Meeting of January 4, 2022
Grayson County Fiscal Court Meeting 01.04.2022 · Watch on YouTube ↗
Summary
The Grayson County Fiscal Court held a brief meeting to start 2022, opening with prayer and the pledge of allegiance before moving through a series of routine approvals: minutes, bills, budget transfers for both the county treasurer and the jailer, and a declaration of surplus property for the old East Main/Market Street buildings so they can eventually be torn down or repurposed.
The court also approved an amended order adopting roads onto the county road list, addressing a mileage correction needed for Whispering Hills Boulevard so the Lincoln Trail Area Development District could process it properly.
Much of the meeting's discussion (outside of formal motions) centered on recent tornado damage in western Kentucky. Magistrates discussed sending road and jail crew resources to help hard-hit counties like Bremen, Dawson Springs, and Ohio County, coordinated through Judge Executive contact with emergency management. There was significant conversation about improving tornado preparedness in Grayson County, including creating a registry of storm shelter locations, evaluating and potentially adding more tornado sirens, and exploring grant funding for public storm shelters similar to one built in Radcliff.
Local damage was also discussed, including significant destruction to boat storage sheds and farm buildings owned by local residents (Becky Mercer and the Talley family) and damage to the county airport, which road crews helped clean up within a few days. The judge executive noted that the state is adding Grayson County to a disaster declaration, which may allow affected residents to seek FEMA assistance.
The meeting concluded with no old business from magistrates and a motion to adjourn, with several magistrates expressing gratitude to road department crews and community members for their help supporting neighboring counties affected by the tornadoes.
Agenda (17)
- 2:19
Approval of minutes
The court approved the minutes from the previous meeting.
- 2:30
Approval of payment of bills
The court approved payment of bills.
- 2:38
Approval of treasurer's budget transfers
The court approved the treasurer's budget transfers as presented.
- 2:49
Approval of jailer's payment of bills
The court approved payment of the jailer's bills.
- 3:00
Approval of jailer's budget transfers
The court approved the jailer's budget transfers as presented.
- 3:10
Declare East Main/Market Street property surplus
The court declared the East Main/Market Street park property buildings surplus so they can be torn down or otherwise disposed of, while the county retains the land.
- 3:45
Amend order adopting roads on county road list
The court approved an amended order adding correct mileage information for Whispering Hills Boulevard and other streets needed for state/Lincoln Trail Area Development District processing.
- 4:59
Updates from fiscal court committees
Magistrates noted committees had recently met and things were in good order, with little new activity due to weather.
- 5:11
New business: road hot spots and winter weather
Magistrate Jason reminded everyone to report road hot spots ahead of expected snow so crews could address them.
- 5:35
Discussion of tornado season preparedness
Magistrates discussed improving preparedness for upcoming tornado season given recent storm damage in the region.
- 5:59
Assistance to tornado-damaged neighboring counties
The court discussed sending road and jail crew help, coordinated with emergency management, to counties like Bremen, Dawson Springs, and Ohio County following tornado damage.
- 7:01
Storm shelter location registry proposal
A suggestion was raised to create a list of homeowner storm shelter locations so they could be checked after a disaster, to be coordinated through the emergency management director.
- 7:58
Public storm shelter and grant funding discussion
The court discussed looking into grants to build public storm shelters similar to one in Radcliff, given a possible shift in tornado alley toward western Kentucky.
- 10:07
Tornado siren evaluation
The emergency management director is getting a bid to add more tornado sirens in the county after residents reported not hearing warnings during a recent storm.
- 12:10
FEMA disaster declaration and local damage update
The judge executive reported the county is being added to a state disaster declaration, allowing residents with storm damage, including boat sheds and farm buildings, to potentially seek FEMA assistance.
- 14:13
Old business
No old business was raised by magistrates.
- 14:29
Recognition of road crew and community support
Magistrates thanked the road department crew and community members for helping with tornado relief efforts in western Kentucky counties.
Motions & votes (8)
- 2:23
passedApprove minutes from the previous meeting
Moved by Damon · seconded by Neal · unanimous
- 2:33
passedApprove payment of bills
Moved by Kevin · seconded by Damon · unanimous
- 2:43
passedApprove treasurer's budget transfers as presented
Moved by Neal · seconded by Kevin · unanimous
- 2:53
passedApprove jailer's payment of bills
Moved by Damon · seconded by Neil · unanimous
- 3:05
passedApprove jailer's budget transfers as presented
Moved by Kevin · seconded by Neil · unanimous
- 3:41
passedDeclare East Main/Market Street property surplus
Moved by Neal · seconded by Kevin · unanimous
- 4:52
passedApprove amended order adopting roads on the county road list with corrected mileage for Whispering Hills Boulevard
Moved by Kevin · seconded by Neil · unanimous
- 16:17
passedMotion to adjourn
Moved by Damon · seconded by Neil · unanimous
Transcript (14 segments)
- 0:00
[Music] thank you for everything you've done for us before we ask you please forgive us of our sins
- 1:13
lord as just new year comes about we ask that you be with us in our decisions that we make as a group will it be godly decisions to actually be with those families that um that are overseas or to actually be with our soldiers that are serving our country and protecting us each and every day i also ask you to be with our first responders lord and the families of those police officers and first responders that have suffered loss in the line of duty and elsewhere lord we ask that you please be with us throughout this new year and uh lord we thank you for the uh uh 2021 as all of us made it through and for those that didn't well we had to be with those families in jesus name we pray amen i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all all right first thing we got on agenda approved minutes from the previous meeting i'll make it my motion by damon second by neo all in favor
- 2:26
aye and i will be voting for all right uh next we have approved payment of bills motion by kevin thank you second by damon all in favor next we have approved treasure uh approved treasures budget transfers as presented i'll make it motion motion by neal second second by kevin all in favor next we have approved jailor's payment of bills i like that motion promotion by name oh second and second by neil all in favor next we have approved jailor's budget transfers as presented to make a motion motion by kevin second second by neil all in favor next we have to declare uh the east main property uh east market street park property up here at surplus as the buildings we purchased up here to declare them surplus whether we're going to tear them down or what we're going to do with them and get rid of those so of course we'll be keeping the property but we have to declare them surplus if we're going to tear those bills
- 3:39
motion by neal second second by kevin all in favor next we have approved amend order adopting roads on the county road list jeremy's not with us here today we have that yeah they do it's the green property they they needed to put mileage from what point default point the state yeah we got that okay so you all got that yeah oh okay that's whispering hill boulevard okay all right yeah the only thing they uh it was that at the last meeting we uh approved for whispering hills boulevard and the other streets there uh that we need to the state or lincoln trail area development district needed the mileage and we had sent kenny and steve out to get the mileage so that's the only adjustment to that is the actual mileage so need to need a motion to approve that
- 4:54
motion by kevin thank you second by neil all in favor aye and updates from physical court committees we've actually met before and everything seems to be in good order don't have a lot going on right now because of the weather so new business norman jason supposed to be a little snow i think thursday i'll just remind everybody if you have any hot spots that we can help with let us know we'll get crew out to work on that thank you jason yeah kevin no anything no not a lot but maybe since we've had all the storms in the area is there anything that we can improve things with over the next few months we're going into a tornado season this is really early early on is there anything we can bring up and discuss about that maybe the later date this is just a pre yeah uh when we got with tony of course uh i i had i talked with keiko about helping some of these other counties uh to send and i got with jason and we was going to send some of the jail
- 6:08
crew down and about three quarters of our road crew down to help uh bremen dawson springs ohio county i mean they've got still got a lot of damage and of course they really wanted to coordinate that with caico and and the reason is is because of course norman and them's already been down there y'all been down there what month or well we're not down there right now but we've had several going down there for a few weeks he was at princeton right uh yes princeton and then we went to uh dawson springs as well yeah they've already sent deputies down there to help law enforcement had called and requested help because people were stealing stuff and and uh rambling through you know people's belongings in the tornado debris but uh something that's been brought up to me it's been several of my clientele brought this up people that had storm shelters you know not in their homes but out behind their homes nobody knows the locations of them would it be somewhere another we could fix a list that those people could report for the position of their storm sellers are so they could be checked on after a major catastrophe yeah several people if the homeowner requests that yeah
- 7:22
and these are requests from what i've seen so far and maybe if people knew they could that's something that we need to get with tony with emergencies and let him know because tony has a meeting every month with the fire department so he's sort of the liaison between all the departments in the county so that would be he would be the person that we need to contact to have that happen and then that way all the other fire departments would have a list of that as well but i also told tony to start looking for grants i don't know you all probably haven't seen it but radcliffe has got a nice storm shelter have you seen it jason have you seen that you've seen a public storm shelter yeah yeah it's nice and i mean it can be used for you know a shelf displacement shelter also so as far as you know say we had a flood or you know anything any kind of catastrophic event so uh that's something that we're actually looking into to try to we'd have to figure out where we got of course we've got you know radcliff's got radcliffe you know we've got uh we've got a lot of communities we've got you know big cliff team we've got caneyville we've got clarkson uh you know falls rough you know we've got different areas in
- 8:35
the community that we'd have to strategically place something you know to try to but it doesn't happen oh yeah yeah because uh i know some of the other counties i know marshall county and judge neal down there i think they're they're already in the process of trying to get something something done of course you don't really you don't really think about it until it happens we've been fortunate but i'm not a i'm not a weather buff by no means but i try to keep up with what's going on but i i've noticed on course they i'm sure they don't know they're they're most of that stuff so educated guests but uh they said that tornado alley has shifted have y'all seen that yeah where it shifted from like you know kansas oklahoma missouri and it had shifted into western kentucky have y'all seen that matt and i mean i've seen i thought oh man that's great so if that is true i mean preparations probably need to be at least yeah i mean that's something where we can look into federal federal funds to try to uh federal or state funds for that matter to try to uh