00:00:06,570	Do we have a chaplain? No chaplain. OK, we’re gonna start with the Pledge of allegiance. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. for Richards. One nation under God in business. and justice for all. They’ll call the August 4th. 2025 meeting of the Burley County Commission to order.

00:00:47,100	The first item is roll call of members. Comm Woodcock, Comm Munsen, Comm Bakken here, Chair Bitner here, um, just for the record, Comm Schwab did contact me. And he has some, um, Some family things that he had to take care of today, so it won’t be here. Um, next is the approval of the agenda. Um Moved to approve. 2nd.

00:01:13,470	Motion second to approve the agenda. Any further discussion? Comm Munsen. Yes. Comm Bakke. Yes. Comm Woodcox. Yes Chaman Bitner. Yes, motion carries. Next consideration of July 21st, 2025 meeting minutes and bills.

00:01:37,530	I did not have anything on the meeting minutes, uh, but I did, uh, uh, peruse the bills, and they are in order, so I would move to approve the bills. Second, OK, motion is second to approve the bills. Any further discussion? See. Comm Bakken. Yes. Comm Woodcock. Yes. Comm Munsen, Chair Binner. Yes, motion carries. Now, with regard to the meeting minutes, um. move past the minutes seconds Motion of the second to approve the minutes.

00:02:03,000	Any further discussion? Call the rule. Comm Woodoxx, Comm Munsen, Comm Bakken, Chair Bittner, motion carries. Here we have a new item that’s called public comment, and this is essentially, uh, for things that are not on the agenda. Does anybody wish to speak under public comments. If so, come forward. OK, seeing none.

00:02:24,330	Oh, OK. Just give us your name and sign in. I think there’s a sheet there. Good afternoon. My name is Mary Podol, and I will write as soon as I’m done talking.

00:02:42,470	I just want to say how much I appreciate, uh, the weed board person, um, they came out, we lost some tornadoes, Pretty sure it was the spraying of the county, but they did the test and um then the The company that they have hired, uh, kept. Working with us and, and I just wanted to, I know you guys don’t hear good things often, so I thought. I do really appreciate that. Thank you.

00:03:05,500	Thank you very much. Thanks. I appreciate that. Anybody else wish to speak? OK, before we go any further, um, There’s, there’s something I want to add. Um, over the weekend, We had a, we had a need for, um, Um, moving a bunch of stuff out of the Provident building.

00:03:26,900	And this came up last minute on Friday. So, I want to thank, um, everybody that That came along and and helped um I contacted Um, um, well, there’s a lot of people involved.

00:03:48,730	First, Marcus Hall, uh, Mary Singer, Pam Binder, um, Chelsea Flores, um, they were all involved on this, and we got a bunch of volunteers and I want to read a letter. Um Because this is something you don’t normally hear about, um, people came in, gave, gave up their Saturday and helped us move. We had, I don’t know, 15.

00:04:11,670	16 people that showed up and uh So I kind of read some names here from the highway department, Chris Birch, James Black, Casey I. John Schoon, Dan Shrio, Shane Yates, Human Resources, Lindsay Bauer, Brower, Desiree Hillborn, Meghan Martin, Human Service zone, Rhonda Block, Chelsea Florey, and Derek Floury, Kenny Vaschek and Janet Yoder, and so it’s from me. Dad today, subject is thank you for your dedication and commitment.

00:04:38,530	I want to extend my heartfelt thanks to you for showing up on Saturday to support our remodel project and help us stay on track with our established timeline. Your willingness to dedicate personal time over the weekend. Speaks volumes about your commitment, work ethic, and team spirit. Thanks to your efforts, we made meaningful progress and stayed aligned with our goals.

00:05:00,200	Your contribution did not go unnoticed and I truly appreciate the extra time and energy you brought to the project. Please know how much I value your hard work and collaboration, it’s moments like these that make a team even stronger. So I want to say thank you and well done.

00:05:18,400	And there will be, um, That letter will go to each of the individuals that Participated in that and we’ll have that in their personnel file as well. So, thanks. Um, next item, consent agenda, Commissioners. Moved to approve. Second, motion to 2nd to approve the consent agenda. Any further discussion? Call the roll.

00:05:42,400	Comm Munsen. Comm Bakken. Yes. Comm Woodcoxox. Uh, I’m not sure. Are we, are we too late and we went so fast. We’ve got these amendments or adjustments to the, to the permits and special use permits, can we, Discuss all. Well, we’re in the middle of the vote, so. And Mitch is this is Mitch here? Yeah, yeah.

00:06:07,570	Is this the amendment to uh ordinance 725. Is that the concerning the, uh, Uh, agricultural recreational use permit that we’ve been. Working on. Uh, chair Bittner Comm Woodcoxx, yes, the, uh, this was from the last meeting where, um, uh, Planarmonogo presented it to this board.

00:06:33,600	And you made recommendation, recommended changes in they were highlighted. Um was sent to you was highlighted the changes that you suggested to make. Basically it was just a few word changes and some clarification. And this was approved by the planning. Yes. Sorry I interrupted the board. It was 2 to nothing so far. Um, we’ll continue that part. OK.

00:07:06,800	Comm Woodcock. Yes Cha Karen Bittner. Yes, we. County human service zone Director Chelsea Florey, um, two items auctioned. vehicle in foster care checking account. Welcome, Chelsea. Thank you. Good evening.

00:07:32,570	Um, so first on the agenda, I had the auction of our county owned vehicle, so we have 2 vehicles up Burley County, but the one I’m talking about today is our Chevy Malibu. It was, um, acquired in 2012, and at that time we paid uh 15,968 for that vehicle, and that was paid on your social welfare fund, because we were county funded at that time.

00:07:50,000	Uh, that vehicle currently has over 300,000 miles on it and it’s not in great shape, um, so I’m looking here for you guys to give me permission to work on auctioning off that vehicle, um, and then. You know, using those funds from that auction to purchase um our next vehicle.

00:08:06,100	It won’t be a large amount, but we have funds, um, through my state budget now to purchase our next vehicle. And um, Sure. Chelsea, uh, in our discussion, that was the vehicle that was actually part of a donation. Uh, that was not correct. So it was purchased, yeah, like I said, it was purchased on social welfare funds for clarifying for clarifying that for clarifying. Yep for clarifying.

00:08:25,800	Um, with that, I would move to approve. Second, Motion second to approve the auction of the county owned vehicle. Any further discussion. Comm Bakke. Comm Woodcock, Comm Munsen, Chair Bit motion carries. OK, Second thing I had on the agenda was, uh, my request for a foster care checking account.

00:08:45,130	So I think there is information in your packet for that. I feel like it was page 12, I can’t remember, um, but what I’m looking for is your guys’s approval for that. I need that for the bank, um, in order for them to allow me to open that account.

00:08:59,900	And this is for children, just for reference, um, when I’m the custodian of children who receive benefits through Social Security. We serve as their rep payee. This is a separate account because it’s a um the way that they’re getting their dollars for this one has different restrictions, so I need authorization to open up a separate checking account.

00:09:14,300	Sure. Comm Bakke and what are you expecting as far as the caps on that or as far as a revolving Dollar amount or is that uh That’s what’s different in the restrictions they give, so typically my Social Security accounts, then I’m repayee, for example, could be a cap of 2000 where this one, it’s the

00:09:33,530	guidance that comes from Social Security on that for, um, and I believe the special use of these funds can be upwards to Like 20,000. That’s why it’s a separate account because you have to manage them, otherwise they have to spend down.

00:09:48,670	Does that make sense? Because it’s a bookkeeping issue as far as having the two accounts, so, uh, with that, I moved to approve. Second, motion 2nd to approve. Any further discussion, call the rule. Comm Woodcoxx? Yes. Comm Munsen. Yes. Comm Bakken. Yes. Chair Bittner, motion. Thank you. I don’t know. Lewis and Clark Regional Development Council executive Director Brent Ekstrom. Dayton county membership. Well, good afternoon, Commissioners.

00:10:18,430	Um, first of all, let me apologize for 2 weeks ago. I didn’t realize the meeting was at 8 a.m. I’m used to get this meeting at 5, so I hadn’t even finished my coffee yet and realized, uh, I, uh, made a mistake.

00:10:29,600	Um, did you guys all get, uh, I believe I sent this ahead of time. I got uh some information in your packet so I won’t hand that out again, um, like I do try to do every year.

00:10:42,400	I just want to stop by and talk to you a little bit about what’s going on within the regional council, within the region. Um, what we see happening with at the state level, um, different things are going on as far as economic development and housing, um, across our area, uh, specifically to, to Burleigh County, but a few things are actually across the state.

00:10:55,430	So if you see in the packet that I handed out to you, uh, the, the one pager they handed out, the first one that, uh, it has, uh, just, uh, some information about some of the uh projects that we have done, um, in the area, um, more recently, um, as well as, uh, we put in there a

00:11:10,270	couple of quotes from a couple of the, uh, our partners that we work with, uh With the lenders and the, um, in the area, um, talking a little bit about what we do and how it’s important to, to them to be able to do their job.

00:11:20,630	Like I said, a lot of stuff that we do is we do a lot of, uh, small business lending, um, helping businesses grow and expand, um, and we’re not the only lender on that. We always work with, uh, with a lender. And so they find our services very valuable.

00:11:37,530	Um, a lot of these projects couldn’t happen without us, um, and them teaming up together. So I wanted to put that in there. Uh, the other information on there, like the front page of that, um, You can see how we’re funded and that obviously most of our funds come from, um, from our internal sources from our, uh,

00:11:49,870	loans and our fees that we charge on the loans, we keep growing what we’re doing, um, gets us allows us to do a little bit more impact that way, uh, but we do require, uh, county dues, and one of the reasons we require the county dos is we use that for match.

00:12:00,900	Uh, we have to, whenever we go out and get other grants or other different programs, which I’ll talk about a little bit that we get, uh, we have to get, um, we have to get private match for that or match from another entity that’s not a, a federal entity, and that’s.

00:12:13,700	your dues come in, they help us to match that, which then allows us to give technical assistance to the businesses, um, in the, uh, And the communities in your area.

00:12:27,270	So a couple things that we have going on, um, I mean the the legislature this last time, I did a couple of interesting, uh, came up with a couple of interesting programs I want to talk about a little bit so you guys are aware of, um, and I believe that was in your packet as well.

00:12:42,530	Um, one of the, uh, one of the grant programs that they came up with, um, was a rural grocery store grant, and that runs through our organization, right? So when the legislature wrote, uh, wrote it they made that as it would run through all the different regional councils. There’s 8 of us throughout the state. Um, this is a rural Grocery store was sustainability grounds.

00:12:53,330	So if you have rural grocery stores in the small communities, and we have 50 small communities throughout the, the region, not all of them have a grocery store, um, many of them do. Um, we are the ones that they’re going to administer, help them apply and administer for these grant programs.

00:13:08,300	Uh, the other one is a rural catalyst grant, and that’s a, uh, a more of a community-based grant, um, where you have the legislature set aside $2.5 million for that fund. It’s going to be statewide competitive. Again, that’s gonna run through our organization.

00:13:24,730	Um, it allows these smaller communities, um, so if Wing wants to do something out there, um, they can apply, uh, for this catalyst grant, um, they could would match those funds. It’s only for communities of 4500 or less, right? So it’s not Bismarck, it’s, it’s the rural communities out there, um, and it, it’s fairly flexible as far as what it’s going to do. It can be community economic development stuff. Um, it could be arts and culture.

00:13:38,130	It’s really driven by that community, but basically what’s gonna happen is they’re going to make that application. They will work through us to make that application to the state. It’ll go to the competitive process. If they’re awarded that, then we will administer those grants for them. So those are two programs.

00:13:51,130	That, that just came out. Uh, the other thing the legislature did is they, uh, one of, one of the things that the regional council has always been really good about, is we’re really good about finding opportunities for communities, uh, to go out and get funding, but we don’t have the capacity to actually help them to apply

00:14:06,470	for those grants. So it’s like, they come to us and say, well, the USDA has a really good program, uh, for that. Here’s a Guy at USDA and then they have to go to USDA and a lot of these smaller communities don’t have full-time auditors so they

00:14:18,730	don’t have, you know, full-time people to You can sit there and spend 8 hours writing a grant. Uh, the state legislature in this last, um, go around here, they actually funded the regional councils saying you need to have somebody in your office to do that.

00:14:34,600	So we are hiring a resource development director that will not only go out to help these communities as they have so community comes up with a program. For a project that they want to do, they’ll come to us. We will help them research, um, low interest loans, grants, all of those things.

00:14:49,830	And then not only will we do that, once that’s done, then we will actually help them write that grant. And then if we need to, we can help them administer that grant. So they make sure that they stay in compliance, because that’s one of the things with the federal programs that happen a lot is you have to stay, whether it’s federal or state, and we’ll, we’ll tap into

00:15:01,930	everything, whether it’s foundations, whether it’s state, whether it’s local, we’ll try to find those different resources. So we’re really good about doing that. Now we actually have, uh, the ability or we’ll have the ability to actually Make that next step to actually help those projects actually go to fruition.

00:15:17,030	Uh, the last thing I want to talk about is, um, Coy dues, right? Um, the other thing the legislature did was probably not as good, right as the capped you guys, right at 3%, right? So, so that’s not a good thing, um, and when we found out about that, my board found out about that.

00:15:29,970	We said, let’s take a look at what we’re doing here. And so what they did is they said, um, you know, like I said, we have to have these, we have to have county dues in order to, to match what we do.

00:15:41,500	So we do need to have them, but, um, as you know, you know, since 1970s. till about 10 years ago, we used to charge 0.2 mil per, um, per county, um, about 10 years ago, we went down to 0.15 mil.

00:15:54,730	And when we looked at it this time, we said, you know what, um, obviously you guys are gonna have a tight budget, you always do. So they agreed to go down to 0.125 mL. So your dues are actually going down from where they were last year. So last year, uh, county dues for Burleigh County were about 98,000, um, this year, they’re down to 87,000. So it’s actually a reduction from what it was last year.

00:16:11,030	Uh, we’ll keep it at that point. 125 until the. decides to, to change that amount. Uh, but we felt that, you know, we, we view all of our counties as, as part of the team to try to get things done in their communities.

00:16:24,830	Um, so we’re gonna tighten our belt a little bit, try to make sure this, that, you know, we still have to have the enough to match the grants that we’re going after, um, but we do need, but we did look at that and said, let’s, let’s see if we can’t save you guys a little bit of money.

00:16:35,330	So it’s, it’s not gonna pay to put in a new highway, but we’re hoping it helps a little bit. So with that, I’ll open up to any questions that we see going on in the, in the region or anything that you I’d like to know. Comm any questions. Mr. Chair, Mr. Woodcock.

00:16:50,600	I’ve always been interested in what, what are you doing in Burnley County? As far as how many counties it’s like 8 counties, isn’t it? We have 10 of our programs are statewide, but what are we doing in Burleigh County? Uh, so, um, right now we, uh, just last year we opened up the Century View, um, apartments was affordable

00:17:08,200	housing, that’s 40 units that we just put in there of, uh, workforce housing, uh, we, we currently own and operate. We did 2 years ago, we did the Boulevard apartments, that’s 120 units there, um, in the commercial side of it, uh, in the last, uh, 3 years, we’ve done. $8.

00:17:26,600	6 million of our own funds, uh, for $56 million worth of projects. So we’ve done things from, um, everything in the past, uh, we’ve, uh, we’ve done, if you look at some of the stuff I have a list here of them.

00:17:44,430	A lot of them have some trade names, but everything from Culvers to, um, to, we’ve done, um, brick oven bakery, um, we’ve helped a lot of these different ones using the 504 program, um, as well as our local funds, uh, the one of the things that we do, um, because Bismarck, um, Bismarck has the vision.

00:17:59,830	fund, um, and they use that for doing like interest rate buydowns, um, on primary sector, they don’t do that for, for the, uh, for any of the retail stuff. So the banks look at us a lot and we’re doing, we’re helping a lot of these local businesses do interest rate buydowns. And so we work with the Bank of North Dakota and with the bank.

00:18:11,470	And so then the, the borrower ends up paying, you know, 1 or 2% interest for the first few years of their loan. Um, and when we cover the difference between that, um, and that gives them a chance to get up and going. So that’s one of the big programs that we do, um, in.

00:18:23,700	in, in Bismarck and in Burleigh County. So, um, I, I have a, definitely have a list of all the projects that we have done. Yeah, so, um, we can certainly provide that.

00:18:37,630	Can I continue? Um, when you have an interest buydown, is that a grant or is that a loan? So, we do it as a loan and so the, the, the state of North Dakota through the Bank of North Dakota.

00:18:51,000	They’re, so in, in Burleigh County, most places in Burle County are 65% is is funded by the Bank of North Dakota and 35% of that buy down is funded by us, and their portion is a grant, our portion is a, is a loan. It’s usually at a couple percent and then when the buydown is over, then they pay us back and then we do that with the next business.

00:19:02,700	So our portion is the loan Van of North Dakotas is a grant. OK, thank you. I’ve always been interested in the low income housing projects for the last two you mentioned were great. Uh, anything in the middle in that? Absolutely. OK. I have an application that’s going to be going in.

00:19:14,970	And it’s, it’s a very competitive process, um, but I do have one, that will be going in, uh, in, uh, in Burley County, absolutely. Thank you. And we do have, we do, uh, Um, we actually managed like the one up in um up, uh, I’m trying to think, so we manage a number of different properties like the USDA

00:19:32,530	properties as well. So if there’s ones, I don’t know if there’s one in Wing, um, but there is one in Wilton that we’re managing. I’m not sure if that’s in McLean County or Burley, I’m not sure where it falls in, but in the middle, yeah, so we do, we do that as well. Great. Thank you.

00:19:47,470	The questions, comments. Thank you. Thank you, guys. I got it. Good one, Burley County Housing Authority presentation. I don’t see any information in the agenda packet on this. But I’m here to present. I Good evening, uh, Commissioners. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak with you guys tonight. Um, my name is Nicole Scherhammer.

00:20:20,070	I’m the executive director for Burleigh County Housing Authority. I’ve worked with the agency over 18 years and I was just appointed the director position in 2023. Um, I’m here to provide you some updates about Burley County housing, um, we provide safe and affordable housing for individuals, for seniors, just people with veterans, people with disabilities.

00:20:40,830	And we also do property management for a nonprofit corporation called Community Homes of Bismarck. Um, we managed 287 public housing units. We also managed Washington Court, which is a 96 unit complex, Edwinton Place, a 40 unit permanent supportive housing project, community homes of Bismarck 2, which is an 811 Pra project, which, um, is for people with disabilities.

00:21:03,330	We also, um, have a contract with HUDD for 1130 housing choice voucher program. That has veterans, um, supportive housing vash vouchers and mainstream vouchers and project-based rental assistance and mainstream vouchers is for people that are non-elderly with disabilities.

00:21:25,730	However, due to federal limitations, we can only support about 890 families on our housing choice voucher program, and we pay out over $470,000 in rental assistance each month on in Burtley County.

00:21:45,070	Um The board or BCHA was established um through North Dakota Century Code, which you as the board of Commissioners appoint our Burley County Commissioners, and we have 5 members on that board. We do meet on the 3rd Monday of the month at 8:30 every morning and currently our port consists of Sister Kathleen Atkinson. Um, Steve Sari, Cynthia Chavez, Loisanquist, and you guys just appointed, um, uh, Lay Hoffer here to replace Arlene Olson that passed away.

00:22:05,930	Um, I like to acknowledge that at the time one of your commissioners did hold us as a portfolio and did come to our board meetings and then, um, that practice has since just ended and we report quarterly, apparently, and I was not aware of that expectation, so I’m here to, um, present you with to reconnect

00:22:22,870	and provide you guys some opportunity to know what’s going on with us going forward. Um, some of our major projects right now, we are doing Dakota 2 redevelopment, which is replacing 17 aging public housing units that we tore down last fall, and we are replacing them with 34 new affordable units.

00:22:43,670	One is a 20 unit apartment building for 62 and older, and the other one is 3e Townhouse complexes that will consist of 14 two-bedroom units, and there’s gonna be 444, excuse me, 4 fully accessible units in the apartment building. And then one assessible unit each in those rows of townhouses.

00:23:04,100	So we’re doubling our stock there, which is awesome. Um, the site has already been raised by the flood plan and then that funding includes low income tax credit, um, CDBG funds, housing trust fund and AHP through the Federal Home Loan Bank and then Beyond Shelter is our co-developer and they’re nonprofit.

00:23:25,870	We are also in the midst of rehabilitating Washington Court, which is 96 units, and that is, um, modernizing it and also doing 20 accessible units, so 4 in each or 5 in each building there, which is a need in our community.

00:23:45,730	Those funding sources too is also um light tech HHP where you receive some home funds back in 2019, that’s switched over to the North Dakota Housing Finance and then um also housing incentive fund. We’re looking at doing some property management transition there, um, to address and reduce the stigma that Washington Court has and hopefully do a fresh start. And improve community perception. We also have Edwinton Place that was built in 2019.

00:24:04,370	That is a permanent supportive housing, that is a very big need for our community with the housing first model. Some challenges that we do face at Burley County housing is we do have some people that have retired in the last few years, so that that knowledge in the background is not there anymore, um, we’re including.

00:24:21,930	Maintenance is a big high challenge with the turnover of staff and then plus with our federal funding, how much we can pay in salary expectations, so that’s rising property insurance is also another big cost and That’s a challenge.

00:24:44,530	Aging infrastructure and that’s like I said, we turn those public housing units into new affordable housing and said, we doubled our stock there. Another one we do have, and I’m sure all of you guys heard is the our bedbugs and not bedbugs is always something that you’re gonna have any in property management, but we are currently have right now no active infestation, but we do remain diligent on we do heat treatment, early detection, we

00:25:05,730	do quarterly inspections. We have changed vendors in order to reduce, um, try different chemical company, um, and then despite our efforts, you know, it is multiple. family property that Early detection is easy, but sometimes it’s not reported on time and it does create Problems, but we’re trying to reuse that.

00:25:30,300	Also another new thing is inspire compliance, and that’s gonna also affect a lot of our private landlords here coming up, um, these standards are really high and especially with public housing with our old stock, it’s kind of hard to, I mean, we can pass, but they are hard with, especially with electrical and um.

00:25:48,600	Cause a lot of our older homes are the electrical standards are not there, so to reduce or to get those up to speed is takes a lot of funding and that we don’t have. Um, Right now we have an overwhelming demand.

00:26:07,300	Right now we have 144 families on our public housing waiting list, and we have 742 families on our housing choice voucher waiting list. One. Mhm. Another thing is our administrative fees have been remained stagnant for the last few years and I was administrator fees helps with the cost of our staff, um, so HUD reducing that budget puts some key concerns on us, um. Also, they have more.

00:26:30,230	More, um, HUD regulations going into effect that puts more strain on us, but Some of the big key budget concerns is, um, the elimination of home and CDBG programs, cuts to administrative fees and compliance and operational burdens will grow then. And then currently there’s a divide between the House bill and the Senate bill and the House bill proposes 67.

00:26:53,530	8 billion for HUD and which is below current levels, and they’re the ones that are sharply reducing the home CDBG and other key programs. The Senate bill, in contrast provides 73.3 billion more than fiscal year 25, which is great, and it’s supporting critical rental assistance and homeless programs, although it does not fund new emergency housing vouchers.

00:27:14,330	Um, implications for us would be underfunding administrative fees, um, We would have to absorb those, the rising compliance and reduced burden or service burdens without adding staffing resources. Reduced fundings could limit how many vouchers we can issue even if technically allowed it, like we said, we’re allowed at 1130, but we’re only averaging about 890 what we can budget.

00:27:37,300	Um Without operational support, even funded vouchers that we currently have could be reduced. Um One thing that you guys can do to help is advocate for continued federal investment in affordable housing and then help shift public perception for promoting positive impact for affordable housing.

00:28:04,570	And stay engaged in our regional housing strategy, especially for a rural access and homelessness, um. Currently closing, we serve more than 13,000 people in or 1300 households in Burley County. We also administrator Kit Kitter and Sheridan County. Um We are proud of the progress we’ve made in the last few years, especially with building Dakota 2 and doing Edminton and affordable housing.

00:28:29,170	But we can with your continued support, we can make growing housing needs while improving quality, safety, and stability for those we serve. And I would thank you for your time and I will welcome any questions. Comm, any questions, Comm, Mr. Chair, thank you.

00:28:48,800	Um, do you get state funding and you get federal funding, and what other sources do you receive? For our public housing and for our housing choice voucher, we get federal funding. OK. Uh, does the city. The city, we do, like for our public housing with the city, we can get a pilot for our taxes.

00:29:02,230	We pay in a pilot, which is a payment in lieu of taxes, but we don’t receive any city funding. We did, we’ve received some like CDBG funds before, um. To help with Washington court on like appliances, um, it helped with Dakota too with the, the demolition of those public housing units, um, but as for state, we’ve not.

00:29:23,100	You ever thought of applying to Burleigh County? Good idea. Do you have any money? Well, we, we’ve, we’ve always been in favor of low-income housing all of, all sorts justur some of what we’ve done or what not entirely, but we have helped. So, might, might not be a bad idea.

00:29:44,570	We have received like housing incentive fund and the housing Trust fund through North Dakota Housing Finance Agency on some of our developments, which really helps with affordable, especially bridging that gap. If we could get rid of garrison diversion funding, we could send it. to you. That would be great. Comm Bakke.

00:30:04,230	Um, when did the Burleigh County, uh, and having a portfolio holder for this. That, I believe. So, Dwight Barton was my predecessor, and I know, um, Sister Kathleen Jones used to come to our meetings, and I’m not sure when the portfolio ended here cause. I’ve seen it on the website one day, so.

00:30:23,330	Any Insight to that or? I don’t remember details on it really. It just seemed like it was not a. Um Uh, I think that at the time, it was just not seen as, as under Burleig County. Wheelhouse.

00:30:46,270	Which is kind of a concern, I guess because people contact us because they think because of the name that it’s Burley County Housing Authority. And I, I think it’s a misleading name, because people think that we have something to do with. And that’s part of the reason I brought it up because I was contacted a couple weeks ago about a question with. Right. So under century.

00:31:02,330	I see the problem here is that we’ve all been getting contacts concerning County Housing Authority. And it’s concerning. Yeah, so under sensory code, it says the county are missing out palities established a housing authority, and that’s where you guys set the board of Commissioners way back in 1969, I believe, and, and then you guys will always appoint our

00:31:22,700	commissioners. for you Jerry, were you on that commission? 1969, yes, I was there. I was going to college, if I remember right, but I was there. You know, I, I would see no harm if, if you were interested in that being a portfolio or something, there would be no harm in re-establishing that, but You

00:31:43,500	know, I, I think it might be beneficial to have a conversation. And, and see what that looks like because you guys. Meet quarterly quarterly reports. That’s what is was on your website for to report quarterly for the housing authority, I think that’s something we should probably do the agenda to Mark Sloanowsky here every month for our

00:32:05,870	housing meetings, our board meetings, so. Um-hum OK, well, you want to discuss that right now? We can, and what are your thoughts, Commissioners? I’m not volunteering for one more portfolio. I can tell you that.

00:32:31,470	We have, well, the only way we’d everybody to ever do any funding, we would have to have somebody that was involved, you know, in a portfolio position, uh, So I’d like to learn more about your budget and where it comes from and that type of thing. Um, Of course we don’t, we like we, we just shouldn’t saying all we know is we give the, we appoint the board members and that’s it.

00:32:49,530	And we never hear anything after that, so. So, Commissioners, do I hear a motion to create a portfolio for that, and, and, uh. That was the motion. Comm Woodcoxx is a volunteering for that. What meetings in the morning? Yes, we have so many meetings now it’s hard. It is 8:30 the 3rd Monday of the month at 8:30. So moved.

00:33:13,830	You’re all laughing. I didn’t hear any died for lack of a, I made the motion. Second, motion of the 2nd. You’re OK with that, Comm? I’m going to vote. You just go ahead and do your, do your duty discussion. Comm Munsen. Yes. Comm Bakken. Yes, Comm Woodcock, abstain.

00:33:35,070	No, I’d be glad to do it then. Well, welcome aboard, you get a new it’s a big, you get a new it’s a big, uh. Oh you get a new it’s a big, you get a new it’s a big, uh.

00:33:52,600	Oh, it’s a component of the county, and I think that, uh, someplace we should probably be engaged to. From an informational perspective, if nothing else, so Jerry, thank you. And Mr. Chair, if I can, you know, as you said from the meetings that we’ve had the last couple, um, besides the phone calls we’ve been getting as commissioners of some concerns.

00:34:08,130	I, I really appreciate Jerry stepping up because I think it is the right thing for us to do. OK. Anything else you want to add? No. I should probably get your cell number one, you wanna write your number down? Sure. OK. So I’m, I’m going to need to get a hold of you one of these days. Thanks for coming in and taking the time. Yes.

00:34:27,870	You’re welcome. Thank you. I wrote it on here. Thank you. OK, next, uh, county finance director, interim treasurer Jacobs. Provident Building renovation funding budget amendment for auditor, treasurer office, preliminary budget review, and Finally, a motion to adopt preliminary budget and call for a final budget hearing on September 15th. Welcome Lee. Good evening, chair Bittner and Commissioners.

00:35:06,330	Uh, first, can I ask that we, item 10 be, can we table that? And bring that back in, in a couple weeks. It’s the budget amendment we got. I think Meet with some some folks about that. Yep, it’s easy enough to do. We’ll just remove that.

00:35:26,530	And, uh, added to the agenda for the next. Regular Commission meeting. OK, good. Thank you. Uh, first item is the Provident building renovation funding. We met with uh Bond council. And the underwriters, uh, last week about. Bonds and uh there’s a couple different options, um. Under the century code.

00:35:54,330	It really, we have a lot of range here, uh, anywhere from 5 to potentially 20 years and so, um. You know, The, the longer option would, would be through a capital projects levy and the shorter option could be just a general fund, um, it’s called a limited, uh, limited general obligation or something like that, but that, that option

00:36:20,670	would be limited to 5 years, um, without a, a vote of the public, which I think the, the vote of the of the public just might take too long. It’s just my, my concern. It’s just the whole. Thing, but maybe that’s something we could discuss that the um capital projects levy, um.

00:36:45,630	is subject to a referral, um, but those are uncommon. So it’s, it’s something that’s just within our the authority of the commission, uh, to go up to 10 mLs on a capital projects levy and bonding is, is kind of falls under that authority, and we’re currently at 0, so we have no capital projects levy, um, we would not require 10 mLs

00:37:05,400	to to do any kind of funding, any amount of funding for this project, uh, wouldn’t, wouldn’t be that, that much. The, I, I forwarded the email that I received and the two scenarios that I asked. The underwriters, uh, colliers to. Come up with were A $16.5 million you know, the full amount over.

00:37:30,070	Say 20 years. Was scenario number one. And the second scenario was a shorter window, the 5 year window and 10.5 million. Because that would utilize the 6 million that we had, um, received from the AARPA funding. And there’s a range in there. It doesn’t, it’s not an either or.

00:37:53,600	I mean, I, I believe you could do, you know, 8 million for 20 years, um, that type of thing. So there’s a range. I just asked for these two. So the first, the, I guess it’s the second scenario that I Just described the 10.5 million over 5 years, uh, would, would be an estimated annual payment of 2.

00:38:17,030	35 million with an average bond coupon of 4%. And then the first scenario that I mentioned, 16.5 million over 20 years would be a 1.35 million payment and a a bond coupon of 5.66%. Right now I, I.

00:38:43,000	As a placeholder in the budget, I put the what I thought would be like the maximum possible bond we would ever conceivably issue just because, and so that amount is that is 3.7 million per year. The reason I did that is because with the um preliminary budget, we can, we can come down for the final, but we can’t go up.

00:39:03,870	So if there’s some sticker shock when you’re looking at your, at your preliminary budget, um, that’s the reason I hadn’t yet received this, this estimate when I put together the budget, so I just started with the max just. Knowing that we would, we would, we would whittle it down. But as far as these, um.

00:39:27,470	Bond scenarios or maybe the different options, you know, capital projects versus, uh, general fund, um, or anything else that I mentioned, um, I, I could stand for any questions. I don’t have a whole lot else to. Say at this point. Commissioner’s questions. Has Mr. Chair, we got the AARPA money that we dedicated to the Provident life.

00:39:52,970	So I, there’s no way we shouldn’t, should not be spending it on that project. I mean, that’s sitting in the bank with drawing interest right now and so uh we can’t think of what the total cost is, just deduct the total from 6 million from that or plus interest, I think it’s drawing interest, isn’t it, so it’s

00:40:08,300	more than 6 million, so. Better be drawing interest, um, uh, so we’re down to where we’re looking at 10 million. Or 10.5, you call it 11 million, you’d be at 17 total, so let’s consider how we’re going to finance the 11 million.

00:40:27,670	In my mind, we should, we should be thinking about, uh, taking some of it from reserves and borrowing the rest whether we borrow it in a bond, I’m not real hopped up on bonds, but, uh, if we get a low cost loan from Bank of North Dakota or something like that and pay it off as quickly as we can. I don’t like a 20 year commitment.

00:40:42,200	At one point some million dollars, that’s dangerous, I think, and. So long term hard commitment for us to, uh, tackle, so, uh, that’s my original thought, strictly if On the table for discussion. It’s consistent with what I’ve been thinking, but go ahead, Commissioners.

00:41:03,500	Yeah, and, uh, I, I agree on the 20 year too, Jerry. The, the. One thing I’m always cognizant of is tying other commission’s hands with things and, and I think that would be burdensome for um, Future commissions as well, so, you know, when, when I’m looking at projects, it’s like, OK, we put that project at the table and it’s our job to get

00:41:22,130	that wrapped up, so, um, sooner the better would be my thoughts. Mr. Munson, I’m, I’m in the same boat, um, I would like to see. I would like not to have a $10.5 million dollar bond in that five-year maturity rate, I’d like to see what our options are to find.

00:41:46,800	Some more of our reserves to buy that down and if it was 7 or 8 million that we were bonding, that would. Feel better as well. And again, I agree, 5 years, we, we, we put this on the table, we should take care of it of putting it down the road.

00:42:05,400	Um Well, we’ve always said, we do, we do have sufficient funding to just do the project and you know be done with it, you know. One of the big concerns that we will have moving forward, I think leading kind of share some information, but Um, in the not too distant future, we’re going to have an issue where we’re, we’re bumping up against the top of the cap for

00:42:20,970	what we can. Have reserves. And I don’t know what the punishment is for, Uh, having too much money on hand, but the fact of the matter is, we don’t necessarily have to borrow. Any. Right. And pay interest. We are gaining interest on having money, so it’s kind of a trade-off.

00:42:42,730	You know, we’ve got the money that the interest would offset the interest on a bond, if that’s what we decided to do. But, um, well, one of my thoughts too though is.

00:43:06,800	I, I, I think in, in this maybe a nuance, but because of the legislature not addressing Situations like ours when our taxpayers decided to, um, Go ahead with the sales tax is, Is that a different pot? We, we don’t really know right now. So when, when you’re defining reserves, what’s the definition of that reserve? traditionally it’s been for property taxes is the bulk of that.

00:43:28,130	So, uh, I don’t think we’re in the state model and the state formula, so I think we do have a little bit more latitude right now to make the best decisions for our taxpayers at this time. And I, I, I think we should. Keep that in the back of our minds when we’re making decisions.

00:43:52,130	If I remember correctly, last, not this year, but the last two years we’ve over taxed the public because of budget numbers weren’t exactly right. Am I correct in that? So that, and that money went into reserves, right? Correct. OK. So, what is that amount to roughly? Uh, about 3.8 million last year. And I think it was just the one year, OK.

00:44:09,900	So, if we, you take the 16.5, you deduct the 6, from the ARPA, you got 10.5 left. If you take 3 or 4 from what you’re talking about our, we overtax. In my mind, that should go to something that we can’t, we can’t just let it sit there and do nothing with it.

00:44:28,470	Either, and we’re already going to reduce the property tax dramatically, uh, you, you sent a memo saying, uh, it’s gonna go down. 40 or 50% this year and then next year will even be more because we’ve got a full year of tax collection. So it wouldn’t bother me if we used our reserves. And what, at what point are the reserves? 20.

00:44:47,700	3, 20.4 in the general fund, um. January 1st. OK, and, and what’s the rule, the state rule is what, 25 to 40% of the, we have to have 75%, 75% of your appropriation. OK. Wouldn’t bother me if we paid it all off.

00:45:09,300	I hate to, I hate to see us burden commissioned down the road we had in this 3% thing we run into trouble with that and. And I know you mentioned that it would be tough for us to raise our reserves if we did that, but I still think there would be adequate to, uh, Uh, hold us. We have, we have reserves because.

00:45:29,530	We’ve been taxing the citizens, and I don’t think we need to continue to tax and and add more to it because the. problem is going to be. Too much money in reserves, so it seems to me paying for it out of reserves only unless you have a um. You know, advice to the opposite.

00:45:44,800	I do have a question for Lee. So From a bonding perspective, the scenario where it makes sense to bond would be if we’re getting a lower rate than what we’re getting a return on those reserve funds, and that’s is that the case? Is that not the

00:46:00,400	case? If we were to take it all out of reserves, are we going to be? Detrimentally Affecting future budgets because we’re not. Drawing Yeah You know, we’re spending more on or losing more. Then we’re, then we’re spending on the bond.

00:46:24,270	Yeah, I think right now we’ve got some, um, You know, for example, we just invested some sales taxes relatively short term. I think it was December 31st at about 4.19% and so what I’m reading here is that we.

00:46:48,870	We have an average bond coupon of 4%, um, been more, most likely that’s because these are not taxable, you know, or, uh, bond issues and so they yield less because the bondholder doesn’t pay taxes on them. Um, and so therefore, it, it seems to me that we’re currently making more, uh, an investments and we would pay based on the bond coupon that I’m, I’m seeing in this email. Now, that’s, that’s a 5 year.

00:47:07,700	Um, so I’m not quite sure what we do going up to 5 years, uh. For me, it’s, the issue is the uncertainty created by uh HB 1176, and you know, where in in the future, just as an example, our average sales tax, so we’re capped at 3% for, for the uninitiated, uh, 3% of your property taxes levied in or your dollars property taxes levied in

00:47:33,300	dollars. So just if we’re switching to a sales tax model, well historically our sales tax increases at about 2.5%. And so if we’re capped at 3%, um, but our sales tax increases at 2.5% we’re, we’re gonna be hamstrung, uh, in the future, that’s, that’s one concern.

00:47:56,230	The other concern is that sales tax goes up and down. It’s, uh, it’s down this year. Uh, it’s trending down about a little over 4%. So, therefore, if you’re trying to budget, you know, and you’re, you’re, you’re, um, sales tax is down and you have no other means to raise.

00:48:13,830	You know, money to make up the difference because of the property tax is capped. You need reserves in that year. No. In another year, sales tax might go up 6 or 8% on those years, you really can’t throw a party because you have to save it for the years when.

00:48:34,530	Sales tax is down, so it’s just one of those things where versus, I mean, historically, property taxes are, they’re the backfill. It’s the plug figure in your budget. So it’s, I need this much money, I have this much money and the difference is property taxes, so it makes budgeting easy.

00:48:51,270	You know, maybe not so much for the taxpayers in some years, but for us, it’s easy. And so now, you know, we’ve just got this. Issue that We’ve got to contend with, which is the property tax caps. Reserves just make it easier, I think for us, um. Going forward, not to mention the fact that it’s gonna be hard to raise reserves unless you get a, you know, 8%, 10% sales tax here.

00:49:15,130	So, I, I’m not comfortable going beyond the five years and, um, have you had an opportunity to look at, uh, as far as any municipal loan programs at the Bank of North Dakota as opposed to bonding, um, because That You know, have you, have you looked at those yet? Well, I looked at one.

00:49:33,370	Where did they come in? Uh, the, the, um, It’s the infrastructure loan, it’s the big, big deal that they that they do. We’ve got. 1 or 22, I think, smaller, well, one is big, it’s the hall road, um, and then a special assessment, uh. We were not selected for this round of, of funding, but we can apply again.

00:49:55,670	I think they said maybe early next summer. So if we’re budgeting this project out of reserves, we can still apply for that loan program. That’s my understanding.

00:50:17,070	And then currently because we, we The, Commission adopted the, the resolution to, you know, refund ourselves or, you know, out of a bond issue, um, it doesn’t mean we have to do that, but we adopted the resolution, so that means that any costs that we’re incurring, you know, from that point forward. We can later bond and reimburse ourselves.

00:50:34,670	So we’ll pay for it out of pocket, you know, for for a while, um, meaning we also, we don’t have to decide right now what we wanna do. We have that option to refund ourselves, um. Out of a future bond issue. I don’t know how Bank of North Dakota fits into that exact scenario. I. I shouldn’t speculate. But we do have future options as far as flexibility within the budget.

00:50:58,630	We would have another go at BND next year and then I think the bond deal is sort of open-ended, especially if we have it in a in the budget, which is, you know. Why I put it in the budget this year if it’s in the budget for next year.

00:51:14,800	We don’t have to necessarily levy. for it This year Um, but if it’s in there, then there’s the option to as long as it’s a placeholder, whether we use it or not, that’s our choice. At a later date. Yes. Mr. Chair, Comm.

00:51:43,000	A couple of things I have not heard anybody talk about any other capital improvement projects that we are having that are major. I mean, we always have smaller things for the road department and all that, but they, that’s a different funding source entirely, but other than that, I, we’re not building any buildings or anything like that.

00:51:57,530	Uh, our equipment needs are in good shape, so as far as I’m concerned, I’ve just as soon as pay it off and be done with it. That, I think that makes sense to me simply because we do have the money, we know that we’re going to run into the cap.

00:52:13,570	Any way, and we have options in the future as he’s laid out, if, if we’ve gotten a pinch, and I really don’t see that happening right now either. I don’t have a crystal ball, but you know, I think. Well, we got a, a parachute just in case. Yeah, there’s options. We’re not. Um, I don’t see any harm in, in that.

00:52:32,270	Pa, you know, use the ARPA funding and the uh and reserves and get her done. Mr. Chair, I’m hesitant on that part. I understand we have it now. Um, but I’m worried with what HB1176 is going to do to us 2 to 3 years, 4 years from now. And, uh, I, I like to reserve some of that just in case.

00:52:57,900	But that’s just an, we’re not cleaning out. No, I know we’re not cleaning it out, and I can tell you that I have talked to legislators and they were aware that there are problems that were not addressed under 1176 and I am certain that there will be Um, some work to.

00:53:14,800	To address those things because, you know, even though I was working with some of them during the session, I guess there was just too much happening for them to. Really consider our unique situation. But we’ll have enough time to work with them and And address our concerns.

00:53:29,870	Well, and, and again, I I wanna come back to the fact that we’re not part of the state formula anymore. When I, as I see it, until the next session when they do address that, I think they will clean up a lot of that. But as of right now, as, as far as caps.

00:53:48,530	That’s coming from this pot, and we’re utilizing this funding source, and that’s not part of the formula right now. So I don’t have concerns about that. Um But I do have concerns about the next legislative session when they do clean it up and what that’s gonna look like because I can pretty much guarantee that the sales tax side of it’s gonna get factored

00:54:09,330	into there in some way, shape or form. I don’t, I have no idea what that’s gonna look like at this point, but, um, I, I think they will fix that. I think you’re right. And I take it we haven’t heard anything from the Attorney General’s office on those questions yet.

00:54:24,270	But We do, we do have. some questions, you know, to the Attorney general’s office in this regard. haven’t got an answer yet, so. Um, I mean, to the extent of, of. Bonding it out, I, I would say we put in because this is a 2-year project. I would budget what we need for next year.

00:54:52,100	Uh, for it, and next year I would say we look at the Bank of North Dakota for reapplying and if needed or we see what, what the numbers are going to look like, then we still have the bond option.

00:55:10,200	Right, you know, we, we, I don’t think we’ve asked the finance department to just look at the question of Just borrowing money from the Bank of North Dakota like that Hall road project. We didn’t, we didn’t have any special. Um Application for that, did we, Marcus? We did apply to the bank before. Right, but it was a loan, it wasn’t under this type of program, right? Transportation. And that’s not available anymore.

00:55:36,300	Well, this isn’t a transportation, but there may be something like that that’s separate from. I think it’s it’s a capital improvement project. It might be the same bucket. Yeah. Kind of legacy fund related type of thing, um, because I, I think it was a revolving loan fund of some kind. The infrastructure.

00:55:56,070	F I N D infrastructure revolving or something like that. It may all be the, be in the same bucket, just a different, you know. They had different streams for it. Yeah. That’s my thought. I’m not sure.

00:56:10,600	If we were to make the commitment like now to fund it entirely by ARA funds and, and, and reserves. If we get into the next February, March, and April when we’re looking at the contracting going and we get behind or whatever, we can still go to the bank in North Dakota or whatever and borrow money to pay rather than pay from reserves, if we, if we get

00:56:28,770	a difference in the legislature, and they say, uh oh, we’re in trouble. We don’t have to pay it all by that. We could bond it back at that point. Right? My, I think we have pretty significant, you know, latitude, um, to bond in the future, uh, I, I don’t know exactly how.

00:56:47,300	How that all works, but because we’ve, you know, again, resolved to refund ourselves, there’s the option in the future to, you know, all, all those expenses, as I said, that we incur from that point forward are refundable. I’m not entirely sure of the.

00:57:06,800	You know, when When and how and the legal side of it, but um. But I think we have some time. Although stuck here, you know, it’s. So again, I would, I would. Iterate, I think we budget.

00:57:31,430	You one of the project with contingencies in the budget and we can address that next year’s budget if we needed to look at the bonding, Bank of North Dakota, some different funding options. If we don’t feel at that point we want to pull the rest out of the reserve fund. Sure. It seems to make sense. I don’t know that there’s any motion or anything required on that, uh. Yes, I think so. You do. Mr.

00:57:55,130	Chair, I would move that we, uh, Spend the ARPA money in its entirety and also pay the balance, assuming it’s, I’ll put a cap of 11 million on it, of reserves and put a cap on it.

00:58:09,470	I, I don’t think we’ll ever have to reach it, but, uh, that would be a $17 million and that’s, that’s a little bit more than what we’ve got bids on. So it’s always contingencies there, but those 22 funding sources, reserves for up to 11 million and funding of ARPA at 16, 6 million, I’m sorry. Would that be for budgeting for the first year of the project out of those funds the entire project.

00:58:29,830	Am I assuming that’s the, so I would say. Pay the 6 million and then we, we can use our reserves at that as we need them along, it’s a two-re project, we don’t pay it until they send us a bill and we have to do it, so you, you understand what I’m getting at.

00:58:48,930	I don’t want to, I, I personally don’t like to see us bonding anything. If, if down the road we need to do something, I’d rather borrow it and pay it off in 3 or 4 years rather than a tenure or a 20-year bond. I just don’t. Yeah. Want to commit the county to something like that.

00:59:08,800	That’s my motion. OK. My motion is there a second? As long as we have the flexibility to be able to. Look at year two on where we’re going to take that funding from, like, I would suck at that. We do, yes, we do, we’re. We know that there’s options. A further discussion.

00:59:29,070	Comm Bakken. Yes. Comm Woodcock, Comm Munsen, Chair Bittner, motion carries. OK, now. The next item is the Uh preliminary budget. I, I guess I, if it’s OK with, With the, the commission. I was late.

01:00:03,800	Finishing this, I, I think I sent it out Friday evening and so therefore it didn’t make it into the packet. And so if it’s OK with you, I would just read this brief, uh, budget letter into the record. Uh Burley County Comm is attached, you will find the preliminary budget for Burley County for the calendar year 2026.

01:00:23,670	The document contains the budgets for the general special revenue debt service and capital project funds. The effects of HB 1176, which cap property taxes at 3% of property taxes levied in dollars informed the budgeting process for most funds, we calculated the maximum increase allowed under the caps and included that figure as the levy for the general fund, we followed the

01:00:45,030	same methodology but reduced the result by the estimated sales taxes collected for use in 2026. Under HB 1176 consideration is given to the total amount of property taxes levied in dollars rather than on a fund by fund basis. Consequently, the significant property tax reduction provided by sales tax, which is expected to decrease further in FY 2027.

01:01:08,970	created the bandwidth to add mills to the highway levy at the request of the budget committee. Another noteworthy item is the addition of a levy for the Provident building renovation project, um. You know, I’ll just skip that paragraph because we just talked about that, save everybody the time.

01:01:27,230	Also related to the renovation project as a capital project budget. Although we intend to use this budget in the coming year, the commission adopted a reimbursement resolution, um. Which gives them the ability to reimburse the county for renovation expenditures out of a future bond issue.

01:01:46,200	Therefore, although we are budgeting essentially the entire capital projects fund in FY 2026. It, it is expected that the fund would be replenished under a bond issuance. We calculated the general fund levy using. The maximum levy formula found in HB 1176, the total came to $22,775,178. From this we subtracted $16,168,514 in sales taxes, earmarked for FY 2026.

01:02:16,770	Note due to the timing of the home rule charter vote, the 2026 year uses only 9 months of sales taxes subsequent years we’ll use 12 months. The difference of 6,606,664 is expected to be collected at 95% due to the. 5% early payment discount for net property taxes of $6,276,331.

01:02:43,500	Uh I go on to discuss how we added a levy to that. I, I guess I’ll continue with that, uh. To this we add a levy of $39,090,900,000 to make the estimated bond payment.

01:03:06,470	Uh, so what this is saying is basically you’re gonna see a Bond payment on the general fund appropriation and then based on what we just discussed, um. We can leave it there if. We want bonding on the table next year. That would just allow us to spend, you know, actually I, I take that back. I think if we’re not. If we’re not going to levy it, we don’t necessarily have to have it in there, um.

01:03:34,700	But that’s You’ll, you’ll note that item. It’s part of what’s driving up the general fund appropriation, I guess is what I’m trying to say. So if that number looks really big, it’s because it includes this, this bond payment. So in total, um. The general fund utilizes a levy of 10,515,999. Now ignoring that. Bond payment we’re back to 6, 6.6 million.

01:04:00,300	This is verses I think 21, 21 last year. The total levy for all funds for which the county has taxing authority comes to $21,897,810. A summary of expenditures and revenues for the 2025 General Fund balance. Yes, or rather the, the 2026 was a typo. So we’re expecting revenue of 41,703,000. And expenditure of 46,800.

01:04:34,470	90,000 for a difference of 5.1 million. Again, that includes the levy for the bond, but if you remove the levee, it’s coming out of both revenue and expenditure, so you’re still gonna have that difference, that budget deficit of, you know, 5.2 million. Uh, I go on to say that this difference.

01:04:56,470	This deficit is made up using general fund reserves. Please note that the difference is a budget deficit only. And we do not anticipate that actual expenditures will exceed actual revenues in the general fund during FY 2026. Therefore we do not anticipate requiring the use of general fund reserves during FY20. 26.

01:05:18,900	We anticipate further refining of the budget between now and the final budget date. One of the things we’re required to do, uh, is underestimate the, the current year end. Revenues and expenses and those schedules are in the, uh, email that I sent out, um. Basically, We I think gonna finish the year flat or maybe Uh, a little bit in the black, um.

01:05:50,800	Meaning that our our revenues may exceed expenditures a little bit, we may add a little bit to reserves. I don’t think we’re going to end up in the red this at the end of this year, it just, it’s just trending to To be As I said, pretty much, uh.

01:06:06,270	Pretty much flat, um, and then next year was, you know, pretty similar, uh, flat to maybe uh slight increase in reserves. Yeah There are some changes in the presentation of the budget. I think I mentioned that in an email, but a couple of items from memory are that we’re, we’ve broken out the.

01:06:33,170	Uh, treasurer and the Auditor departments we’ve broken out, uh, finance from the county board. We’ve broken out some of the boat ramps. We’ve broken out some of the parks, and we’ve broken out risk management from human resources management and one other item is that, and this may require. For action we’ve got a provident building fund.

01:06:58,600	That fund existed to basically manage the rental revenue from the building when we had tenants and also to pay the expenses out of that, uh, revenue stream, um, we accumulated a fund balance in that fund, and then now we have no tenants we’re looking to occupy the building and so.

01:07:21,070	What’s left of that fund balance has been paying certain expenditures among them are like the director of facilities salary. And a couple of, couple other significant line items from the, from the facilities budget.

01:07:41,570	I don’t think we’re going to have enough money in that fund balance to fund next year if we just keep doing things as, as we’ve been doing it’s like $500,000 we think we’ll have left at the end of the year, so the recommendation is to just simply close that fund. And move, create a facilities management. Department within the general fund.

01:08:03,730	And just move The the the expenditures that were in that Provident fund over to the general fund, uh, facilities has budgets kind of all over the place. They have some budgets and the, some of their budget comes out of the courthouse, some comes out of the detention center.

01:08:17,530	We would just leave all that in place for now and just strictly move those provident funds over to the general fund. It’s probably a better place for it. Um Because they really don’t, they’re not just providing services to that building. It’s, it’s for the whole county. Um, you call the new fund facilities facilities management, I’m open to suggestions. That’s all good.

01:08:42,170	Yeah, I, I think it makes sense. Maybe I should ask the director what he wants, what, what he wants it to be called. OK, um, I think we can just take care of that right here. Um-hum.

01:09:06,130	Um, I don’t Is there a motion? Some moved Second, Motion is second to close the Provident building fund and create a facilities management fund. Move the funding from The 520, 528,000. Mr. Chair.

01:09:29,670	Comm, that’ll effectively raise our Or uh reserved by 500,000, correct? That’s part of the, yeah, so I was going to mention that when you look at your um budget schedules you’ll see a transfer in to the general fund, so that’s part of what’s increasing the revenues, but when I was talking about. Finishing the year next year, you know, flat. I was not including those reserves in that calculation. It Great. Any other? Paro Mr. Woodcock, Comm Munsen, Comm Bakken, Chair Bitner. Yes. Motion carries.

01:09:54,730	There was one question. The other Comment I found a typo, uh, in the weed board, I. put the mill levy At 3.13, that’s not correct. I was getting my wires crossed. Uh, we need to have an appropriation of more than 3 mLs. Which we do in order to qualify for the LAP program.

01:10:26,270	And so when I was doing the formula, I was thinking appropriation. And uh and so our, our actual mill. Anyway, it’s, it’s much smaller than that. It’s like 1.5 or something like that. And again, with the weed board, those are out of town. Mills So it’s You know, 1.5 mL of $189,000.

01:10:51,370	Valuation OK, so at that rate, that still keeps the, uh, lab program, with the appropriation at 3.13, we still qualify for the lab program. We won’t spend 3.13. We don’t, we, we don’t expect to, but we appropriate that much. I think that is basically. What I’ve got now I.

01:11:19,730	I Scanning through here, if there’s anything else to note. Now, as I mentioned, a couple other things I should probably mention. So under HB 1176 were limited by the total. You know, so it’s not fun by fun. So when I said that I took the max. Uh, in, let’s just say the.

01:11:47,930	County agent budget and and calculated the max. That’s not really A thing, it’s not a fun by fun thing. I just did it as a starting point. Under the bill, you’re punished if you don’t go to the max. And so if you don’t do the max every year, then the. Maybe I should explain it even.

01:12:07,230	I’m sure that all the us understand it, but just maybe for some. Uh, watching her in the audience. The max is on your previous 3 years. So you, you look back 3 years and you can, you can essentially do 3 a 3% increase off the highest of the previous 3 years with some other calculations for growth

01:12:29,070	and stuff like that. So if you can picture that, if you have a year where you don’t do the max, that’s now a smaller year. If you have 3 years where you don’t do the max, then that’s gone forever. It just rolls off the paper, uh, you know, similarly, if you’re coming into, uh, this.

01:12:49,500	Environment and you have a levye that’s below the max. That we do a couple different levies pick on the highway department because that’s, that’s the other topic here. If your levy is 3.4 mills. And now you have a Max, you’re 3.4 mLs forever.

01:13:14,470	It’s just, you know, unless you dramatically lower another fund, then you can shift those mills over, that’s just how it works, um. In our case, because we had 20. 30, 31 or something mills in the general fund and we’re reducing those significantly because of sales tax we have all that space now available and so when I’m, you know, when we were, uh, meeting as the budget committee, uh, the

01:13:42,870	committee asked the highway department to come and actually increase their meals. So what’s happening is we’ve got all this extra space created by lowering the general fund mills, and that is. Been essentially moved over the highway, um.

01:14:02,730	So that’s, I, you know, that’s one thing I wanted to mention is it’s, it’s not on a fun by fun thing. And then the other thing I wanted to mention is that we have kind of a unique situation in Burley County created by sales taxes where Um, we don’t have to make the hard decisions this year, you know, because, as I just

01:14:18,630	mentioned, um. We have sales tax now funding $16 million so we’ve got all that room to grow and the property taxes, which I, I realize we’re not doing that because the board committed to a a property tax reduction scared me. That scared me, I mean, I, I understand, I understand all that.

01:14:38,270	I’m just saying that we, under the law, I mean, we have that bandwidth, other, other. County others political subdivisions don’t have that. They have to make the hard decisions right now. So we have time to adapt. Um, you know, meaning it can be a business as usual budget year.

01:15:01,270	That doesn’t mean we’re gonna grow to fill that whole space we’ve created, but, um. Going forward, as I mentioned, we’re going to be situated poorly because Our sales tax is increasing at below the rate of the cap. And so whereas other. You know, entities have 3%, we have 2.5%. And this year we have 4%. That’s just what sales tax is doing.

01:15:29,000	Um And, and then we do, we, we can always increase on the, the property tax, but that’s gonna be a much smaller. portion of our budget. So this year, let’s say it’s 6.6 million, well we can imagine that was the max, we can increase 3% of 6.

01:15:49,830	6 million, so that’s not, not gonna do much, um, so if Property tax, if sales tax goes down 4%, and we can. Only increase 3% of 6.6 million. We’re cutting It’s just the reality or spending reserves. And so, In the future, we’re going to have to have some really difficult, uh, decisions. I would suggest that You know, if we want to take that time that we have and.

01:16:16,670	You know Um That other, other counties don’t. We’re gonna take a year to figure this out that we would get real serious about it. You know, pretty soon after the budget and start having maybe meetings as departments or maybe it’s my responsibility to.

01:16:39,070	bring this to the department head meetings and start talking about what does it look like if you have a. year where we’re going down 4%, what would you do? What would you bring as a budget and start making those plans. Um, I hope that makes sense. I think I’ve said plenty. I can stand for any questions. Comm, any questions? Mr. Chair, Comm.

01:17:00,830	So, Lee in, in the past few years, we’ve, the citizens in Burleigh County have received, if they applied a property tax credit to the state of $500. What was that revenue to Burleigh County.

01:17:21,670	And what’s anticipated now that it’s 1500, obviously 3 times the amount, but what is that dollar amount that the state will provide in relief to the residents. I think, I think what it was 10.5 million that we got to distribute for to everybody, um, our portion of that was like 1.8 million, but that’s. That’s $1 for dollar.

01:17:37,630	It’s just, you know, it’s like you’re taking it out of your left pocket instead of your right pocket. It’s not, you know, more money, um, so then under the with 1600, it would be, you know, I guess 3 times that, maybe. What is that 5 million something like that. That the state is providing that is coming off the tax rolls, essentially, yeah. When you take your total budget.

01:18:00,070	You subtract that, you subtract the sales tax. That’s when you get down to the mills that we’re charging the residents. And that’s why that number keeps dropping.

01:18:20,270	When we start looking at the 3% of that cap, That number gets pretty small as our sales tax grow and as the reimbursement from the state comes as well. Although I think the, the 3% would include the PRC, um. It’s just that the state would be paying the. The citizens portion of that, um, or the citizens would be paying it through the state. I mean, however you want to look at it, but the state will be paying that portion.

01:18:37,400	We would still get to use 3% of that total of the of the of the amount that the taxpayer paid plus um what the state we’re levying, we’re still levying it.

01:18:56,000	It’s just that the state is coming into to credit, so it’s like they’re, you know, it’s still attacks, they’re just the state’s just paying your portion of it instead of you paying it. I appreciate that. I, I, I thought it was the other way, so. Did you get anything back from that question about a public administrator? I did not. I sent it, I think, the 30th or 31st, and, um, I mean, for all I know.

01:19:24,600	That individuals on vacation or something like that, but, uh, I can reach out again, maybe try somebody else. OK. And the reason that we ask is that It’s it’s our understanding that the public administrator. Is paid for by the state of North Dakota, but there’s like a $25,000. I in the budget for that.

01:19:45,130	So we’re looking into the state actually paying or not, and I think it’s administered through the North Coast as Association of Counties. I think that’s right, cause I was able to find somebody on the website that. You know, Did that Mr. Chair, Commission.

01:20:07,330	So the process is we tentatively or if we approve this as a preliminary budget, it’s set at whatever the total is. We cannot go above that. We have to, if we want to do anything to it, we have to reduce the amounts. Is that correct? I might, I, I think that’s so. I, my understanding is it’s, it’s more about the levy.

01:20:26,330	But in, in other words, you can’t increase the levy from what you said at the preliminary. Um, but you could potentially move budget items around or maybe if you wanted to find something with reserves, you could, you could include that, uh, but I think it’s a, it’s more of a levy, but just

01:20:41,370	to be safe, it’s, you know, as you said it is what it is to be safe, it’s, it’s better to, it’s easier to just say we have, we can only go down. Rather than we can go up. That’s kind of always been the practice.

01:20:55,200	So maybe it’s best to just continue with that. And I’m, I’ve gone through it. Quite extensively, but I have a lot of questions about maybe 10 of these different departments, which a lot of them are not even here yet, so they’re here tonight, so I don’t, I don’t want to, I’d rather wait till the next meeting and and peruse

01:21:11,300	it again and get him down so I know exactly what I wanted or what I consider. And then go from there, rather than analyze it today with the, some of the department heads are not here. Yeah, I got a pretty good list here too, um, Mr. Bachman.

01:21:27,200	You know, I think it’s a little disingenuous because basically what the legislature did with that 3% cap is incentivized. Municipalities to put a higher tax burden out, at least upfront on the citizens. So I just That just does not sit well with me and it’s, that’s something we’re not going to do.

01:21:49,200	So, um, And that was a discussion I had with a lot of legislators that. Um-hum. It’s like you realize what you’re doing, and I know a lot of political subdivisions that turned around and started uh figuring out how they can max out their budgets right away, and because of that 3% cap, so.

01:22:04,700	Hopefully, that’s something that doesn’t get addressed next session. And I think it will, but I just, it, it, it just does not sit well that that’s the way that they did this. So, Um You know, Rest assured that’s not the path we’re taking. Right.

01:22:25,930	Well, I, I could show you the emails that I sent to legislators Association of counties saying they don’t, you know, not a good idea because that what they’re making as the ceiling becomes the new floor for a budget you’d be those three years look pretty good, pretty high. Yeah. Then 3% of that rather than, uh, looking at reducing it, I don’t think. And this is me.

01:22:44,530	I don’t think at this time we’re in that formula because of our sales tax. I, I, I don’t think we’re held to that same standard because that formula that we would fall under, I don’t think exists with the state yet, so.

01:23:03,470	You know, that might be one of the changes that we can look to get done at the state level is, is recognizing where we were compared to where we are. Um-hum. You know, we’re, I mean, If, if the sales tax, and this is a great thing, I think the sales tax is just one of the best things.

01:23:21,170	However, If it, if it totally goofs up the budget process just because of this 1176, then that’s something we need to address. So, We’ll get there. Yeah. I didn’t, I didn’t see a need for making any changes yet on the preliminary budget because there’s obviously a lot of things that we’re looking at. Um I do have a question that has not been answered that C recreation. It’s good old city of recreation.

01:23:47,730	What do we do? What did we, what did we end up doing there? I thought. We were Um Gonna rescind that JPA. It never got brought back up. Personally, I wasn’t gonna bring it up because I believe in it. What we do we do? I guess that’s the biggest. Right. And so, they are collecting, there’s 0.

01:24:13,400	65 of a mil, uh, that goes to, um, Waterfront recreation, including our boat docks and their boat docks and parks and things along that, including security, uh, police force, uh, involvement in, in our, in those ramps as well along the, the river. Uh, OK, so I have a question though. They’re removing a boat, Doc.

01:24:40,030	I I’d really like to know what the Waterfront recreation looks like and anything on the water, we’re providing. with the sheriff’s department, security on the water within the city limits. Right, right. So The city doesn’t have a boat. Yeah, Fox Island. They don’t have a dive team and all that. Yeah. So when you’re talking What it, I, I’m.

01:25:08,870	Under the guise of waterfront activity that, that seems to be lacking, so. Well, here’s my. And, and you know where I sit on this from the past, so.

01:25:26,400	Now Well, my thoughts on it is uh uh city has its own, uh, levy authority, the Parks and Recs has its own levy authority. They do. This is like a hidden tax. Yeah. On the citizens and we just hand it off. In the way of some waterfront.

01:25:46,130	things so Now, my understanding of the original agreement came back when Burley County asked Parks and Rec to take care of Sily instead of having it within their own park district. That was my understanding as to where it was initiated. And how did that morph into a city? It used to be Burley County Park, So we asked them to manage it, and they then eventually took it over.

01:26:11,270	Uh, as one of theirs, but that’s where District but not the, not the recreation But the, the tax is called city recreation. And then it goes to the park district for their efforts along the riverfront. Again, I don’t see a lot of recreating along the riverfront on the city part, so.

01:26:34,200	I, I think that it’s just something that needs to be within the, uh, parks and Recs budget if it’s recreation or the city’s budget this city recreation category seems to me to be disingenuous. I just, I just think it’s wrong. And so I guess the question would be for the auditor if we just left it, you didn’t contact them about making a change to that.

01:26:52,900	To my understanding of the agreement, they have to be given a one year advance notice in order to get out of it. Correct. And that action was not taken by this commission last year.

01:27:12,670	Because I think those are funds that we could utilize for county residents in a much better fashion, whether It’s out at Missouri Valley Complex, for example, that would be a better use of those funds. So we might, we might want to look at that agreement if you, if you said there’s a one year opt out. Yeah. That might not be one year, it might be 6 months or we don’t know for sure.

01:27:28,700	If, if, if we got an agreement, copy or whatever somewhere. I, yeah, I can send it out if you’d like. Yeah. We sent it out last year as well, uh, for everybody to look at. Uh, there is a one-year clause. Uh, within that for us to opt out. Like I said, I think we should opt out, so.

01:27:48,930	Um, if you want to wait and read the agreement. Yeah, I, I, I would, please. OK. Mark, can you resend that? Yep. Thank you. For Lee You would, Mr. Chair. Yeah, um, so if we’re pulling this bond revenue off of our preliminary budget. Do we make that adjustment today? Yeah. In our expenditures, preliminary expenditures.

01:28:23,600	Or do we leave it for the final budget to Take care of all the details. I would prefer to leave it and deal, I mean, again, we don’t. Have to levy that.

01:28:38,600	So even if it sits there, I mean, I, I don’t think it should sit there if we’re not gonna use it, but even if it sits there. We can bring that levvey down. The levy that you see in, in the email that I sent out.

01:28:54,200	reflects the bond payment so that I can remove for the final budget, but I’d like to hash out the detail a little bit of the details with the Bond guys like, what if we do something? Next summer or something like that and we. We don’t have the, the, the payment levied. You see where I’m going with this.

01:29:15,870	When would that start? Would we have to start incurring interest da da da da da, um, type of thing, but certainly by the final, you know. We can Take care of it. OK. Media’s just going to, Jump on it and I thought we might as well remove it now. Nobody understands budgets the way Lee does and we do working through it every day. Um, but the general public is going to see. From listening to this meeting, that $3.

01:29:42,800	9 million in the general in this budget. And if it’s not something, if we’ve just made the motion to pay for it out of reserves. There’s no reason for it to be in the. Preliminary budget. Well, there’s the reason that he gave. Yeah. It’s the insurance, basically an insurance policy in the meantime. The final budget we can go down.

01:30:01,870	I think the public is more concerned about what that final number looks like. Um So We intend to go down, we will go down. So. Without a doubt, we. It’s just until we hit the final budget, I think it probably gives Lee a little bit more flexibility to make sure that time and time.

01:30:20,570	Yeah. Yes. About the only question I would have then, Lee is is does this budget, this preliminary budget, stay within that 3% cap. No, I don’t, well, it’s hard to say because um. We had Some items last year that were not on the budget. That probably Should have been um.

01:30:48,270	And so the total That you see at the bottom. is not really comparable with last year. Um You know, the general fund if you remove the Bond payment.

01:31:13,430	I don’t think it does, but again, the, the, I don’t think it, in fact, I know it doesn’t, it’s not within 3% of last year, but again, the. You know, HB 1176 is a cap on the property taxes, um, rather than on the, the budget. And so our Property taxes. Even those are not within 3% because as I said, we’ve, we’re shuffling, um. Some of those mills around over to the highway department.

01:31:40,600	Um, we’re, as far as I know, I mean, we’re, we’re totally compliant with the bill, we have a unique situation because we have just created. You know, whatever, whatever it is, 20 mLs. With sales tax, um. So we’re still within, we’re, we’re actually well below 3% if you look at the at the language of the bill.

01:32:04,130	Uh But our situation is just totally unique from what probably any other county’s dealing with. I mean, right now, probably, you know, like Cass County has to be within 3% because they don’t have another funding source. It’s all property taxes, um.

01:32:22,200	So no, this budget, I guess back to answer your question, no, we’re not within 3%, but we will be eventually. We have to be, we have to be by your. For Uh, I mean, again, we are within 3% of property taxes levied in dollars. Um By year 4, we’re gonna be in the same boat as everybody else. Meaning that um.

01:32:48,400	We won’t have this, this bandwidth created, that’ll all be that’ll that’ll scroll off the page. But for these next couple of years, we, we do have a unique situation where we can maybe take some time to react to this.

01:33:12,030	Which I think will take Pretty significant You know, meetings and planning and, and, and scenarios and so forth with, with the department heads as well as um the commission. Ms. Lee, we had talked during the budget, uh, meetings that, um, we, we had talked about creating a capital improvement fund. And because we didn’t have a capital improvement fund, we could put some dollars in there and stay within 1176.

01:33:40,230	The next question that came up is. If we have a, because we don’t have 0 in the capital improvement fund. If we’re using sales tax to pay the sheriff’s departments. Budget and now they have a zero balance. They have zero taxes levied for the sheriff’s department, the state’s attorney, and the jail.

01:34:03,730	At year 4, if the state doesn’t fix 1176. We can then increase above the 3% because those balances were at 0. Is that accurate or is that? A misinterpretation of my portion.

01:34:29,430	The The total, I think it would be the total general fund levy that would have to be at 0, and I don’t think we’re gonna get there. I have the, you know, the, the jail and the uh and the um sheriff and state’s attorney are a significant part of that, but just with our Just with our historical increases in expenditures, I don’t think by year 4 we’ll be at 0 in the general fund, uh, you know, if we’re at 0 in the capital

01:34:49,600	projects fund, we could. Go from 0 to the max in a given year, I mean, not saying we will, so there’s some. We can maybe create some have do some creative budgeting there, but I just don’t, when I look at it, I’m not, I don’t think we’ll

01:35:05,600	get down to 0 in the general fund. So what the bill allows as, as I understand from, you know, the, the trainings and stuff that we’ve been through is that if a given levy is at 0 in a year, then you can go anywhere from all the way up to

01:35:21,130	the max. There’s no cap, and the, the, the reason I was given that that was included was some of counties out West have no basically no tax because they’ve got all this oil, you know, revenue, and so they’re saying, well, when the oil Revenue goes away if we’re at 0 in the general fund and we

01:35:40,870	can only increase 3%, you know, 3% of zero is still 0, and so the, the state, you know, created this exception, uh, for those cases, but as I understand it, it’s on a levy by levy basis. OK.

01:36:10,200	Well, so the question is whether to adopt the preliminary budget and call for a final budget hearing on September 15th. Why not? Mr. Chair, I move that we adopt the preliminary budget as presented and call for a final budgeteering September 15th and we peruse these, uh, preliminary budget figures, religiously, so we can. Um-hum. Do the best we can to hold them down as much as we can.

01:36:31,530	That’s not part of the motion, but that’s a. That’s a wish list, I guess. It should be part of the movie. Well, clearly, clearly our intent is to reduce the preliminary budget. No question. We always do. Second. Motion to second. Any further discussion. Caro. Comm Munsen. No. Comm Bakken? Yes.

01:36:56,770	Comm Woodcock, yes, Chair Bittner carries. Hard work. I Thank you, Lee. Did you have something? For other business, yeah, yeah, yeah, two things, two things. One, is there anybody from Summit Carbon Solutions here? No. All right, thank you. Um, second of all, tomorrow, Our conversation and um you saw the preliminary agenda for the ETA discussion.

01:37:28,230	So, um, I was just curious if anybody had any thoughts of what that looks like. Uh, tomorrow’s more of an informational piece and just kind of. Start the ball rolling. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, 4:00 p.m. tomorrow. So, uh, yeah.

01:37:55,030	You saw the agenda, so any, Thoughts or anything you wanted to add into that? We just got to start somewhere. I mean back previously, uh, with the previous commission and on the city side, myself and another Comm who had plenty of conversations with the county and And We couldn’t get the ball rolling and I’m hoping that we can on the county side now, so 11 thought I’d, I’d

01:38:13,600	like to have a map of what the current ETA line is because of good luck. Well, that, that’s very important to get it moves and it doesn’t move and some say it’s a 1 mile and some say it’s a 3 mile, and Mitch, do you what’s the latest

01:38:27,530	statistics. Mitch, do you have the current map that you can provide tomorrow for that. Thank you. And big enough. Just in case the city does not. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, um, it, it’s the most gerrymandered thing, I know going to see in your life.

01:38:48,200	It is brutal, and it, it’s not fair to citizens either in city limits or in the ETA or beyond the ETA. It, it People don’t know where they’re at. Will we be able to find out what the state law allows. At that meeting tomorrow. We’ll get. Yeah, 4 o’clock, so. I will be remote. OK. But I will call.

01:39:11,200	Um We didn’t have, um, I was intending to provide some information that the highway department had provided to me. I don’t know if, if were you planning on making a presentation of any sort. What Yeah, we had all those drainage, you know, those three pages of. Wasn’t planning on tomorrow’s meeting. We can talk about it at that. OK.

01:39:37,030	Uh, like I said, uh, tomorrow is more informational cause I know there’s some misconceptions on some of the city commissioner’s side on what the ETA actually is, how it’s administered. Yeah.

01:39:54,330	Yeah, so, um, you know, I, I heard a Comm say that, well, either party can opt out, great, and then it goes to 4 miles by default, and that’s not in the best interests of the residents of either the ETA, the city limits or Burleigh County. So, um. So tomorrow is more of the informational piece, but uh. Uh, gentlemen, thank you. So. At least it’s a starting point. Yes. Anything else, um, for the good of Burley County. We are