Board of Supervisors Meeting   3/11/2025

Oh yeah, you don't want them to catch on fire.

It'd be a cloud.

Actually, the last meeting I had, that's who put it here.

The problem is that those ones were all taken by people.

Yeah, I'm cool.

Well, these are great compared to those.

Those are the worst chairs.

But these hurt.

But those really hurt.

These have served us well.

Yeah, they've been good.

They've been good.

And, you know, somebody could probably use them.

So we got a quote.

What Marie wants, she gets.

Mm-hmm.

Same with James Howard.

I know.

Davis was here and ran into Kelly.

Nothing like losing the old wallet.

No, I'm just going off my phone.

Well, actually, the thing goes to the record first.

That gives us away.

It's actually just probably a coincidence that it's 430.

Is it?

Yeah.

Okay.

meeting come to order.

Okay, Kelly.

Thank you.

Whereas the Board of Supervisors of Greene County desires to discuss in closed meeting the following matters.

Discussion, consideration, or interviews of prospective candidates for employment assignment, appointment, promotion, performance, demotion, salaries, disciplining, or resignation of specific public officers, appointees, or employees of any public body concerning the water and sewer department,

and county administration.

Whereas pursuant to section 2.2-3711A1 of the Code of Virginia, such discussions may occur in a closed meeting.

Now, therefore, be resolved that the Board of Supervisors of Greene County does hereby authorize discussions via four stated matters in a closed meeting.

Okay.

Motion for closed session.

Do I have a second?

Okay.

We have a motion and a second.

Roll call vote, Mr. Quiggin.

Aye.

Mr. Goolsbee.

Aye.

Ms.

Durer.

Aye.

Standing at work.

Yeah.

It only takes me like a month to get all the blocks in my account, you know, like the fish, the microwave, or whatever.

Yes.

How many are these?

Motion and a second.

Roll call.

Vote Mr. Lamb.

Aye.

Ms.

Durer.

Aye.

Mr. Goolsbee.

Aye.

Mr. McQuiggan.

Aye.

And the chair votes aye.

Do all members certify that only public business matters lawfully exempted from the open meeting requirement and only such matters as identified by the motion to enter a new to close meeting were discussed?

Mr. McQuiggin, I certify.

Mr. Goolsbee, I certify.

Mr. Lamb, I certify.

And the chair certifies.

Next on the agenda, we have the adoption of the agenda.

Is there a second?

Yes.

We have a motion and a second on the agenda.

Roll call vote.

Mr. Lamb.

Aye.

Ms.

Mr. Goolsby.

Aye.

Mr. McQuiggan.

Aye.

And the chair votes aye.

Number seven matters from the public.

Thank you, ma'am.

We have three minutes to speak.

Hey, I got three things.

Thank you for cleaning up the library.

sagebrush or whatever that stuff was that got cleaned up took me three meetings to get you to do it but finally it got done the other thing is you're working on the budget

And I want to tell you, I want to plug in for the sheriff's department.

You cannot put a value on life.

And after those two policemen in Virginia Beach just got killed, doing a traffic stop, as our sheriff's department does, and he's shaking his head.

He knows what I'm talking about.

I don't know what you're putting in that budget, but I'm going to ask you to put more.

Okay.

And the other thing is, if I'm not here on your action items, please vote for the renovation on the Department of Social Services if we ever get moved.

But I've got something that nobody probably knows nothing about.

And I might not be here in 25 years more.

I made it this 25.

But I got pictures and a letter to y'all and probably Dr. Francis and Tim don't even know what I'm gonna say.

But I'm gonna say it to you and I'm gonna tell the public and I got pictures.

And I got on 12-31-1999 in front of the courthouse, the only supervisor didn't come was the late Mr. Mickey Cox.

But we planted the time capsule in front of the courthouse.

Now, Marie was down there in the clerk's office, somewhere that was at the time.

She might remember it.

Dr. Francis ain't going to know what I'm talking about.

Look at him shaking.

Tim was not going to know.

Hey, Davis knows it because I talked to him about it and Marie might have heard about it.

But this time capsule, y'all gonna dig it up on 1-1-2050 and I may not be here.

You might not be here.

Tim, I don't know how old you are.

You're not going to be here.

Steve, you ain't going to be here.

Marie's not going to be here.

And he's going to be, let me see, 25.

100.

All right.

But it really did happen.

Oh, I've got my three minutes.

I've got you three minutes.

I've got to give you this.

And don't forget it.

Kathy, I heard you put something in some minutes.

Burkholder is good at that to me.

Thank you, Ms.

Burkholder.

Jennifer Lewis Fowler.

Jennifer Lewis Fowler from the Midway District.

I have more comments and questions regarding water in the reservoir project.

Many localities in Virginia

and across the country have determined that it costs less to outsource water utilities.

I realize that Greene's past experience with the utility company was not pleasant.

However, with the current amount of money that Greene has paid to Rocktown, Roto-Rooter, and Rooter Mann, it may be wise to reconsider continuing the maintenance side or the water department.

It appears that Rocktown Excavating in Harrisonburg has repaired numerous water pipe breaks and utilizing a professional contractor may in fact be more prudent long term as they have the expertise, equipment, and manpower to handle various issues that Greene faces.

There are plenty of projects such as fixing dozens of fire hydrants and upgrading water meters for the Water and Sewer Department's crew to work on.

Regarding the overdraw of water last year, I am perplexed.

Doesn't the storage tank behind Terrace Green hold water for that very reason?

Was water being used from the tank during the peak times and we still overdrew from the river?

With the upcoming addition of hundreds of new apartments tapping into the county's water, I have to surmise that the overdrawing of water will continue to occur.

and the Department of Environmental Quality will fine us again and again for over drawing water.

At the last meeting, this was brought up, but I thought it should be reiterated.

The elderly population of Greene County is substantial and growing.

By moving forward with the reservoir project, many fixed income individuals will be in jeopardy with their finances, deciding on whether to pay for water or for food.

The U.S.

Census data from July of 2023 shows Greene's population has approximately 19.5% of age 65 plus and 22.9% under the age of 18.

Over 10% of those under 65 have a disability and 8.9% are considered poverty level.

Furthermore, Greene has over 1,500 veterans.

That is a huge number of residents who are not in a position to pay a substantial amount of additional money towards water.

My very rough calculations suggest that the reservoir would be about 23 feet deep if it was a uniform depth.

So it would actually be much deeper than that in the middle.

Again, think about the size of the proposed reservoir.

Four times the size of Walmart and Lowe's and their parking lots and then that area in between the two.

For a county that places a lot of emphasis on the comprehensive plan and maintaining rural landscape, this is a huge amount of land forever gone, not to mention the various species forever displaced and or killed while the reservoir is built.

However, it will be a huge draw for Canadian geese and they are very messy birds.

Also, some states require reservoirs to be covered to help prevent contamination from above, so that is a consideration as well.

We have seen major water issues in recent months in Orange and Richmond, so relying on only one source of water can be catastrophic.

Are we really going to be able to fill that size reservoir and still draw enough water on a daily basis for the current demand?

Again, I encourage you to consider drilling some very deep wells and putting up a few more water storage tanks, as well as fixing the current empty storage tank on 33 so it can be utilized.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Fowler.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I turned 81 this week.

I will be here in 25 years.

So I'm looking forward to the opening of the time capsule.

That's awesome.

You know, I like it when I get a letter in the mail that says your house is worth more, 6% more this year than last year.

But if it comes from the government, I don't have the same reaction.

Why?

Well, because I figure I'm going to wind up at some point paying more in tax.

Then I reflect a little bit and I think to myself, well, we're all in the same boat.

What difference does it make?

Well, we're not all in the same boat.

My dear friend Ken Copeland, my next door neighbor, has told me, and hopefully on good authority, that Greene County's practice is to assess real estate, residential real estate, every two years.

and commercial real estate every four.

So as a result, the letter that I got this year telling me my house was worth more than it was last year.

Well, Lowe's didn't get the same letter.

Walmart didn't get it.

McDonald's didn't get it.

None of the commercial enterprises got it.

So therefore, they're going to be paying fundamentally the same tax they did last year, while myself and others like me, we're paying more.

Now, that's obviously pretty unfair.

It's not only unfair, but it's probably illegal.

Now, I'm not an expert.

I don't claim to be.

But I spent a little bit of time today, hit books, and I looked at the Virginia state statutes as it relates to the frequency with which real property is assessed or reassessed.

And from what I've read, counties are able to choose the frequency with which they assess real property.

But they're not free to choose which groups of properties they can assess at a particular point in time.

So if you're only going to assess in 2025, it's got to cover everybody.

Okay, Dr. McGuigan, all of you, myself, my wife, Ken, along with Walmart and everybody else, Food Lion, everybody else.

As I understand it, that was not the case this year.

Now, I don't know what y'all can do to rectify that, but something should be done.

And I do believe that there are some consequences for the county if you violate that rule.

If I've got it right, and I think I do, I don't mean to

be the lawyer here, but I made a photocopy of the statutes that I think are relevant.

I'll give them off to Ms.

Kemp.

She's probably far more familiar than I am.

That's all I have to say right now.

Yes, anyone that is joining us through the Zoom feed, if you would like to address the board for matters from the public, please use the raise your hand feature.

You can

find that under the react button at the bottom of your screen.

We'll give you a chance to indicate your desire to speak.

Thank you, Mr. Friedel.

So anybody else that hasn't signed up that would like to speak?

Mr. Copeland.

Thank you.

I want to address the inequity in the real estate assessments.

Residential properties are being hit this year with an average of 7.5% increase in the real estate assessment.

For commercial properties, that increase appears to be less than 1.5%, often zero.

Looking back in time, Ms.

Shafrick, Commissioner Tate have been very helpful in providing me more information to help educate me.

Net results since 2020, with essentially no change in the number of residential properties or commercial properties, residential assessments gone up a total of 40%.

That's to 2024, didn't have the summary for this year in which there were even greater difference.

Commercial, 19%.

What's that translate into?

Average tax bills for residential properties.

You've been dropping the tax rate, but it still results in an increase for residents.

Commercial, the average tax assessment from 2020 to 2024 dropped by 1.5%.

There will be a further drop for them this year with the proposed tax rate, proposing a 3% drop in the real estate tax rate from 71 to 69 cents.

Given the 7.5% increase on average for residents, that means be faced with about a 4.5% tax increase.

Businesses, 1.5% to 3% drop.

What can be done?

Immediately, you could choose to not use the 2025 assessment, given that they weren't done for commercial, with the exception of new construction.

Could consider applying a 7.5%, which is what was done for residential, to the commercial assessment.

Arlington County does this, adds a supplement onto the commercial.

So that's my thoughts and, you know, really strongly encourage you to address this inequity.

Thank you, Mr. Copeland.

Okay.

Moving on.

We have no public hearings.

Presentations, number nine.

First presentation is from Andrea Whitmarsh, budget presentation for the schools.

Thank you.

Good evening, Mr. Chairman, members of the board.

Thank you for your time and continued support of the Greene County Public Schools.

Tonight, I'm honored to introduce Superintendent Dr. Andrea Whitmarsh, who will share why we are requesting additional local funding for the upcoming fiscal year.

Simply put, our schools run on people.

And we cannot do what we do without them.

Okay, a couple key points.

Investing in our people, 75% of our budget goes directly to salaries and benefits for our staff.

3% salary increase is essential to keep the pace with the neighboring divisions, ensuring that we retain the talented educators who make the difference to our students each and every day.

higher health care costs that hits everybody.

It's 8.5% increase this year.

Must be accounted for the maintain the competitive benefits for employees so the cost is not passed down to them.

There's nothing more than a punch in a gut than to get a pay raise and take home less money each month.

It's tough.

Without this funding, we risk losing teachers to surrounding counties that offer much higher pay and benefits.

Why this matters?

Education is about the people.

Teachers are not just instructors.

They are mentors, counselors, and a lifeline to many, many students.

The demands on our staff is growing, increased students' behavior, challenges, absenteeism.

The new state mandate and instructional programs require more time, resources, and training.

So that takes away from the instructional time.

And we cannot afford to fall behind.

As I said before, neighboring districts are actively recruiting educators.

They're poaching our people, right?

We must remain competitive to keep the best talent in Greene County so that our children benefit from that, because they are our future.

That's who's going to be living in this community and growing over in this community, so we need to invest in them.

Yes, and opening, I don't know if I'll be here, but if I am, I'll be there.

I'll be there.

I promise you, Ms.

Burkholder, I'll be there.

But again, your support ensures that Greene County Public Schools can continue providing a high-quality education to our families that our families expect.

Thank you for your time and your consideration into this matter.

Thank you all so much.

Thank you, Dr. Whitmarsh.

Thank you very much.

I am Andrew Whitmarsh, superintendent of Greene County Schools, and I am honored to be here tonight to share our FY2026 adopted budget with you.

I'm going to go through this.

First of all, I have to apologize.

It is going to be more than 10 minutes, but I'm going to go as quickly as I can.

And stop me if you have questions, okay?

so I'm going to start with just a little refresher on school finance basics because school finance is very different from county finance so there are three areas of revenue we have a general operating fund this is the money that our state funds go into our federal or local we have school nutrition funds which are separate and then we have school activity funds which are fundraisers and and

school clubs, things like that.

it's not quite just simple revenue we have over a thousand budget codes which are dictated by the state state and federal reporting requirements we have many many mandates many stipulations attached with the revenue that we receive the majority of our budget is non-discretionary and fixed by the time that we start the school year and that's because we're primarily people as Mr. Taylor shared

fluctuations can even occur throughout the year.

And I'll talk a little bit about that because we've just received a difference in revenue for this year's budget.

We do receive state, federal, and local funds as well as other funds.

Other funds are things like building rentals or retiree insurance payments or small grants that we take in, but you can see the percentages of our budget there.

We are very heavily state funded, so more than half of our funding from the state and that orange piece of the pie is the local.

Oops, there's a little overlap on this.

State revenues come from standards of quality, which is the largest category of funds, and it's based on the local composite index of ability to pay.

If you would like me to go into what that is, I'm more than happy to do that.

But it's basically how wealthy we are in comparison with other school districts in Virginia and is what it balances out.

So as one goes up, others come down.

Incentive funds like at risk, VPI, Virginia preschool initiative, compensation and bonus supplements.

We receive categorical funding like school lunch, homebound lottery funding, which is for at risk funds, regional special education programs and things like that.

The state has over time taken some things that were included in basic aid and standards of quality and moved them over to lottery funds.

And we do come with a lot of mandates.

So if you look at our expenditure, 75% of our budget is personnel and the rest you can see the other percentages you can be there.

That's just my very short version of school finance.

So it's important, you know, the budget is a moral document and it's important that it's a reflection of our priorities.

Our strategic plan, IMPACT 2027 guides our work.

It's our roadmap for what we do each and every day.

Our vision is empowering our community's children for lifelong success.

And we operate by five core values, culture of excellence, safe, supportive, and caring schools, resource stewardship, connections and partnerships with our community,

and an exceptional workforce.

It's important to look at our context and that would be our demographics.

So here we have our enrollment over the years.

These are enrollment totals which do not equal ADM or average daily membership.

And these include pre-K and out of district placements.

We do have students placed in other places based on their needs.

So you see our enrollment here, our fall enrollment.

Each of those lines represents one of our schools, with the top being the high school.

Our high school continues to grow.

The other lines you can see there.

A large portion of our students are economically disadvantaged.

So you can see based on the blue line is our total enrollment and the red is students who are economically disadvantaged.

And you can see that that number is pretty steady and it's just under half of our student population.

Over time, we've had a growing number of English learners.

Currently, we have 176 active students and 52 monitor students.

And so there are requirements in working with those students.

as well.

Here you can see our populations by building.

Rutgersville has always had the highest number of EL or ML multilingual students, but the high school is certainly right behind them.

We have 376 students, totals with disabilities.

As you are probably aware, every student has very different needs.

And here are the disabilities that are represented in our school division.

In those 376 students, speech language, other health impairment, autism, SLD, specific learning disability, emotional disability, so traumatic brain injury, you can see all of that.

And all of those students

have IEPs and have special requirements in working with them.

One of the biggest challenges that we face is recruitment and retention of our staff.

It's no secret.

You've heard it on the news.

You've seen it everywhere.

Education has gotten infinitely more challenging.

Before there was ever a pandemic, we knew that there were not going to be enough teachers to fill the roles of the retirees.

That's only been exacerbated by the pandemic because people left the profession without even getting to retirement.

Just nationally, 3% of our public school teaching positions were vacant in October 24.

In Virginia, it was about 3.68%.

And in Greene County this year, we've had three unfilled positions.

The demands are getting, you know, they're incredibly challenging.

We have new curriculum and standards in just about every core content area.

Chronic absenteeism has become a focus for the state.

Students have to be in school.

And that's preparing students for the workforce.

So you can't, students cannot miss more than 10% of the days.

And so you can imagine

You can imagine the extra extra effort that has to go into that we do also allow students to make up their time so we're running we're running additional classes after school because the state allows for makeup time as well for chronic absenteeism.

Student needs.

I wasn't able to be here last week, but I did see the CSA presentation.

Some of these things are directly correlated.

We have students in our community who are also in our schools.

We have students with increasing needs, whether it be mental health, whether it be behavioral needs, learning loss, social skills, all kinds of things.

We have students whose needs are greater than ever before.

And I would just sum that up by saying education has changed considerably.

and rapidly.

So if you look at our demographics and you overlay that in a class of 20 students, I think we all went to school and we remember it in different ways based on our experiences.

It really has become different.

The accountability is greater for sure.

But if you look at its class of 20 in Greene County, you have the red students that are economically disadvantaged.

The yellow is special education students, so that might require additional meetings on the behalf of the teacher, certainly providing accommodations and those kinds of things.

If students that are chronically absent, we know when students are not in school, the teacher is having to make sure they get caught up, the extra work and things like that.

And we would have one English learner in that class.

Here's the top critical shortage areas as determined by Virginia.

Once upon a time, we never thought we'd see elementary educators on the list of critical shortage.

And this year we had a fifth grade position that we could not fill.

So it's certainly become a challenge and that's what Virginia has determined as their critical shortage areas.

you're probably more interested in the financials at this point, so I'm gonna move on.

Any questions are certainly welcome.

So I apologize, that got a little wonky, but influencing factors.

So looking at our enrollment, our current budgeted enrollment is 2702.1.

We are projecting using the state ADM a number of 2634.15.

So we are projecting a decrease.

It is the second year of the biennium.

So the VRS rate will remain the same at 16.6%.

And our LCI, our local composite index of ability to pay will remain at 0.3505.

We're always comparing ourselves to others in such in an area like this.

We have so many smaller school divisions in close proximity.

Teacher can go from one place to another.

Right.

And so we want to make sure we're remaining competitive.

We don't we know we're not going to be at the top of the you know, we're not going to be at the top of the list.

Like Charlottesville or Albemarle, we aim to stay pretty much in the middle.

And with our bachelor's degree, we are we are right there in the middle.

Fairly similar at the master's degree level.

You will notice that as we get closer to the end of career, we lose some ranking there.

And so that's something for us to work toward in the future.

All right, so looking at our state funding, you will, so all the numbers that I'm gonna share with you are based on the governor's budget that was released in December.

And while you know the General Assembly has met and has passed on a budget back to the governor, we don't, the state budget isn't finalized yet.

So we're starting with the governor's budget.

We know how that translates to Greene County.

And so those are the numbers that you see there.

So our state funding is still very likely to change.

So you can see the fiscal year state and state budget and budget ADM.

The FY25 budget listed our state funding at $27,739,67.

I'm sorry, that's what came out in December.

We approved at $27,845,414.

So we are receiving a reduction this year.

The governor's budget proposes a 3% salary increase effective July 1, and that's the majority of the money that we're seeing coming from the state.

There is, I do say, if we don't give that salary increase, we will not receive hundreds of thousands of dollars.

from state funds.

And so looking at the ADM projection and looking at the decreases there.

This will be the third year of all in Virginia per pupil funds.

So we received just over a million dollars, all attendance, literacy and learning from the governor.

You may have seen it in the news from the state.

And so we have to utilize those fundings to address those three areas.

We use them this year and last year, and we will carry forward just over $300,000 of those funds.

Looking at federal funds, we anticipate level federal funding at this time.

just over $3 million.

The thing to say about our federal funding is that federal funding more than anything else has the most strings attached to it.

It's very deliberate in how we can use it.

They tell us, for example, for our title programs, they tell us how much money we're going to receive.

We have to write an application to match with that amount.

And then there's an iterative process to approve our application.

And then each time we seek reimbursement.

This is the first budget in some time with no ESSER funding or COVID related funding.

So that's important to know.

Looking at local funding,

So you'll see FY23, 24, 25.

So the thing to say here is the amount that you have in your packet from the county side is the amount that was approved in May of last year in a supplemental appropriation.

When we received our final state budget, we used the 19,272,767 number.

which is a difference of $254,000.

And then there's other local funds looking at 230.

Our VRS rates, our VRS rate, VRS is about $4.4 million in our budget.

That's the Virginia Retirement System for our employees.

We pay about 16.6% for employees.

No.

Actually, when the local composite index changed last year, we saw a little bit of an increase in state funding.

And because this is the second year of the biennium, it remains the same.

Yeah.

My hope really is that we're going to receive more state funding at the end of the day.

not based on LCI, but other.

And just as a reminder, our budget really is all about our exceptional workforce.

We are 75% people.

So whereas I received about $900,000 in requests for new positions, new additions, we are not adding anything, any people or other items to our budget requests.

We are only addressing, we are only addressing

adding things that address the people that we currently have to take care of our exceptional workforce.

So we're looking at a raise of 3%.

Payroll is 54% of our budget.

Health insurance is 8% of our budget.

VRS is 8.3.

And FICA is 4%.

So you can see that's the majority right there.

A 3% raise will cost $879,205 all in.

We anticipated our health insurance increase, and I apologize, that's wonky, to be 10%.

So we were happy with eight and a half.

I would have been even happier with your renewal.

But yeah, but we didn't have that this year.

So $365,000 for health insurance benefits.

One of the other things we're trying to do is a scale modification to our educational support staff.

That's twofold.

So one, we want to modify the scale by $3,000.

Those are our educational support staff members.

There are teacher assistants, there are office assistants and things like that.

The starting salary is $18,242.

They work 185 days currently in six hours and 55 minutes.

We'd like to increase that salary scale.

That'll cost us about $177,000.

And we will also want to do a contract modification to add 20 minutes for safety so that they're there for arrival and dismissal and

and also five extra days.

As challenging as things have gotten, more training is required for our teachers and our educational support staff needs to have additional time to train as well.

We are also looking at a scale adjustment for our secretaries.

There's only about nine of them in the school division.

It's important that we're looking at our capital debt.

The debt retirement for the upcoming year is $57,638.

Two more years, we get a big reduction, but for this year, it's almost $58,000.

So again, here's our revenue projections, looking at revenue, federal, state, and other.

And again, this is based on the supplemental appropriation from November 12th, $50,435,294.

The increases in personnel, $1,571,757.

Again, all to address existing employees.

and here's our proposal.

Now this proposal number varies from the other things that you've seen from the county and that when using that lower number, we are requesting an additional $427,184.

I'm happy to walk through that if you like, but you can see all of the numbers that are included there.

Yes.

So that was done with federal money, our last remaining COVID funds.

And if you remember, a few years ago, we received some state money.

Three years ago, we received some state money for construction, and it couldn't go to a better use.

I mean, it's beautiful.

It's coming along.

They're moving very quickly, and we should be done in no time.

At this point, we're just we're moving some of our classes.

We're not necessarily adding yet, but we left the spaces very flexible and adaptable so that we could move, you know, move things as needed.

But welding and HVAC will go out there.

And if you've been in their space, they're in a classroom that used to be a cabinetry classroom.

Yeah, I think it's going to be pretty fantastic.

I also have Ms.

Bicker.

She's our representative from our Monroe District.

Did you want to add anything to?

Thank you so much.

Again, Kara Bickers from the Monroe District.

I just wanted to say that I've been on the school board for just a little over a year, so this is my second budget season.

Obviously a lot to learn in the budget and all the things, and I'm thankful that I'm not the one putting all that together.

But I would like to say that I also work in a school system that's not Greene County, and I'm really proud to be on the board where we prioritize our people.

I can tell you how hard it is to get a small 2% raise and then have your insurance premiums go up by 8 to 10% and make less over a 10 year period than you actually did 10 years ago.

And the fact that our school system here in Greene County is fighting really hard to keep that from being a thing, I think is astronomical.

It is a morale killer.

And so that's one of the areas in which we're asking for a little bit more money.

And I think that that's a really great place to put it.

We still do fall below as far as money goes from other counties, as she said, and it's hard to compete.

But those things help us stay in a competitive place to be able to compete in other areas where they might not be living up to that great expectations.

A lot of things happen in the school board and I know when money is involved, like there's lots of things and people in places where they would love for that money to go.

But I have to say, you know, putting money into our children, I just don't think that there's any better place.

And by, you know, enabling our staff and our support staff to adequately care for those children and educate them appropriately is absolutely 100% where we want that money to be.

And so

Thank you so much for allowing me to speak.

That's just a place that's really near and dear to my heart.

And I think it's a really important place for it to be.

Thank you so much.

Has there any consideration to raise the salary for the aides?

So that is what educational support staff.

So that's the piece.

That's okay.

That's okay.

So what we're doing for those staff members is, and there's just under 60 of them.

So we're looking at raising each of them by $3,000.

So that's the scale increase.

They would also receive the 3% cost of living basically that we're receiving.

that the rest of the staff would receive.

And then in addition to that, we're modifying their contract, which means they'll work more, but we will pay them more for working more.

That is an area that we have needed to address for some time.

We cannot do it without them.

And so that's absolutely a priority here and was with our board.

I'm glad to hear that because you're right.

You can't do without those things.

No, we cannot.

We cannot.

So many ways is valuable.

There's the educational support staff.

That's what we call them.

But, you know, we call them aides.

We call them teachers assistants.

We call them all the things.

But yes.

Yes.

Great question.

How long do you have?

We have a fantastic person, our student services director, who has worked with our staff, particularly about chronic absenteeism.

We want to nip those habits in the bud early.

So there's a lot of efforts.

We're chasing people down quite a bit.

Kids, when they're younger children, that really is not their choice not to come to school.

That's because

That's their parents.

So we do everything.

We monitor, we send notices.

We have family meetings with social workers and things like that to figure out what's the root cause of someone not coming to school and how can we help?

You know, there's a lot of anxiety in our children and adults, frankly, and some of that manifests itself in not wanting to come to school.

So we try to find all the resources that we can utilize to assist our students so they're

The reason I asked, I got a grandchild who's going to be in school pretty soon, maybe next fall.

And she says, I don't want, she doesn't even want to go to the babysitter, much less go to school.

Well, it's important to be there.

And, you know, it is reflected in our state's accountability system because our workforce, you know, that's our workforce.

Employers don't want people who are not going to show up for work.

And so we develop those habits very young.

Appreciate the presentation.

Thank you very much.

Next, we have a budget presentation from the Jefferson Area Board of Aging, Judith Seltzer.

Welcome.

I can chat a bit more, so thank you for

So hello, it is a pleasure to be back here.

Judith Selzer, I'm the new CEO of the Jefferson Area Board on Aging.

I've been here now for a total of about eight weeks.

I think when I came to see you last time, it was more about the six-week marker.

So I know a little bit more this time, but really it is an honor to be here.

And I wanted to come, of course, to thank you for your continued investment in the aging community and those living with disabilities throughout our county and our community.

We're celebrating our 50th anniversary this year.

You all created JABA 50 years ago.

You came together with several other counties here in Central Virginia, and you created JABA.

And I've been learning a lot these first eight weeks about the tremendous services we provide to ensure that our seniors continue to have a community, that they're not isolated and lonely at home.

that they have warm meals, that they have transportation, that they have connection to all the different resources that they might need.

As you probably know, here in Greene County, 25% of our residents are over the age of 60, and that number continues to grow.

But over 25% are over the age of 60.

And over 20% of those seniors live in poverty.

And that, while Java services are available to everyone, we are a safety net provider, like many others in the community, working to ensure that those who are most vulnerable get their arms wrapped around them by all of us.

So folks might come to Java first by calling our senior helpline.

and they might be calling themselves or caregiver calling to say, hey, we've got a tax bill.

We're confused about how do we get some meals.

My parents is dealing with cancer and can no longer also care for themselves, but they want to stay at home.

Do you know of services?

They might start by calling our senior helpline.

They might then get connected to our aging services coordinator.

That individual thinks like a case manager might be going out to their home

and figuring out, oh, they need a new ramp at the front door, but they can't afford one.

Or they're now living on the first floor of their home, no longer the second because of mobility issues.

There could be hoarding issues.

And so we're working with volunteers to come in and help them create a safer, cleaner environment.

It could be that they're

dealing with hunger issues and isolation and so they might be coming into our community center for enrichment programs and more meals.

It could be that they are homebound and so they need our moms delivered meals and they get those delivered so that way they can have that nutrition at home.

A variety of different services all because of the investment you make.

So I do have copies of the PowerPoint that we can share as well for you.

I won't take you through every slide but do want to share that towards the second to last slide in the booklet does show how we're doing this year so this does give you an overview of our accomplishments and impact last year with the funding you gave us and we're about halfway through this year and we're on track to meet and exceed all of the goals for this year as well like I said from that senior helpline to our respite and enrichment program to our community centers to our meals

I think the biggest thing that I want to really thank you for is also being ambassadors for these services.

I was just at the Nelson Board of Supervisors meeting earlier today and while sitting here listening to the amazing complicated work that you all do at the schools, thank you for that.

Glad my budget is less complicated.

But I got an email from one of the board members from Nelson saying during my presentation there he heard about the home delivered meals and has a neighbor who is

very income insecure and also dealing with cancer and so can no longer work.

And so how do we get them enrolled in the home delivered meals?

So your ability to also tell your constituents, tell other social service programs that you work with about Java and help make connections for us.

So that way, none of our seniors go hungry.

None of our seniors are isolated at home.

wherever we can step in and make a difference, we appreciate.

But I'm happy to answer questions.

And again, thank you for the years, the 50 years of investing in this work.

Our budget request for this year was $5,000 more than last year.

It's just, as you know, the continued increase in costs of that transportation, those food, those home delivered meals, staffing increases.

Our insurance, like everybody else's, constantly goes up.

but we appreciate again all that you're doing to be part of caring for our community of seniors here.

Thank you very much for your services.

Thank you.

It's been a constant in our community for a long time and I think that's great.

Been multi-generations of people served with a consistency.

People want to age at home.

And so Java is here to try to help them do it with dignity and respect in whatever way is best for them by supporting them and their families and caregivers.

And we know there are many that are isolated whose families have passed on or they don't have children or their families live states away.

And so Java becomes their family and it's an honor to do so.

So thank you for inviting me in to be part of this Java community here.

So how would you convince someone to go?

Yeah, so part of, I'm trying to do this now with my own parents who I moved here as well.

And so, for example, we have an open house at our, one of our facilities, we're going to be doing them for our 50th anniversary in every county.

So we've got one coming up on March 26 in Charlottesville.

So I am

gotten my sister-in-law to agree to bring mom over to our community center in Charlottesville so that way she can check it out and see it.

But I think that's the first piece is finding somebody who already goes there to talk to a neighbor, to talk to a friend.

It could be somebody they know from their church.

to be able to say, hey, I really enjoy this program.

I've made friends there.

The food is delicious.

I'm getting connected with the student nurses that are coming in, getting health care I don't get elsewhere.

And just say, just come with me and try it out.

If you don't like it, I won't force you to go back.

Well, it's like I tried to get my dad to go years ago before he passed away.

Because it's fun.

I mean, we have bands come in.

We have, you know, their cosmetology school came in and was giving everybody facials at one of them the other day.

You know, there's good music.

We go on field trips.

So I think it's super fun.

But, you know, we try to listen to the community about the programs that they want.

But I do think people come and they try it once and then they stay.

It's awesome.

Thank you.

When you have a program that stops aging, let us know.

All right.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, members of the board.

Thank you, sir, for coming.

I know you all are incredibly busy tonight, so I won't take too much time.

My name is David Plunkett.

I'm the director of the Regional Library System.

And with me, I have Martha Ledford, who's Greene County's representative to the Regional Library Board.

We are here mostly to thank you for your ongoing support of library services and the Greene County Library.

It's one of the best branch libraries in the state of Virginia, thanks largely to the support of Greene County government.

The return on investment that the county gets here is phenomenal.

The public library truly serves every member of this community.

Even from birth through retirement, there are services and resources available.

The library's mission is to foster personal growth and lifelong learning for all by connecting people with ideas, information, and each other.

We see that at the Greene County branch more than anywhere.

It's a hub of community gathering in the county.

People in Greene make use of this resource at a high rate, and thanks to your support, they get the library service that they expect and deserve.

So, well, speaking of time capsules, something must have been in the air in the early 70s, because that was also when JMRL was formed.

1972, the regional library was formed.

1974, Greene County joined, and the first branch library here was on Main Street, and Greene has been part of JMRL for 50 years now.

After that branch on Main Street, we moved into the library right across the street here on Standard Street.

And here it was in 1982.

And then finally, in 2003, moved into the forever home here, which we share, of course, the county's building shared with Java and with Piedmont Virginia Community College.

so this is really a crown jewel for the county this building obviously the library services inside this building led by the board of supervisors and county staff with tremendous encouragement and fundraising support from the community it's likely the most visited building in standardsville i don't have any numbers on other buildings but i know what it are what it is going inside the library there 40 000 community members came in last year so

The days of the dusty stacks and the shushing librarian are for better or worse, probably a little bit behind us.

The job of the librarian is to connect people with information.

It was always connecting with books.

Now I replaced the word books with information in your mind there.

It means a million different things.

There's so much information out there.

People know that they can come to their public library here in Standardsville to help them navigate it, whether that's learning how to use the new device they just got, getting connected to daily stock market information on business databases, looking up their family tree for free on ancestry.com in the library, or attending a program to learn something new, the Greene County Library can help.

So just a few of the services so just in case you were thinking we're just sitting around reading all day.

33 items to check out at the Greene County Library plus access to 450,000 regionally that can be there.

We usually tell people two to three days really it takes about 24 hours to get anything shipped from anywhere in the region.

350,000 digital items available to check out.

early literacy, lifelong learning, team programming, public computer use, still very popular for all, digital navigation and support because people come in to use the computers then they need help with simple things.

You can't apply for a job now without having an email address.

So this is one of the places that people come to get that help.

Online databases in the library and outside for research, car repair, foreign language learning, local newspapers, business information, genealogical research, consumer reports, all those things are available at the library's website.

Printing and fax services.

Public Wi-Fi, meeting rooms, public privacy pod, conference space.

We got a grant from the state a few years ago.

It looks a little bit like a phone booth, but it fits two people and you can set up and have a Zoom meeting in there.

If you needed to meet with a notary or something, there's a spot in the library for you.

Speaking of notaries, there's notary service available at the library.

There's free interlibrary loan with anything that's in the University of Virginia's library that they will lend out.

They'll send it to JMRL and we'll send it to patrons at any branch library.

blood pressure monitoring.

There's a whole library of things.

These are kits that people can check out.

We've got book club kits where it might be 10 books and some questions, but then we've also got STEM kits, Wi-Fi hotspots that you can check out and take home, bread making kits, foods of the world.

There's even a ukulele.

for some reason.

There's a 24-hour hold pickup locker that's outside the branch now that went in about a year and a half ago.

So if the hours of the library don't meet your needs, if you work nights or you can't get in on the weekend, you can put something on hold and come by and pick it up after hours just using your card.

That's been very popular here.

Virginia State Park passes the checkout and on and on.

I ran out of room on the slide to talk about the things that the library can do.

and usage last year, just between the last two fiscal years, these are Greene residents checking materials out.

Fiscal year 23, it was a hair under 100,000 items checked out.

Fiscal year 24, 104,000 items were checked out by Greene County residents from the library.

182 programs in 23, 157, so about 30 less last year, but program attendance was almost 2,000 more.

So to me, that's bang for your buck.

You know, you try to program in ways that people are interested in coming in and learning about library resources.

Last year, 168 groups used the public meeting rooms, 2,200 people came in to use the computers and almost 3,000 came in to use the Wi-Fi in the library.

So

Greene County's planning and the comprehensive plan says that Greene County will enhance a robust library system in Greene County.

First, it says to coordinate, to assess the feasibility of a Rutgersville branch library.

Don't worry, I'm not here to ask for a Rutgersville branch library, but it's something that we have talked to Ms.

Shaferick about down the road, you know, as we have population move.

If we can't put a new building there, then maybe there's a book drop option or some way that we can offer services.

The people in Greene County also heavily use the Northside Library, which is, you know, just a few miles down the road there on 29.

work with Greene County Library to expand its role as a center for learning and in the strategic plan, practice good governance and strengthen community engagement while the library is here to help Greene County meet those objectives.

So the budget requests that we have for this year, I have full copies of the budget for you all.

Ms.

Schaefer might have already shared with you, but this is the regional library system budget.

We're holding the line.

No new positions, no new hours, no new major initiatives.

Just continuing to provide the library service that the people of the county expect and deserve.

It's great value here.

The request to the Greene County is to deal with rising costs, especially in the library's health insurance, as you've already heard a few times tonight.

And basically the increase there is about a 5.6% increase.

And that's the lowest amount that any jurisdiction that pays into JMRL is being asked for for next year, in large part because we have done a good job here allocating resources over the years and we've got a right size staff right now.

One of the many things that impresses me about the library is that it's 24-7, 365, meaning that if you need internet access, you could drive up to the parking lot when the building is closed.

If you want to pick up books, that's paper books.

You can order them and get them in the locker.

I personally like listening to books, and I'm getting them through JMRL.

I'm getting movies through JMRL, being to me up on my mountain.

That's not my mountain, up on that mountain.

There are so many things that are available that you don't have to be in this spot.

But I think one of my favorite things at the library right now is a community involvement that we're doing.

There's a cookbook.

And we pick a recipe out of one cookbook and we all

Okay, and come and have a wonderful feast.

I will say, just to add on to that, that when COVID hit and library branches were not as easy to get into, the first online program we did, the Greene County staff called me and said, we can't cancel cookbook book club.

We have to hold this.

And so that was our first Zoom program.

People baked or made food and ate at home and shared community, even though they were not in the library.

Are there any questions from any members of the board?

I'm happy to be here.

Well, come on on that night and you can taste everything.

We have probably at least as long as this board here.

Full of food, and then there's another one of desserts.

Thank you all for your time.

Appreciate you having us.

Thank you all very much.

Budget presentation for the Water and Sewer Department.

Mr. Tom Hutke, Director.

Thank you.

So, I won't take too long.

You've heard...

all of this, so much of this before.

And that's kind of the first point is that we basically did the budget back in September and have watched it and verified it and tested it since that time.

We're slow in building a track record because even our great staff don't have a lot of experience running these particular facilities, which is unusual in utilities.

But when we did the finance plan and presented it and rate study and presented it in October and November, it was all based on our capital budget, our operating budget.

So they all fit together.

They all build on each other.

And you've heard a lot of this before.

We've

looked at the track record and building the budget, the operating budget.

We looked at staffing and powering chemicals and made sure that previous budgets and current expenditures were all in line, tweaked them where we needed it.

We specifically looked at our short track record of repairs.

And my first couple of months, almost every week, I got a bill on my desk for $30,000 to $60,000 for things that were breaking down, that were in misrepair.

We seem to be coming out of that, but

All of that went into figuring out how much does it cost to actually run the daily operations at the water and sewer systems.

Building on that base, we added an R&R account, a repair replacement account, which is standard for the industry.

And so that when we get those unexpected bills, we actually have a funding source for them.

We added an administrative transfer, which is very definitely standard for the business for enterprise funds.

And what that is, is we'll make an annual payment to our friends in finance and HR who do a lot of work for the water and sewer system.

Not only is that a good idea and it's not only is that the accepted practice for enterprise funds, our auditor somewhat informally pointed that out to us a few months ago.

They caught that.

We're adding to this budget request an administrative manager.

a water plant operator and a sewer plant operator, as we've explained.

And again, I'm repeating myself, but these folks have been working double shifts and sometimes six, seven days a week on a continual basis without taking vacation and sometimes without taking sick leave when they need to.

And then we added inflation on for next year's budget.

The

Recently, since we last talked, there's an awful lot of concern that our enterprise fund will not be self-supporting as we go forward.

Specifically, that the water and sewer funds will have to rely on the general fund, and particularly if there's a slow year of recession, lower housing starts.

And I want to take a couple of minutes to explain how this financial plan, this budget,

and our rate study, we already looked at those possibilities.

We're already insuring and using good financial practices for utility systems.

We started with standard practices for the utility industry.

We put together a financial plan using the most prudent numbers possible.

Every number that went into it was prudently low, including housing starts.

We will continuously monitor and update the financial plan as things change.

Sometimes good things happen, like we get grants that we were hoping for but don't have yet.

Sometimes if prices go up, prices go down, we will continue to monitor and update the financial plan on a very routine basis.

forever after from now into the future as a well-run utility system.

We'll change rates and to the extent possible change expenditures, reduce expenditures as we go if we need to facing difficult financial times.

We've already, this financial plan and the proposal for debt

is we are capitalizing interest to reduce the crunch that I talked about before.

The first few years of debt service are the biggest crunch on the system, and we're capitalizing interest to kind of spread that out so that the first four years of payments will be less than the average payment in future years.

And then the big one is, this is the huge one.

We have and will continue to build more reserve accounts

just like all of this is analogous to buying a house on a mortgage and the first thing the mortgage banker will say is in order to buy a house you have to have the down payment okay and you also have to have so much money in the bank cash in case you lose your job in case you have high medical bills or something you can get through difficult months that you have cash in a bank otherwise you don't get the mortgage well we know that and we're

already have a large cash reserve and we're continuing to build on that.

So that if we do have a lean year, if our housing start estimates are off, if we have a major recession and things don't develop as they are fully expected to in the development of the area, we can weather that storm.

We can also, just like a home mortgage, if we need to, we can refinance at any point during the 30-year plan.

We don't want to, it's not advisable, but if we need to, if there's a difficult financial year, we can refinance.

So all this adds up to, as I said back in October, presenting the financial plan,

We are not relying on general funds.

We should not have to use general funds at any point during the 30 years that we're proposing for a bond sale.

One last note is just a reminder, our bond anticipation note, the ban, some people are calling it a bridge loan, is coming due this summer.

And there are various dates for when we have to, but we have to get serious.

It will take time to

prepare the refinancing mechanism for that to pay off that ban.

And so basically, I'm saying we need to schedule a discussion of all the options and make decisions with our financial advisor earlier than later would be good.

We definitely don't want to default on the ban just because we weren't planning in advance.

And that's it.

Okay.

Questions?

Yes.

Director Hutke, so there's a 30% increase in your budget from last year.

And that was blown through in the actuals.

What does the model call for as far as growth in the operating expenditures of the water system?

From what I recall, it was 3%.

So there's a huge difference there.

When do you anticipate the crossover point when this system will stop requiring massive county

subsidizing even without the debt that we're about to get of $87 million.

When you talk about county subsidizing, you're talking about general fund, property taxes?

Well, yeah.

I can't agree with that.

We recently raised user fees.

We recently raised the EDU development fees, and that put us on a path where we can

When will that happen?

That's all I'm asking.

Because you get a 30% increase if you're looking at that you are only supposed to get a three long term for the next year models to nine years.

you're blasting through that.

So even if the model says at some point in time, you will be able to contribute user fees and cover the debt service, well, you're behind the curve already.

The financial model.

I'm sorry.

No, it begins right now.

It began when we did it in September.

It began in September and it showed that we would never rely on

No, not at all.

I'm sorry, I have to apologize.

I made a promise and I didn't follow through with it tonight.

I said every time we talked about rates, I would remind you all that water and sewer rates, utility rates are not like the general fund or property taxes or sales taxes or any other typical government taxes.

They don't adjust themselves for inflation.

So we'll be back in front of you on a regular basis to adjust

the rates, both development fees and user fees, to keep up with inflation in future years.

As far as the 30%, I can't speak to budgets from past years.

I can sit here, I can give you a partial recitation of the things I know that weren't properly in the budget.

Moneys to cover emergency repairs, which is why we're putting an R&R account in there.

Previous budgets didn't have sufficient funding to operate the plans.

And from folks at the plan when they can't take vacations to be with their family.

They didn't include funding for the meter replacement program.

We're putting that in for the first time.

So I can't speak to a 30% increase.

I can tell you, again, what I said earlier is the operating budget, the capital budget, the proposed bond sale, the financial plan, the rate study, all fit together seamlessly.

The starting point was last September, and they show, no, we do not need to rely

on the general fund.

Previous years, I can't speak to that.

Where the CIP for the next five years calls for $127 million worth of spending, we keep talking about 87.

like this CIP, the mini CIP this year is gonna be a million dollars that I don't think we expected to actually pay for.

So where's that other $40 million gonna come from if we're only kinda, even with the rosy model that we have,

that we're just gonna be able to cover that.

Right, they were built into the financial plan.

The 80, I have to do the math.

We had $76 million for the reservoir projects, four projects rebating, minus $3 million grant, soon to be minus another $4 million grant.

Plus we were showing

$11 million for the Standardsville water line, all of that bond funded.

That was the proposal.

Before I got here, it remains the proposal, all bond funding.

The closing of the Standardsville sewer improvements, or the closing, I'm sorry, the closing of the Standardsville lagoons.

They call it a wastewater treatment plant.

It's barely a plants, lagoons.

Okay.

A loan or a grant?

It's a loan.

A loan or a grant?

It's a loan.

So we owe that money.

It's not.

So again, we know the numbers.

We also have a consent decree to do that, right?

Almost off by the top of our head.

So still, the plan is to borrow $87 million on the top of our existing debt of 68 as a county.

and all these other things are $40 million.

I'm not following the math.

Where do you get $87 million?

Okay, the standards for sewer improvements are closing in lagoons.

That's a loan.

That's not bond money.

The standards for water improvement is the new line.

So that's 87, 86 million.

And then you're saying before we were told it's going to be a grant for the 13 million, but that's not going to be a grant.

It sounds like it's a loan.

I never told you it was grant.

I will say this is that when I came, I was told it was a forgivable loan.

It is not a forgivable loan.

Okay, so 13 plus 87 is $100 million.

And then there were line extensions.

Let's go back because we're already off, okay?

75, 76, I've seen both.

We've used 76 for the reservoir projects.

Minus $3 million grant that was already awarded

last year, okay?

Brings us to 73.

Minus, and this hasn't been yet updated, minus $4 million grant that we're- When the governor signs a budget.

When the governor signs the budget.

So count that or not.

$11 million for Stanisville water improvements, which is both the line and a new tank.

to improve pressures and reliability of the water in Sandersville.

That's 80.

Thank you.

You're faster than I am.

$80 million for bond money.

Okay.

The, again, the standards feel sewer improvements as it's labeled here.

I tried to keep the old name so it wasn't confusing, but that's closing lagoons and pumping all of that to the Rutgersville water treatment, wastewater treatment plan.

That's $13 million.

Okay.

Actually that number is high.

That was originally the loan amount that included

replacing sewer lines in downtown Standardsville.

Apparently, there was a project to redo the Standardsville streets or Main Street.

And at that time, county staff thought, well, then we can replace the water line and we can fix the sewer laterals.

And then we no longer have a project.

The community no longer has a project to redo Main Street and Standardsville.

So that number will only go down to cover just the loan for closing the lagoon's.

We've been trying to use that for the alum feed.

But as you know, I was here two weeks ago to fund that from our reserve.

And if we can, we're still pushing to get that as part of the loan.

But that'll fit comfortably within the $13 million.

We have $200,000 for pump station number one to put that online.

That's a high estimate.

If we need to, we'll take that out of the R&R account that we're establishing.

So I would like to focus just on the operations side.

Let's not litigate all the projects because my concern is we haven't agreed on any of those projects, right?

Well, we'll give direction on that at a later time, but I just think first we need to get into your budget and need to deal with that, and then I guess we'll provide direction at a later time as to where we're going.

Sound good?

Yeah, that's okay.

Okay.

Clear?

All right.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you all.

Appreciate it.

All right.

Consent agenda.

Looking for a motion.

Second?

We have a motion and second.

Roll call vote.

Mr. Lamb?

Aye.

Mr. Dura?

Mr. McQuiggan?

Aye.

Mr. Goolsbee?

Aye.

And the chair votes out.

All right.

action items.

First, Ms.

Terry Biggie, grant writer approval to apply for spring 2025 rescue squad assistant fund.

Thank you.

Thank you for hearing me again on another grant.

And no.

All right, so I'm just going to talk.

I only have four quick slides anyway.

So the Rescue Squad Assistance Fund is twice a year, and it opens in the spring and the fall.

And per our grant policies, I need to have permission because it does require a match to apply.

After the past few weeks of discussions, I know you're very aware the public safety is the largest component of the county's budget outside of the school system.

And I believe the best way to leverage taxpayer dollars is to find grants to cover at least portions of the cost of this very expensive equipment.

Since January 2023, we have received $548,860.22 in grant funds specifically for EMS.

and those that did require matching grants or matching funds were paid using the local assistance, tribal and state funds that the board at the time directed to be used as a match, ARPA funds and opioid abatement settlement funds.

So nothing has come from the general fund at this time, but we're running out of that money.

This application that we're asking to submit is for two new life pack monitored at a cost of $102,800.

As you're aware, we inherited a lot of outdated older equipment when we took over for the contract and the contract provider and the volunteer rescue squad.

So this is replacing that.

These monitors go on to the ambulances.

It's really likely that this grant is only gonna cover 50% of that cost.

So we don't know if we would only be awarded one

or both.

So we don't know that amount.

So I'm giving you the maximum amount.

The grant will not cover required accessories for the operation of these defibrillators, however.

And you need different monitors for different size people, different age people, pediatrics, things like that.

So the maximum required match for this grant is $82,329.16.

matching funds can come from unreserved balance in any amount, opioid abatement settlement funds or other unobligated funds.

We don't need to decide where that match is going to come from until the award happens and then we'll know the exact amount.

So

Hospital travel can take more than 36 minutes for a person on board.

So if you're dealing with cardiac arrest, chest pain, strokes, things like that, that's a long time to be operating and managing a patient on the back of the bus.

And in

I updated the amount.

So the updated call numbers, in 2022, there were 169 chest pain and cardiac calls for GC and EMS.

In 2024, it was up to 175, and this is when I applied in August.

And however, at the end of the year, the county answered 226 chest pain calls, which is roughly a 33% increase over two years.

So this type of equipment is life-saving and needed.

We have an older, as you learned tonight, we have an older population here.

And those that tend to be living in or near poverty do not do as many well checks and take care of themselves as well.

So they actually end up being sicker when they reach that age.

So that's something we're facing here with our EMS.

So the devices have a life, so the cost analysis.

So the life cycle of these defibrillator monitors are seven to eight years.

So the cost per county resident for LifePack, this specific request is 76 cents annually for eight years without a grant or 47 cents with the grant.

So approximately $3.76 per person for these two life-saving devices.

and it is due next week.

Okay.

If you don't apply, you won't get it.

And EMS does not have a lot of grant options.

It's a 50% match, most likely.

Most likely.

We can ask for more, but we also don't know if they'll give us both defibrillators or only one.

Right.

So that changes them.

Yeah, Price has been not being able to get them out.

I think we try it and we make a motion.

I move that we approve the resolution to the count, allow the county administrator to execute these.

Let me go back there.

Let's get this white one.

Okay.

Is there a second?

Second.

Okay.

We have a motion and a second.

Roll call vote.

Mr. Lamb?

Aye.

Ms.

Dura?

Aye.

Mr. Goolsbee?

Aye.

Thank you.

All right.

Hold on, my computer's slowing down for some reason.

I'm working it too hard tonight.

Come on, baby, there it is.

Okay, B, resolution to authorize the advertisement for the tax rates for 2025 and the proposed real property equalized tax rate.

Ms.

Before you have a resolution to reduce

to advertise a tax rate, reducing real estate by two cents and bringing it to the equalization rate.

The equalization rate is the rate you would have to reduce so that you're not taking in any more with the new assessed values.

You're not taking in any more revenue than you did the year before.

You also, at your request, have a 50 cent reduction in personal property tax, which would take it down 50 more cents.

You took it down 50 cents last year.

So that's a dollar between last year and this year that you would take it down.

So the total would be $4 per hundred assessed value.

and also the real estate.

I should have mentioned you also brought down last year out of cycle of the reassessment two cents.

So this year,

will recognize over two years, four cents reduction and a dollar for personal property.

Now, reducing that much, just like last year, means that decreasing the real estate by two cents.

And I gave you a sheet that looks like this to give you a summary.

Thought it would be easier to

help jumpstart, you know, give a framework for the discussion.

I know you've you all spent a lot of time going through the budget books, I'm sure, since last week.

But reducing the real estate tax rate by two cents will require about six hundred and eight thousand dollars.

Reducing personal property by 50 cents will be

a million and about $62,000 for a combined total of just shy of $1.7 million that we have to cut from the balance budget that you were presented.

So to do that, been busy working with a lot of our partners.

So did talk to Kim Tate, the Commission of Real Estate.

And as I mentioned, the final numbers for assessments, both real estate and personal property, aren't in.

We haven't gotten them from our contractor, Pearson, that will help us with both of those.

However, the piece that's missing on the real estate side is still going through meetings with people who

want to have a meeting to challenge their assessment.

So that's ongoing and he's working through, you know, whatever the outcome of those meetings are, plus entering in the new construction.

So we did get a fairly good estimate working with Kim Tate and working, you know, based on information we had so that we look, you know, on that sheet, you see 96, 417.

That's how much we can increase safely the

real estate tax that would be coming in.

Personal property with new tax receipts, we did get a rough file and we were able to go through that.

And we feel confident that $524,000 could come from there.

You could, as an option I put on here, and you'll have to decide just to make sure that

you're considering all options.

The additional three cents in TOT tax that you added last year that you're directing for a future rec center, you could redirect that back to balance the general fund.

and working with the treasurer who has come before you to talk about putting our money in interest-bearing accounts.

We work together to figure out what is a reasonable amount that we could have on an annual basis.

So looking at $5 million invested for a year based on the current rates and the Virginia pooled investment program that they have, that's $175,000.

caveated with her strong caveat, which that requires that bond anticipation note or the bridge loan, as it's sometimes called, that assumes that that gets refinanced because if that comes due and we have to take all our cash to pay it, then there won't be any cash to put into any kind of interest-bearing account.

it's possible that as she works through looking at the different options that it might be more than 5 million or it might be 5 million in this one.

And so she's still working through how all that program would be.

But safely, I think we could have $175,000, which means 1.1 additional

money that we can count towards revenue, which offsetting that 1.7 means that we have just under 600,000 where we still have to find.

You heard from Dr. Whitmarsh, she mentioned it at the beginning, the budget that you adopted last year and the budget that we proposed

had an increase of the general and additional money going of $173,149.

If we keep them flat to what you adopted last year, we could reclaim that $173,000 and use it toward that deficit.

And working with Dr. Whitmarsh

Obviously, it won't say no to more money, but it also wouldn't devastate the schools.

We had had proposed six, well, actually, it was six full-time positions, four for sheriff, two for EMS, part-time

Ms.

Sheriff, please.

Oh, a part-time victim witness position and a part-time parks and rec position.

And talking with some of you wanting to see four positions, two for EMS and two for Sheriff's Department, the people that if you gave me feedback, that's the consistent feedback that I heard.

that would be asking the sheriff what two he would want.

He said he wanted one deputy and one dispatcher communications, communication officer.

And then we had the MS.

So what I cut from the 620,000 was one of the deputies and one of the officers, which still leaves one and one funded,

and those two part-time positions.

So that's with the schools and those reductions in staff of the new staff that we proposed, that's 429,000.

And then we really went through and nobody's happy about these cuts, let me say,

And nobody ever is.

But we found an additional $200,000, which includes a reduction of about $23,000 for legal services, a reduction of $10,000 that we would pay to Pearson.

Even in off years, there's always new construction.

I was going to have him look a little bit more at commercial, but we don't have to do that.

reducing vehicle maintenance by $30,000 he's very nervous about this cut because parts are going up in cost now $20,000 for EMS vehicle maintenance same thing again it just gives reduced available funding if there's a big problem but because especially parts are going up in cost reducing uniforms by $10,000 in EMS

reducing the general maintenance budget by $25,000 for equipment.

And then the contingency that you guys approve spending out of reducing that by 80,000.

That leaves you at the bottom where you see 58,572.

I purposely found more in cuts

because I thought if you wanted to add any of these cuts back in, or if you want to add position or something back in, I want to give you a little more flexibility than just, just managing, you know, like tightening it up.

So, I mean, you could do, you could add something back in and the transmittal letter, there were other positions that weren't funded.

You were from the treasurer.

She has a part-time position.

You know, there's other things you could, you could fund with that 58 or do something different with it.

So I wanted to be able to let you guys, and I'm sure you guys have already come through when there were things that you were interested in having us look at.

Thank you.

It's the board's pleasure.

What was the general fund access?

About $3 million more.

I'm sorry?

Yes.

The funding balance went from about 15.8 to about 18.8.

In the one year?

Okay.

Great question.

So we're trending down slightly.

For revenues.

For revenues are trending down.

So our revenues are trending down a little.

I think part of that we anticipated, of course, we had a rate cut last year.

And that includes like cigarette taxes down, which isn't a bad thing.

I'm actually kind of happy about that.

And that's not a major revenue category.

And some of the other smaller revenue categories are trending.

Definitely we see the trending down piece.

Okay.

Motion to adopt the resolution?

Yeah, I'll move that we decrease the equalization rate on the

real estate tax, bringing it down from 71 to 69, and that we also take 50 cents off the personal property tax, moving it from 450 to 400%.

All right.

Okay.

We have a motion in the second roll call vote.

Mr. McQuiggan?

Aye.

Mr. Goolsbee?

Aye.

Ms.

Durrah?

Aye.

Mr. Lamb?

Aye.

And the chair votes aye.

All right.

Get back up here again.

I think it's Ms.

Sheffrick.

I can help.

and Mr. Howard from the start.

So short story, we purchased the building.

When Mr. Taylor started working with Mr. Howard, it was identified that there's special criteria needs for the building.

Mr. Howard had some concerns that

He's been in a transformed grocery store since he started, and he wants to take this opportunity to make sure that his needs are met, especially the needs for serving the clients and the safety of the staff and the safety of the environment.

So it required some improvements that have been identified as additional entrance, additional safety measures for some of the testing they have to do, separation of the people that are required to do testing,

The process involved, when the board was involved, the social services board was very active.

We, at the direction of the board, hired an architect firm.

The architect firm has completed all the work

they're ready to do the work.

The building is ready for the work to occur.

But in order to do that, there's the need for the funding to pay for the bids that are gonna come back.

So we've got the estimates, we've got everything ready.

The engineering firm, architect engineering firm is ready to go out for bid.

And if we do that now,

building will be completed pretty much at the end of the fiscal year, and social services will be able to start moving in in July.

If we wait till next year, the money is going to come from the exact same place.

This is money from the reserves, from the capital portion of the reserves, so it has no budget impact this year.

If you wait till next year, it's just saying that

Social Services won't be able to begin moving in until three months after the year begins, probably four months.

And it's actually much more complicated than that.

The architect, because there's a lot of changes involved and a lot of working back and forth to get the design just right.

He's ready to move and he's got a lot of work and we're not ready to move.

We may have to find another architect for him to finish it because he's ready to move on.

And that's the simple crux of it.

And it does move the sheriff project quicker because they can start on the review and the design work for that because that building is all chopped up.

It's going to take some pretty creative work to make it work.

Any other discussion on the board?

Okay.

We have a motion and a second.

Roll call vote.

Mr. Lamb.

Aye.

Ms.

Mr. Goolsbee.

Aye.

Mr. McQuiggan.

Aye.

And the chair votes aye.

Okay.

Don't have any more items for discussion.

We'll move to informational items, updates and reports.

Start with board liaison reports.

Well, I had a soil and water meeting last week.

None?

Okay.

Got snowed out.

That'd be for the next meeting.

Okay.

Yes, I've got two quick things.

One is that

you heard the review that was done by Virginia Tech and I know I emailed it all to you and I emailed it actually Mr. Copeland too just hot off the press around four something today we got an another 87 page addendum to it so because of when it came in I have a time to read it I scanned through it looks like a lot of information in there we've posted it on the water and sewer page

There is like right on the landing page on the left hand side, there's a bunch of links to key pages.

We made it its own page to be super easy to find.

I think it's got the title of the report, which somebody was making fun of me for making it so long, but it's a review of the financial model for water and sewer, whatever the title of the report is.

So you can find the original report.

There was like a one page addendum to correct

I think it was one of the housing developments or something.

And then there's the second

major part of the report.

Second, just a reminder, I forgot to say because usually I'm last and everybody wants to go home.

But if you go to the Board of Supervisors page, there is a place where you can see public comments, questions answered.

And we always post it.

So I refreshed it for this calendar year.

So people come up and they ask questions.

A lot of times I'll get back with them personally, but for everybody else who heard the question, never heard the answer, to make sure that the answer is there so people can go look at it if they want.

Nobody's complaining.

So the next thing, since you bring it up and it's a good segue, I mentioned it in my county ministry report last time, but, and it's the end of, we've got the calendar up and it's in the end of my presentation and we try to get it out as much as possible.

But the next meeting is, no, March 20th is the budget town hall at the Dyke Volunteer Fire Station and that's at six o'clock.

And then the next one after that is March 27th, the Budget Town Hall at the Standardsville Volunteer Station over here at 6 o'clock.

It's going to be the same thing.

Sounds good.

Other items from the board.

Yeah, Mr. Chairman, I wonder if we could work in a discussion in the next meeting for establishing that, which we touched on last meeting, that CIP fund.

And the way I would envision that it would work is everything above that 25% that we need to have in reserve would go into that fund.

And then additionally, each year, if we have an excess

that that would also automatically roll over so that people don't start eyeing it and saying, well, that's a part of the budget for the following year.

Do you want to do it as part of a budget discussion or do you want to do it as a separate agenda item?

I mean, I think it's related to the budget just so we kind of clear all this stuff so we're not doing budget stuff into June and July.

Like when we do our synopsis and when we finally start making, make sure we don't forget that because it's a good idea.

Okay.

Other items from the board?

Motion to adjourn?

Second.

I have a motion in a second to adjourn.

Roll call vote.

Mr. McQuiggin?

Aye.

Mr. Goolsby?

Aye.

Ms.

Dura?

Aye.

Ms.

Lamb?

Aye.

And the chair votes aye.

Good night.