Proposed road budget seeks increase of $200,000 years ago
The proposed 2003 budget for Marion County Road and Bridge Department requests an overall funding increase of $204,125.
The hike is due to increased materials cost, need for more expensive material to maintain more paved roads, and need for updated equipment, officials said.
County commissioners took no action on the request. All budgets will be reviewed together as the county and its auditors prepare the 2003 budget in the next few weeks.
Dispatch
Emergency management and communications departments requested the same budget amount as this year.
Michele Abbott-Becker, who heads both departments, said line items had changed within the budgets. For example, she is requesting the carpet be removed from the dispatch center and replaced with a hard surface, since heavy rains tend to leak into the dispatch center. The carpet is soiled and efforts to prevent the leaks have been unsuccessful.
Also, a long-term emergency plan released by Kansas Department of Health and Environment includes a requirement that, by 2004, dispatchers provide emergency medical information to callers before ambulances arrive.
Abbott-Becker said the requirement does not include any definition of minimum training requirements but that emergency medical dispatchers usually don't stop the call to contact emergency responders. This means the county probably would have to add three or four additional dispatchers, she said.
It's possible the regulation will be delayed or withdrawn, she said, but for now it remains a legal requirement to be in place by 2004.
Also, discussions continue about a monthly assessment on cell phones to pay for equipment that would identify the site from which a phone call is made. Counties want the cell phone assessment so they can pay for the required upgrades, Abbott-Becker said. For Marion County, the 911 fund currently in place, which receives a monthly assessment from land lines, probably isn't enough to pay for the needed changes to track cell phones, she added.
Another possible change discussed is requiring full-time emergency management directors, so counties are better prepared to deal with natural or manmade disasters, she said.
Commissioner Howard Collett said he had heard questions about reinstating the burn ban. Abbott-Becker said she had not received a request from fire chiefs for a ban.
Attendant care
The county will allow an attendant care program for juveniles to end but may pay for it to begin again.
Attendant care provided a safe place to stay for juveniles involved with the court system. It isn't designed for youths facing serious criminal charges, but for runaways, those in child in need of care cases, and similar instances.
Without attendant care, youths have to be taken by law enforcement officers to a juvenile facility in Junction City. Sometimes they stay just a few hours before officers return and bring them back to Marion County to make their first appearance in court.
Loretta Klose, who started the program in Marion County, said it never achieved its potential. Law officers were unfamiliar with the program, she said, and the organization providing juvenile intake services was based out of Junction City, which meant most youths weren't seen in person unless they went there.
However, with the judicial district taking over intake services in the next month or two, "intake will be much more effective than in the past," Klose said.
Commissioner Leroy Wetta asked if the benefit to the youths and to the county was worth the cost, about $6,000 a year.
"Officers have seen what it is like to not have the service," Klose said. "They see the benefit."
Commissioners didn't take official action, but Klose recommended the program be allowed to end as currently organized. After the district takes over operations, the county can begin funding attendant care, she suggested.
In other reports:
Commissioners took no action on an offer from the City of Marion to participate in a joint request for grant funds to pay for improvements to Eisenhower. The city is seeking a grant to pay up to 75 percent of the cost for new overlay, curb and gutters, and sidewalks from Main/K-256 to Kellison Street. The county would only pave its portion from Kellison to U.S.-56. Commissioners will make a decision by Monday. The grant application is due Aug. 1.
Register of Deeds Faye Makovec presented a budget proposal that was slightly less than this year. She noted that she may stop her own microfilming due to cost of supplies and age of equipment. Records probably will be scanned for local use and microfilmed by a private company, with the microfilm stored off-site for security reasons.
Appraiser Deanna Carter presented two job description changes for her office. Commissioners Wetta and Bob Hein voted in favor of sending the changes to an employee committee for review. Collett voted against it, saying the change probably will lead to a request for higher wages in those positions.
Commissioners reviewed fuel bids. They approved purchase of 8,500 gallons of fuel from Cardie Oil, Inc., Tampa, for $8,623.
Purchase of a new 60-inch mower deck from Sellers Tractor was approved for $7,953.
