April 13, 2023
By: Dwayne Page
Several county department heads and public officials met with the budget committee Tuesday night to make their capital projects funding requests for the 2023-24 fiscal year.
No action has yet been taken on them.
The county plans to make application for a Community Development Block Grant for a new ambulance. If fully funded the grant totals $399,638 with a 16% grant match by the county of $63,942. EMS Director Hoyte Hale said the projected cost for a 2025 ambulance is $237,000 but it would also need about $161,000 in equipment that the grant could cover including a Stryker automatic loading system, Pro 2 ambulance cot, Stryker Stair Chair, Zoll heart monitor, and ventilator.
Director Hale also asked that capital projects funding of $36,000 be allocated for the purchase of 10 portable radios with dual band/multiband frequency capability which would enable each of the EMS units to have two portable radios.
Hale has further requested that $45,000 be allocated to equip a new ambulance scheduled to arrive in January with an automatic loading system and power cot which had not been included in the specifications when the ambulance was ordered this past year.
Sheriff Patrick Ray has requested a capital projects funding allocation of $165,000 to purchase four patrol cars. The needed equipment for the vehicles is to be funded by the sheriff’s department’s maintenance budget line item which is about $12,000 per car.
County Mayor Matt Adcock asked for an appropriation from the capital projects fund for an SUV to be used by him for official county business.
“The car I have now has become unreliable and has broken down on me a couple of times lately. I do a lot of traveling to places like Cookeville and Nashville on county business and sometimes people ride with me like UCDD and staff members so an SUV would provide more room for travel, and as a 4-wheel drive vehicle it would also be handy when I have to go out in snow and ice especially during emergencies,” said County Mayor Adcock.
Seventh district commissioner and budget committee member Beth Pafford requested that $10,000 be allocated from the capital projects fund toward engineering costs in a joint effort with the City of Smithville for putting down sidewalks on Bryant Street in Smithville.
Solid Waste Director James Goff asked for $80,000 to fund the purchase of 12- 30 cubic yard open top containers. He said the new cans are needed due to “areas of concern from our state inspector because of leaky, rusty containers that we are having issues with that could become violations”.
Goff also presented the proposed solid waste department budget for the 2023-24 fiscal year. Perhaps the biggest change is the increased cost for contracted services. The county is under contract with the Capital Waste Company to haul to a landfill in Dayton all the county’s garbage collected at the transfer station.
Although the contractor’s fees have apparently not increased, the volume of the county’s garbage has which has resulted in an increase in the haul bill.
The county had budgeted $985,000 for the contracted service this year but for 2023-24 the budgeted cost is $1,365,000.
“The average cost is $55 per ton because of the volume we do,” said Director Goff. “That (current budget) only gives me $82,000 per month. We haven’t had an $82,000 month since I have been here. Last month it was $115,000 so we are trending well over $100,000 each month (cost to transport garbage out of county)”, he said.
Budget committee members suggested that part of the higher volume may be due to persons from outside the county bringing their garbage here.
“It is very tough to police that at the convenience sites,” Goff admitted but he added that “at the transfer station some do have contracts with us and they do pay so if they come in whether they are a singular entity as a citizen or if they are a corporation or company they are contracted with us and they pay every 30 days,” said Goff.
A change in the operating hours at the convenience sites has also impacted the budget. The total budgeted costs for laborers has gone from $352,000 this year to a 2023-24 budgeted amount of $394,176.
“That is more due to the convenience sites being open more and being open longer hours. Prior there were different shifts and different days open for different sites so this is bringing continuity across the entire convenience site operation that will bring it to six days a week and open from 9 to 6 every day,” said Director Goff.
Meanwhile the transfer station has now become the centralized location for solid waste operation including the weighing, billing, and renting of dumpsters, etc. and an existing operator has been reassigned as bookkeeper at the same pay. In addition to the director and bookkeeper, the solid waste department has one operator and four CDL drivers along with the 24 part time people who man the convenience sites.
Meanwhile as reported in a previous WJLE post, County Fire Chief Donny Green has requested that an additional $100,000 in capital projects funding be allocated to build a public safety building on property owned by the US Army Corps of Engineers near Center Hill Dam to house a fire truck to serve the Wolf Creek Community once a partnership agreement has been finalized between the county and the Corps.
In his other capital projects funding requests, Chief Green has asked for an appropriation of $40,000 to replace a leaking metal roof on a portion of the Main Station fire hall on King Ridge Road and $7,000 to install insulation to the Belk Fire Station, which is a metal building with a concrete slab with no inside insulation.
Chief Green has also requested an expenditure for an SUV for the fire department. The cost for a new one is expected to be around $50,000.
“We currently have a utility trailer and two boats that we have to move and pull. I propose to surplus a 2006 SUV that we bought from state surplus several years ago. It has about 150,000-160,000 miles on it. We propose to surplus that vehicle and then put the new SUV into service. The SUV would be assigned to me. If we have to take the boat to the lake, I am primarily the one who gets the boat and the trailer if we have to haul some special type of equipment like generators. I spent a lot of time during icy weather taking generators around to people that didn’t have electricity that were on medical equipment. That is generally what we use that (SUV) for. I do keep it equipped with a lot of emergency equipment that we can use before an ambulance or rescue truck gets there (scene) that we can do some initial operations with so that is why it (SUV) is necessary,” said Chief Green.