – (to Jay) Do you think you could get something emailed to Kim this morning?

End 26.2 minute mark on cd  

18.39 minutes – 4.26 MB

File 4

9:30 A.M. – LESLEY McGUIGAN & MINDY ROBBINS (UNITED HEALTH CARE PREMIUM CREDIT)

NO REVIEW

End 1hr.  9 minute mark on cd  

42.46 minutes – 9.82 MB

File 5

1hr.   12.75 minute mark     Bob – "I have a letter from Prosecuting Attorney Martin Votel regarding hiring outside counsel for County Engineer". Letter read into record at 1hr. 13 minute mark.

related to William Stapleton (mentioned earlier)

1hr.   15 minute mark     Receipt noted 3 – 0     Resolution 212-10-144

1hr.   18 minute mark     Kim – on Pizzuti since 2005, "we paid them $46,971. I could not find any payments to Poggeymeyer from 2005 forward." They must have been paid before 2005.

Chris – I guess the key question here on this guys is what ahm what's your thoughts on committing to this.

Bob – If we are indeed going to move forward we have to commit to it now. Everybody in this Court house and everybody in the state of Ohio wants part of our Conveyance Fee.

Dave – chuckling

1hr.   19  minute mark       Bob – I'm a, my thoughts always been that it's been committed to an E.D. an economic development director. If in fact we can commit this to that the conveyance fee to the and guys I would like the commitment to go ahead and pursue and I don't know exactly at what level the financing we're talking about for an economic development director. I certainly think we are going to be in a position where we need somebody hired by somebody in this county to move forward with an economic development office. Is that vague enough? Well however that shakes out. We absolutely have to be committed to moving that process forward also. I know we've got to move that process out there forward so..  I guess we have to look two different ways here.

1hr.   20.2 minute mark      Chris – what's your thoughts Dave?

Dave – Well, I sort of stated them to Jay on tape. I mean your serving on the committee, what's your feeling about committing 100% of the conveyance fee over the next "X" number of years?

Chris – Well, I guess here…here's the question – Do we want to move the project forward?

Dave – ahh We want to move it forward without everybody doing this.

Chris – Ok but at some point we got to commit financially..

1hr.   21 minute mark       Dave –  Yeh here at the last minute at the 11th hour their calling in and telling us that things they thought aren't the way they appear that they thought they were   LOL That is the way I took it.   So I mean weren't these things put to better thought Chris? If you remember part of my discussion with you guys when we made this commitment was additional funding was going to be the key to this project moving forward  Well yes and they want the Conveyance Fee   and with the Job Ready Site the EDA grants all other kind of grants… little or minimal expense to the county. We don't have the funds and so we raised the conveyance fee for a certain I believe – economic development. Just as Bob said that was our look to the future to also get somebody on board here working full time for the villages the city you know the county, whoever to encourage growth. Slow controlled growth to bring jobs and job creation to this county to help boost our sales tax to help become a destination county. I understand that does it but you know I saw the sewer and water projections.. 100% they were asking for the conveyance fee to go into. I am disappointed they didn't use more unique methods of creative funding and I saw in one of the papers the other day Chris that after April 1st they ceased to be helping us. I thought they would help us through these other funding grant cycles. I mean let’s face it they did get $250,000 and I was hoping that even though it is all spent they would hopefully see that in the future that they may be the beneficiary of..of future engineering plans and studies or whatever.  So I guess Chris I am here to say let's play with the conveyance fee but I don't want to give the entire amount dedicated for the rest time to them.

Chris – I don't think that is what they are asking for  lol not yet   

1hr.   23 minute mark       Dave – Well it is a little unclear exactly how much they are asking for. I understand, they are not going to be taking any of it unless this is successful. We don't know exactly the time period, I think that is what he said that they are going to do some additional exploration to find out what other in-kind projects that could be used. So I think there is still some additional information. Am I for it Chris using part of the conveyance fee? Yes, that's economic development. But on the other hand we've got other areas that we may want to use the conveyance fee for. And part of it is coming up you talking about the foundation with the Chamber. Is that the way we want to go? We've got another economic development visit, is that the way we want to go? So I think there are still something’s here Chris. I am ok with using a portion of it as long as it is not all totally dedicated for this.

1hr.   24 minute mark     Chris –  Well and I guess the key to that is you know when you start going out and acquiring there’s not going to be any that is going to be 100%.. free. We've got to have a match and and that match is going to come from somewhere ahh you know that there are several scenarios that that they put together the water sewer and things. I mean there are a lot of scenarios now it all depends on how things shake out with some of the current business up there. Ahh but even with those funding sources there not 100% free money ahm so at some money we have to be committed to put dollars into it at some level as to what Jay is saying this is one way to put our commitment in now does that mean we are committing the entire amount?

1hr.   25.2 minute mark     Dave – I think that is the question asked him and he said no not ness… it doesn’t have to be that way. But I asked how many years it is out and how much per year and I think that is still what..

Chris – Well you know we don't know when we would get the grant award and so you know that kind of starts the clock ahm ahm there's a lot of we’re speculating you know on what their doin but depending on how much work they can get done. You know we don't know when ODOT participation might be that can count on some of that stuff. Ahh Ahhh the Engineer's office can count as in-kind I mean there is a lot of stuff that in the future here. But I guess that the question is that at some point we have to make a commitment and say you know we're we're willin to try willin to get to this amount and we're I'm not saying we know what it is. Ahhh unfortunately you go into a lot of these projects and you got some good idea and your best guess but things change and ahh get kind of old going there.

Dave – But also we have some additional property that ever since you guys became commissioners and found out the property that we own could be potentially used for a match dollars exactly like this. We have hardly done any exploration into how to ahh how to do that.

Chris – and realistically we're… we're two years out before we can start construction, on anything. So we're just committing to try and get our foot in the door ahh

Dave – and I understand. I understand that.

Chris – there's a lot of variables here but I guess the key factor is.. we've got to take that step and either say we are all in or or we're not.

Dave – We are all into help but not at the 100% of using the conveyance fee in my estimation.

Bob –  I am willing to talk about this further but I would certainly like a commitment from us to pursue and as I have said whatever form an economic development director …. Foundation and the Chamber. Does that sound all part whatever how that shakes out, we don't know that.  That's something that we've got to commit to.

Chris –  but that's something until we figure out what…  what direction it's gonna take and it's going to cost you can't commit to it.

Bob – I just want us to commit to pursuing an economic development director in whatever form that shakes out. I think we need to do it before the next Quarter

1hr.   28 minute mark       Dave – Well, I think that is part of the reason for going to Van Wert once again, once again look at their model again and I know you've been having discussions with this Chamber Foundation so..

Bob – and it's beginning to go but you know.

Dave – and also

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Bob – ….I guess I don't want to being saying some day we’ve got to do it. At one point we've got to commit to it, whether that be a hundred thousand dollars or it be $50,000 or it be $10,000.

Dave – Well Chris why don't we wait and see what a other scenarios come up and I am ok with committing a portion just not 100% of it, I want to save part of it.

Chris – Where are you going to get the rest of it? We've got to commit to $250,000, that's what we're looking at.

Dave – Their still talking about in-kind and using the Pizzuti and the Poggeymeyer.

Chris – But we don't have that stuff hammered out David. I guess my point being we gotta make a commitment. The only mechanism we have in place right now where we do have a funding stream, we know where the money is coming from is that. That's why he suggesting going that route…now

Dave – and he said we still have a little bit of time though, so I am not wanting to make the decision exactly today.

Chris – They need that decision for the application.

Bob – the application has to go in yet today or tomorrow.

Chris – Tomorrow

Bob – I'm willing to commit to that if we commit as I say some form however that shake.. however that happens.

Chris – We need to have further discussion on this.

Dave – I heard him talking about you know replenishing the fund with the water and sewer, some day.

Bob – it's 10:30 and it is time for the HIT Foundation meeting

End 1 hr.  29.75  minute mark on cd  

20.48 minutes – 4.76 MB

File 6

10:30 A.M. – HIT FOUNDATION QUARTERLY UPDATE

1hr.   31.25 minute mark     meeting starts.

1hr.   35.5 minute mark     THE GREAT GRATIS POT HOLE SAGA CONTINUES!!  LOL

1hr.   37.5 minute mark     Community Concepts

1hr.   39.50 minute mark     erosion problem must be taken care or $20,000 grant paid back. Dedicated "right of way" with a name but not an actual street.

1hr.   42 minute mark     done like a driveway and is washing out. Grant can't be closed out until the erosion problem is fixed.  

1hr.   44.5 minute mark     Kim – on reimbursement procedure.

1hr.   48.5 minute mark     Janet Crelin to start April 26.

End 1 hr.  51.25  minute mark on cd  

21.31 minutes – 4.92 MB

File 7

1hr.   51.25 minute mark      Bob – Kim, you got anything else?

Kim – you might want to talk about recovery zone bonds.

Chris – ….tell them we are not able to participate..   we don't have anyone ready or interested at this time.

1hr.   53.75 minute mark     Bob – JRS application

JRS Application discussion

1hr.   57 minute mark     Bob – Well and we have a..I think our figure's close on how much money we already have in there. We may commit. whatever form we use money wise. We have to move forward in trying to get a grant to further this property or all the money we spent in the past is wasted.

Dave – I wouldn't say that.

Bob – Well, it's on hold let's put it that way. But there are other grants we can pursue but this is important that we move forward on it. My concern is that we still move forward on the thing that I talked about here a while ago…  the E.D person.  Well I guess I am willing to commit to that if we use a combination of other funds in order to move forward that other part of the phase. It's extremely important that we have a person looking at economic development opportunities everyday of the week. And it is time we did it if this project moves forward that very person could be working on that. I'm committed or should be committed

Chris – (laughing) Well we have I mean we're not locking ourselves into the position that we can't… we've got options. Unfortunately at this point we don't know what all of our options are. We've got time to work on that and ahh you know right now it's a matter of just trying to put an application together that people are willing to look at and get enough, you got to get enough there for them to buy into and if we get fortunate enough to the interview stage then that is where you really tweak.  I mean that's where the rubber meets the road ahm.

Bob –  I had to get a good feeling from Marty ( Marty Hohenberger DDC)  that we have a very good chance of getting this, that's what I took away from this. You have the same opinion?  …. I think he is very impressed with the program project that we have started. … What do you think?

David – I mean I disagree with part of your last statement about saying all the money that has been put in so far has been wasted. I disagree there. You guys weren't part of that you don't know everything that went on ahh that was over several years. And I do recall Kim the initial investment with Pizzutti or and Poggeymeyer that was in I think late 03' it could have been the beginning of 04'. We were looking for the process, we went out for RFQ's, there were four companies that I believe that met the match and we chose Poggymeyer – Pizzuti. They ahm I can't remember how much money we gave them beyond that, very little. They always said that ahh they passed the money on ahm to Pizutti or Poggemeyer. They kept coming back and saying look you gave us 50 we've already spent a hundred and you know Ron Pizzuti wasn't going to stand for Pizzuti to continue working on our behalf and that was over several years guys and you know they had nice brochures, they had nice things. There’s a couple things, we didn't have control of the land but they put out nice brochures they looked like Kleingers have. They had that to, so I disagree with that. We retooled though, I mean let’s face it part of the with the last Job Ready Site is we did have an economic development Director that helped apply for that and Kim I think you worked a little bit on the Job Ready Site deal didn't you?

Kim – Not very much, that one there was one that I really wasn't too involved in at all.

Dave – But it was mostly Ohio Gateway and you know as far as I know everything went fine as Marty said. It was political and something’s ahh weren't very good over here compared to some other places, to where some of the places got funded. But anyway, now we came to Kleingers they had $250,000 to work with and a very short window of time and ahm so… I agree with your last statements Bob that we need to ahh to put this application in but I don't want to obligate. And like you said it Chris we're not obligated to give 100% of the conveyance fee necessarily and there's a lot of things we don't know. But I think we do need to be committed to the a giving Job Ready Site money but at the same time just like ahh the OGDC was underfunded and finally went away because it had lack of funding. That with what you're talking about is trying to get an economic development office to work on our behalf to work on the whole county's behalf and that was the initial push with the conveyance fee.. to work towards economic development but it was towards having an economic development director to. And so I don't have a problem using part of the conveyance fee for putting in this application but I don't want it 100% dedicated for the next "X" amount of years. So I am with you that we can put this in but if if whenever we decide to hire an economic development director, hopefully we could use part of the conveyance fee dollars to still do that.

Bob – Well I… I agree other than even if we use money out of General Fund that is not designated for conveyance fees however we come up with that money, which we can do is my concern I don't want to have the E.D. position to go unfilled much longer. It's to important.

Dave – Just like Marty stated, have we gone after the stimulus dollars. I know Chris had initially put in an application for 15 million but can something be pursued now in the future at a lesser rate? What..what does it take to be successful in that? Preble County didn’t get much of the stimulus dollars and if they're going to hand them out we may as well try and be in the picture.

Bob – That is exactly why we need this type of person.

Dave – Yeah working on our behalf every day, on the county's behalf every day.

Bob – So that's my concern we're go along with the program as long as we pursue that on to and I think we are going to. However that works whichever way it works. And part of those answers will come up in our trip. I think the Foundation is ready to move forward at some point to form and see what money is available. So any rate… I'll commit, it only happens if we get the grant.

Chris – I guess then we'll see what ahhh Jay gets to you ahhh see what he gets to you and after lunch we'll take a look at those and figure out what direction we are going to go. Like I said, the only thing he is doing.. he's trying to put something in the application that shows that we're committing and at this point in time that is the only thing that he can put ink on that's going to get us points in the app…bottom line. That a pretty fair analogy?

Kim – Yeah, I'm going to assume that their requiring 25% match which the number they chose.

Chris – That's the general gist of the 25%, they felt that that their applying for is the limit that they could get with all of our criteria that we need. Ahh and going for the .. not the mega project but the .. I forget what he called it.. but there's two levels, a smaller and a larger. We can't the mega site we don't qualify for, that's what they went for before, they didn't qualify.

Kim – there were two or three, one was for mega site….

Chris – they didn't meet all the criteria. A mega site has got to have a railroad it’s got to have so many acres, it's got to have … there were five major components but railroad and 150 acre or thousand … it was a large number, ahh that was committed. And there was some other stuff.

Dave – We realized I think when we had one solid application the one you know the one at District but we also submitted two others just in case they wanted to look at you know.. because they were changing the criteria almost weekly on what you had to commit to. Well then maybe Kleingers is right and this came up at the last minute  

Chris – they may change this time because the ahh they didn't do a round last year.

Dave – this is the third round isn't it?

Chris – they skipped around last year.

Bob – it would appear that all these things change criteria daily.

 2 hr.   8.75 minute mark         Bob – What else you got?

RECESS FOR LUNCH UNTIL 1:00

End 2 hr.  9 minute mark on cd  

17.45minutes –  4.06 MB

File 8

1:00 P.M. – LYNN COLEMAN, ATTORNEY GENERAL LIAISON & JOHN JONES, STATE TREASURER LIAISON (TREASURER & ATTORNEY GENERAL PROGRAMMING)

 2 hr.   12 minute mark         Meeting begins

Bid rigging

NO FURTHER REVIEW OF THIS MEETING

End 3 hr.  8.5 minute mark on cd  

59.30 minutes – 13.6 MB

File 9

3 hr.   8.6 minute mark         Bob – did you think to call SILFEX?

April 9,  Time 8 – 9:30 a.m.

Have to call the Dayton Development Coalition. Going to Versailles after the meeting.

3 hr.   12 minute mark         Kim – mock up of a resolution from Jay Stewart.

3 hr.   8.6 minute mark         April 9,  Time 8 – 9:30 a.m. Economic Forum at SILFEX  –  April 9,  Time: 8 – 9:30 a.m.

3 hr.   14.5 minute mark           Goose Creek

3 hr.   17.2 minute mark            Discussion of resolution from Jay Stewart of Kleingers with regard to encumbering future use of the conveyance fee.

3 hr.   17.5 minute mark            Preble County Prosecutor Martin Votel comes into Chambers.

EXECUTIVE SESSION TO DISCUSS THE POSSIBLE PURCHASE OF PROPERTY

Out of session with Katie and Marty, NO ACTION TAKEN.

3 hr.   20  minute mark            More discussion on Kleinger resolution.

Dave wants more of a dollar amount.

Kim – they've got in here that you "earmarked it" and I don't think you want to.

3 hr.   21  minute mark            Kim reads a revised version  … "a portion of"…

3 hr.   24.25 minute mark            Resolution 213-10-144             passes 3 -0

3 hr.   25.5 minute mark            Recovery Zone Bond

ADJOURN

End 3 hr.  28.5 minute mark on cd