MINUTES
Board of Directors Meeting
Jasper County Emergency Services
November 6th, 2018
Chairman Fries called the meeting to order at 12:07 p.m., at the Board office, 13870 Dispatch Lane, Carthage, MO as per public notice. Present in addition to Chairman Fries, Greg Dagnan, Ron Brewer, and Carl Francis. Representing staff was Executive Director April Ford and Office Support Clerk Amber Madison.
No representing public.
Review and Action of Minutes
Open minutes of the Board of Director’s Meeting on October 2nd 2018 were reviewed.
Director Dagnan motioned to approve the open meeting minutes for October 2nd 2018. Director Francis seconded the motion. Vote: 4-0. The motion was adopted.
Public Comment and Correspondence
No public comment
Financial Report and Payment of Bills
The sales tax for September was received on October 9th 2018 in the amount of $132,630.20. We have not received the sales tax check for November.
Total bills submitted for approval today $431,125.45
The Checkbook balance after payment of bills will be $27,043.00
Accounts receivable balance: $1,165.91. (Joplin Fiber, and Wright County purchased surplus items).
The Money Market account balance is $756,651.62.
Executive Director Ford read the financial report and explained that the Money Market account has a lower balance due to paying for Avtec radio equipment. The board and April discussed the sales tax distribution for the center and Director Francis mentioned that Webb City has been fortunate to have the increase in Amazon tax distribution.
Director Brewer motioned to approve the Financial Report with Payment of the Bills. Director Dagnan seconded the motion. Vote: 4-0. The motion was adopted.
The board had an open discussion in reference to the rules and regulations on tagging vehicles that have expired. They discussed what could be the penalties/fines for not tagging your car.
Executive Director Report
See Attached Report
Executive Director Ford reviewed her report highlighting that Jesse Merritt stopped mowing our yard and that Berry West with the Sarcoxie Fire Department has taken over the yard maintenance for the same price. Executive Director Ford stated that Amber is working on quotes for wallpaper removal and painting in the front office/eoc areas. Executive Director Ford
Stated that there is a new program that Jasper, Avilla, and Sarcoxie schools are using called Crises Go. Executive Director Ford is concerned with this product because it would require the dispatchers to have to have another screen up at all times and would be more to monitor.
Executive Director Ford shared with the board that she will be nominating two people for the employee of the year award at the appreciation banquet.
Executive Director Ford requested that House Bill 1456 be added ton the agenda under new business for today’s meeting.
Director Francis motioned to approve that the discussion of the House Bill 1456 be put on the agenda under new business for today’s meeting. Director Brewer seconded the motion. Vote: 4-0. The motion was adopted.
Unfinished Business
Radio Console Project
Executive Director Ford explained to the board that they have been working on the radio project at Jasco this week and that they will be building screens tomorrow. Executive Director Ford is working on getting quotes for microwave equipment and backup fiber.
Radio System Consulting and NexEdge System Work
Executive Director Ford stated that the process of moving the Carthage towers to Jasco has been put on hold. Executive Director Ford stated that they are still wanting to do more programming and field testing of the equipment before they make a decision on moving any of the towers.
Text-to-911
Executive Director Ford stated that Jasco has been getting ready for text to 911. She stated that T-Mobile is ready now and that as soon as all of the other cell phone providers are ready for testing, we will test with all carriers.
Building Property and Liability Insurance Renewal
Executive Director Ford explained that she put this back on the agenda for today because at the previous meeting the Southwest insurance premium was approved, but it did not have the $38.00 annual charge for terrorism on it. Executive Director Ford advised the board that she has paid the bill. This was approved and there was no questions.
New Business
Security Pledge
Executive Director Ford presented the securities pledge held at the Country Club Bank as of September 30th, 2018. In the book amount of $1,525,385.84 and market amount of $1,522,335.00.
Director Francis motioned to approve the Bank Security Pledge. Director Brewer seconded the motion. Vote: 4-0. The motion was adopted.
Tower mapping projects Re-done
Executive Director Ford stated that during the tower climb they found issues with a previous map that was done to the tower. Executive Director Ford stated that she had a new mapping survey of the tower done and they will be cleaning up the tower during the next tower climb for the finalization of the radio console project.
Budget Amendment 2018
Executive Director Ford will bring the budget amendment to the December board meeting.
Health, Dental, Vision Insurance Premiums
Executive Director Ford advised the board that the Health insurance premiums increased by 8 percent. Delta Dental did not increase and VSP increase very little. Executive Director Ford stated that she met with Director Francis and discussed the plans and the prices. Executive Director Ford had the board look at the report that Beimdiek sent over that had the current premiums and the new premiums, as well as options for change. Executive Director Ford stated that the first and second plans are what we are currently “grandfathered” in to and that if we opt out of those plans they will not be available in the future. Executive Director Ford went over the plans with the Board that Lorie from Beimdiek sent over. Director Ford stated that if we go with 2AK or 3AK plans then the co-pays and the out of pocket expense goes up and that the premiums would save the center a couple of thousand dollars. Executive Director Ford does not recommend the ACA plans. Executive Director Ford’s recommendation is to stay with the current plans that we have and to take the 8 percent increase. Director Dagnan stated that his departments insurance plan increased by 18 percent. Director Francis stated that going to self-insurance is the best thing that the Webb City has ever done. Self-insuring is what Director Francis recommends for the future. Director Dagnan stated that he covers 75 percent of the employees’ health care and that he checked into self-insurance before but it was not a good fit for Carthage. Director Francis explained the health insurance that they have and the way that self-insurance works. Director Francis stated that he hasn’t had an increase for 6 years on self-insurance in Webb City and that it is worth looking into for Jasco. Director Francis said the cost savings wasn’t enough to justify the move.
Director Francis motioned to keep the current insurance plans. Director Brewer seconded the motion. Vote: 4-0. The motion was adopted.
Wage scale modification 2019
Executive Director Ford went over a wage scale study that Stone County completed for the Region D PSAP’s. Executive Director Ford stated that our starting wage is $13.00 an hour and then they increase when they have completed training. Executive Director Ford recommends that we remove step A and bump the entire wage scale 2.5% and add a 2.5% merit to January instead of having a July merit for a total of a 5% increase to the scale in January 2019. Executive Director Ford stated that the support staff would only receive the 2.5% increase with the exception of the Office Support Clerk, who acts as a TCOII while working in the communications room and she recommended her scale change with the TCOII. Executive Director Ford suggested that we move the performance reviews to January instead of July and this would keep all of the raises due at the same time of the year if COLA is recommended in the future (2020 and beyond), instead of twice a year. Executive Director Ford stated that this will make budgeting easier, as we have to anticipate January changes and merit at different times currently though out the year. Executive Director Ford stated that this will increase the budget for 2019 by about $60,000.00, but this increase includes the raises, and the health insurance increase. Director Francis stated that both he and April went over this proposal and this is the only way that they can see this working.
Director Brewer stated that he did have a question about this, but that he does accept this wage scale increase. Chairman Fries advised that we would come back to his question because a board member needed to leave.
Director Francis motioned to approve the changes to the wage scale and the increase of 2.5% and the 2.5% merit increase to be moved to January instead of in July. Director Dagnan seconded the motion. Vote: 4-0. The motion was adopted.
NeoTech Contract
Executive Director Ford stated that the NeoTech Contract is up for renewal and had a slight increase, but they are taking over spam filter and some software in there, so they are actually breaking even on previous expenditures.
Director Dagnan motioned to approve the new NeoTech Contract. Director Francis seconded the motion. Vote: 4-0. The motion was adopted.
Benefits Modification- Policy Change Recommended (vacation/sick)
Executive Director Ford is recommending that we remove the personal time policy. She stated that we could allow a new employee to start accruing sick and vacation time after a full month of employment and it would not leave any reason for personal time. The new employees would not use vacation time until after they were fully released from training, unless otherwise approved by the Executive Director. She explained the reason for the original change back in 2010 and how it is no longer a concern.
Director Fries motioned to approve the policy change. Director Dagnan seconded the motion. Vote: 4-0. The motion was adopted.
At 12:42 pm Director Dagnan left the meeting and the meeting was adjourned due to a loss of quorum.
Open discussion continued with Director Brewer, Director Francis, Chairman Fries, and Executive Director Ford.
Chairman Fries opened the floor for Director Brewer so that he could asked his question. Director Brewer stated that he had a question about where the figures came from on FICA/SUTA estimation for the 2018 budget. Executive Director Ford explained her calculations and how she over projected the numbers due to the increase of staffing and the anticipation of turn over and extensive overtime. Chairman Fries also helped in the explanation. Director Brewer also stated that the projections for the sales tax distribution report needed to be changed so that it showed what the 4-year average would be. That we would need to change the calculations to only calculate the months that we have received a check for when the report is presented. OSM – Amber Madison took note of this and will modify the report accordingly.
Budget 2019
Executive Director Ford stated that she would bring this information to the December meeting.
MOU with City of Carthage on Tower Equipment
Executive Director Ford stated that this is on hold for now-she did a recap for the board members that were not at the last meeting. Explaining that a suggestion was to pull the radio equipment off the water towers in Carthage, and to move the north tower to the Jasper County Jail and the south tower to Jasco. If this happens then there would need to be a MOU completed for the Sheriff’s Office, as well.The board had an open discussion about the expense it would cost to put up another tower.
Superion CAD/CAD to CAD with Newton County
Executive Director Ford explained that Superion will continue to support their product for fixes, but they will release new versions with enhancements in the future. She further explained that they merged with another company and the plan moving forward for that company does not have Superion as the flagship CAD and they will eventually have to move to another CAD. Executive Director Ford will start contacting CAD vendors in 2019 just to find out what’s new. She explained she anticipates a change in possibly 2022..
House bill 1456
Executive Director Ford explained that the Department of Revenue originally said that they would stop collecting the current 9-1-1 sales tax, in lieu of the newly pass 3% fee on pre-paid cell phones. Department of Revenue is now saying that they will not be sending out notices to businesses and that it would be the counties responsibility to notify them to remove the 9-1-1 sales tax and initiate the new 3% fee on all sales of pre-paid devices and minutes. There is an opt out deadline to this new law, by Nov 15th. Executive Director Ford explained that she has been in contact with Jasco’s attorney, Frank Foster and he has stated that if we opt out of the collection of the pre-paid fee then we will not be eligible for any 9-1-1 grants or funding in the future. Frank Foster recommended that Jasco stay in and put any revenue received by this new funding fee into an escrow account until this is all sorted out. Executive Director Ford stated that some counties have opted out and some have not. She further stated that their legislative taskforce is working on clean up of the language in the law to overcome this obstacle and there are other attorneys involved. She said that at some point, we need to review our current 9-1-1 sales tax and determine if we will need to ask the voters for an increase if revenue begins to decrease with the online sales increase and more businesses closing. Executive Director Ford’s recommendation is to stay in and if we start collecting revenue, then we follow Frank Foster’s advice and separate it in another account until this is cleared up. Since the Board originally said they wanted to stay in at a previous meeting, Executive Director Ford inquired if they wanted a special meeting to discuss the options of opting out. They declined the request.
Personnel and Training
Executive Director Ford advised the board that they had a trainee that didn’t make it through. Executive Director Ford advised the board that we are losing employees during training and that the Training Coordinator will be meeting with all trainers to discuss further improvements. Executive Director Ford stated that we did offer a full time position to a person with experience, but that he turned down the position because of the pay.
The meeting adjourned at 1:01 pm.
The next Board Meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, December 4th, 2018 at 12:00 p.m.
On the_________________day of ______________________2018____
I, Jeff Fries, Chairman _____________________________________________certify these Jasper County Emergency Services Board Meeting Minutes for___________________________. They have been reviewed and are accurate.
On the_________________day of_____________________2018______
I, Carl Francis, Director __________________________ attest the Jasper County Emergency Services Board Meeting Minutes for _______________________________. They have been reviewed and are accurate.
