Meeting of March 14, 2023
Fiscal Court Meeting - March 14th, 2023 · Watch on YouTube ↗
Summary
Hardin County Fiscal Court – March 14, 2023
The court held a routine meeting covering committee reports, one ordinance, one resolution, and a large consent agenda. The Hardin County Conservation District presented its FY2023-24 budget and plan of work, including scholarship programs, a tree giveaway on April 1, and the dead animal removal program, and donated a $7,500 check to the county.
Department heads reported on planning and zoning activity (including approval of an RV park at the former Glendale Children's Home and a 72-space RV park on South Dixie), engineering/public works statistics on erosion control, code enforcement, recycling, and shredding events, and road department work including pothole patching and storm cleanup from a major wind event in early March that knocked out power to over 14,000 NRECC members and generated roughly a thousand 911 calls in a few hours.
The court gave second and final reading to Ordinance 3295, a budget amendment addressing grants, an opioid settlement of $642,000, and other housekeeping items, which passed unanimously. It also approved Resolution 48 authorizing the county's participation in a second phase of opioid litigation settlement funds, which passed unanimously.
A large consent agenda was approved unanimously, covering March claims and payroll, an executive order authorizing two magistrates to perform marriages, an intergovernmental agreement with Fort Knox/Army Cadet Command for EMS training support, financial transfers, a copier contract, road department job reclassifications, a public relations officer title change, EMS personnel approvals, and renewal of the EMS medical director's agreement.
Magistrates and staff praised first responders, 911 dispatchers, road crews, and utility linemen for their response to the recent windstorm. Upcoming committee meetings and a shredding/e-scrap event schedule were announced, and the meeting adjourned with the next regular meeting set for March 28.
Agenda (14)
- 2:17
Roll call and invocation
County Clerk Brian Smith called the roll of magistrates and Judge Executive Tall; Magistrate Chris Yates gave the invocation followed by the Pledge of Allegiance.
- 4:52
Approval of minutes from February 28 meeting
The court reviewed and approved the minutes from the previous meeting.
- 6:07
Conservation District informational presentation
Vincent Thompson presented the Hardin County Conservation District's FY2023-24 budget and plan of work, discussed the tree giveaway and dead animal removal program, and presented a $7,500 check to the county.
- 13:57
Planning department report
Adam King reported on conditional use permits, zone changes including the former Glendale Children's Home RV park project and Royal Oaks Mobile Home Park RV park, building permit statistics, and comprehensive plan update meetings.
- 21:58
Engineering/Public Works department report
Stephanie Gibbons reported on dead animal removal statistics, erosion sediment control inspections, code enforcement cases, recycling totals, and upcoming shredding and e-scrap events.
- 28:15
Road department report
Michael Steck, filling in for Dwight Morgan, reported on encroachment permits, sign installations, pothole patching, storm debris cleanup, and salt usage during a January snow event.
- 35:46
Discussion of windstorm emergency response
Judge Tall and magistrates commended 911 dispatchers, EMS, road crews, sheriff's office, and utility companies for their response to a major windstorm that caused widespread power outages and a surge in emergency calls.
- 39:15
Citizens concerns or comments
The floor was opened for citizen comments; none were offered.
- 39:45
Second and final reading of Ordinance 3295 (budget amendment)
The ordinance addressed grants, election equipment funding, a $642,000 opioid settlement, and other budget housekeeping items; it passed unanimously.
- 41:19
Resolution 48 - opioid settlement participation
The court voted to join a second phase of opioid litigation settlement involving several pharmaceutical and retail companies; passed unanimously.
- 42:58
Consent agenda
A bundled set of items including March claims/payroll, marriage officiant authorization, Fort Knox EMS training agreement, financial transfers, copier contract, road department job reclassification, PR officer title change, EMS personnel and medical director approvals, and committee meeting minutes; approved unanimously.
- 48:14
County Attorney audit report
County Attorney Jenny Oldham reported that her office's grievance procedure audit had no exceptions.
- 48:48
Magistrate comments
Magistrates gave closing comments, including thanks to first responders and utility crews for windstorm response, and reminders about committee meeting agenda procedures.
- 53:26
Adjournment
Judge Tall announced the next meeting date and the court voted to adjourn.
Motions & votes (5)
- 4:52
passedApprove minutes from the February 28 meeting
unanimous
- 40:50
passedSecond and final reading approval of Ordinance 3295, Series 2022 (budget amendment number five including grants and opioid settlement)
Moved by Sue · unanimous, all magistrates voted yes
- 42:38
passedApprove Resolution 48 relating to participation in opioid litigation settlement
unanimous, all magistrates voted yes
- 47:43
passedApprove consent agenda including claims, executive order 4, resolutions 45-53 and committee minutes
unanimous, all magistrates voted yes
- 53:26
passedMotion to adjourn the meeting
Transcript (43 segments)
- 1:01
to begin just I want to say good afternoon to everyone that's that's here and welcome um I want to welcome all of our elected officials and our department heads that are here and I appreciate you all being here of course all of our citizens that are you know interested in your County government and what's going on so I appreciate everyone here today and we've we've got I think a fairly uneventful agenda today but you never know so it's what makes it exciting so we'll we'll we're going to jump into this and this is the um March 14th 2023 Hardin County Fiscal Court regular voting meeting and just a note uh before we start the meeting the cell phones if you'll take those just check those real quick make sure they're turned off or on stunned whatever you need to do there all right so we will call this meeting to order and we'll start with our roll call by Brian Smith our County Clerk thank you
- 2:15
Squire Clem here Squire and Hicks here Squire Muse here Squire Pennington here Squire Saltzman here Squire Thompson here Square Whitehead here Squire Yates here judge tall here so let's go ahead and stand for invocation by Magister Chris Yates in pledgeable Larry Hicks father we thank you for this day that you have given us to conduct business of the county we ask that you watch over us and gives us the wisdom and knowledge to make wise decisions for the veterans of the county we also ask that you watch over our First Responders and our men and women who are fighting for our freedom at home and abroad in your name we pray amen amen pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty liberty and justice for our own thank you okay I don't have a lot of opening
- 3:31
comments today just again thanking everyone for being here and participating a quick review of the agenda today we will have the typical approval of our minutes from the last meeting we do have informational item from our Conservation District that will that we'll have today and then we'll have our department office reports and then some written reports that are included in the packet and any citizen concerns or comments and we have two we have one ordinance and one resolution to vote on today separately and then we have quite a few resolutions uh an executive order and a few things like that in the consent agenda that we will vote on and then and then we'll have some comment time at the end so that's the agenda there are a few copies left up here I believe in that box if anybody wants wants an agenda to to follow along okay so let's go ahead and
- 4:46
um look at our our minutes from the last meeting which was February 28th and so do I hear a motion to approve second so promotion in second any discussion about these minutes hearing none we're gonna have a roll call please Squire Clem yes Squire Hicks yes Squire Muse yes scar Pennington yes Squire Saltzman yes Squire Thompson yes Squire Whitehead yes Squire Gates yes judge tall yes motion passes all right so we'll move on then to the informational item and this is a Hardin County Conservation District fiscal year 2023-24 budget and plan of work and I believe Vincent you're going to uh fill us in on that a little bit so thank you for being here Vincent Thompson well hello Mr judge executive all members of Fiscal Court good to see you all again many of y'all got to see a couple of nights ago and I hope you all enjoyed yourself those that weren't able to attend our banquet on Monday you have an open invitation next year to come to it several new faces on the panel but uh happy to see you there and hopefully we
- 5:59
can work together in the near future so my name is Vincent Thompson as a Mr College just said I'm the chairman of the Hardin County Conservation District and we've got our budget and our plan of work and we also have a surprise uh offering that uh it's always well accepted in years past of the dead animal removal project and we have the check ready to be taken care of and passed over so if we can get a photo at the end of this I would sure appreciate that oh I'm just presenting the budget and our plan of work we do each of them one at a time but uh make sure there's no questions that you all have Okay um in a it also I've heard you're coming earlier if you need some excitement next time I can bring my guitar so that's up to you all that might be fun no question to entertain on the budget as you can see well we're uh we do a very good job in my opinion of uh being a absolutely very fiscally conscious Organization for our government and we have a lot of programs that many of you all saw at the bank would give it away a lot of awards to uh students in the county uh give away 12 scholarships so that's two of our main drivers of the county also uh just getting conservation
- 7:13
and boots on the ground to uh make sure there are farmers and even our our Urban dwellers have uh some access to that we have the tree giveaway coming up this is Marsha Butterworth our 49er on finish all over not we're having our tree go away April the 1st and it will be at the extent at the Hard Candy Farmers Market um I can't remember what varieties we had this year but uh make sure you come out and at least get a couple for your yard that's another big project we have any questions or any um comments anyone has no fooling about the trees on April 1st no food it's not a joke I promise you they're going to be giving away a lot of them will be giving away thank you I read through the report and everything and uh you know it's amazing how much you guys actually get done with the amount of money that you have we uh yeah it's it's impressive so um I appreciate you guys very much appreciate the compliments and uh the people that serving the budget committee work very hard to we look at it very closely Blind by line and I'm sure you as you all do um but we uh we do our best well thank you all right and I will go ahead and pass this check along and like I said at the end if y'all don't mind to stick around for a
- 8:26
photo opportunity it'd be great yeah we'll do that all right thank you now for anybody else who comes up here and speaks that's the way actually bring it over here instead of over there this way I guess I could have divided up all the way in different ways and y'all just pulled it together or something no just tea seven thousand five hundred dollars that helps thank you thank you if I could say one more thing about that program as well um so I'm sorry to take more time if anybody's got more steps to say um I've recently been elected to the State Board Kentucky Association of the conservation districts and that we get a grant program so some of that money comes from County taxpayers some of that comes from a grant program that's been inputted with the state and that program is uh fast drying up as many programs are we're seeing a lot of that was established way back when with the tobacco settlement so uh in the coming years there's going to be some challenges but as you see we when we know what we're doing we're dealing with the money and we're very conscious of it so I'm hoping that maybe in the coming years the county can uh get with us and we can really get some local programs
- 9:39
going for just this ordeal because dead animal removal is invaluable to all of us every County citizen yeah I know the the price is going up every year do you know how much you're charging right now for a dead animal so it seems so Doug's Towing is what it's doing that through they've got a separate entity of course but they're the ones that are actually doing the program and I think how it goes is they draw from the funds that the county has and has those funds deplete the amount goes up incrementally but I don't know the exact amount yeah I mean it wasn't like a massive amount no it was under a hundred dollars I believe correct the last time I looked so it's it's really good program and much better than taking the animal back to the sinkhole back which is back part of the farm which is a terrible thing to do but people that that don't uh yes yes please please County engineer and judge you and I haven't had a chance to talk about this yet but the dead animal removal program has been something Hardin County has been doing for quite some time in in