00:00:07,370	We have Chaplain. Welcome. Thank you. Appreciate that. Let’s stand as we pray. And then we say the Pledge of Allegiance. Heavenly father, we just are so grateful for today. We thank you for the cool weather that’s coming in, but we certainly need the moisture. And we’re asking you to pour that down upon us.

00:00:30,700	Be with this meeting today and all the things that need to be talked about and decided on, I, uh, pray that we we receive your guidance today. Be with these commissioners they serve and all these that are here that are attending.

00:00:48,100	Uh, may we just, uh, do what needs to be done for this county, be with our first responders out there as they continue to watch closely for, uh, grass fires and many other things that happen in this dry heat. And, uh, do this all in Jesus name. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands.

00:01:10,070	One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Appreciate it. Commissioner Bakken knew. Let the county board first. Yeah. Uh, calling the meeting the Weed Board. Order, please. Uh, roll. Roll call. Commissioner Munson here. Commissioner Woodcox here. Commissioner Bitner here. Commissioner Schwab. Chair. Bakken here. Uh, approval of the agenda, please. Motion to approve.

00:01:52,000	Second motion and second. Any further discussion? Hearing none. Call the roll, please. Commissioner Schwab. Yes, Commissioner Woodcox. Yes, Commissioner Bitner. Yes, Commissioner Munson. Yes. Chair. Bitner or sorry. Bakken. That’ll be the first time. Yes. Uh, consideration of the. May 1826, 2026 meeting minutes. What are your wishes? Move! Approval. Second. Motion. Second.

00:02:21,430	Any discussion? Hearing none. Call the roll, please. Commissioner Bitner. Yes, Commissioner Woodcox. Yes. Commissioner Schwab. Yes, Commissioner Munson. Yes. Chair. Bakken. Yes. Uh, this is public comment for Weed Board concerns. Anybody wishing to speak concerning the Weed Board. First call. Second call for public comment. Third and final call for public comment.

00:02:47,200	Public comment is now closed with that next agenda item. Weed Board officer Johnson. Good evening. Members. Chair Bakken. Just, uh, I’d like to come in in July, beginning of August, right here to just kind of give you guys an update on what’s going on out there.

00:03:07,300	Um, the the, uh, chemical purchases and, uh, has been going real well. I was, uh, distributing from April 30th through June 25th. It’s close to about the same number of people. Uh, for purchasing this year. Uh, as well as the landowners, uh, getting chemical, uh, applicant on their property, on the noxious weeds. That number’s real. Consistent with last year. Also.

00:03:32,970	Um, a lot of the landowners are still interested in doing some fall application on their spurge areas because they’ve, uh, talked to other neighbors and whatnot and seen a real good, uh, outcome with the second application. So. And, uh, like I mentioned in here, um, the RW this year, we’re doing the high noon and toward on liberate yet.

00:03:53,230	Um, we’re going to take in, uh, use some E2 on the county pits and this, uh, this fall here because of the, the, uh, kosher and whatnot. Most all the pits have been operated with this, uh, uh, this high noon toward on liberate. But this fall, the coaches, it’s some tough stuff to get rid of.

00:04:13,930	So we’re going to do some E2 on that with the rain. Liberate with it, and then, uh, now that, uh, it’s the weed board, I can tell you what we did with beetles this year instead of last meeting. Uh, we ordered our I ordered, uh, uh, beetles to, uh. What? The company of Montana. It’s weed busters.

00:04:36,500	I ordered in 15 snow, 18 applications. There’s 1500 beetles in each. Each container. Um, and they’re both put on some private land. Some land up by wing. And then there’s some also on another landowners up on 1804.

00:04:56,770	Um, hoping that within time we’ll be able to get a collection site closer to town here where, um, both landowners don’t want to open to the public, but we officers of the, of the state can come in and do their collecting and take back to their counties. That’s what I’m working on in this area here.

00:05:12,900	And then, uh, all the townships have been sprayed, um, in their first run. We’re actually running around now tidying up some of the, some of the thistle was later, of course, and like it usually comes in that June or July August time. But we’re finding a lot of younger stuff now coming back so that, uh, we’re out replicating that.

00:05:31,970	And we’re also operating on the forbs that are in problem areas. Um, like your Chinese elm and stuff that are growing up on your corners and where they’re going to hold back, you know, snow on certain roadways and stuff.

00:05:48,800	So we’re we’re allocating some of those areas to, um, we’ve got yeah, we’ve just got a few miles of, uh, the, the rows are done. But for the MnDOT, we’re going to we’re back up on 14 because that was new construction last year and the year before. So there’s a lot of a lot of growth there. And uh, so that’s where we’re at there. We’re still under budget for the MnDOT as of right now.

00:06:10,530	Um, they got there 35,000 is what they budget for it. So we’re still underneath that. Um, and then just a little bit, uh, the symposiums coming up here in August the 24th through the 26th. I’ll be attending that.

00:06:29,730	Um, we got, um, I didn’t I could have added the portfolio for it, but we got a number of speakers that are coming out of state. Um, just to give some, you know, clues of what they’re doing and whatnot and what’s what they have for weeds. We all have the same, just similar.

00:06:49,170	But then there’s going to be, um, up there, there’s going to be a spray clinic up there, and weed identification and different things like that. So and this is held only every two years. So and that was the application was actually part of the bills that were agreed on tonight. So I’m entered up for that. So but that’s, that’s what I have for just a little update.

00:07:09,270	Um any questions from any gentleman? Mister Schwab, there are other. Deals coming up. Uh, they seem to pop. Up a. Ticket that nobody has a problem with. Uh, Darren going to them so he doesn’t have to get permission all the time or whatever. You know, continuing it and stuff.

00:07:39,400	So I think that’s just consensus and he’s promised me he wouldn’t stop at the Long Branch on the way. He didn’t say anything. I’m not going to comment on that one. I just I can’t do that. So I assume, you know. So and.

00:08:04,700	Actually just for protocol, I think I’d be more inclined to put it to a vote rather than a consensus and put a dollar amount of, of continuing education on that. Darren. Typically, what what’s the expense for? Well, like the simple year, the symposium is 300 bucks for just a person to go.

00:08:21,430	So I’m the one, you know, the only one going up there for for Burleigh County, of course. But, um, the conference that’s that there ties in with the membership to NWC. I can’t remember exactly what that is. I mean, it’s not a thousand bucks. It’s probably five, seven or whatever. Right in there. 100 bucks for that.

00:08:44,200	But, um, in that I mean, I thought about, uh, contributing or being a sponsor for either breakfast or something at the symposium this year. Um, but talking with Harlan or Merlyn lead off from Elgin. He said they’ve got the monies to to have this, but the monies would be better appreciated towards the conference later on. You know, in the beginning of the year.

00:09:02,470	So if we gave you a discretionary budget through the Weed Board for $5,000 for continuing education conferences, and. I have I actually have this stuff here for the preliminary budget. So, I mean, if if we want, we can talk about that at that time because then I’ll have my number.

00:09:18,870	I don’t have it right now on perfect as far as what it. Is, rather than a consensus. Just so it’s in stone because we’ve run into too many handshakes and and agreements lately. Um, I would feel much better that if it was actually to a vote. So. Mr. Chair, if I can.

00:09:40,370	Uh, so in his 26 approved budget, he has 2000 for traveling lodges and meals and another thousand for continuing education that we’ve already approved. Right. So do we need to increase that or is that are you comfortable with that number? Well, what’s. The what would be the total then. 3000, 3000, 3000.

00:10:04,300	I would say that’d be you know, I, I didn’t go to Carrington this year, um, because it fell in a little difficult time. But, I mean, it’s 3000. If you went up a couple of it, that’d be fine. But I think three would be fine with it, you know what I mean? Because even with the contribution coming out of that, you know, of a few dollars towards the conference.

00:10:20,300	Since your budget is pretty much set, if you’re comfortable with 3000, we’ll just leave it at that and then if something comes up next year, you can just come back to the board. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, we can do that. Perfect. All right. I think the more education we can get to, the better. So absolutely. I would.

00:10:36,800	Encourage you to come back if quite a few of them, quite a few of them just show up in the summertime, you know, and that’s when we’re busy. Yeah. You know, there, but not excuse either. But it’s, you know, to to get more education, you got to do what you got to do too.

00:10:49,330	But keeping track of counties gets to be a little bit of a driving time and stuff, looking at stuff. So. That 3000 I mean I think we’d be fine with that. So we’ll just address that when it comes up in the budget then. Okay. Is there any other questions? Gentlemen.

00:11:10,430	Thank you Darren. Any other business for the Weed Board? Hearing none. Weed board is adjourned. Okay. The time is not the time. Okay. We’ll call the Burleigh County Park Board. August 3rd, 2026 meeting to order. First item is roll call. Members. Commissioner Schwab here. Commissioner Munson here. Commissioner Herman here. Commissioner Bakken here. Commissioner Woodcox here.

00:11:41,530	Commissioner Behm here. Chair. Bitner here. Approval of the agenda. Commissioners. Any additions? Subtractions. Anything. Mr. chair, if we could move a down to the bottom, I’d be nice to get through the top three fairly quickly and then leave some time for the discussion on the new park board.

00:12:01,770	Option seven eight. Yeah, seven. A move that to the bottom in front of other business. Yep. Please. Okay. Anybody have an issue with that would approve second motion or second to approve with that change any further discussion. Call the roll.. Commissioner Herman. Yes. Commissioner Behm. Yes. Commissioner Schwab. Yes. Commissioner Bakken. Yes. Commissioner Munson. Yes. Commissioner Woodcox. Yes.

00:12:27,400	Chairman. Bitner. Yes. Motion carries. Consideration of the July 6th, 2026 meeting minutes. Move to approve second motion and second to approve any further discussion. Call the roll. Commissioner Behm. Yes. Commissioner Schwab. Yes, Commissioner Herman. Yes, Commissioner Woodcox here. Commissioner Munson. Yes. Commissioner Bakken. Yes. Chairman. Bitner. Yes. Motion carries.

00:12:54,570	Hey, this is, uh, opening for public comment relative to the Burleigh County Park Board. Anybody have anything they wish to say? Speak once again, this public comment period. Anybody wish to speak? Third and final call. Anybody wish to speak under public comment? I’ll close the public comment, period. Um, and we’ll move into item seven. B Kimball bottoms, asphalt.

00:13:17,200	I’m going to ask Nick Cullen to come up as part of this. Um, so early in July, we had a tree. Oh. Let’s go. Kimball. Asphalt. Nick had met with, um, Auditor Splonskowski and the Corps, and I’ll let Nick give us the results of his survey and our report card, and and then their their their

00:13:41,100	demand. I wouldn’t even say a request. Their demand. Good evening. Chair. Commissioners. Uh, yes, Commissioner Munson is correct. We at his request, I met out with the corps and, um, Auditor Splonskowski on July 23rd at the Kimball Bottoms area, where we’re looking at the bank stabilization here and maybe

00:14:05,100	2728. Um, but one of the biggest concerns that they had brought forward to us was the asphalt, again, falling into the river pollution of the river. And they said they waited a long time. Uh, haven’t seen much movement.

00:14:22,170	They were happy with the progress that we’re making with, uh, the bank stabilization project. But they need the asphalt removed now. They can’t wait any longer. Um, so if I could have the Elmo up. This is just a quick draft of what we put together. This was planned to be in the 2028 project. Uh, with the bank stabilization.

00:14:51,300	But being that the Corps is asking this to be removed, uh, put this little exhibit together here for you quick. It’s approximately 18,000ft of asphalt to be removed. Um, bring some topsoil and some seeding to prevent wind erosion. And then we would look at removing some of the asphalt from the river. Um, just along the water edge.

00:15:13,470	But we don’t want to be touching anything along the bank itself so that we don’t disturb that vegetation and create further erosion. So, uh, I don’t know if, uh, our agreement was put into the packets or not that I forwarded to you and Auditor Splonskowski, but, uh, we’re happy to move forward with this

00:15:33,170	project, to get this removed and get a contractor out there as quick as possible. Just need your permission to get that to move forward. Now, this has been a request from the Corps for the last several years.

00:15:53,430	Um, and it had just been a request as we’ve been out to dredge, we’ve removed what we could while we were on site and what was available. Um, we went from a request to a demand. Pretty much. Today. They’re not giving us any more time. Sure. Commissioner Bob Commissioner Munson.

00:16:16,670	I would assume that if their demands are not met, then they’re just going to go do the project themselves or find a contractor for it, and it’s going to be much more costly. Be much more costly, because they’ll build it all back to us. Plus their their fees. Yeah. How much? Um, how much asphalt removal has been done while the contractors. There, I’m guessing with the low water now is a good time to do it anyway.

00:16:33,570	And that’s why you see a lot more today, which probably instigated a little more of the conversation. I know the last every year for the last three years that I’ve been involved with the dredging, uh, we’ve had the contractor on site take what he can. Um, that’s down in the water.

00:16:51,030	Uh, and I don’t know how much it’s actually been removed over the last three years or so, but, um, every year we’ve taken some, uh, that we could get to. Um. So now it’s they’re they’re talking up on top up to the jersey barriers.

00:17:08,970	They would like all of that removed as well as what’s in the water because they don’t want any more falling down into the river itself. Their, their, their statement is the asphalt is contaminating the river. And there again now at this point is a demand to to have it removed. So let me be clear, though, the demand is only what’s visible.

00:17:36,630	Where are we getting like I’m a certified scuba diver right now. Are we going out there diving. For this? What are we talking. No, no, this would be strictly visual. When you look down from the bank, you’ll be able to see a few random blocks that are along the water’s edge.

00:17:51,470	We’re just asking for the contractor to pick those specific pieces out. Um, as good as they can, they. The Corps understands this within reason. You’re obviously going to have a few pieces that are just going to be left over, obviously. And then all the asphalt on top of the bank still would have to be removed up to the Jersey barriers.

00:18:11,670	Which if we don’t get it done, though, I’m guessing at some point it’s not going to be within reason. They’re going to demand every bit of it. We’re going to have bigger problems down the road.

00:18:27,370	So what’s the, uh what’s the fund and what what are we paying for that with? This will come out of the Kimball bottoms, um, budget. Um, but we’ll have to. Right. We’re going to need to get an estimate first. Absolutely. We’d have to put together an OPC. I mean, I have a quantity, but I haven’t reached out to anyone. Right.

00:18:49,030	And I’m assuming this is going to exceed the $20,000, um, minimum threshold, if that’s still what holds, um, to go to sole source. So we’d have to bid it. So I would move to approve hiring Houston to put together the bid specs and get this cost calculated for us so that we can bring it back here to this table and make that decision.

00:19:07,300	Second, proving the motion. And second, any further discussion, Commissioner? So what’s the timetable of getting, uh, that put together and getting bids back to us? Because we need to get it done this year.

00:19:25,370	So what’s this timetable look like? We’ll have the plan set and project manual completed by the end of next week. And then we would have to go through the regulatory permitting process, though, so we. Can take. Some time. It is um, thankfully the Corps is on board. They said that they would provide us a letter. of packet. Yep. Exactly.

00:19:45,070	Uh, we still have to go through the state DWR floodway review and no rice certification because we’re dealing with a regulatory floodway. And then we also have to go through Burleigh County for floodplain development permit. As long as we get those three permits. I’m sorry. One more sovereign lands as well. We need to get sovereign lands from the state.

00:20:02,170	Contractor availability. As we’re getting to the end of the season, and they’re trying to finish up projects. Yes, sir. So contingency if all of these pieces do not come together, what’s the Corps stance if it doesn’t get done this fall? I did not ask that question. Okay, well, that yeah, I. It’s a real thing.

00:20:24,070	My glass half full guy. But I that’s a tight timeline. It is so wish you luck. Thank you. Oh we still need to put together the plan. We need to put together the beds so that we have all the costs. Yep, yep. Any further discussion? So, uh, is there any. Need to take a look at where.

00:20:48,300	those jersey barriers. Are now so that if there’s a need in the future, uh, maybe we can take care of some of that now. Uh. Chairman. Yeah. Chairman. Commissioner Behm.

00:21:12,200	Um, what I would say is that the Jersey barriers are far enough back to where as long as we don’t have a 2011 flood again, I believe we’ll be able to get the bank stabilization project done before we even come close to touching those barriers. Good. Good question. Any other discussion? Seeing none. called roll. Commissioner Woodcox. Yes, Commissioner Bakken. Yes, Commissioner Herman. Yes. Commissioner Munson. Yes, Commissioner Schwab. Yes, Commissioner Behm. Yes, chairman. Bitner.

00:21:39,870	Yes. Motion carries. Next is Kimball. Barnes. Grant approval? Uh, just to give, uh, Nick and his team a lot, a little bit of credit since he’s standing up in front of us all, uh, their team put together an application for some grant dollars to help pay for the bank stabilization engineering,

00:21:58,570	and we were awarded $50,052, uh, from the, uh. W.R. so. That’s correct. And it’s going to help pay that grant will help pay for some of that design. So I just wanted to give Nick and his team a kudos. Uh, the next item is the nifL boat ramp. Vault toilet of early July. We had a tree fall.

00:22:22,600	Uh, on top of that, Nick and his team have went together. Uh, we will have to have the roof replaced. Uh, and, uh, Nick reached out to the manufacturer of this, and they will be able to just manufacture a replacement roof so that we don’t have to mess with the rest of the construction of that facility.

00:22:44,500	Uh, and they will work with Nick and get a, uh, a bid put together for that, as well as an install company that is certified to do that. Um, this is a fairly recent purchase, um. In June of 2009, 2009. So, uh, the walls withstood the tree, but the roof did not.

00:23:03,370	Um, so Nick and his team will be back with us, uh, soon, I hope, with a bid to, uh, ask for our approval. Uh, for the roof. We have also talked to our insurance company, and we do have some coverage. Uh, we have a fairly high deductible, but we do have some coverage for this as well.

00:23:25,700	Um, so, Commissioner Bakken, is it still usable or. It is still usable? Okay. The concern is, is where the roof is cracked as winter moisture starts moving in. Seepage, seepage and then the freeze cracking more of the concrete, it’ll become dangerous to this winter. So we’re going to want to make sure we’re ahead of the game.

00:23:45,830	On getting that replaced. What about the rest. Of the tree? Is that that the the trees all been removed? I did hire them to remove the stump and they were going to put that in their non-emergency schedule to get that that stump taken care of. But with today’s I’m sure they’re all busy again today.

00:24:06,230	After today’s stuff. So. Okay. It’s not really any, uh, action, no action needed there as well. Nope. Okay. Um, last item would be. Mr. Chairman, can I ask a question? Yes. Um. Are we doing any dredging there at the base? Because I see that’s virtually impossible to get a boat in and out.

00:24:26,630	Are we going to be doing it? We dredged that a couple months ago. And, um, for as far out as our responsibility is now, the Marina is responsible for the rest. Okay. Um, but that’s that’s one of those marinas we have to dredge every year. I know. That it comes. It just keeps coming back in. But we.

00:24:48,870	There’s a very defined line as to where our responsibility is. And the marina’s responsibility. And so we’ve worked very carefully to make sure we take care of our portion only. And the Marina is on their own to get out to the mouth. We’re going to move on. All right. Formation of a new park board.

00:25:13,770	Uh, and and the more, uh, Mr. Bakken and I have talked about this, um, the reorganization of the Burleigh County Park Authority. Uh, so in front of you, or would be we gave to you about six weeks ago.

00:25:36,370	A document that I created, uh, that talks about how this is all been formed over the years and a guide, a framework of options that can we can move forward with. Um, before I get too far, I’m going to ask Julie Lawyer. I had sent her some questions and she needs to let me know that if this is a park board approval process or is this a commission approval process? And where do we go from there? Both.

00:25:59,300	My opinion is it should be both. Um, and the reason for that is because it the the plan looks like it’s building another department within the county, which would be the commission’s oversight.

00:26:21,300	And then, um, given that it’s directing and controlling the parks, which is the park board’s oversight, then that would be the person that they would report to. Or the entity that they report to. So therefore, I think it should be both. Okay. So when we get to the agenda for the commission, since all the documents are already here, we’ll add that to the commission, um, agenda today as well.

00:26:39,530	But so as you go through this, it again, it’s, it’s uh, it the biggest thing that is going to do, number one, it’s going to take Missouri Valley Complex and make it a park so that it is part of the authority’s, uh, organizational operation.

00:27:01,370	Uh, it does change the makeup of the board, uh, to two county commissioners and five members at large. Um, other than that, it operates under a budget. It at this point in this packet, I have worked for, worked through the staffing side of it as well, which is also covered in my budget request for 27. Um. Questions? Sure. Commissioner So.

00:27:31,770	Currently we have five county commissioners sitting on this park board and under the reorg that changes this to a park authority. Um, why would that make up change instead of being this with the at large? Well, what I see this park authority being is a lot more active within their duties of the park authority.

00:28:00,570	Um, as commissioners, we already have several portfolios to work with on a daily, sometimes weekly basis. Um, I would like to bring more people into this working group, if you will, so that the, um, elected commissioners are managing and monitoring and the park board, the park authority, uh, are handling the day to day manage, day to day planning and

00:28:24,170	operations of it, along with the staff in regards to that conversation, I see this getting wildly out of control. Commissioner, right now you have a park board that’s fully accountable to the citizens of Burleigh County for any expenses in any operations. And we have members of the board that are compensated for being here.

00:28:50,170	We don’t get any additional compensation that I know of. Right. So first off, just on that one item, you’ll automatically increase the cost of the Burleigh County Park Board for every single meeting. Correct.

00:29:18,570	And then second off, I think that would give unelected or appointed individuals financial authority that, um, um, they’re unaccountable for and I see that as a huge problem for Burleigh County, because when we make a decision for funding, like we’re talking about 50 grand here, 100 grand there, probably 3 million for this bank stabilization or something. We’re accountable to the citizens for those dollars.

00:29:40,300	And how is an out and appointed person? Um, expected to have the same depth of knowledge of the budgets and the costs? So I, I simply think that it’s a recipe for disaster. Commissioner Puckett. So.

00:30:09,370	What if it were built as a department accountable to this board? But a department head and staff, because we’re going to need staff at some point with with the park authority or I like that terminology as opposed to a park district, or it separates us from what we were in with the city. Um, but we’re going to need that at some point.

00:30:28,470	So what would that look like if we had, you know, and I don’t I, I’m not saying it’s this budget cycle, but at least a pathway to grow into. We’re going to need something more, because managing the mowing and the caretaking and putting in the docks and making sure that the budgets are lined up so that the highway department is building back those services and whatever

00:30:51,370	other services are required. I it there needs to be a better mechanism to work with. I think. I think you get that much work done on Monday and you’ve got nothing left to do the rest of the week. Um, I had that portfolio for a long time.

00:31:05,330	We had a park ranger similar to the part time guy we had this year. Um, there was no problem with the park ranger managing the mowing the trash, collecting the toilet paper and the outhouses, the everything that needed to be done was handled. No problem. Without any additional staff.

00:31:25,700	Now, if there is some development at some point in the future, which I think that whole question needs to be addressed through a strategic plan of some sort, we don’t have any, um, you know, quite frankly, I’m disappointed in this, uh, complex committee. I don’t I’m not seeing progress.

00:31:46,070	So, um, I don’t know how throwing more bodies into that with no increase in work, we haven’t added a single park, a single boat ramp. Uh, a single outhouse. We haven’t changed anything.

00:32:10,570	And going through Commissioner Munson’s numbers that he presented for, uh, the Budget committee, it appears, from what I recall, that Bismarck Parks and RECs was billing us for approximately 20% of the director fella’s time, and approximately 15%, I believe, of the part time workers time. So that would be Monday. Uh, for the one guy in a week. And then part of Monday for one guy for a part time guy. So getting to a full time employee for Burleigh County Parks is just astonishing to me.

00:32:42,400	Well, and I was told by, uh, a park board board member from the city that the services they provided, they were losing money with what they were providing for Burleigh County. That’s what they said. So. It’s possible, Mr. Chairman. But that was the deal. Commissioner Woodcox.

00:33:04,100	You mentioned that we had a park ranger back several years ago, and I remember that did work out well. But now you’re talking about we don’t have anybody hired. Now we’re hiring a new one. You’re objecting to that those those. Do not. I’m not objecting to the park ranger guy. I think we need that. Absolutely.

00:33:16,670	We needed it then. We need that now. Now that guy has gone back to school. So we’re back to no employees. Now we’re on our own. Yeah, but that one position has no problem handling the need for county. So now in your budget, you’re talking.

00:33:31,670	And I am not quite clear on how come you have wages and salaries type of things in the individual boat ramp budgets. But you’re also funding the FTEs through the the county parks budget.

00:33:49,000	It looks to me like a double dipping, but if I did then that’s a mistake, right? Well, that’s the way it looks to me. So I think that we’re we’re throwing a whole bunch of money at a problem that doesn’t exist. We’ve been we’ve functioned just fine. Now we should be looking to hire a guy that can fill the thing more than just the summer school, because I think we still have the need today.

00:34:08,970	You know, we gotta we gotta stock the outhouses with toilet paper. You got to watch the trash. You got to check the mowers, guys. That whole thing. Um, also, in your budget, I think you’ve got a budget for another, uh, new truck and a new trailer and a new mower.

00:34:24,470	Um, I just see this wildly out of control spending, commissioner, and I think that we need to focus on the most economical way to do the work. Not the most expensive. Correct. Chair.

00:34:43,030	One thing I like to add, though, um, you mentioned growth in future projects, and I do see future projects and growth coming. So I’m looking more for a pathway to get the pieces in place for when we need it. So I think this is a good start to a plan, and I think we should consider that. Strategic planning is probably necessary. Yeah, I wouldn’t disagree.

00:35:04,070	With the notion of changing the current makeup of a park board to accomplish that. The Burleigh County Park Board has functioned just fine and is accountable to the citizens as elected people. I see absolutely no reason to consider that. And I think it’s a Trojan horse for other reasons, and I don’t think I’ll ever support that.

00:35:23,800	So when would you like to have a strategic plan? Well, as soon as possible. Okay. I think I think that’s probably one of the next things. We’ve had conversations.

00:35:43,970	I think you and I have had a conversation about, um, you know, we have to look more at the the long range needs possibly. And I discussed this with the county administrator to more of like a community needs assessment. You know, something that, um, is going to give us a better handle as the decision makers on on what to what to focus on out there that meets the most needs with the least amount of money.

00:36:04,230	Because right now, um, we’re we’re just kind of throwing money at something with no end goal. Mr. chairman. Commissioner Ben. Are there any. Possibilities that we could research if there are some nearby models that have worked well, that we could use to follow. or use as a reference? I see no problem. Then. Those that are successes already.

00:36:35,730	If there. Is, yeah, I would have no problem. I mean, some neighboring counties or whatever. Mr. chairman. Commissioner Woodcox obviously we got a lot of problems at work out here. I would assume, because I haven’t had a chance.

00:36:51,830	I read it and didn’t get a chance to discuss it. So I would like to table this until we get some more information than even a month from now, not just two weeks. I don’t think we can do a whole lot two weeks, but I move, we table it. I’ll second that. Motion and second to table. Commissioner Schwab.

00:37:06,730	, uh, I’m going to ask Julie a question. Can Burleigh. County have a park district under state law? So the law does allow, um, service districts for providing police protection, garbage removal services and deferring the cost thereof. Um, that’s specifically what it says regarding service districts.

00:37:49,570	Um, you can and then there’s recreation service districts as well. Under the law. Um, but so I’m not sure exactly what your question is. If you’re talking about having a different, um, department creating it. Is your question the creation of a new department within Burlington. Here it says evolution of the evolution of the Burleigh County Park District.

00:38:16,670	Then down below, it’s a standalone reorganization of its park district, Burleigh County, top of the page strategic reorganization of the Burleigh County Park District. We don’t have a park district. And that’s probably just a wording thing, but obviously the county is responsible for taking care of its parks and recreation areas.

00:38:39,870	And so instead of district, maybe it should say area, because the law says county parks and recreational areas. Okay. There hasn’t been a specific district, um. It’s my understanding. It’s my understanding that only metropolitan areas like the city of Bismarck, probably Lincoln and whatever can have districts. And this is kind of pushing a district thing that can’t happen under state law.

00:39:08,470	But the problem I have with it, if it is a purely county district that gives him the authority to tax, we just got done, uh, lowering taxes through the sales tax. And it’s kind of taking it with one hand and giving it with the other.

00:39:29,230	Uh, I think this is headed for some kind of a, a tax trap, just like when that building was turned over to the park board. And we’ve got to run it back for $5,500 a month after we paid it. Uh. And there’s things in here.

00:39:52,270	And one thing I really object to. It’s on page 17. Cooperation with the highway department. Highway department’s cooperating late, but the highway department is county’s most well resourced operational entity. Its role is addressing Apple Creek erosion or simply drive demonstrates its capacity for emergency infrastructure. Repaired. Western sunset.

00:40:24,370	The heavy lifting on that Burleigh County didn’t have the resources because you’re out fixing roads. So that’s not true. Uh, as far as form, formalizing a relationship with the highway department provides heavy equipment. Our highway department right now is over three weeks behind, and now we’re going to burden them. And have them. I don’t know, build roads up there.

00:40:54,030	And we went through that before that. They are not architects for planning parks. Or housing. They are strictly highway but it just keeps creeping up, creeping up like there’s an obsession to get that highway department in there. And the hell with the roads. I can’t even imagine passing this. Okay. Mr. Schwab, and yes, your department has been absolutely fantastic to.

00:41:26,770	Work with, I know it. Then why do we have this? It is simply a statement that the Park authority wants to have a good working relationship with the Sheriff’s department, as well as State Attorney’s office and the highway department.

00:41:44,830	It has nothing to do with asking for more. It’s just simply saying that we want to have a great relationship. Then why doesn’t say that this this thing is false? I I’ll tell you what.

00:42:05,170	Uh, we ran into a lot of trouble out of Apple on Apple Creek Road, and we’re just getting close to pulling out of it. We. It took time to go down there to the desert, do what we could. And I know you wanted that done, but we ran up to the Bureau of Reclamation, I believe Army Corps. A lot of the problems on their property. We can’t go in there. And the highway department is working.

00:42:32,370	To coordinate with them. But communication has to be communication to understand what we’re trying to do. It isn’t that the highway department sloughing off.

00:42:53,170	So the thing the thing about it is I can get you updated, but we cannot we cannot go into federal land and start screwing around. Okay? And I mean, that’s a no no. Okay. So. Um, let me just point out, for the benefit of the public, you’re talking about doing a different kind of park arrangement.

00:43:14,030	Park board arrangement, and somehow that’s going to improve the relationship with the county departments, the sheriff’s department, the state’s attorney, the highway department. I see that as being impossible because we have an outstanding working relationship with our own department. I’m not saying it needs to get any better.

00:43:33,900	I’m just saying that part of the document that we put together is just saying that we have a working the park authority will have a working relationship, no different than we have now. Commissioner Schwab’s crew has been absolutely phenomenal for everything we’ve ever asked. The hope now, as the budget will show, is adding a full time staff this year and working towards doing that another one next year. As we grow.

00:43:52,970	But next year we need that full time staff. Sure, you need one full time staff, not three. Go ahead. Commissioner Bakken. See. Part of this conversation. For me, it goes back a long way. Is what we’re leaving on the table. Whether it’s the Missouri Valley complex or waterfront, access is economic development.

00:44:17,570	We’re losing out on that and not having a park authority. or a better mechanism by which to function. We’re leaving those funds on the table. Ask anybody who fishes what pulling that boat ramp out of the off the river that the city did. What’s the impact of that? And I’ve talked to a lot of fishermen.

00:44:36,770	It’s like, you know, city’s comment is, well, it’s for everybody that, you know, there’s more inclusive. Not if you fish. Um, we need more opportunities. Um, you know, I see the Missouri Valley Complex Committee languishing. Mhm.

00:44:58,130	Um, I think this would go or the strategic plan would go a long way for, for helping that as well, because we’re leaving money on the table. That would take off the burden off of taxpayers. So I’m okay with tabling this.

00:45:18,300	But part of the discussion, going back to Commissioner Ames comment about seeing what is around, I think we should also start taking a look at a strategic plan and what that should should be. We need to get going. Well, we have to do that because right now we’re just spinning wheels in the wind. I call for. The question. We’ve got a motion and a second to table. Okay. We’ll get a table. Any further discussion? Call the roll. Hang on. Commissioner Schwab is out of the room.

00:45:47,730	Mr. chairman, when we talk about we talk about cooperation between our departments. We have to have that. I mean, we just we don’t want seven entities out there being independent. Well, I’m going to billion for this. If I do anything I’m going to go.

00:46:02,030	I don’t want to do that because it’s not my job. I think we have to have cooperation between the Water Resource Board and the and the park complex and the and the boat dock people. If, if we’re going to be so independent that we can’t on an emergency, come down and say, hey, pick that up or fix that, whatever.

00:46:19,970	We’re we’re not doing our job because we just we just have to have that cooperation. Well. Commissioner Woodcox is part of the reason we brought a county administrator on board. Absolutely. To manage all those different tasks. That’s that’s 100% why they’re there. And a lot of it is to not have silos.

00:46:36,900	That’s the worst thing you can have in any form of government. I see this effort as creating those kind of silos because it’s it’s just. We need to get on with the strategic plan. Okay. We we had a had a call to question Commissioner Schwab. We were waiting on you. So hold on. Commissioner Commissioner Bakken.

00:46:59,830	Yes, Commissioner Schwab. No. Commissioner Behm. Yes, Commissioner Herman. Yes, Commissioner Munson. Yes, Commissioner Woodcox. Yes. Chairman. Bitner. No. Motion carries. Okay. Um. Any other business for the good of Burleigh County Park board. Any other business? Okay. Thank you. Commissioners. We are Adjourned for the county park board.

00:47:28,270	And I will call the, um, August 3rd, 2026 meeting of the Burleigh County Commission to order um, first. Thank you. Item is roll call members, please. Commissioner Schwab here. Commissioner Munson here. Commissioner Woodcox here. Commissioner Bakken. At 548, I am here. Chairman Bitner. Here. Okay. The approval of the agenda. Commissioner Bakken has asked to add something right ahead of other business.

00:47:59,170	Um, so we’ll put a Commissioner Bakken rail conference in between eight A and other business. Any other changes or wishes? I would like to pull one item from the consent agenda for further discussion. Um, thank you, Mary, for pointing that out. Um, there’s a there’s a special, uh, what’s it called? Special use request.. Special event permit.

00:48:29,470	Special event permit. And, uh, yeah, Wilderness Cove. And the reason for pulling that for discussion, um, is to ask questions about the, the license, whether it’s a city license or a county license. So I want to discuss that and have a sheriff’s department involved with that. Any other changes or anything.

00:48:56,170	Otherwise it entertain a motion to approve with those. Two to. Approve second motion and second to approve those changes. Any further discussion, call the roll.. Commissioner Munson. Yes. Commissioner Schwab. Yo. Commissioner Bakken. Yes, Commissioner Woodcox. Yes. Chairman. Bitner. Yes. Motion carries consideration of July 20th, 2026. Meeting minutes and the bills? I did the bills. I approved them, but I want a flag. One.

00:49:29,830	Uh, for emergency work. That was billed for 3500. Does it make any difference who build it? But it was billed and, uh, the person that needed this done had the right to do it.

00:49:56,830	However, I didn’t have the right to do weed control out at the fairgrounds, so I think there’s kind of a double standard there. Other than that, the bills are okay, but I just wanted to call that your attention. Mister chairman. Commissioner Woodcox. Did we approve the gas bill of 200 and 1902? You can’t. You can’t, because I didn’t bill you. I’m sorry. You can’t. Where’s Taylor? Is he here? Taylor? Come up. Explain it.

00:50:25,870	Well, we did that individually on that one particular bill, didn’t we? Okay. That’s all I needed to know. Um, yeah. So I spoke with Commissioner Schwab today.

00:50:39,770	Um, so we haven’t received an invoice or anything for that yet, so we don’t have anything to pay now, since you guys did approve the minutes tonight, we can pay off of that. But there has been no invoice submitted yet, so our office hasn’t paid anything. I’ll be pushing up daisies before you get an invoice. Chair. Commissioner Bakken. How does that affect your accounting? In what way? You checkbook. It’s a bill that’s been approved. That’s not.

00:51:01,130	Well, the minutes weren’t approved yet, so we don’t have anything to to back up. Why we wrote that check, we’d have nothing. So once we get the minutes, we’ll write it and it’ll be in the next meeting. Okay. Thank you. All right. Thanks. So, Mr.

00:51:22,700	Chairman, if if, if you flag those two, how can you flag something wasn’t there? Pardon me? You flagged those two bills 3502 19 or whatever. Right just now you approved the bills and you pulled out two that you didn’t approve of. How can you approve? How can you pull out something that’s not there? Because the he just said we didn’t get an invoice. He didn’t pull it.

00:51:43,770	He didn’t know. I never I never approved that. So nobody said. Do you understand what I mean? I, I thought I heard you say you you approved. You approved the bills. Exception of those two 3500 and. Well, no, but. They did not submit a bill. No, you probably heard that wrong, Commissioner Yeah.

00:52:06,270	Not invoiced. You can’t pay it. Right. Okay. So the invoices are approved and the minutes look good. Second motion and a second to approve the minutes. And the bills. Um, any further discussion? Call the roll. Commissioner Woodcox. Yes, Commissioner Bakken. Yes, Commissioner Schwab. Yes, Commissioner Munson. Yes. Chairman. Bitner.

00:52:30,800	Yes. Motion carries. Okay. Next is the consent agenda. You got abatements, special event permits, raffle permits, 2026 Q two Treasurer’s report. Second access request. Remember, I pulled the special event one. So I asked for that. So move to approve. With the exception of item six, be the special events permit.

00:52:52,200	Second motion to second. Any further discussion, call the roll. Commissioner Munson. Yes. Commissioner Schwab. Yes. Commissioner Bakken. Yes. Commissioner Woodcox. Yes. Chairman. Bitner. Yes. Motion carries. Um. Commissioner or chairman? We did skip over public comment. Oh. That’ll be good. Next. That’ll be next month. Just rocking right through it.

00:53:20,530	Anybody wish to speak under public comment? Period. This is, uh, open for public comment. Anybody wish to speak? Third call. Anybody wish to speak under public comment? I’m going to close the public comment period. And now.

00:53:44,170	In regards to special event permits, um, I think we had one of these in the past, uh, county administrator flagged this for me, that, um, the the applicant has a city liquor license, but not a county liquor license. So the question was, what to do about that? And I don’t know if the sheriff’s department has some input on that state’s attorney or the state’s attorney, I guess. It’s more of a clarification issue. We’ve done it two ways.

00:54:09,700	We’ve had applicants go under another businesses, county liquor license, or we’ve just approved it, but we’ve done it two ways, and there’s no real clarification for how staff should proceed with those. Thoughts? Legally, where do we stand legally? On which one? I need to pull it up.

00:54:38,930	Do you have the packet handy? So they have a permit application? They don’t have a county County license, but they got a city license that that the bottom line. It appears. Thank you. If you want to table that for a moment, will I look up the law real quick. We can come back to that.

00:55:10,100	That way you can move things along. Move. As I research this. Thank you. Second motion and second to table, at least temporarily. Any further discussion? Call the roll. Commissioner Schwab. Yes, Commissioner Bakken. Yes. Commissioner Munson. Yes. Commissioner Woodcox. Yes, chairman. Bitner. Yes. Motion carries. Uh, we’ll move on to item seven. City planning and zoning discussion. Power outages.

00:55:40,330	What? City not pay the bill? You didn’t, uh. City planning and zoning discussion. Who has that? Anybody know why that’s on here? Mary? Does. Mary. We have to open county ETA seats on that commission. They have to live in the ETA boundary. But the county commission does appoint those seats. Okay. Thanks for the clarification.

00:56:08,500	So what we’re asking is for citizens that are interested in serving on the city planning and zoning Commission. Um, uh, make application for appointment to that. And I would strongly suggest calling the early county planning department or the city planning department to review the map of the location, because the available population base to serve on

00:56:31,570	that board has shrunk dramatically. So it may not be real easy to fill those seats, but citizens interested in, um, helping out with the city planning and zoning as a representative of the extraterritorial area, please consider making an application. Commissioner Bakken.

00:56:51,900	So that was my concern as well, seeing as how we’ve greatly shrunk the ETA and cooperation with the city. Are two seats appropriate on the ETA anymore because it’s going to be hard to fill those seats. I agree with you on that. So should we look at having one ETA seat and then the other county seat? Well.

00:57:11,130	Can we change the makeup of that board? There’s a state law that that talks about the membership, and it’s apparently city Planning Commission bylaws that establish the the membership of the board already. So is. That so what what this is doing is, is there’s 1 or 2, I guess, uh, current planning commissioners that were in the ETA. That’s not now the county.

00:57:36,770	And so they’re not eligible to sit on it because they’re not actually in the current ETA. And also they have changed the, uh, something to do with the growth management plan. But there won’t be a county commissioner sitting on it either. After, um, uh, 1st of October, I believe nobody from the county on the city planning. Right.

00:58:01,830	If I may, that was a change in the land development code. Land development code. Okay. Um, which is. Concerning. Let’s say it’s more than concerning, but it’ll give me a break because I’ve been on that board now for almost 20 years. I think I was on that before I was even a Commissioner So.

00:58:23,170	All right. Um, so we got that out of the way. We’re asking for applications for the current ETA citizens for the City Planning and Zoning Commission. Okay. Um, Commission continued items. The 2027 preliminary budget discussion. Mister chair. If I could make a suggestion. Okay.

00:58:50,370	Go ahead, Commissioner Watson, state’s attorney, lawyer still working on her thing. Should we go to the rail conference? Sure. Conversation. I’m good with that. Yeah. If you guys want to, we can do that. Um, so I had an opportunity through the MPO, one of the ongoing discussions.

00:59:13,900	Um, and we’re part of this, uh, was the passenger rail service coming back through, um, the old Hiawatha Line, which is through Burleigh County and Bismarck, Morton County and Mandan. So, um, they are Having a rail conference at the end of this month. Uh, as any member of the MPO that was available to join that conference, uh, there is a free conference.

00:59:37,000	Um, admittance to that. Uh, I would like to attend that. Um, the only thing we need to discuss is, um, transportation and hotel, but it’s a free, uh, attendance. I think it’s rather important because that is going to be, uh, a larger piece of the MPO and the siting of the passenger.

01:00:04,800	Um, depot is going to be of great advantage if we can get that started in Burleigh County. Where’s that conference? Helena, Montana. Honolulu. Helena. I’m sorry. Yeah, you can go. I’ll go. Well, um, I, I personally see no problem with that. I think it would be good to have some representation at that meeting.

01:00:25,430	Um, I guess my only thought would be we’re not putting you up in a five star, and, you know. If I drive them and sleep in my car. I don’t care. And keep yourself out of the long branch, like. Yeah, I. get it. Um. but actually, I don’t I don’t have any problem with that.

01:00:41,000	Actually, it popped up, and I’m actually, uh, leaving town. Um, the following day, I get back, so it’s it’s going to be a a quick, tiring trip, so. Yeah. Is that something you’re asking for, a motion? Yes. Is consensus. Just consensus? Yeah.

01:01:00,300	It’s such a small I don’t I don’t think I’d move to approve the expenses to attend the conference. If Commissioner Bakken believes that he needs a motion second. Yeah, a motion to second. Any further discussion? Call the roll. Commissioner Munson. Yes, Commissioner Schwab. Yes, Commissioner Bakken. Yes, Commissioner Woodcox. Abstain. Actually. Well. I’ll abstain. Commissioner Woodcox. Yes. And. Chairman. Bitner. Yes. Motion carries. Okay.

01:01:28,930	So now we’re back. Uh, Julie, are you ready yet or. No? Sure. That was a definite maybe. So, um, the law regarding, um, issuing a basically a permit to allow a qualified alcohol beverage licensee to engage in the sale of alcoholic beverages at events designated by the

01:01:56,630	permit, says that it can only be given to an a qualified alcohol beverage licensee. And then, for purposes of this section, that means a licensee in a city that imposed a city lodging and restaurant tax.

01:02:16,500	On July 30th 193, who paid the tax and continues to pay any such tax imposed by the city or a licensee in a county. A licensee in a city that did not impose a city lodge tax. Whatever doesn’t qualify. So they have them separated as a licensee in the city and a licensee in the county. And because they’re saying a qualified alcoholic beverage licensee.

01:02:36,870	My opinion in quickly reading the statute and looking at the attorney General’s rules and not seeing anything that’s helpful in case law, basically, if they have a liquor license that allows them to sell in that jurisdiction, then they can have a special permit for someplace in that jurisdiction.

01:02:53,830	But my quick opinion here is if they’re licensed in the city, um, we can’t give them a special permit in the county because they’re not licensed to sell alcohol in the county. Okay. Thank you. But the city is part of the county. Correct.

01:03:09,470	But a city liquor license wouldn’t allow them to open up a business in the county and sell alcohol in that business in the county, they’d have to get a county liquor license for that. Mister chairman, what’s the what’s the county license cost? Are they a nominal or or is it $20,000 or what? I don’t even know what the what they are. Any idea? Sure wish the. Mary you said. We’ve done it both ways.

01:03:33,900	Or it’s been done both ways in the past. Um. It’s the way it has been done before is if it’s a city organizer, they can go under an existing county license. Like I know in the past, they’ve done it under Burnt Creek, which is now crossroads. We’ve just done it both ways. So it really needs some clarification.

01:03:56,800	Do we have a precedent? It seems that we’ve done it both ways or. No, that was better. Question is. She was talking about. Should we.

01:04:14,500	And this might be a question for Judy is do we need to come up with some sort of protocol or ordinance? So we know exactly that doesn’t have to come to this table. We know what the. Well, regardless of what our precedence is, we should be following the law. Like I said, I, I’ve had how many minutes to quick research this.

01:04:33,170	And so like I said, since they’re saying, um, a city licensee and a county licensee and there are qualified, um licensee, um, a city licensee would not be qualified to sell alcohol in the county. And that’s what I’m basing this question on right now. Um, we should be looking into it and then giving, uh, a well researched opinion on it.

01:04:52,900	Um, my advice to you is, since this is for this coming Friday, there isn’t time for us to to put something together for this board to approve a special permit. Um, and based on what I’m seeing right here, just by the letter of the law, it doesn’t appear that we can grant that special permit under their city license.

01:05:08,570	Now, as Miss Sanger was saying there in the past, um, they have operated under someone else’s liquor license, like through another entity that is licensed in the county to do an event in the county. But that’s not what this, um, special permit is being used for.

01:05:27,900	And so my recommendation is, at this time, based on the law and the strict reading of the law, is to deny it, and then we can come up with a policy after we’ve done some in-depth research and see if there’s an.

01:05:52,670	Opinion on, would it be possible to do a contingent approval on the request or getting a county licensed facility to step in, since there are county licensed facilities? If you want to put a condition on it, saying that it would be allowed if they were operating under, uh, if they were going through a business that is licensed to sell in the county, you can certainly put conditions on that special use.

01:06:08,230	The note leaves and leaves them the ability to to have their event. I don’t know if it’s an. Engagement. You know, um, I don’t want to necessarily scuttle the event because I have no doubt that it would be fine. But if we could do a motion to approve with a condition of getting a county license holder. To. go back through. Yeah, yeah, move to approve. Second.

01:06:32,730	Okay. Do you understood the motion, Thomas? Okay. Any further discussion? Call the roll. Commissioner Schwab. Yes, Commissioner Munson. Yes, Commissioner Woodcox. Yes, Commissioner Bakken. Yes, chairman. Bitner. Yes. No. Applicant. We want you to understand that’s conditional on what you just heard us talk about. Mr. Chairman. Commissioner Woodcox.

01:06:54,900	Can we have do we have to have the township approval of a liquor license? Well, if it’s a county liquor license, they’ve already got the approval of the township to operate where they’re operating.

01:07:16,670	And then the the county commission can authorize them to do with a special use permit to sell it, a special occasion for that one time. And that special use permit does not require the township to give approval. Okay. So we had one, one event ten years ago that we ended up turning down because the township was the main objector to it.

01:07:34,870	So and in this case, this is Hay Creek Township and they already approved this, right? They did. Yeah. And they’re fine. So the packet they do. Yep. Yep. Okay. Um we’re going to move on to the 2027 preliminary budget discussion. Um, I did have a conversation with Sheriff Lehman, and he said that he’s leaving us behind and having a great old vacation, and he wasn’t going to be here.

01:07:55,570	Um, but he does have sheriff’s department representatives here in case we have any questions or concerns about the sheriff’s department budget. Taylor. Welcome on. Good evening, chair Bitner and commissioners. Um, so just just to recap quick, before we get started, uh, the preliminary budget has to be approved by August 10th.

01:08:13,130	And then we also need to even though it’s already scheduled, just officially set our final budget hearing, which is currently scheduled for September 21st at 5:00 pm. Um, and then again, just another reminder. This is this is the preliminary. This is the starting point. This is kind of everybody’s request that asks for something to be put in.

01:08:29,700	The budget committee did make some changes, and a few of those were, sorry, some recommendations for changes. Some of those were decreases. A lot of them were just moving things around. You know, we had some budgets we wanted to clean up.

01:08:42,700	Um, but anything that you as a board approved for the preliminary, the levy for that, you know, we have a handful of different levies, but let’s say the general fund that levy cannot increase. So if it was something substantial, you know, and then it got taken out, it may not be able to go back in.

01:08:55,000	If we can’t, we’d have to move around things within the current budget if anything changed at the final. So it has to like I said, it has to go down, but you can still move things around within the budget. As long as the levy, the levy can’t increase. Not not any one individual department. Um, and then I just had a few highlights.

01:09:08,630	I know I handed out that memo last meeting and kind of went over that, but, um, just some, some big highlights. Again, the general fund budget represents an increase of about 4.2 million compared to last year. That has five new full time employees in it. Um, there is a new capital improvement levy and a budget for about 2.

01:09:26,270	5 million. Um, and then that brings the total levy is actually a decrease of all county levies. It’d be a total decrease of 2 million. Um, and part of that is due to the sales tax funding. A lot of our watch states funding almost all of our public safety.

01:09:40,170	That was approved when the sales tax was brought on. Um, so that actually increased from last year. We don’t have the final number yet. We’ll get that when we get our deposit in August. Um, but that’s up from about 16 million to over 22 million is the estimate for this year.

01:09:52,500	Um, and then again, just a reminder from the memo, this budget contains about a $4 million deficit, but the majority of that’s a budget deficit because we again, budget kind of worst case scenario. But we do spend very conservatively in the county. Um, but I would estimate realistically it would be about a $1.5 million deficit.

01:10:07,300	If we did use that full 1.5 million out of reserves, because that’s where the deficit would come from. That would bring our reserves, which are estimated to end 2026 at 17.7 million.

01:10:22,300	It would bring them down to about 16 million, which is a 35% reserve rate, which is well within our policy. So now I’ll just stand for any questions or anybody has any questions or anything. Commissioners, any questions for Taylor. Mr. chair, Commissioner Munson. So the last several years and with the new 3% cap, so what have we levied the last three years, each. Of those years.

01:10:49,570	And the levy is calculated after the sales tax comes in, after all the credits from the state come in? Correct. Well, we don’t consider the credits from the state because those are for taxpayers. So we tell the state how much we’re going to levy. And then based on the applications, because again, that we we don’t lose any levy levy authority.

01:11:05,700	If people stopped applying for the primary residents credit, their tax statements would just go up. So that comes off their bills. We are allowed within the 3% cap to levy based on that kind of we call it the gross number.

01:11:18,470	And then the net number is the state pays out for homestead credit, disable that credit. And then now the primary residence credit and then the sales tax. But yes, it was based on that sales tax. So one I’ll just pick on here. And and I guess I didn’t go through years back I apologize, Commissioner months. And I have three total years. So 2025 the general fund levy was 21.

01:11:32,770	8 million. In 2026 it was 6.5 million. And based on where the preliminary budget is currently at um, it would be 930,000 would be the general fund levy for 2027. Well, it would be. And it’s the 2026 levy, but it’s for the 2027 budget because it’s always a year behind.

01:11:50,500	And the total, the total levy, um, for everything that the county has levy authority over back in 25 was 26 million. And then again, we brought on that sales tax in 26. So that brought down to about 14 million. And then we’d be looking at 11.7 million for 27, where the preliminary budget currently stands.

01:12:09,070	Okay. If we took all the, um, recommendations from the budget committee and implemented that, what would the bottom line look like now? And I have that number. I don’t think. I haven’t. As I went through the budget and reviewed it, um, those things all made sense to me.

01:12:28,800	I’d have to get back to you with the exact number. I know I had it at one point, but now I don’t. Um. So I’d have to get back to you on that one. Okay. It wasn’t any great big number.

01:12:46,700	No, no, because like I said, most of them were were things that we may have suggested we increase. Um, and some of them were, were and sorry, those increases were mostly moving things around. We have a lot of kind of miscellaneous budgets. And the suggestion from the budget committee was to kind of merge those all into the treasurer’s department, like, for example, supplies, printing, postage.

01:13:03,600	We manage all those budgets anyway. And so the thought was just for simplicity to move all those into one budget rather than have these 5 or 6 random departmental budgets that the whole county can use, it’s still the whole county can use them.

01:13:16,370	It would just be managed by our department rather than have kind of no one knows who where the number came from or how it got set. So that way you have a department that’s actually keeping an eye on and managing that budget. Okay.

01:13:40,430	Do you have any sense of the park budgets that I referred to earlier, and the amounts in there for employees and how those budgets are divided up, including employees costs, plus the county parks, FTE increase. So the the and I did double check. So and I spoke with Commissioner Munson about this. You know we do have all those.

01:13:57,830	We have the boat ramps that we broke out and we have the parks. So each of them have their own departments. So the board can budget for those specific, you know, projects or specific expenditures. And then we have the county parks, which is actually a fund in the county.

01:14:11,900	So the parks budgets are part of the general fund, but there’s an actual fund set up. And so the suggestion was to have all the salaries in the fund rather than try to charge out hours to each, you know, you spent ten hours at the boat ramp, you spent ten hours at the park. So that was where they should all be.

01:14:22,470	If there’s if there is a document out there where they’re in the individual departments, I do apologize for that because that was not how they were. Maybe an original draft. They may have been. Way back in the before. They were. Um, but looking at like page 69 is Kimball Bottoms, there’s no labor, there’s no salaries. Or or wages.

01:14:40,130	In there. As Taylor suggested. We put it all under the park board. So for each boat ramp, each park. Um, there are no wages and benefits and any of that. Same with the Missouri Valley complex. I double checked in that one as well. And there is no wages and benefits in that account either. Okay.

01:15:06,370	But your rent Commissioner Bitner, in the beginning, the the the draft it was. But then as Taylor and I talked about it prior to, uh, presenting to the budget Committee, we we took it all out and we put it all into one account.

01:15:24,000	What I was referring to the information that you presented to the Budget Committee had that in there. Yep. That all changed based on Taylor, the Budget Committee’s request. Okay. So. How do we go from let’s let’s just pick Kimball bottoms.

01:15:55,430	Is this $192,000 department head request something to do with the pavement removal or the the, uh, bank stabilization or what exactly is that for? We went from 25,000 to 192,000. And the same question applies to capital outlay where we were at zero last year. Now 25,000 than that.

01:16:18,100	Um, you explain that so contracted services and I did provide uh, my worksheet, if you will, my internal document to Taylor and the budget Committee as well, so that they could have an understanding. So in contract services, we have professional services for engineering at 15, we have service contracts at 1000, sanitary system at 1000 for vault pumping, dredging at 15,000. Engineering costs for the dredging at six. We have engineering for the bank stabilization at 150.

01:16:42,100	And you heard today that we did receive a grant for 50 of that. Uh, so if effectively, if we needed to, we could move that from 150 down to 100. Um, but we don’t know what additional costs we will have throughout next year for that process.

01:17:01,700	Uh, and then we have, uh, 15,000 in there for parking lot snow removal, trail repair and stuff like that. So then we go into supplies and again, my internal document, I list everything from shop supplies to painting supplies to miscellaneous supplies for 200, uh, chemicals, for fertilizer, for the for the Weed officer to to build back to the the boat ramp.

01:17:21,900	I’ve got 3000 in there for that. Um, with the proposal and the Missouri Valley complex budget of purchasing a lawnmower and a trailer and a pickup. Now I have fuel into each of my internal documents. Um. In a supplies. You know, utilities are very similar to what we’ve had in the past.

01:17:45,070	Um, so, yeah, my internal document where I calculated out each one of these line items, um, that all went to the budget Committee as well. And I apologize, Commissioner Munson. I see that’s not in here. I don’t know what happened there. Most of them made it in, but I guess for some reason that one.

01:17:59,400	But I will definitely add it to the final. When I do my when I do my business budgeting, I don’t put a $192,000 line item down without having gone through very specifically each line item as to how I calculated that, because someone’s going to ask a question, and rightfully so, they should.

01:18:21,100	Uh, but this is where I have, you know, this is how I came up with my numbers. So I have that commissioner or chair, if you would like me to send you my internal document, I certainly can as well. I think that would that would be really helpful because I simply can’t support your requests. Mr.

01:18:41,400	chairman, Commissioner Are we can we go on to another subject? Okay. I want to look at page one. Uh, it’s the county board budget one and two. Uh, looking at, uh, county involvement. And last year or this current year, we did, uh, spend $35,000 on the 4th of July celebration. And next year, they want to continue.

01:19:07,570	Not as much as they did last year, but, uh, I would like to recommend that we add on that it’s it’s 11,000 now. Add on 25,000 to that to make it 36,000 total. Because they continue this is going to be a community involvement project every year. It was free.

01:19:28,600	It was very well attended and very well approved. So I think our county involvement should at least support that one. You know. Yeah. I understand what you’re saying, Commissioner, but for many, many, many years we were paying $5,000 a year towards the fireworks show. Forever. For as long as I. A. Long 5000. Yeah.

01:19:53,670	That 35,000 was specifically because of the 250th birthday of the United States of America. Right. What would possibly justify 35,000 suddenly when we would have been paying 5000 historically? They’re making the continuing, uh, weekend or whatever, whatever the date might be is going to be much bigger than they had, say, 2 or 3 years ago when they just had the

01:20:11,400	fireworks at the, at the Capitol. So they intend on having it a much bigger celebration than what was done 2 or 3 years ago. So you’re thinking that now $5,000 contributions to some 35,000 per year in perpetuity, is that.

01:20:30,370	Well, I don’t know what that 11 is to begin with, but I want to add on 25,000 on to that 11. So make it 36 total. So Commissioner Woodcox wasn’t the part of the reason we landed on the number of 35,000 this year, because there was a grant involved. There was a grant, but we never did receive the grant. Okay.

01:20:49,600	We once we decided not to do the the, uh, mural in the south of the Provident Building, we denied that or didn’t deny it, but we told them we didn’t need the grant, so that was returned. We never did get never did get the money. So if the. County’s county budget.

01:21:03,470	So the county if the county is thrown in 5000. And what what’s the other six? That I have no idea. Okay. I have no idea. Because I would be comfortable our input for that event going up to 15 or 10. I mean, just due to inflation.

01:21:24,330	And it is very well received. And I when I was there, I talked to a lot of people from all over, not just city residents that had attended. So I would like to see something a little bit more in there. I would be comfortable with, because that is an event that is county and it will continue to grow.

01:21:45,600	And I think the county should be involved in more community wide events, countywide events. 25 might be a little steep, but, uh. Well, we can put it in there and get some more input and reduce it down the road too. So so doubling it or 15 total for that event, I would, I would be very comfortable with.

01:22:08,070	Doubling it to what. , either 10,000 or 5. Well it’s 11 on there. So 11 is not even I don’t. Know what the other six is either. Pardon me. Taylor, do you know what the other six is? It’s off top of my head.

01:22:21,070	I know we used the historical numbers, and I know it was a little muddied because the last, as we you guys were discussing the, the mural kind of got added. And then I know when the request came, a little more was added.

01:22:35,830	So I’m vaguely thinking maybe it was minus what was originally added for the mural, and we left the rest alone because there was that increase. But historically the county has done 5000 towards the the fireworks. So if if we were to bump not knowing what the six is and can you find out if you could um, I would be comfortable moving that number to 15 total. So that’s a $4,000 increase. Well.

01:22:56,030	Because the whole 15 not going to go to that particular event. No, the event I would be comfortable doing 15 or at least doubling it to ten. But I’d like to. It’s already 1111. Doubling it to ten would be a reduction in what it’s called.

01:23:13,230	The county traditionally has done historically has done 5000. So I’d like to know what the other six is, though, before making a decision on that. But I would like to see us participate at a greater rate. I mean, it is a county wide, and I can see that growing and growing and growing. It was a very well attended event.

01:23:31,870	Mister chair, Commissioner Munson well and like Commissioner Woodcox said, you know, I think this budget needs to be developed. So this is what we’re talking about for the fireworks event. But what else in county involvement are we looking at doing? And we need to line item that out. Other than that, right.

01:23:53,200	We don’t want to do all just one event. We need to be involved in several items. And so what do you do today since we have to approve a preliminary. We. What happened do that today. Do we preliminary. By the 10th. Right. Yeah. You would have.

01:24:11,400	If you don’t do it tonight, you would have to call a special meeting. No. Okay. But yes, you do have till the 10th. We have till the 10th. But, um, if we pick a number again, as Taylor said, it can go down later, but it would be nice again, the way I’d like to do my budgets.

01:24:26,370	I’d like to line item it so we know, um, what r x is for the fire fireworks. And X is for what? It’s tough to just throw a number. I don’t like throwing a number. Yeah, well, technically, you should never do that. And you need to, um, tax for specific purposes, not just use your wild imagination. Oh, I don’t, I.

01:24:49,270	Don’t I don’t think it’s wild imagination, really. I mean, that’s a little over, over zealous, so to speak, but, uh. Well, I’ll throw one. Other thing. I visited with John Bullinger, who managed the last event at the 4th of July and which was very, very successful. And he felt that there.

01:25:07,570	And he said they’re going to continue doing another event, which won’t be as magnificent as the last one, but it still will be way better than what we had before. So that’s why I requested the increase and not the full well.

01:25:26,100	And the better that event is attended, the fewer complaints the Sheriff’s department is going to have from people shooting off fireworks out in the county. Mhm. So for me there’s a cost benefit to that as well. So if we do have to approve the budget tonight then. Correct. Unless we have a meeting why do we. We don’t need a special meeting. I don’t think so.

01:25:48,030	I would, I would move the approve that we increased the $11,000 request to 36,000, which is a $25,000 increase. Could you break could you break that out a little bit, though, for where those funds would go. Primarily to that event and the 4th of July next year? Their ask was 25. Pardon me there ask was 25..

01:26:12,100	Right. And we’ve got 11 in for other events. Maybe that if that if that five was was fireworks that we’d then go back up to 20,000 and we still would have 25 available to sponsor the next event. Okay. Right. For preliminary, I would be inclined to approve this, but I really want to know where that breakout.

01:26:37,670	Well, and if I can so that that, um, line item is historically a bit of a catch all for the county board. Um, one consistent thing is some service awards or some county appreciation things for employees, but the bigger one is if the county has special large meetings where you’re

01:26:51,770	paying for camera equipment or space. And so that was, again, kind of a worst case. What you’ve spent historically high in previous years, because it does some years it’s relatively nothing. Some years it’s, you know, 5 or 6000. And so that’s where it’s hard because you can’t plan for those things.

01:27:07,630	But it’s based on the historical use of that, of that line. Item. One year there was a large contribution to the United Way in there. So it has been kind of a catchall for for the board. Okay. Is that where that should go? I mean, that’s not community involvement.

01:27:27,670	When we do, uh, equipment stuff you’re talking about for it’s not community. No, we we should create a new line that going forward. Yeah. County involvement. So that six. I think a public hearing is probably pushing the county involvement a. Little. I mean. We’re we’re. That’s semantics. But we want to get it right too.

01:27:48,800	So I have a motion for 36 to a total of 36. But can I adjust that. Was that ever seconded.. That was second. Was you seconded. Can I can I. Just know what you did. Can I adjust that and reduce it to, uh, 31,000. Take the 5000 for fireworks, which is really what we’re talking about.

01:28:08,430	The community involvement in the event. So you’d have to rescind your motion. I’ll rescind my motion. I’ll reset my second. No, I, I move. Would we increase that $11,000 to to $31,000? Second? Motion and second. Any further discussion? Seeing none. Call the roll. Commissioner Munson. Yes, Commissioner Bakken. Yes, Commissioner Schwab. No. Commissioner Woodcox. Yes, chairman. Bitner.

01:28:40,030	No motion carries. That might continue. I got two more little ones. Well, one, not little. I think our 2% cost of living is too low. I think we should, uh, go up 1% more, and I.

01:28:58,570	Mary, you gave me the figure of what that would cost us, and I can’t remember what what that was. Do you remember approximately. The additional 1% is approximately 301,000. Okay. Thank you. I just kicked that off for a discussion because I just think cost of living is way more than 2%.

01:29:22,570	And I think our our continuing fight with, with, uh, getting good quality candidates to all of our departments, no matter what it is, the main, one of the main things that they look at is salary and benefits. Probably the biggest and so far salary and benefits are slightly higher than others that we compete with all the time. I think that’s to our benefit. Pam still here? Yep. Sorry about putting you on the spot.

01:29:54,630	You have a sense of the cost of living and and, um, you know, the actual number. The actual cost of living trend. Yeah. Chair Bitner. Um, chairman Bitner, what we’re seeing is right around a 3.6 for overall cost of living trend in the, um. Cost of living index that comes from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

01:30:23,470	So it’s right around the 3.6. But that’s also those that are just giving a cost of living increase to. Good. Commissioner Bakken. What would your sense of sense be towards an impact when it comes to recruiting and retention? Does that make us competitive when we’re out in the job market a little bit

01:30:47,300	more? I know it helps a little, but does it help enough? Um, chairman. Bitner. Commissioner Bakken, it would help just because every little bit helps, that might bring us up a little bit on the totem pole. Okay. Because we’ve had that discussion. So thank you, Pam.

01:31:11,000	In order to move this along I move that we increased our cost of living from 2% to 3%. Second, you have a motion and a second to increase from 2 to 3%. Any further discussion? Call the roll. Commissioner Woodcox. Yes. Commissioner Schwab. Yes. Commissioner Munson. Yes, Commissioner Bakken. Yes. Chairman. Bitner.

01:31:36,600	Yes. Motion carries. We’ll do a little more research on that. We can always take a closer look. But it seems to me that we have to keep up.

01:31:57,970	Well, I think part of the conversation we’ve had this before is, is readjusting where our employees are at and where our scale is at anyway. So, um, I this’ll factor into that to some degree. But but that is a discussion we still need to have. What about the only other recommendation I have as far as a preliminary budget is to implement the suggested changes from the Budget Committee. I would move to approve that. I.

01:32:27,870	The motion was to approve the preliminary budget. No. No, no. The recommendations from the Budget Committee. Oh. I have one challenge to that. So. Okay. Have a couple of questions. Just questions that I have. Approved for discussion or second for discussion. I need a second for discussion.

01:32:46,000	Otherwise I better is there a second? Is there a second? A motion dies for lack of a second. You want to go ahead. What’s your question? The, uh, Mr. Chair, the the one recommendation from the the committee that I disagree with is removing the $100,000 from job development authority, which really is the Chamber of Commerce.

01:33:13,330	They’ve recommended to remove that. And I disagree with that. Um, I don’t like paying on past performance, but they have done very well for us in the past. We’re going to need them again. And I don’t want to eliminate that $100,000. Out of motion. I would move that. We keep that 100,000 in our budget. Second.

01:33:37,270	Okay. We have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Uh, yeah. Commissioner, is that include, uh, the other recommendations? No, that motion is just just for that one. Just for that one. Okay. Mr. chairman.

01:34:00,500	Commissioner Woodcox, I go back to when, uh, they do job development and I know we have a lack of employees, but now but still, the job development is very, very important. Work always has been, always will be down the road. We have ups and downs on on labor forces. But, uh, job development still extremely important. And I hang my hat on the one the menards.

01:34:20,570	Uh, business that’s out by McKinsey that we fought with, with Glendive and, uh, Billings and somebody out each Jamestown baby and the chamber of the BMV. The chamber was the leader lead in that getting that business here, along with the county and the city, we we we we didn’t reduce taxes. We taxes in lieu of something.

01:34:42,430	Anyway, we fought for that and they were the lead on it. We’ve got it now. We’ve got a great big business out there that, uh, employees like 2 to 300 employees, if not more than that.

01:35:01,700	And, uh, those taxes alone that they contribute along with the labor taxes that come in more than covers the $100,000 that we that we, uh, contribute to the to be a member of the chamber. They also led the charge for our sales tax. And I think that’s a phenomenal win for our residents. So, uh, I know we’ll have the ability to use them in the future as well. Okay. Any further discussion? Call the roll.

01:35:20,900	Commissioner Schwab. No. Commissioner Bakken. Yes. Commissioner Woodcox. Yes. Commissioner Munson. Yes. Chairman. Bitner. No motion carries. Okay. What’s next? I will make a motion to approve the other recommendations by the Finance Committee. Second. Okay, motion. And second, to approve. Mr. chairman, recommendations of the Budget Committee.

01:35:50,730	Commissioner Does that mean we can’t change anything? We can go down later on. But no. We we assume everything else in. Here. Is set in stone. All we can do is go down. We’re voting on the recommendations of the. Their list of recommendations. Yep.

01:36:09,500	Can I ask, can I ask you a couple of questions? We don’t have a motion for the approval of the preliminary budget. Can I ask a couple questions? Sure. Okay. On page four, Treasurer’s office. Why is salaries gone from 418 to 632? Are we adding on staff there? So back in October, November, um, the board voted to combine the finance treasurer’s departments. So that moves the salaries for the finance director.

01:36:36,670	And even though we don’t have it right now and the deputy finance director from that budget to the treasurer. So no, no, no staff. Thank you. And, uh, write down a couple more property. Insurance went from 0 to 275. I assume that came from another budget. And we’re moving it over to here.

01:36:50,870	Yep. So that far right column, if you look at the heading as the, uh, request recommended changes. So all of those are things that were their own budget that we’re just moving into. The Treasurer’s. Probably another one. Yeah. Same with the telephone. 45,000. Yep. And, uh, contractor services, 150 from 2000 to 150.

01:37:11,930	What? That’s our, um, county’s accounting software. And our tax software. So that was just its own budget before, and we’re just moving that into the Treasurer’s department. And we had an audit, I think, in on the in the county board’s budget for 45,000. Is that the state audit? Yes.

01:37:28,700	Yep. Okay. And that’s every year we get that really just moved into our budget. Yes. I believe that one has always been in the county board’s budget. Is it okay. And question on what what we’re doing how we come in with our state audit now.

01:37:45,070	And we hired an outside firm to come in and help. Where what’s the status of that. Slow and steady progress? We’ve had some IT stuff. So we’re kind of at a stall there. There it is. Working on it now I believe, because they’re getting into our system so that they can start doing.

01:37:58,670	We sent a lot of things back and forth with them, but a lot of our files are quite large, and so now they’re waiting for their IT to get the basically the IT stuff set up that they need to access our server remotely so that they can get into our accounting software and run their own reports and do things like that.

01:38:12,830	But they will be doing a part of what the state auditor used to do. The state auditor was both preparing our financial statements and auditing them, and now we’re having the accounting for prepare the financial statements so that they’ll be ready to be audited.

01:38:27,630	So the audit process with the state will be much shorter than usual, because they don’t have to go through and prepare the financial statements first. And we received any billings from the outside audit. Yes we have. Yeah. Because they’re doing three different projects right now. They’re helping us with our budget process, with just our general policies and procedures, and then also with the financial year end and, and financial statements.

01:38:44,770	Any amount of just looking for ballpark. What have we spent? Not on top of my head, but not a significant amount because the majority of the work will be the accounting stuff once they get in. Okay, that’s all I had. Thank you. Yeah. You’re welcome. No, I lost track of where we were.

01:39:03,230	There was a motion and a second. Motion and a second to approve the, um, Budget Committee. Committee’s recommendation. Any further discussion, call the roll. Commissioner Schwab. Yes, Commissioner Bakken. Yes, Commissioner Woodcox. Yes, Commissioner Munson. Yes. Chairman. Bitner. Yes. Motion carries. Mr. chairman.

01:39:26,430	Commissioner Woodcox hate to bother you, but does the Highway department is that a one meal increase? Is that correct? No. I couldn’t tell you exactly where we don’t that this stage typically deal in Mills anymore. Just dollars, I believe it was a half a mill increase. Okay. And their budget is a little there.

01:39:48,400	Their appropriations are down a little bit because they fund things with grants, with other money, with their savings. But the mill rate itself is or the mill levy. The dollar is levied is increased. Yes. Thank you. Okay. Does anybody want to make a motion to approve your budget? We can discuss some of this at the final. Move to approve the preliminary budget.

01:40:09,170	Second motion, and a second to approve the preliminary budget. Any further discussion? Seeing none, call the roll. Commissioner Woodcox. Yes. Commissioner Bakken. Yes. Commissioner Munson. Yes. Commissioner Schwab. Yes. Chairman. Bitner. No motion carries just because it can. You always have to say no. Votes again. What are you two. Guys.

01:40:29,930	Okay? Other business? Uh, we already dispensed with. Thank you. Taylor, um, we dispensed with Commissioner Bachmann’s rail conference thing. Any other business for the good of Burleigh County? Seeing none, we are adjourned. Thank you.