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1. CALL TO ORDER - PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE - INVOCATION   REGULAR AGENDA ITEMS:
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A.   Information/Discussion to consider the implementation of a local court fee schedule which, if approved, would be effective in FY26.  (Jon Bearup)
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B.   Information/Discussion regarding pending legislation addressing rural groundwater management. (Michael O'Driscoll)
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C.   Information/Discussion regarding the Gila County Courthouse Paving Project, Globe Jail Paving Project, and Gila County Courthouse Roof Replacement Project. (Joseph Dickison)
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3.  CALL TO THE PUBLIC:  A call to the public is held for public benefit to allow individuals to address the Board of Supervisors on any issue within the jurisdiction of the Board of Supervisors. Board members may not discuss items that are not specifically identified on the agenda. Therefore, pursuant to Arizona Revised Statute §-431.01(I), at the conclusion of an open call to the public, individual members of the Board of Supervisors may respond to criticism made by those who have addressed the Board, may ask staff to review a matter or may ask that a matter be put on a future agenda for further discussion and decision at a future date.
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4. At any time during this meeting pursuant to A.R.S. §-431.02(K), members of the Board of Supervisors and the County Manager may present a brief summary of current events.  No action may be taken on the information presented. IF SPECIAL ACCOMMODATIONS ARE NEEDED, PLEASE CONTACT THE RECEPTIONIST AT (928)5-3231 AS EARLY AS POSSIBLE TO ARRANGE THE ACCOMMODATIONS. FOR TTY, PLEASE DIAL1-1 TO REACH THE ARIZONA RELAY SERVICE AND ASK THE OPERATOR TO CONNECT YOU TO (928)5-3231. THE BOARD MAY VOTE TO HOLD AN EXECUTIVE SESSION FOR THE PURPOSE OF OBTAINING LEGAL ADVICE FROM THE BOARD’S ATTORNEY ON ANY MATTER LISTED ON THE AGENDA PURSUANT TO A.R.S. §38-431.03(A)(3). THE ORDER OR DELETION OF ANY ITEM ON THIS AGENDA IS SUBJECT TO MODIFICATION AT THE MEETING.
Transcript
OK, everything good. 00:00:00
OK, we're all ready. 00:00:06
OK. Good morning, everyone. I'd like to call this meeting together Tuesday, February 25th. It's about four minutes after 10. 00:00:08
And I've asked. 00:00:15
Supervisor Klein if he'd lead us in the pledge if he goes down. 00:00:17
Of the United States of America. 00:00:20
And to the Republic for which it changed one nation under God. 00:00:27
Thank you. 00:00:36
OK, fair warning shortage in the long meeting. 00:00:41
Item 2A is information and discussion to consider the implementation of a local court fee schedule which, if approved, would be 00:00:47
effective in fiscal year 26. Good morning, John. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of the Board. 00:00:54
Thank you very much for this opportunity today. 00:01:01
Often we come before you with a complicated package in one meeting and ask you to take action. 00:01:04
So I'm grateful that we have the opportunity to discuss it in a work session format. 00:01:10
I'm really looking for input, feedback, thoughts, concerns, criticism. 00:01:15
And so, well, thank you, John. And I'll just admonish the other supervisors, just jump in whenever you'd like when it is a work 00:01:19
center. 00:01:23
Absolutely. 00:01:27
So if you want somebody to know something or know nothing, then tell them everything. 00:01:29
And so we're going to try to keep this presentation in the bite size chunks to show you how we arrived at the conclusion. 00:01:34
To make the request for a local court fee schedule. 00:01:40
So the courts operate under a coordinated courts budget. 00:01:45
Administrative Order 2017, Dash 79 for the Supreme Court. 00:01:49
Requires that the presiding judge submit a coordinated budget to the Board of Supervisors that encompasses. 00:01:54
Budgetary requests from justice courts. 00:02:01
Superior Court, the clerk of Court, Juvenile and adult probation. 00:02:04
So we've operated under that format for a number of years. 00:02:09
Rule 93 of the Supreme Court Rules requires that the court administrator. 00:02:14
Drafts that budget. 00:02:19
And so it's primarily budgetary concerns that have brought us to the point of making this request to you today. 00:02:21
We're always conscious of impositions to the general fund. 00:02:28
For example in 2016. 00:02:32
All of the court groups used to have their own IT department while the county was operating an IT department. 00:02:35
We consolidated that as a duplication of services. 00:02:42
There was number need to impose those. 00:02:45
Extra expenses we felt on the general fund. 00:02:47
2017 thereabouts, we closed down the juvenile detention center. 00:02:51
Umm, we also use the coordinated courts budget to. 00:02:56
Meet the county's budgetary expectations. 00:03:00
Meet with the manager of Finance. 00:03:03
And they give us the plan. 00:03:05
With the coordinated budget, we have the ability some flexibility within the departmental requests so that you can guarantee that 00:03:07
we live up to. 00:03:11
What the county expects of US annual basis. 00:03:15
For example. 00:03:20
I'll give you an example of that, not the complete history, but in 2014, in the first year in court administration, the county 00:03:22
asked us to make a 5% budgetary reduction. 00:03:26
That would be demanding, perhaps to one department or even a series of departments. 00:03:31
But because we operate under the coordinated structure. 00:03:37
We were able to leverage that out without compromising service or operations throughout our entire court groups. 00:03:41
2015. 00:03:47
And Rasta Absorbor. 00:03:49
Total of $1.4 million in personnel expenses that were the result of a classification and compensation study at that time. 00:03:50
And again, that's another example. 00:03:59
Of the flexibility within the coordinated courts budget. 00:04:01
However. 00:04:06
We are experiencing some business pressures. 00:04:06
I think we're all familiar with the term unfunded mandates. 00:04:09
That's what we're looking at here. 00:04:13
In two areas primarily, we have seen the heaviest impact. 00:04:15
That is in. 00:04:20
Cord Automation. 00:04:22
Where we consistently run what they call the E suite. 00:04:24
Which means E filing which is paperless filings. We don't have file folders anymore. 00:04:28
The judge has to be able to access all of those documents. That's E bench and other automated function that we've had. 00:04:34
Digital Evidence. 00:04:41
Been before this board seeking grant funding to. 00:04:43
Equip our courtrooms for digital evidence before. 00:04:46
And we're running a lot of audio visual tech in our courtrooms. 00:04:50
We stream to YouTube just like you do for your board meetings. 00:04:54
We have. 00:04:59
Remote appearances all the time. 00:05:00
We do a lot of in custody stuff with the jail so they don't have to make transports. 00:05:02
So that's the demand that automation has placed on us. 00:05:09
Just recently, within the past few years really, since COVID. 00:05:13
Another area, another unfunded mandate, is court security. 00:05:18
So in 2017, the Supreme Court released an administrative order detailing about 30 court security standards. 00:05:23
The mandate what worked with county administration and facilities and other groups. 00:05:32
To comply with those requirements, there's still a few outstanding. 00:05:37
Most of the heavy lifting has been done. We still have some stuff. 00:05:43
That we need to work on to bring ourselves into full compliance with all of our courts. 00:05:46
These pressures, I think. 00:05:53
Threatened to disrupt our coordinated budget, which is turned in flat operating expenses. 00:05:55
Really. Since 2014 or 2015? 00:06:01
There are potential solutions to mitigate that without making impositions on the general fund. 00:06:04
Couple of areas that we've identified are the management of expenses obviously. 00:06:10
And the identification of new revenue sources. 00:06:14
As far as the management of expenses, I've given you a few examples already and I'll just state that we continue to scrutinize 00:06:20
every line item for all of those departments that comes in front of us. 00:06:25
Prior to making a coordinated budget request to the board. 00:06:30
We've also been able to identify some new revenue sources. 00:06:36
The meat and potatoes of why I'm in front of you today. 00:06:40
Thank you. Is that better? 00:06:44
OK, I won't run through the whole thing again. Well, thank you. 00:06:53
So new revenue sources? 00:06:59
Local court fees. 00:07:01
Courts can establish local court fees with Supreme Court approval and board approval via resolution. 00:07:04
Our courts currently have 3 local fees. 00:07:10
I can tell you, compared to other counties, that's relatively modest. 00:07:14
Cochise County, for example, has over 10. 00:07:18
Maricopa County has several. 00:07:21
Pima County has 6. 00:07:23
So we're not. 00:07:26
We don't have a very aggressive local court fee schedule in place right now. 00:07:28
The local fees that we do have is cost of prosecution. 00:07:33
Which is a split revenue source with the county attorney's office, court administration, my unit. 00:07:37
And the Clerk of Courts office. 00:07:44
We have the local probate fund. 00:07:47
Which provides funding for experts and professional attorney services and guardianship and conservatorship cases. 00:07:49
And we have a Justice court enhancement fund. 00:07:57
Which I brought through this board in 2019 I believe. 00:07:59
We are asking to do 2 things with the fee schedule. 00:08:07
Subject to your input, of course. 00:08:10
We would like to increase the probate and the justice Court fees. 00:08:14
The probate fee was established in 2006. 00:08:21
Has never had an adjustment to whatsoever. 00:08:24
The Justice Court enhancement fee is $20. 00:08:27
Pretty modest and that was a pre COVID figure. 00:08:31
And speaking with her. 00:08:35
Elected justices of the peace. 00:08:36
They were interested in increasing that fee. 00:08:38
We'd like to establish 2 new fees. 00:08:42
Two new fees, not surprisingly, are in the areas that. 00:08:51
We're looking at an automation fee. 00:08:55
That would be split with the Clerk of Courts office. 00:08:57
And we're looking at a security fee. 00:09:02
Which would be. 00:09:04
Available to all courts and any of the. 00:09:06
Expenses from that fee would be subject to. 00:09:09
Written approval from the presiding judge and of course, coordinate. 00:09:12
County administration and county facilities on. 00:09:16
How those funds might be utilized? 00:09:19
The fee proposal. 00:09:22
That I anticipate or I would like to bring before this Board. 00:09:24
Is not radical. 00:09:28
These fees exist in other counties. 00:09:29
Now, not everything that's right for other counties is right for healing. You will let us know that. But we felt that these fees 00:09:33
that address the immediate pressures that we're seeing. 00:09:37
And they have been accepted by other. 00:09:42
Or the supervisors and other counties. 00:09:45
The automation fee will be a. 00:09:48
$20 and I. 00:09:50
I attached summary sheets for both of the new fees. 00:09:51
And I used. 00:09:55
Very low end estimates. 00:09:57
And so we modeled them at a low cost. 00:10:00
I didn't want to. 00:10:03
To put big numbers in there without talking to you first. 00:10:04
The court automation fee. 00:10:09
With generate approximately $25,000. 00:10:11
Be a $20 fee assessed on top of. 00:10:15
Civil case filings. 00:10:17
The security fee. 00:10:21
Is the exact same security fee that's in Grant County right now? 00:10:23
Our numbers are slightly different. 00:10:27
The security fee in Grant County. 00:10:29
Says it's $10. 00:10:31
On every criminal or civil traffic disposition sentence. 00:10:33
And uh. 00:10:37
That fee applying. 00:10:39
Those numbers to Hila. 00:10:40
Would be about 20 grand. 00:10:42
One more note on the proposed local fee schedule. 00:10:47
It's not overly. 00:10:50
Onerous. 00:10:51
The filing fees are not going to prevent anybody. 00:10:53
From Accessing Justice in Hilo County. 00:10:57
Filing fees in both the Justice Court and if applied. 00:11:00
Superior Court. 00:11:04
Are subject to fee and our fee deferral and waiver provisions. 00:11:05
That currently exists within the Code of Judicial Administration. 00:11:10
If you want to bring your case in Healing County, you're not going to be priced out. 00:11:14
The criminal disposition fees. The security fee in this example. 00:11:19
That is subject to the discretion of the judge. 00:11:23
As to the imposition of that fee? 00:11:26
So that is the fee proposal in a nutshell. 00:11:29
And I'd like to hear any thoughts or questions that you might have. 00:11:33
Thank you, John, Supervisor No for anything. 00:11:38
OK, these fees, who? Who will pay these fees? 00:11:41
The users of the services. 00:11:46
Court users in the instance of the. 00:11:48
Filing fees. 00:11:51
A lot of civil cases and superior courts are filed by attorneys. 00:11:53
Of course, their clients always bear cost as well. 00:11:59
But again, it wouldn't prohibit anybody from filing a certain case with us. 00:12:01
In the other instances, the security fee. 00:12:06
That is tacked on to. 00:12:09
Criminal defendants as part of their sentencing or sanctions. 00:12:11
OK, Yeah, because I was going to say, you know some of these that. 00:12:17
Use our court system. Who's going to collect? 00:12:21
Things. So if it's if it's the filing, then then I I can better understand it and the security fee. 00:12:24
Does that include the security at the front door? 00:12:33
I mean, because that's a, that's a big cost that was brought to the county. 00:12:38
Because of our courts, to protect our courts, that was mandated by the state. 00:12:43
And so it's like, oh, OK, Big Brother, thanks for putting this burden on us. 00:12:47
When I don't see that it's, you know, all our burden carry. 00:12:51
And so you know, that could help our. 00:12:56
Our couldn't agree more. Yeah, that could help. 00:12:59
You know our our. 00:13:02
Our budget. Our manager. 00:13:04
Our tax base money. 00:13:06
From not. 00:13:08
You know, paying the fees that are from the court. 00:13:09
And so. 00:13:12
Yeah, if that could. 00:13:14
Then I would. You know I would. 00:13:16
I would like to see that be at a point where it could. 00:13:18
May be helpful with that cost. 00:13:21
I will disclose to the board that I had. 00:13:24
Talked with County Manager Men Love on a number of occasions about this P proposal and that was one of the very options that we 00:13:27
discussed. 00:13:31
Yeah, yeah, 'cause I, we, we love to put a service out there, but it costs us and so yeah, anything that we can do there to. 00:13:35
To help that and you know and like you say that the people that are coming to use the court that. 00:13:46
That's you know. 00:13:52
That's something that. 00:13:53
I appreciate you. 00:13:55
Bringing these up to a work session. 00:13:56
For our awareness. 00:13:59
Of these things so. 00:14:01
Thank you. 00:14:03
Appreciate it. 00:14:04
Thank you. 00:14:06
So Jonathan was by. 00:14:08
Umm, setting these fees and and working with these fees that'll that'll bring. 00:14:11
The courts up to kind of where you need to be financially and. 00:14:16
Not quite so. 00:14:21
Yes, I do, honestly. 00:14:24
You honestly believe that? 00:14:25
You know, we do have. 00:14:27
Tremendous flexibility with the coordinated structure of the court's budget. 00:14:28
We can reapplicate resources to where the. 00:14:33
Actual demands are. 00:14:36
It's just. 00:14:39
Security and automation. 00:14:40
Are threatening. 00:14:43
Our framework. 00:14:44
Made general fund budget request for absolutely fundamental operations. 00:14:46
We have other special revenue sources which might be limited. 00:14:51
To certain services and can't be spent. 00:14:54
Across the board. 00:14:56
And I do really believe. 00:14:58
You know, I've been working with this budget since 2014. 00:15:00
I've actually made pitches for local court fees before. 00:15:03
And never been able to get the support I needed at the Supreme Court level. 00:15:08
And sharing the basically the same presentation with them that I just shared with you all. We were able to get there. So what I am 00:15:12
seeking. 00:15:16
Is not an abundance of money. 00:15:20
I'd like to see. 00:15:23
My coordinated courts budget be sustainable for the next 10 years. 00:15:24
And I think this will greatly help us reach that goal. 00:15:29
Well, thank you for putting the time and thought into this and what you proposed here seems to me to be real reasonable and. 00:15:33
And, umm. 00:15:40
Looks like I don't know why it can't be done so. 00:15:41
Thank you for that. 00:15:44
Thank you. 00:15:45
Yeah. Thanks John for the presentation. So. 00:15:46
I'm kind of a proponent that would support. 00:15:51
Users paying for. 00:15:54
The product or the service that they're using? 00:15:56
We do that with community development. 00:15:59
A landfill and other soap. 00:16:02
A lot of some of the burden on all these departments share equally. 00:16:08
Throughout the county. 00:16:13
But uh. 00:16:14
If you're not using the service, you shouldn't have to contribute to it. 00:16:15
And a large amount, so I totally support. 00:16:20
The fees and these seem like really low numbers to me. 00:16:23
But if you if you feel that that's. 00:16:27
What you'd like to? 00:16:31
Offer then I feel I can support that. 00:16:32
Yeah, yeah, it's a fine line. You know, there's a. 00:16:35
I'll give you an example of. 00:16:38
Something that. 00:16:40
We couldn't get behind obviously when we developed these proposals. I mentioned I had been down this road before and didn't have 00:16:41
the support I needed from the Chief Justice to to get their approval, but. 00:16:46
We studied models in all these other counties. 00:16:52
The two new fees, as I mentioned, are. 00:16:55
The exact same thing in other jurisdictions. 00:16:58
But Coconino County, for example, charges an $85 assessment fee on all of their civil and family law filings. 00:17:01
That's something that I wouldn't bring to this board. 00:17:11
I agree with you entirely, Mr. Chairman, I think. 00:17:15
There is room for. 00:17:18
Perhaps a slightly more aggressive program here. 00:17:20
But we didn't want it to be. 00:17:23
Onerous to the citizens of Hilah. 00:17:25
Like some of the other examples of me. 00:17:28
You want to file a civil case in Maricopa County. It's going to cost you like 300 plus dollars. 00:17:30
That certainly wasn't. 00:17:36
Right for healing. Nothing that he would ever bring to this board. 00:17:38
Well, one thing that I've noticed is if we delay the. 00:17:41
Increases long enough, then it becomes much more problem because we're we're literally absorbing the loss over. 00:17:45
These years and then we say, well, we've got to jump it up and we had to do that with the landfill. 00:17:54
And it's better to me to say, look, we need to adjust this the fees and the schedules and all of that every. 00:17:59
Couple years or so. 00:18:07
And we need to do that with community development. I think that we're way behind on that too in this. 00:18:09
Then it becomes a big jump, and then everybody you know hollers about the big jump. 00:18:14
When they've been. 00:18:19
Living pretty comfortable for the last maybe 10 years on fees that should have gone out. 00:18:20
I agree so. 00:18:25
You know the thought here? Oh, Jessica. 00:18:28
Chairman. Member. Supervisors. 00:18:31
Mr. Merrup, I did hear you mention an allocation in regard to the needs. 00:18:34
Assessing the needs when they come, but just for clarification for the public. 00:18:41
I just want to clarify that the fund increase is intended to cover the cost. 00:18:45
Of the actual service, so for example security the. 00:18:52
The fee increase is intended to cover the cost of security. It is the statute requires that we use these funds to be free those 00:18:56
expenses. So that's the exact intention. 00:19:02
OK. Thank you, Jessica. 00:19:10
Anything else? 00:19:12
No, I'm fine, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Jonathan, very much. 00:19:14
I just had one more Johnson The Security Service you use in your courts is the same as we got the front door. Same, same company. 00:19:18
Is that right? Yeah, it is in both locations, Pace and Anglo, same contractor. 00:19:24
OK. 00:19:29
All right. Thank you. 00:19:30
Thank you very much. 00:19:32
OK, good item 2B. 00:19:36
Information Discussion. 00:19:42
Regarding pending legislation addressing rural groundwater management. 00:19:45
Good morning, Michael. Good morning, Chairman, members of the Board. 00:19:51
So today there's a group of residents in Northern. 00:19:54
Gila County that are here to sort of. 00:19:58
Present some information about rural groundwater. 00:20:00
Possible legislation. Future legislation ideas. 00:20:04
And I'm going to go ahead and introduce Miss Chris Ray, who's the first speaker from the group. 00:20:08
OK. Thank you. Thank you. 00:20:13
Good morning, Chris. How are you today? I'm doing well, Mr. Chairman, how are you? Very good. Honorable board and supervisors, I 00:20:16
want to thank you for hearing us today. 00:20:21
OK. 00:20:28
OK, sorry. 00:20:33
What we've come to discuss is in regards to. 00:20:35
The state authority about groundwater in the proposed legislation that umm. 00:20:40
We actually have. 00:20:45
There we go. OK. 00:20:49
Sorry. No, that's good. OK. 00:20:52
We would ask, we have a lot of information that we're going to go through and so we would ask that you would hold your questions 00:20:54
to the question and answer if you would please. 00:20:58
OK. 00:21:02
Why is this important and why should we care as Heila County who were speaking about this? 00:21:05
Excuse me, I apologize. 00:21:13
On the state authority, this means the state or local level cannot operate in isolation. 00:21:17
We, let's face it, we in Gila County, we like being a rural county. 00:21:24
And we enjoy that. 00:21:29
But we have to consider. 00:21:30
What Arizona State and our policies will actually do and might impact national security and we're going to go into that. 00:21:33
We are. 00:21:41
In the interconnected world now. 00:21:42
The governor's executive order. 00:21:45
She has recently signed some. 00:21:50
And what that is, is it's treated as law. 00:21:52
In a state agencies. 00:21:56
They will implement that. 00:21:59
Here's an example. 00:22:02
Remember COVID, all of us. 00:22:04
Governor Ducey wrote over 45. 00:22:07
Executive orders that were implemented. 00:22:11
State and in our county. 00:22:15
In regards to COVID. 00:22:17
Remember. 00:22:19
Schools closed those types of things. 00:22:21
So they are treated as a law until. 00:22:24
Either a governor. 00:22:29
Deletes it. 00:22:33
Overrides it. 00:22:34
Also if it's suspended if the state actually. 00:22:36
Legislation actually enacts the law. 00:22:41
OK, next one. 00:22:44
The governor has vast powers and as we've been looking at these laws, we've seen. 00:22:48
How that actually is? 00:22:53
And even though their executive orders, they are implied as law in regards to that and Allstate agencies will enact those. 00:22:55
Groundwater. 00:23:07
One of the things that we found found in our research is. 00:23:09
That groundwater can be taken. 00:23:13
As legitimate public youth under state law. 00:23:16
And here's an example of eminent domain. 00:23:21
We just had this in the last six months in pine strawberry with pine straw, better Berry water Improvement District. 00:23:25
And that's they actually declared imminent domain for their deep oil in regards to that. 00:23:33
So the reason we bring that up? 00:23:40
Is because it does mention this in some of the legislation that we have been researching. 00:23:42
OK, I this is uh. 00:23:50
Quite a slide that we have. 00:23:54
I don't know a lot of people. I didn't realize it till we started researching. Arizona has moved into the 21st century as a 00:23:58
leader. 00:24:03
In AI, advanced mobility, clean energy. 00:24:07
And ship manufacturing. 00:24:12
We have the largest. 00:24:14
Chip manufacture. 00:24:17
In the world. 00:24:18
In Phoenix now. 00:24:20
We have a total of 105. 00:24:22
Of those at this time in the state of Arizona. 00:24:25
And in regards to them. 00:24:29
It takes 1,000,000 gallons of water. 00:24:32
In order for them to fill and start fabricating. 00:24:36
And they reuse but. 00:24:40
Just to start off, it's a million gallons water. 00:24:43
Um, she just Governor Hobbs just recently. 00:24:48
Announced and it is on her web page. 00:24:53
Space station? Have you heard of it? 00:24:56
Yuma, it is on her web page. She announced it. 00:24:59
And they are planning on setting up a Cape Cernavil a Houston in Yuma. 00:25:03
And one lift off. 00:25:11
Just for that one lift off takes a half million gallons of water. 00:25:15
For that lift off. 00:25:19
In regards to it. 00:25:21
So these are some of the reasons. 00:25:23
If you go on and you start looking at Title 45. 00:25:26
Which is. 00:25:31
In regards to the powers of the. 00:25:32
Water director in regards to that. 00:25:35
He controls decision making on. 00:25:38
All waterways. 00:25:41
All watersheds. 00:25:43
Surface water. 00:25:45
Groundwater. 00:25:47
Groundwater basins. 00:25:49
He cooperates with the United States of America in. 00:25:51
Anything that they may need in the way of water or decisions about water, such as the Colorado River. 00:25:56
And he has the decision, the final decision on Paul Van. 00:26:04
Right of way and water rights. 00:26:09
OK, in regards to that. 00:26:14
Essentially on Title 45 about the director. 00:26:17
He has all. 00:26:22
Authority. And it's all spelled out in Arizona. 00:26:23
Title 45 in regards to that. 00:26:27
And so. 00:26:31
We're going to continue. 00:26:33
I'll step away. 00:26:37
Good morning. 00:26:42
Good morning, Carolyn Eppler. 00:26:43
If you didn't know. 00:26:46
The right button. 00:26:48
OK, I'm Carolyn Eppler. I'm also a concerned citizen and resident of Hewlett County. 00:26:49
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and Members, for allowing giving us the time to talk about this. 00:26:56
Let's see. 00:27:02
As an example. 00:27:05
The current legislation, Senate Bill 1425. 00:27:07
Is the focus of today, but strictly as an example, there's been over 100 bills. 00:27:11
That have come across the table. 00:27:18
Chairman Christian shared with us the other day he has had a chance to look at several of those. 00:27:21
The main thing that we noticed is probably. 00:27:28
More than half of these bills. The language in these bills has been. 00:27:31
Very beneficial to Hula County. 00:27:36
The other part of that though, however, is they have got language that's more focused on the issues in other counties. 00:27:39
But this is a bill that's intended to actually affect the entire state. 00:27:48
So those guardrails and things that are missing. 00:27:53
With the language, that's more specific. 00:27:56
So what's going on in the other counties? 00:27:59
Is the big concern and what we'd like to kind of cover a little bit today to make you more aware of what we've been finding. 00:28:02
And you probably heard the 30th of January, Governor Hobbs. 00:28:10
Announced. 00:28:13
That we have a Rural Groundwater Management Act of 2025. 00:28:15
That's how she referred to. 00:28:20
She's told the state legislative body that if they can't. 00:28:22
Come to an agreement. 00:28:26
She plans to actually initiate an executive order to implement this act. 00:28:28
Uh, there's a rural water working group that is not sanctioned, but it's a very little, excuse me, a fairly large group of. 00:28:36
Individuals. 00:28:44
And also some other county. 00:28:46
Supervisors that have been participating in it working. 00:28:48
With a gentleman named Chris Kuzdis, who overseas most of it, he is. 00:28:51
Also working very closely with the governor. 00:28:57
So there's a lot of influence in that group and it's given the three of us, Shirley, myself and Chris, an opportunity. 00:29:00
Staying track on track with. 00:29:09
Proposals, the comments, the issues. 00:29:13
That it keep coming to the table that cause. 00:29:15
This constant change in revision. 00:29:18
The problem is a lot of those are staying in the last three bills that we looked at. 00:29:22
So impacts the Gila County. This is a very short summary. 00:29:27
There is a council that's proposed. 00:29:31
If a rural groundwater management area is selected either by the governor. 00:29:34
Or even the Department of Water Resources director if he sees based on the data he has. 00:29:42
There may be a need the governor just recently. 00:29:48
Created an AMA active management area in Wilcox. 00:29:53
There was number vote. 00:29:57
It was executing order. 00:29:59
If in that space the way it is, and that was in large part because of the water table problems down there. 00:30:01
The law that they're looking at now that she's referring to as the Rural Groundwater Management Act of 2025. 00:30:09
That would immediately change. 00:30:16
What's happening in Wilcox from an active management area which has significant water management restrictions in groundwater? 00:30:19
To a real groundwater management area which is not as restrictive. 00:30:26
But still very similar. 00:30:30
And for Gila County, because we are so different, you know, environmentally, ecologically, our population. 00:30:33
The topography, the weather, everything is quite different in Healey County. 00:30:40
A lot of what most of our state legislators are looking at. 00:30:45
Is their knowledge of other counties. 00:30:49
Not so much heal the county so. 00:30:52
If this RGMA act passes, it will create storage and use restrictions. 00:30:54
Anybody that has more than one residential well. 00:31:01
We'll have to monitor because they don't want you to go over 30. 00:31:04
Excuse me, 35 gallons a minute. 00:31:08
Or 10 acre feet a year, which is about the same. 00:31:10
It would affect your ability as county supervisors to. 00:31:15
Fully implement your legal obligations on Land Management decisions. 00:31:19
What have we seen so far is they're not using. 00:31:26
The best available science that we would hopefully would use to address. 00:31:29
Water issues, especially if they're going to do it statewide and impact what you've already got in place for Hewitt County. 00:31:34
And the one thing that I saw that would be a huge concern is there's no. 00:31:42
Guardrails in the current language in this SB1425 and its beard. House Bill. 00:31:48
That. 00:31:54
Control the cell. 00:31:55
Or lease of water rights. 00:31:57
And we've seen this across the state where our water situation, our groundwater situation is. 00:32:00
Dire in some places, the town of Queen Creek. 00:32:07
Had a company go outside of the county. 00:32:11
To buy property that had really good water rights. 00:32:16
They're now using the water rights from a whole of the county. 00:32:19
To provide water to Queen Creek. 00:32:23
That's done. 00:32:25
Buckeye. The same thing. 00:32:27
There was one we had heard there was one acre of land in a separate county. 00:32:28
Where Buckeye is. 00:32:34
They purchased for several $1,000,000. 00:32:35
Just for the water rights. 00:32:38
So of course, as citizens, we don't want that to happen in Human County. 00:32:40
And is there a way you can prevent that? 00:32:45
You know, those are things that we're helping by just sharing you with you what we've located. 00:32:48
In the data what we found. 00:32:53
In conversations and meetings. 00:32:55
That we can start thinking about. 00:32:58
Find some solutions to to protect this. 00:33:00
You know, there's always that imminent domain that I think if there's a way that we can. 00:33:04
Demonstrate. 00:33:08
The needs of Gila County. 00:33:10
And take a look a harder look at other options rather than just going out and buying land. 00:33:12
Can we stop that in Hewitt County? 00:33:20
Then we put restrictions on who. 00:33:22
The purchase of land in Gila County so that there isn't a well that's dug that's going to take more than 35 gallons a minute. 00:33:25
They can do that under restrictions, but right now? 00:33:33
There's no restrictions. 00:33:37
Anywhere except for active management areas, and those are primarily the urban areas in the central part of the state. 00:33:38
So the bulk of our rural country. 00:33:45
In Arizona, including Hewlett County does not have. 00:33:48
Restrictions on groundwater use. 00:33:53
We just get a permit to dig a well. 00:33:56
This slide here is a sample of the current bills. 00:33:59
Idea of how? 00:34:03
A council would be formed if they declare a rural groundwater management area. 00:34:05
And the other thing that the governor created? 00:34:11
Was restrictions on how the size of these? 00:34:14
Groundwater management areas. 00:34:18
Everywhere else in the state they can't go smaller than a sub basin. 00:34:20
But in northern Gila County. 00:34:25
There's not that restriction. 00:34:26
So that opens the door for. 00:34:30
More. 00:34:33
Possibilities of somebody. 00:34:35
Coming in that lives in Gila County that may see a concern on a groundwater issue. 00:34:38
That it could be much smaller area, like a watershed, a small watershed or something like that. 00:34:43
And they could use 10% of the voting. 00:34:49
Population in that area. 00:34:53
To create a petition. 00:34:55
Or the Department of Water Resources Director to create this new level of government. 00:34:57
As citizens, we've already experienced what the three of you, as our Board of Supervisors, have done. 00:35:03
To manage this county and this county has been very successful for decades. 00:35:09
And we see that and we find. 00:35:15
That another layer of government could create some serious problems with how we function as a county now. 00:35:18
This is just one example of what's in the current law that Governor Hobbs used to declare. 00:35:27
That we will have a Rural Groundwater Management Act of 2025. 00:35:34
This is requiring measuring devices on individual residential wells. 00:35:38
If you have more than 35 gallons a minute or more than 10 acre feet a year. 00:35:46
Out of that, well. 00:35:51
So all of us that have one single residential well it's typically A10 acre feet a year or 35 gallons a minute is what's what that 00:35:53
well produces. 00:35:58
You don't have to monitor. 00:36:03
At this time and even if this law goes into effect. 00:36:05
However, if you have more than one property. 00:36:09
That puts you more than. 00:36:12
What's typically? 00:36:14
Available with one well. 00:36:16
And you would have to monitor it. 00:36:18
Something else that a lot of folks don't know, the Department of Water Resources has over 14115 fourteen 150. 00:36:22
Wells that are monitored across the state. 00:36:30
They get a lot of their data from NASA satellites. 00:36:35
Data. There is a lot of telemetry involved and a lot of these wells are actually manually. 00:36:39
Red and they're looking for the change in water level overtime. 00:36:46
Looking at the depth. 00:36:51
To the water table, those kinds of things, but they're keeping track of it. 00:36:53
And the other thing that comes into what? 00:36:58
Chris Ray shared about the national aspect of it for the state. 00:37:01
Which ultimately affects us as a county. 00:37:06
Is how they look at groundwater. 00:37:08
And it is considered part of the national critical infrastructure. 00:37:11
So knowing we've got this new Taiwan semiconductor facility and several other. 00:37:16
It chip companies in the state. 00:37:22
Umm, you know, our hope is they won't end up finding a need to come to US county to take our grandmother, but that's a possibility 00:37:26
and that's why we're trying to follow this and stay more closely involved. 00:37:32
And some of the data sets and this is. 00:37:41
I asked the question, is the median enough? Because if you look at what I'm going to show you next. 00:37:44
Umm, here. 00:37:51
This is a very busy. 00:37:54
I'm just going to tell you, take a look at the upper right. 00:37:57
That's the Little Colorado River Plateau. 00:38:00
This is an example of the data sets our state Department of Water Resources is using. 00:38:03
And if you look there to the. 00:38:09
Legend the yellow. 00:38:12
Is most of the rural areas. 00:38:15
So based on their own data. 00:38:17
They're showing that the wells in our rural parts of our state, including the HeLa County area. 00:38:20
Are fairly stable. 00:38:27
So the change in their monitoring wells isn't just between 1 foot? 00:38:29
From zero between a negative foot declining or increasing by a foot. 00:38:34
And all those areas that are blue are primarily blue because they're being recharged. 00:38:40
With Colorado River water. 00:38:46
But the challenge is. 00:38:49
When you look at that, you see the little round dots that are in the upper right larger area. 00:38:53
That's actually a sub base in a little Colorado River plateau just above us. 00:39:00
Healey County gets a lot of our groundwater. 00:39:04
That drops down from that basin. 00:39:07
But they're only using 31 wells. 00:39:10
In that entire area, that's 26,000 square miles. 00:39:13
And they're using that data. That's what they're presenting to our state legislators and to the public. 00:39:18
This kind of data. 00:39:23
Umm, using the medium information you could have 31 wells. 00:39:25
That are dropping down 40 feet. 00:39:31
Some of them and some of them on this instance have actually increased in their water table up not 20 feet. 00:39:34
Over the last 20 years. 00:39:41
That if you only look at the two middle numbers, which is the median. 00:39:43
That does not tell you as county supervisors, what's really going on in that landscape. 00:39:47
I know Chris wanted us to hold some questions till later, but I'm not going to right now, so. 00:39:54
With all due respect, but Kevin, let me ask you a question because you got the map up by. 00:39:59
Want to ask, but when you look at the little Colorado Plateau up there, a lot of that is Navajo Nation, yes. 00:40:04
And a lot of it is. 00:40:11
The uh. 00:40:14
Apache County. 00:40:15
Reservation there and whatnot. So is that why the little red dots are down there on the lower edge? Is that mostly in Navajo 00:40:17
County? 00:40:21
That, yes, yeah. They don't have any wells currently on the reservation that they're monitoring. 00:40:25
OK, so let me ask you this is. 00:40:32
Because of reservations are considered sovereign. 00:40:36
They have sovereignty. 00:40:40
The state. 00:40:43
Really doesn't have any control. 00:40:45
Over their water use. 00:40:48
Per SE. That's why the big fight. 00:40:50
Has been going on with White Mountain Apaches, the water, San Carlos Apaches, and and and so forth between them and the state. 00:40:52
And the users over here, right? 00:41:00
But there was a Supreme Court ruling in 2023. 00:41:03
And this was more specific to the Navajo Nation and a couple of the tribes in New Mexico. 00:41:09
But the language in that ruling and that Supreme Court ruling actually. 00:41:16
More cemented, but already exists, and that's that. The state of Arizona is the ultimate control of management of all. 00:41:21
Waters in the state. 00:41:30
Over. 00:41:31
And over the tribes. 00:41:34
So that actually helped Arizona, that ruling did. So that was. 00:41:36
A bonus. 00:41:42
For us, but as you know with anything it takes time to implement. 00:41:43
Even Supreme Court ruling. 00:41:48
But you know what's concerning to the three of us right now based on what we learned the last. 00:41:51
Several sessions at the state legislature. 00:41:57
In the last several years that we've been looking at this is. 00:42:00
The information that our state is using right now. 00:42:04
To make decisions and what Governor Hobbs is using to back her plan to implement this 2025 law. 00:42:08
Around real groundwater management act. 00:42:18
You know the data. 00:42:22
That they have there's a significant amount of data. 00:42:23
And it's just like with statistics, you know you can use what you need to get what you want done. But. 00:42:26
This is just a close up. 00:42:32
Of that big map you can see a little bit better. 00:42:35
The wells now they've got data from all those wells. 00:42:37
You know the depth to water and change overtime. This particular set of data where I've got all the red zeros and the minus 10s 00:42:41
and 30s. 00:42:45
That's a 20 year period of time showing the change in the water level. 00:42:51
And they're looking at the entire state. This is information they're using to make decisions, and we're included. 00:42:56
The other county is included in that. 00:43:02
You know, here's what's going on down in the southern part of the state, which is very different than we are here, but. 00:43:06
It's part of the decision making process that they're using. 00:43:12
To come up with these laws or trying. 00:43:16
Very hard to get done. 00:43:19
Before the end of the year. 00:43:21
I'm just going to quickly go through this. 00:43:25
Here this is additional information, I just think it's important. 00:43:27
For you to see how much information they actually have. 00:43:32
So they're looking at the entire state. 00:43:36
As their. 00:43:39
Faucet. 00:43:40
And what are the conditions across the entire state? This one just shows where the aquifers are in Arizona. 00:43:42
And knowing the type of bedrock. 00:43:50
Or the geology of those aquifers makes a big difference on accessibility. 00:43:55
And how well it can store that. 00:44:00
This is a big picture to give you a better idea of. 00:44:04
The water that's out there. 00:44:07
Umm, that has been measurable for decades. 00:44:09
These are our neighbors. 00:44:13
And right now, our governor has. 00:44:14
Committed to the Water Infrastructure Fund money. 00:44:18
That Chuck pedal act is going to take out of state out of the seven state compact to try and find water. 00:44:21
So they are really looking for ways to get more water. 00:44:28
To meet the entire state's needs. 00:44:31
These are the wells they have where they're getting all their data. 00:44:35
It's 14150 wells. That's the states using to look at what can this state. 00:44:38
Provide to ensure. 00:44:44
The infrastructure. 00:44:46
And the population that we have become. 00:44:47
Can continue. 00:44:51
And they've got the legal obligations from the. 00:44:53
The national standpoint. 00:44:56
You know, with our national security and with. 00:44:59
Taiwan Semiconductor and those kinds of things. 00:45:02
This is another part of the data they're looking at. 00:45:05
Southern Arizona. 00:45:08
Has some fairly deep soils. 00:45:10
One reason why their water table has changed. 00:45:12
Also because it's a little different in how it stores that water that the state's looking to get. 00:45:16
These are all dry, depleted wells. 00:45:22
And as you've heard on the news, this is areas where there's actually land subsidence in the southern part of the state, another 00:45:29
part of that big picture. 00:45:33
Our governor is looking at. 00:45:37
When she's trying to find, where can she get? 00:45:39
She's going to look in the state first. They're already looking out of the state. 00:45:43
But they're looking at all. 00:45:48
Areas where they can get water to meet the needs of the state. 00:45:50
So, you know, it's something we need to think about in all of our counties. 00:45:54
Those are fishers, so. 00:45:58
That's a lot of information, but my hope is that. 00:46:02
You'll take a good look at what we need to look at. Umm. 00:46:05
As a county. 00:46:11
As a state and where our state's going right now. 00:46:13
In order to meet the needs of the state. 00:46:18
You know they're gonna draw. 00:46:20
There's. 00:46:22
Our neighboring state and just as an example. 00:46:23
In New Mexico, and this could happen very easily and it already is happening in some places in Arizona. 00:46:28
Chama, New Mexico has a water treatment plant and there's a very, very large water pipeline that goes all the way up to Colorado, 00:46:33
where Pagosa Springs is into the Rockies. 00:46:39
And draws all that groundwater out of that precosa spring piece of the Rockies. 00:46:44
For the town of Albuquerque. 00:46:50
Very large pipeline. 00:46:53
And they they put it through a treatment plant and it goes down to Albuquerque. 00:46:55
There's nothing to keep. 00:46:59
That from happening in our state. 00:47:01
And our county. 00:47:04
Depends on. 00:47:06
We've got the Colorado Plateau Aquifer and they call that the Sea aquifer. We've got the Mogian. 00:47:08
Rim which beats Tunnel Creek. 00:47:13
That creates what they call the muggy on basin. All of that creates. 00:47:16
Water that seeps down into Gila County for all the wells. 00:47:21
And the governor in December of 23 already put in her Arizona administrative code direction on where to place wells on the 00:47:26
Colorado Plateau. 00:47:31
For transfer of water. 00:47:36
So there's a lot of things going on in the background that we're trying to bring it all together to look at the big picture to 00:47:39
see. 00:47:42
What's going to happen next and is there anything? 00:47:46
As citizens and as our as our county, our county supervisors, all of you, is there anything we can do to protect what you have 00:47:50
already established through? 00:47:55
A long time. 00:48:00
For the citizens in Hema County. 00:48:01
And I'll turn it over to Chris to close up on the switch. 00:48:04
We did not want to just bring. 00:48:11
Issues that we're discussing, but also possible solutions. 00:48:15
For the Board of Supervisors to. 00:48:19
Possibly consider. 00:48:23
One would be that the Board of Supervisors might want to get involved with the rural working. 00:48:24
Water Group. 00:48:32
That we have been meeting with now for a couple years. 00:48:33
And there are multiple county supervisors that are involved in that. 00:48:37
And they're helping shape. 00:48:43
The legislation. 00:48:45
That is being proposed each time. 00:48:46
In recently a bill was stopped because of it and and so we would. 00:48:50
One possible solution. 00:48:57
Also that. 00:49:00
There, there is no. 00:49:02
In regards to that, they're in ARS Title 45. There's no protection for us in Hilo County or water. 00:49:05
And being involved in that. 00:49:14
Some of that legislation. 00:49:18
You might, you might be able to, whether it's a surrogate or you yourselves involved might be able to help shape some of that 00:49:20
legislation. 00:49:24
Another option would be also to. 00:49:30
Create a Research Council committee of Sheila County residents. 00:49:34
And they would research any proposed legislation, what it is, and analyze it. 00:49:39
And then they would and how it's going to impact Gila County and they would provide you that information. 00:49:46
In order for you to make whatever decisions you would feel appropriate. 00:49:53
And that that committee would collaborate with the. 00:49:58
Rural water working group. 00:50:04
With those analysis and recommendations, you would be more informed on continuing the great job that you've done. 00:50:07
Got sheep on the next slide. This is just a couple suggestions that would be they would be recommendations to the amendments to 00:50:16
SB1425. 00:50:22
One that they should include the best science. 00:50:28
And as was just stated a moment ago by Carolyn. 00:50:31
That they're using a medium. 00:50:35
And she was talking about how statistically that can be changed in any way to support 1's. 00:50:37
Outcome that they want. 00:50:46
That there be transparency in. 00:50:48
That it would include all stakeholders and also. 00:50:51
The ability of the county or residents to be able to. 00:50:55
Appeal because once that final decision is made. 00:51:00
By the director. 00:51:04
There is no appeal process. 00:51:06
OK. 00:51:10
Thank you. 00:51:11
Shirley is going to be taking the questions and answers. 00:51:13
Shirley died. Thank you so. 00:51:17
We have 15 minutes. 00:51:20
Shirley died from Basin. 00:51:22
Yes. Are you making comments or receiving questions? Are making comments first. 00:51:24
Right. Because I heard we had 45 minutes and then you guys get QA, right? 00:51:30
OK. So OK, I've been timing it. 00:51:35
All right. So there's there's all these initial Amas that were developed. 00:51:37
Back in the 1980s with the Groundwater Act. 00:51:41
And Tucson, Phoenix, Prescott, Pinal County. 00:51:44
Our Penile and the Santa Cruz. 00:51:47
Well, one of the things that we are working here. 00:51:49
The rural water working group that we've been working with is La Paz County. 00:51:52
Nava, uh, Mojave County, Yavapai. 00:51:57
Coconino and then us. 00:52:01
There's a lot of supervisors, there's a lot of mayors, there's a lot of concerned citizens on that group. 00:52:04
We would love to have one of you. 00:52:10
Take on being on these. 00:52:12
Right now we're meeting every other Monday on Zoom calls with updates. 00:52:14
We have been working the last year and a half. 00:52:19
Every month we would have a Zoom call that was over. 00:52:21
Half an hour where we go over all the bills and all that stuff. 00:52:25
So previous bills have not included. 00:52:30
Northern Hialeah County. 00:52:33
The northern counties. 00:52:35
But this bill also includes. 00:52:38
Five problem basins. 00:52:41
Like we've already mentioned, this bill would supplant. 00:52:43
The AMA that was just imposed upon Wilcox. 00:52:47
But there's also the Gila. 00:52:50
Bend Basin area. 00:52:53
In Maricopa County. 00:52:55
Koala Pie in Mojave County. 00:52:57
The Rhenagras in La Paz County, the San Simeon, which is in a basin that overlaps Graham and Cochise County and underlies, I 00:53:00
should say. 00:53:05
The two county border. 00:53:10
And then, of course, the Wilcox Basin. 00:53:12
Part of the initiation. 00:53:16
Of a groundwater basin. 00:53:19
Is that some person in this county? 00:53:21
Maybe a? 00:53:25
Environmentalist. 00:53:28
Could come and say Oh my gosh, we need to fix this. 00:53:30
And initiate. 00:53:33
A petition to get 10% of the people. 00:53:35
To then get a whole election going with hearings and all that. Very expensive to run an election to prove it. 00:53:38
The other thing is, and I think briefly we went over it. 00:53:45
You need to have the governor and the minority and Majority Leader of the House and Senate, so those five people. 00:53:49
Get 3 referrals. 00:53:57
And they get to then the governor gets to choose from that pool of people. 00:53:59
Who is going to be on our board? 00:54:04
Our council in Healy County. 00:54:07
And since we have three major areas, we have the northern basin, we have the central basin and we have the globe area basin. 00:54:09
And all these other basins and sub basins like Young. 00:54:19
We could end up having 4 councils. 00:54:23
Each council has to have an irrigation district, a industrial area. 00:54:26
A municipal person. 00:54:33
And then you know, and a member at largest was on your chart there. 00:54:36
So who are we going to get? 00:54:42
To recommend. 00:54:45
There. 00:54:48
The pool for who they're choosing from. 00:54:50
It's supposed to be local control. 00:54:53
However. 00:54:56
In past renditions of the bills. 00:54:57
These water councils have superiority. 00:55:01
Over the municipal water users, the irrigation districts and water companies. 00:55:06
So this can be end up being a big thing. They will have the power. 00:55:12
To get grants. 00:55:16
For conservation and all that. 00:55:17
You guys get grants for conservation? 00:55:21
These things are very unclear in the legislation. 00:55:24
Who has what power over what? 00:55:28
In this particular rendition. 00:55:31
It's simplified from the other ones, but what is the underlying? 00:55:33
Channel under the tent. Camel's nose under the tent. 00:55:38
You know. 00:55:42
Didn't inch. They could take a mile. 00:55:43
Our biggest things are. 00:55:46
This particular bill, the one that we have been watching so closely, which is the. 00:55:51
Governor's choice. 00:55:55
Which we examined last year along with the bill that was going through that was not heard. 00:55:58
And they did update it and simplify it for this year. 00:56:04
According to our sources down there on the water working group. 00:56:10
This has not even been heard in the House or the Senate yet. 00:56:13
And it was not expected to because it's still being under negotiation. 00:56:17
And we're not. It's not just our rural water working group that's negotiating. 00:56:22
It's those other basins that. 00:56:26
Will be immediately put under this law. 00:56:29
It indeed goes through SO. 00:56:34
It could go through on a strike. 00:56:37
And be heard in the joint committees of the House and the Senate and passed out of both committees at the same time, and then go 00:56:39
on to the governor. 00:56:44
Or like she said, she threatened last year that if we if that last year's bill. 00:56:49
Who did not arrive on her desk and she wasn't happy with it. 00:56:55
She was going to do executive order. 00:56:59
And mandated. 00:57:01
So this GNA just mandated, it just may be that she is holding it off from going through legislation. 00:57:03
So we're concerned about that. 00:57:09
So, umm. 00:57:12
There's a lot of push from the agricultural. 00:57:16
Huge areas down there in the South part. 00:57:21
Because Big AG is being pushed out. 00:57:25
Because developments in residential housing. 00:57:28
Has uses way less water. 00:57:31
They're trying to push AG out. 00:57:35
Well, it's very possible that some agricultural would end up in Gila County. 00:57:37
On a bigger scale than the cook. 00:57:42
Cook Ranch. 00:57:44
That's on Hwy. 188. 00:57:45
Where they grow their own. 00:57:48
Feed for their cattle. 00:57:50
So those are some areas that we're concerned about. 00:57:52
Umm, so heavy minutes. 00:57:56
OK. 00:57:59
What? Umm, and we may get some manufacturing to come up here. 00:58:04
With all the other it and everything going on. 00:58:11
So the requirements in order to set up a basement management are. 00:58:16
The declining, declining well levels. 00:58:21
And the median we have decided is not. 00:58:24
You need 10 years of actual readings of actual. 00:58:27
Depth below ground. 00:58:31
Subsidence, which I don't know that we've have any subsidence here because our ground is so much more stable than down there. 00:58:35
And the water quality? 00:58:42
Well, we had Jake Garrett, your county water. 00:58:44
Umm, the environmental. 00:58:50
Part of the health department. 00:58:53
Which does all of the sewage issues. 00:58:54
And the especially these septic systems. 00:58:59
That are like that were up by the landmark up there in Christopher Creek. 00:59:03
And the water was the groundwater that was overflowing out of their septic system. 00:59:08
Was going through crevices and. 00:59:13
Going into the Creek downstream and they had to trace it all back where it was coming from and then they had to put in a very, 00:59:15
very expensive. 00:59:19
System there. 00:59:22
Now down in Geisela. 00:59:24
They have that $250,000 grant. 00:59:26
That will only because the new septic systems are. 00:59:29
20 to $30,000. 00:59:33
And these people that live in these homes down there that have not. 00:59:36
Great value. They can't even sell their homes without taking money out of their home in order to upgrade for the buyer. 00:59:40
Because that's the way it goes. That's. 00:59:48
My background 15 years before I moved here was septic systems and sewers. 00:59:50
So there is a lot of areas. 00:59:54
Where you have groundwater contamination and that's one of the three things that someone could come in and say, oh. 00:59:58
You know you're contaminating Tonto Creek. 01:00:05
Therefore, we need a basin. 01:00:08
Counsel. So anyhow, let's see here. 01:00:11
March 4th. 01:00:17
Is the day at the Capitol for the Rural Groundwater Working Group? 01:00:19
Yep. 01:00:26
I have it on my phone here. 01:00:29
So anyhow. 01:00:30
We would just love to have. 01:00:32
One or two of you, you don't have to hang outside by side. 01:00:34
And not. 01:00:39
Via Quorum. But we're going to go down there. They're going to sit through the Natural Resources, Energy and Water meeting. 01:00:40
And we're starting in the morning and includes lunch and it's like a nine to four. 01:00:46
But that is March 4th, and it would be really great if you could join county supervisors from La Paz and Mojave and Coconino and 01:00:51
Yavapai and Gila. 01:00:57
On that working group to go down there and mix and mingle with those other people and find out what their problems are. 01:01:03
You know, fundamentally. 01:01:10
Whatever the alfalfa growers there in Mojave County that are sucking water out of the hawala pie. 01:01:12
And La Paz is where they're transferring water from that one acre into Buckeye, and that's one of the basins that's in trouble 01:01:18
now. So there's a lot of issues. 01:01:23
That we would love for you all. Send us an e-mail regarding that March 4th meeting. 01:01:29
Say what? Have you sent us all an e-mail regarding? I don't know that I've sent. 01:01:37
That one I've sent you an awful lot of stuff. 01:01:43
We will definitely do it. All right. Thank you. 01:01:46
It is time for Q&A. 01:01:50
OK, jump in. 01:01:53
President Humphrey. 01:01:55
Yeah, my head's swimming. Thank you for all these information. 01:01:58
Holy smokes. Holy smokes. 01:02:01
Yeah, and and what wasn't mentioned is, is like here in southern Halo County is mines. 01:02:04
Our minds are using an awful lot of water, they have an awful lot of property just for the wells that are capped off. 01:02:10
Just in case they needed in the future. So you know, there's there's just an awful lot of issues. 01:02:17
That weren't even brought up and like I say, my head swimming with what you did bring up so you know and and and condensing. 01:02:24
Closer into Gila County. 01:02:31
And interested? Yes, very much. 01:02:33
About it. 01:02:36
But it also seems like you know, and in the politics of the world. 01:02:37
The small rural counties don't get listened to because we don't have the vote. 01:02:43
I've been fighting issues for eight years that I've been a supervisor that fall on deaf ears. 01:02:48
Because when you get down to the state. 01:02:54
They don't listen to you because you don't have the votes. 01:02:57
And so I, yeah, I, I, I'm not, I'm not saying that I'm not interested and not going to work hard at it. It, it, it's just, I've, 01:03:01
I've seen a lot of issues. 01:03:06
With that happening to rural areas and so we try awful hard and so. 01:03:11
I thank you for the information when I get the invitation. Umm. 01:03:19
You bet I'll look into it. Supervisor Christian is already working with the legislature through. 01:03:24
Through. 01:03:30
Our CSA, Yeah, Thank you. 01:03:31
For your interest of gathering this information. 01:03:36
To present to us. 01:03:39
I I thank you very much. 01:03:42
The first rendition of our PowerPoint. 01:03:45
Had the quote. 01:03:48
Whiskeys for drinking, Waters for fighting over. 01:03:50
Didn't make it into the second rendition. 01:03:54
So anyhow. 01:03:57
Yeah, you're just ready to blow up. No, no. 01:04:00
This issue is older than I am. 01:04:05
And so. 01:04:08
You know, growing up through all the years, there's always. 01:04:11
There's always been the threat of monitoring wells and everything. 01:04:14
Like that, it's always been a fight. 01:04:18
Quite honestly, it always will be a fight. 01:04:20
There is a lot of moving parts to this. 01:04:23
An awful lot. 01:04:27
Umm, you know, a lot of it is a huge concern of mine as well as what what you ladies and Andrew's talking about what not so. 01:04:28
We're all on the same page. 01:04:39
You know, being a real rural county and things like that. 01:04:42
They do look at us. 01:04:46
With that respect. 01:04:48
Here not too long ago, I listened to the speaker down there at the Capitol talk about water issue, some water issues he just 01:04:51
hitting on. 01:04:55
On bits and pieces of it and how many bills are going through. 01:05:00
That's trying to deal with water and the governor and all that. But the one, one part of that that really caught my eye that I 01:05:05
asked him about was water transfers. 01:05:11
And so I know that there's already been attempts for some of that. 01:05:17
To some extent. 01:05:22
Umm, what happens? 01:05:23
I just let you know is the back door deals. 01:05:28
You know when you have SRP, that's a. 01:05:33
Major corporation and. 01:05:36
You have a DWR. 01:05:38
You have the. 01:05:40
Development communities that just keeps building. 01:05:44
House after house after house. 01:05:48
In the desert. 01:05:50
And so it's the backyard deals that. 01:05:52
That we don't. 01:05:56
We're not Privy to unless just by accident. 01:05:58
And by the time they're made, it's too late. 01:06:01
One of the things that hopefully. 01:06:04
Here, in time, we're gonna. 01:06:08
Be working on as a Land Management plan for Ela County. 01:06:10
And this is going to be one of the. 01:06:15
Something that would be a part of that. 01:06:17
You know, the other thing that that kind of has frustrated me along the way in the last eight years is we've dealt with 01:06:20
developments that I know. 01:06:24
Are pushing the limits on water supply. 01:06:29
But we have water companies that still given the certificates. 01:06:33
We, we can't. We have no real control over that. We're not water specialists setting up here at this board we rely on. 01:06:39
On them and that's who has to give certificates for development water. 01:06:47
And usually it's 100 year supply. 01:06:52
And it seems to me, and somebody may very well correct me one of these days if I'm wrong, but they handle melt like candy. 01:06:55
Well, we all know better, especially in a year like we're having right now. It's a tough year. You know, we're not, we don't have 01:07:02
the snowpack and that's what we need is the snowpack for our water supply. 01:07:08
And so. 01:07:15
Like I said, to start with, there's a lot of moving parts on it. We, I shouldn't say we. 01:07:16
I get a lot of emails every week. 01:07:22
Water and bills. 01:07:25
And and so forth. 01:07:27
Uh, there's, there's a lot of people involved with this right now. Our main player in the water part of it. 01:07:29
Has umm. 01:07:37
Been our CSA, our accounting Supervisors association. 01:07:38
Is on. 01:07:42
Big committee that's dealing directly with the governor on this. 01:07:43
I've talked to Craig several times about about the water issues and what I felt like was my. 01:07:48
Concern. And like you all said, you know they talk. 01:07:56
Um, about. 01:08:00
Control, you know, here locally and everything, but I know that's not where they're headed. 01:08:03
I know that in all my heart they don't want local control. 01:08:11
And that's that to me is a big issue. 01:08:15
I've always said if you could bring in the local control, put it on this board. 01:08:17
You people send out there, they are the ones we work for. 01:08:23
We work for all of you, so if this board isn't doing something to. 01:08:28
So that that that's right. 01:08:32
You have the ability to come in here and raise hell with us and. 01:08:34
Until we got it right. 01:08:37
You know, but I'm almost positive. 01:08:39
In the end, it's not going to shake out that'll. 01:08:43
But it doesn't mean that we don't keep trying. 01:08:46
And we keep pushing it and so. 01:08:48
Umm, so I really thank you ladies and everybody involved for everything that you've done. You're spot on. 01:08:51
What Jim said about the minds is absolutely right. You know, a long time ago when we had a tour of resolution. 01:08:59
Their pipe and water out of that deep hole down there on the flats around Casa Grande and Coolidge and storm it. 01:09:06
My question is, is OK that's easy to say? 01:09:13
You pump it out of this ground, you know you're 7000 feet in the. 01:09:17
Dirt. And you pump it out and you go down there on the flat and you put it back in the ground. That's easy enough, but what makes 01:09:22
you think it's going to be there when you need it? 01:09:25
Or is it the quality? 01:09:30
Well see, their quality is they need it to wash the tailings all the way to Dripping Springs come back. That's where they really 01:09:31
need it. And until they do that, they need a place to store it because their hole fills up with water. 01:09:37
If they don't pump it out. 01:09:43
So they're doing all this, but but it's like, you know, I don't. 01:09:45
I don't know that he can be positive that it's going to stay in one place or be there or whatever, so. 01:09:49
So there's always that. 01:09:55
You know there's a question there and if it's not there. 01:09:57
Where are you going to get the water? 01:10:00
You know so. 01:10:03
So there's a lot of concerns, a lot of questions, a lot of things that in. 01:10:04
And definitely the last six years or so that's been kicked around and looked at and talked about, and it's a fight that it will 01:10:09
continue. 01:10:13
The governor very well may. 01:10:18
Pull the power she has and do an executive order, in which case it'll stand until another governor comes along and redoes it. 01:10:21
But so it's but it's not a fight we we just give up on and roll over for it. We we all need to keep up on it and so. 01:10:28
Quite honestly, I'm on so many boards right now I don't think I could get on another one but. 01:10:39
But we'll we'll see where it goes on James. 01:10:45
But thank you, Shirley, and thank you everyone. We don't want to be in the warmest, but we didn't want to get your attention. 01:10:48
You know, but I OK guys, you better step up. 01:10:55
No, but the fact is surely what you don't see is we already have. 01:10:58
In many different ways, yeah. And so we are, we are a part of it. It it's just that. 01:11:02
Well, there's there's going to be a lot of negotiations and I honestly believe it's going to come to an executive order at the 01:11:10
end. 01:11:13
Steve, I mean. 01:11:18
Yeah. Thanks, Chris and Carolyn and Shirley. 01:11:24
Both. I have Mr. Costanzo here with us. He's a new kind of a new member of the group and so. 01:11:28
Of no, you've been working on water for a long time. 01:11:36
They're concerned about it and I think we have a real history. 01:11:41
Of water concerns in the state going back 100 years or more. 01:11:45
That's why we have the cap, that's why we have the, you know, the tunnels and the, and the dams and the reservoirs and all this 01:11:49
stuff. It's all because of that. And so as we grow. 01:11:53
It becomes more and more concerning the. 01:11:58
I would love to see the board of supervisor have more power over water in the county than we do, which is almost nothing. 01:12:01
The state has always controlled it. They're the ones that. 01:12:09
Issued the permits for the wells. 01:12:12
The governor wants to. 01:12:15
Solved it all with an executive order. 01:12:17
But that's not. 01:12:20
That's the wrong approach in my opinion, because. 01:12:21
It's one person deciding what happens in the state and that's not really. 01:12:26
The way our government is set up, a representative government is not just. 01:12:31
Person and the highest. 01:12:36
Office in the building. 01:12:37
Socializing the utility is what it looks like to me. 01:12:40
It's the same. Well, because we're having trouble. 01:12:43
Let's let the government step in. 01:12:47
And take over all water concerns and. 01:12:49
You no longer have rights anymore. 01:12:52
We'll say it's eminent domain, we'll say it's an emergency. We'll say. 01:12:55
We're going to monitor everybody and the same kind of discussions occur with. 01:13:00
Are you using too much food? Are you using too much gasoline? Are you using too much electricity? 01:13:04
It's a it's a move toward socialism. It's not. 01:13:10
It's not the solution, but that doesn't mean that. 01:13:14
We shouldn't be addressing the solution, my major concern as well. 01:13:18
Is the harvesting of water to go to to move out of? 01:13:23
Accounting and that could happen. 01:13:27
Because we have the the drainage systems in the reservoirs. 01:13:30
To just dump it into the Salt River and the Tunnel Creek. 01:13:34
Reservoirs and it ends up in Phoenix. 01:13:38
And so we don't want that. 01:13:40
So some of what you suggested I think is great, more involvement. 01:13:44
More research. 01:13:50
And research committee. 01:13:51
And indicating amendments to bills that we don't like. 01:13:54
The bills that you mentioned I don't think are going to pass, but there's going to be a continuous pressure. 01:13:58
To create legislation. 01:14:04
That is going to work in some places and not in others. 01:14:06
And so. 01:14:10
I really do appreciate the presentation is very insightful. You guys are very. 01:14:12
Involved. 01:14:17
I will send me the invite. 01:14:19
And I'll consider how much involvement I'd like to do. 01:14:22
With that and justice, keep us informed as you keep going. 01:14:26
Anything else? 01:14:30
No, I just think it's a huge problem when water transfer. 01:14:32
When you go hay and ship it out of the country. 01:14:37
That's water transfer that's already happening. 01:14:39
When you can buy water and store it in Lake Mead, I hope it's on the bottom half, not the top half because there isn't any in the 01:14:42
top half. 01:14:45
So, you know, water is is a major issue and I appreciate your interest. I just hope that we can get some ears from some people 01:14:49
higher up on the totem pole. 01:14:55
To help us. So thank you very much. 01:15:01
Daniel the only thing else I would throw in there is that the state is so diverse in everything that just one catch all water bill 01:15:05
or whatever you want to. 01:15:10
Say it will not work. 01:15:15
It just will not work. 01:15:18
That every every county's needs are basically different that I see. 01:15:20
And so. 01:15:26
That's just a huge red red flag right off the bat and and hopefully. 01:15:28
Hopefully somebody will pay attention to that and try and. 01:15:34
And correct it. 01:15:38
I would hope but. 01:15:41
That's I think one of the main messages that we need to drive the people that hey. 01:15:42
You know, you can do a bill or whatever you want for Wilcox and down there. 01:15:48
Meets the needs there, but it isn't going to meet the needs up here. 01:15:54
And so. 01:15:58
I think that's something that our legislators really need to take serious. 01:16:00
And pay attention to. 01:16:04
Can you share that? 01:16:06
Yeah, so this is Katie Hobbs. 01:16:10
Management Act. 01:16:14
And it sounds marvelous. Local choice, local solutions. 01:16:18
Let's see that happen. 01:16:24
Flexibility protection. 01:16:25
Adaptable. Customize it. 01:16:28
Funding. Oh great. 01:16:30
Protection of basins. 01:16:33
So it all sounds like that's what we all want, but this is not really what she wants to do. 01:16:35
She wants to take it. 01:16:42
And make the choices for you. 01:16:44
Not local choices. 01:16:47
If you want to speak, come on up to the mic. 01:16:50
That sure. 01:16:53
May I ask? 01:16:56
Did you get a chance to see the first rendition of Our Power? 01:16:58
Point, which was what was prepared by the attorneys. 01:17:02
For the governor's office. 01:17:06
That gave the whole big breakdown of all. 01:17:09
Yeah, that one, yeah. 01:17:12
OK, because it gives you more insight also into how this bill. 01:17:14
Is umm. 01:17:20
Look like. 01:17:22
OK. Thank you, Shirley. 01:17:24
Appreciate you guys coming down taking the day. 01:17:25
Well, that's a good lunch. 01:17:28
Anything else supervisor? 01:17:30
I'm good. Thank you. Thank you. All right, thank you very much. Let's move on to the next and last item. 01:17:32
Item 2C. Information discussion regarding the Gila County Courthouse paving project. 01:17:38
The Globe Jail paving project and Gila County Courthouse roof replacement. 01:17:44
Good morning, Joseph. 01:17:49
Good morning, Chairman, Board of Supervisors. 01:17:51
Thank you for your continued guidance over our past capital project presentations based on your invaluable input. 01:17:53
We have refined our approach and have now established recommendations for source funding and preliminary budgets. 01:18:00
To the following capital projects. 01:18:07
Hill County Courthouse paving project Estimated cost is 1,000,000. 01:18:10
And source funding recommendation is LATCF. 01:18:15
The Globe Gel Paving Project estimated cost of 5000. 01:18:20
For 500,000 excuse me and source funding. 01:18:24
Latcf. 01:18:29
And Hilla County Courthouse roof replacement project. 01:18:30
Estimated cost of 450,000. 01:18:33
Source Funding from the General Fund. 01:18:36
And also a combination of LATCF. 01:18:39
With that, an important note is I'd also like to briefly mention one of the Board's top priorities. 01:18:44
The courthouse electrical infrastructure. 01:18:50
Recognizing its importance. 01:18:52
We just wanted to note that we are moving forward with that project. It's just in the very early starting stages of architectural 01:18:55
design and of course that's going to be paramount to. 01:19:00
That project. 01:19:06
With that, I'd be happy to take any. 01:19:08
Any questions? Can you tell us what the LACCF means? 01:19:11
The latc F is. 01:19:15
The Local Assistance and Tribal Consistency Fund. 01:19:18
That was the $12 million got that's kind of. 01:19:22
Basically same as built money. OK one time. 01:19:25
One time money. OK, great. Thank you, Joseph. Supervisor Humphrey. 01:19:30
Yeah, 1 and it's a minor deal when we do all this paving and we put new parking places in. 01:19:38
That last one that you have right there is a horrible place for the parking place. 01:19:44
Because all you got cars in like this and then you put one where the car back. Any cars that backing out of there can't see. 01:19:49
And where we park, it makes it difficult to back out or to swing wide enough to turn in. 01:19:56
With that one parking place. 01:20:03
Umm, other than that, it's going to. 01:20:05
I would. 01:20:08
It's going to be a large job. 01:20:10
It's going to create a lot of chaos. 01:20:13
Especially with some of our parking down off. 01:20:16
Below umm. 01:20:19
And so. 01:20:21
Good luck with the project. I think it's necessary, but it's. 01:20:23
It's gonna create some some traffic issues. 01:20:27
I'm sure. 01:20:30
Yes, Sir. I thank you for the feedback. We'll certainly take it into account when we're finalizing the design. 01:20:31
And we look forward to this project and in the roof. 01:20:37
We have parapet walls around the roof, is that correct? 01:20:42
Yes, Sir, Our roof project that we're just going to build another pond or are we going to put a pitch up there? 01:20:46
Where we don't have a flat roof with purple walls around it. 01:20:52
How we appreciate that feedback, that's something that we're still in discussions with the administrative team to see if. 01:20:57
If that's going to fit in with the budget. 01:21:03
Or if we're going to do a direct replacement of what is existing. 01:21:05
Because if you build another pond, it's going to leak. 01:21:10
We don't disagree, Sir. 01:21:13
OK, I'm done. 01:21:17
By decline. 01:21:18
Joseph, are we able to lose? 01:21:20
Able to use some local contractors on these. 01:21:22
It's a high probability for the paving project. 01:21:28
We will be looking at outside of the county. 01:21:32
We're certainly always open to that. 01:21:37
And we're always looking for new companies, whether they can support it. 01:21:39
The roofing project, that one's a different one. I think there's a high probability that we're going to be able to use local on 01:21:43
that. 01:21:46
Umm, so it just depends on. 01:21:49
The prioritization of the timeline and what we're working with. 01:21:51
I think. 01:21:55
I think Cactus has done quite a bit of paving force. They're not in the county, but I know that they've done a lot of work, but. 01:21:57
You know, for projects like this, it'd be awesome to see if there's somebody local that can do it. 01:22:04
Keep the money local. 01:22:09
Yes, Sir, agreed. We can certainly take a harder look. 01:22:11
And then one more question, Mr. Minlov, how much LATC F funds do we have left? 01:22:14
Mr. Chairman, we want to decline about 5 million, a little bit over $5 million. 01:22:20
OK. 01:22:25
After the after these projects are taken out. 01:22:26
About five and a half million right now. 01:22:30
OK. 01:22:33
These projects would be. 01:22:34
Well, with the paving stuff going to. 01:22:37
He's about half of that. 01:22:40
OK. 01:22:41
Thank you, Joseph. 01:22:43
Thank you. Yeah. Thank you, Joseph. So, yeah, keeping up on all this, so. 01:22:44
That's the shortest presentation you have ever made. 01:22:50
That's a new record. 01:22:53
Doing our best to set records. You're doing great, thank you. 01:22:55
I don't have any questions, so I just have one, OK. 01:22:58
Supervisor Klein brought up Cactus. If you're talking to Cactus about doing the paving, I would definitely vote against them after 01:23:02
my Geisela. 01:23:06
Process with them. 01:23:10
Noted, Sir. Yes, Sir. 01:23:14
OK, that's all. 01:23:16
Thank you. 01:23:18
Yeah. OK. Thank you. 01:23:19
We all get over there. Yeah, OK. 01:23:23
All right, So that's all we have on our regular items. So call to the public anyone here in? 01:23:25
Flow no anyone in Payson? 01:23:32
No. And anyone on the Internet, no. 01:23:35
OK. 01:23:38
So let's move on to Item 4, which is our presentations. 01:23:39
Management love. 01:23:43
Mr. Chairman, members of board last week attended the Arizona Local Government Employee Benefit Trust annual meeting. 01:23:45
That's mean where we review our health insurance. 01:23:51
Trust that we have health insurance for our employees. 01:23:54
I spend most of three days in that discussion about health insurance. 01:23:58
And the end result is that there was a recommendation from our actuaries. 01:24:03
For the trust, so we have a 5.9% increase. 01:24:08
And our health insurance costs for fiscal year 2526. 01:24:12
We have been banking some money. 01:24:17
In the trust the last few years that we've been responsible and how we're supposed to address it. 01:24:20
One of the biggest issues that we have. 01:24:26
Currently regarding. 01:24:29
Cost, drivers and health insurance trust is a semaglutide. 01:24:32
That's the GLP ones. 01:24:36
That are related to. 01:24:38
It's what everybody's using to lose weight. 01:24:40
The trust only. 01:24:43
Prescribes semaglutides to diabetics. 01:24:46
And you're not prescribed that drug? 01:24:50
It's an injectable. 01:24:54
Do not prescribe that drug, just simply simple weight loss. 01:24:55
But it's a. 01:25:01
The latest thing you see? 01:25:02
What are the ones you see on the TV of all the commercials? 01:25:06
I'm losing weight. I'm doing this and doing that. 01:25:09
That's what is driving a lot of costs is. 01:25:12
Very expensive new drugs and. 01:25:15
They're trying to open it up that you can. 01:25:17
Use it for. 01:25:19
Other health related issues. 01:25:21
Helping heart attacks. 01:25:24
And stuff like that. 01:25:26
We only do it for diabetics very specific that we can hopefully try to control cost of that. 01:25:27
Instead of the 5.9% recommended increase because we have been able to manage our health insurance costs. 01:25:34
The increase will be 4.5% for fiscal year 2526. 01:25:42
On our health insurance. 01:25:47
We do. 01:25:49
Pass a small portion on to employees. 01:25:51
That's typically same percent percent like employee only maybe a 90%, ten percent, 9% covered by the county. 01:25:55
10% covered by the employee. It's whatever that split. 01:26:03
Maintains or whatever that split is to maintain that split of a 9010. 01:26:07
7723%. 01:26:15
Who maintain those splits? Who contribute? 01:26:18
Costs. So there is a small cost increase to employees. 01:26:21
And a little bit more increase if it's if they have employee and family coverage. 01:26:26
Uh, certainly can. 01:26:33
That will be coming up in our budget discussions that we have. 01:26:35
That you have with finance department. 01:26:39
That is results of. 01:26:41
Arizona Local Government Employment Trust meeting last week. 01:26:43
This week I am going to Flagstaff for a couple days for. 01:26:47
Training of government accountants. I maintain my certified public accountant. 01:26:51
Credential and as part of that. 01:26:56
On Friday, Sherry and I will be traveling to Washington DC again, as mentioned last week. 01:26:58
To try to get a little bit firmer grasp of what is happening in Washington DC with. 01:27:05
A change in administration and different things that we can expect. 01:27:12
Particularly in financial and the grants and things like that. I had a discussion yesterday. 01:27:15
With folks from Washington have. 01:27:20
What is going on and what kind of things that we can potentially? 01:27:22
Expect the financial so. 01:27:26
I will be in Flagstaff next couple days and in Washington DC through next. 01:27:28
When they has allowed for in county policy. Mr. O'Driscoll, deputy County manager. 01:27:34
Is umm. 01:27:40
Given authorization to. 01:27:42
Act as county manager while I am out of the county. 01:27:44
That's my report, Mr. Chairman. 01:27:49
Thank you, Supervisor Humphrey. 01:27:51
Yeah, I held a Guy Sila community meeting on the 22nd. I want to thank staff for showing up. We had. 01:27:53
Homero was there. 01:28:02
We had engineering there. We had. 01:28:06
The SO showed up and so it was. It was a good meeting. I appreciate staff being willing to go to Diceyla on Saturday and. 01:28:10
Taking notes. 01:28:19
I'll hold a I'll hold a Public works staff. 01:28:21
And directors meeting on the 20. 01:28:25
6th and there again, I like to meet with everyone to talk about what's going on in District 2 and where we're at with it. 01:28:28
Introduce new projects. 01:28:35
See where existing projects are going. 01:28:37
I'll hold a southern. 01:28:41
Healy County preseason fire meeting and it's not preseason because we never got out of. 01:28:43
Out of. 01:28:49
Fire danger. And that's not, you know, to divide North and South. It's just. 01:28:50
When I got elected, I started having meetings down here because. 01:28:56
21 We have a completely different environment in the northern part does. 01:29:00
And also too, to help get our everybody on the same page down here Gila County DPS A dot. 01:29:05
And so and Forest Service comes and our local fire departments come in it. 01:29:14
It just helps us get. 01:29:20
Everybody on the same page and also. 01:29:23
If we do have lightning strikes and things of this nature. 01:29:25
Everybody understands which are going to be our worst areas if we. 01:29:29
End up having to fight a fire. 01:29:35
And also to help with evacuation. It's amazing. 01:29:37
When I had my first when we had our first meeting, there was. 01:29:41
You know what county was willing to put water tanks and things that needed them but. 01:29:44
I mean, nobody even knew which hoses fit which trucks and so. 01:29:49
You know, things are like that and our first couple meetings we didn't even think about evacuation and then. 01:29:53
All of a sudden that came in when we had a fire and so. 01:29:59
It really helps to get everybody on the same page. 01:30:02
With Emergency Management, so. 01:30:07
If we do have a fire. 01:30:10
We know you know what part of the fairgrounds we can use for. 01:30:13
Animals and things of that nature and so. 01:30:17
It it it really helps and and I understand you and yours too so. 01:30:20
Yeah, it just helps, I think to get. 01:30:26
Our emergency staff. 01:30:30
All on the same page so. 01:30:33
I'm looking forward. 01:30:35
To that. 01:30:37
And so then. 01:30:38
Let's see, and then I'll hold the Tunnel Basin community meeting. 01:30:41
On the 4th at at 5:00 PM to. 01:30:45
I thank you very much, very good. 01:30:49
I'll start with a few days ago I met with Jenna Dean with APS. 01:30:53
Here a couple of years ago they started that public safety power shut off project and basically what that is is when. 01:31:00
Indices start showing that we're an extreme fire danger, which it was based on humidity. 01:31:08
Temperature timing. 01:31:16
In fuel conditions. 01:31:19
They would start entertaining the fact that shutting power. 01:31:22
And so. 01:31:26
She had requested a meeting with me and I visited with her and because of the time, type of year that we're having. 01:31:28
Having that, there's a real good chance that can happen this summer. 01:31:35
And it's not only APS, I believe SRP or. 01:31:41
Are picking up some lines as well. 01:31:44
Their their areas are starting to expand. 01:31:47
More and more. 01:31:51
And so. 01:31:53
Is probably going to get to the point here pretty quick, especially in the northern part. 01:31:55
And places like the canals. 01:32:01
Maybe on some of your Roosevelt country. 01:32:08
Him, but anyway. 01:32:10
It might come to the point pretty quick where we need to help start getting the word out so people could somewhat be prepared. 01:32:13
The power shut off could be a few hours. 01:32:21
To who knows how long. 01:32:25
And the problem is, and you know, there's a lot of people out there that rely on that electricity for medical. 01:32:27
Equipment to run or. 01:32:33
Or whatever. And if you're talking about the middle of June, you know, temperatures in the middle of June are pretty hot. 01:32:35
Things of that nature. So it's going to be a real hardship on a lot of people. 01:32:42
If this does actually come to happen. 01:32:46
I think, you know, I thought a lot about this. I've been working with APS and the Forest Service here quite a bit. 01:32:51
And I think we're on the on the right route. 01:32:58
APS, and I believe I've talked about in this this meeting before, is APS on their right of ways, on their power lines. It's only 01:33:02
20 feet. 01:33:06
Well, that's like for me to carry. 01:33:11
And so in the pine type where the biggest concern is, is you have a right of way that's 20 feet that they work on, they keep it 01:33:14
open. 01:33:18
And cleaned out. 01:33:23
But beyond that, it's heavy fuel loadings and everything, but you have 120 foot pine trees. 01:33:25
Beside it. 01:33:31
So they can still reach the power lines if something. 01:33:32
Blow one over whatever and cause problems. 01:33:36
In all of my years, I don't believe I remember ever having a fire off of the secondary APS lines. 01:33:41
We had fires off of the big KV lines that you see going through the country. 01:33:49
One one side is APS and one side is SRP. 01:33:54
And in the summertime, they'll stretch and arc out, and we've had several fires from them. 01:33:58
But not really a secondary alliance, but neither here nor there. 01:34:03
My goal has been is to work with APS and the Forest Service. 01:34:08
To try and widen these right of ways. 01:34:12
Maybe to a couple 100 feet. 01:34:16
And and get them cut back and opened up. 01:34:19
So they have the room that a tree can't reach the lines, or if a line falls they have the room. 01:34:21
And the latitude to make a run at it and catch it before it gets. 01:34:29
Into the heavier fuel so. 01:34:33
Trying to work on that, but that's that's down the road and that isn't going to help this this spring. And so we have that ahead 01:34:36
of us. 01:34:40
Umm, I attended a ECO meeting last Wednesday and the CSA board meeting on Thursday. I did that by Zoom. 01:34:46
Umm, really? There's so much up in the air with this new administration. 01:34:55
I don't know that you could even out guess where we're really headed right now. So and what's gonna happen. 01:35:00
Everybody's just kind of sitting back waiting for the dust to settle and. 01:35:08
And see where we're at. 01:35:14
I think that's going to be the case for a while. 01:35:16
Umm, we'll just have to see I the. 01:35:19
Another big concern is, like the Forest Service, probably the state. 01:35:25
To some. 01:35:30
Amount uh. 01:35:33
The big question is their firefighters this spring and how many they're going to have and if they're going to have. 01:35:36
I honestly believe they're going to have them. Somebody will shake loose and say no, you're going to have to hire them. 01:35:43
Let's go. Let's get it done. 01:35:48
I think that'll happen, but. 01:35:50
But some other people aren't real sure, so I think we'll just have to hang back and see. 01:35:53
Me and Kathy are headed to DC tomorrow. 01:35:58
Will fly out to DC. 01:36:01
I've got meetings on the hill with. 01:36:03
Ruben Gallegos, Senator Gallegos, Senator Kelly. 01:36:06
And Congressman Crane on Thursday. 01:36:10
And then my meetings will start on Friday and Saturday and there will be returning on Sunday, so. 01:36:13
That's where I'm at this week. 01:36:19
Busy. Thanks for that SO. 01:36:21
I don't have a lot to report other than I did meet with the water group last Thursday so. 01:36:25
This was a rerun. 01:36:30
And so appreciate all their efforts. 01:36:33
And. 01:36:38
Let's see, it seemed like there was something I was going to say, but. 01:36:40
Anyway, just looking forward to this week and. 01:36:43
Keep them busy with some things so I don't have much to report today. 01:36:48
Jessica, do you have anything today? 01:36:53
Now you're kind of looking like. 01:36:55
Have no authority to speak at this time. You want some? 01:36:57
OK. All right. Well, if there's nothing else, then I'll adjourn the meeting. Thank you. 01:37:02
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Transcript
OK, everything good. 00:00:00
OK, we're all ready. 00:00:06
OK. Good morning, everyone. I'd like to call this meeting together Tuesday, February 25th. It's about four minutes after 10. 00:00:08
And I've asked. 00:00:15
Supervisor Klein if he'd lead us in the pledge if he goes down. 00:00:17
Of the United States of America. 00:00:20
And to the Republic for which it changed one nation under God. 00:00:27
Thank you. 00:00:36
OK, fair warning shortage in the long meeting. 00:00:41
Item 2A is information and discussion to consider the implementation of a local court fee schedule which, if approved, would be 00:00:47
effective in fiscal year 26. Good morning, John. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of the Board. 00:00:54
Thank you very much for this opportunity today. 00:01:01
Often we come before you with a complicated package in one meeting and ask you to take action. 00:01:04
So I'm grateful that we have the opportunity to discuss it in a work session format. 00:01:10
I'm really looking for input, feedback, thoughts, concerns, criticism. 00:01:15
And so, well, thank you, John. And I'll just admonish the other supervisors, just jump in whenever you'd like when it is a work 00:01:19
center. 00:01:23
Absolutely. 00:01:27
So if you want somebody to know something or know nothing, then tell them everything. 00:01:29
And so we're going to try to keep this presentation in the bite size chunks to show you how we arrived at the conclusion. 00:01:34
To make the request for a local court fee schedule. 00:01:40
So the courts operate under a coordinated courts budget. 00:01:45
Administrative Order 2017, Dash 79 for the Supreme Court. 00:01:49
Requires that the presiding judge submit a coordinated budget to the Board of Supervisors that encompasses. 00:01:54
Budgetary requests from justice courts. 00:02:01
Superior Court, the clerk of Court, Juvenile and adult probation. 00:02:04
So we've operated under that format for a number of years. 00:02:09
Rule 93 of the Supreme Court Rules requires that the court administrator. 00:02:14
Drafts that budget. 00:02:19
And so it's primarily budgetary concerns that have brought us to the point of making this request to you today. 00:02:21
We're always conscious of impositions to the general fund. 00:02:28
For example in 2016. 00:02:32
All of the court groups used to have their own IT department while the county was operating an IT department. 00:02:35
We consolidated that as a duplication of services. 00:02:42
There was number need to impose those. 00:02:45
Extra expenses we felt on the general fund. 00:02:47
2017 thereabouts, we closed down the juvenile detention center. 00:02:51
Umm, we also use the coordinated courts budget to. 00:02:56
Meet the county's budgetary expectations. 00:03:00
Meet with the manager of Finance. 00:03:03
And they give us the plan. 00:03:05
With the coordinated budget, we have the ability some flexibility within the departmental requests so that you can guarantee that 00:03:07
we live up to. 00:03:11
What the county expects of US annual basis. 00:03:15
For example. 00:03:20
I'll give you an example of that, not the complete history, but in 2014, in the first year in court administration, the county 00:03:22
asked us to make a 5% budgetary reduction. 00:03:26
That would be demanding, perhaps to one department or even a series of departments. 00:03:31
But because we operate under the coordinated structure. 00:03:37
We were able to leverage that out without compromising service or operations throughout our entire court groups. 00:03:41
2015. 00:03:47
And Rasta Absorbor. 00:03:49
Total of $1.4 million in personnel expenses that were the result of a classification and compensation study at that time. 00:03:50
And again, that's another example. 00:03:59
Of the flexibility within the coordinated courts budget. 00:04:01
However. 00:04:06
We are experiencing some business pressures. 00:04:06
I think we're all familiar with the term unfunded mandates. 00:04:09
That's what we're looking at here. 00:04:13
In two areas primarily, we have seen the heaviest impact. 00:04:15
That is in. 00:04:20
Cord Automation. 00:04:22
Where we consistently run what they call the E suite. 00:04:24
Which means E filing which is paperless filings. We don't have file folders anymore. 00:04:28
The judge has to be able to access all of those documents. That's E bench and other automated function that we've had. 00:04:34
Digital Evidence. 00:04:41
Been before this board seeking grant funding to. 00:04:43
Equip our courtrooms for digital evidence before. 00:04:46
And we're running a lot of audio visual tech in our courtrooms. 00:04:50
We stream to YouTube just like you do for your board meetings. 00:04:54
We have. 00:04:59
Remote appearances all the time. 00:05:00
We do a lot of in custody stuff with the jail so they don't have to make transports. 00:05:02
So that's the demand that automation has placed on us. 00:05:09
Just recently, within the past few years really, since COVID. 00:05:13
Another area, another unfunded mandate, is court security. 00:05:18
So in 2017, the Supreme Court released an administrative order detailing about 30 court security standards. 00:05:23
The mandate what worked with county administration and facilities and other groups. 00:05:32
To comply with those requirements, there's still a few outstanding. 00:05:37
Most of the heavy lifting has been done. We still have some stuff. 00:05:43
That we need to work on to bring ourselves into full compliance with all of our courts. 00:05:46
These pressures, I think. 00:05:53
Threatened to disrupt our coordinated budget, which is turned in flat operating expenses. 00:05:55
Really. Since 2014 or 2015? 00:06:01
There are potential solutions to mitigate that without making impositions on the general fund. 00:06:04
Couple of areas that we've identified are the management of expenses obviously. 00:06:10
And the identification of new revenue sources. 00:06:14
As far as the management of expenses, I've given you a few examples already and I'll just state that we continue to scrutinize 00:06:20
every line item for all of those departments that comes in front of us. 00:06:25
Prior to making a coordinated budget request to the board. 00:06:30
We've also been able to identify some new revenue sources. 00:06:36
The meat and potatoes of why I'm in front of you today. 00:06:40
Thank you. Is that better? 00:06:44
OK, I won't run through the whole thing again. Well, thank you. 00:06:53
So new revenue sources? 00:06:59
Local court fees. 00:07:01
Courts can establish local court fees with Supreme Court approval and board approval via resolution. 00:07:04
Our courts currently have 3 local fees. 00:07:10
I can tell you, compared to other counties, that's relatively modest. 00:07:14
Cochise County, for example, has over 10. 00:07:18
Maricopa County has several. 00:07:21
Pima County has 6. 00:07:23
So we're not. 00:07:26
We don't have a very aggressive local court fee schedule in place right now. 00:07:28
The local fees that we do have is cost of prosecution. 00:07:33
Which is a split revenue source with the county attorney's office, court administration, my unit. 00:07:37
And the Clerk of Courts office. 00:07:44
We have the local probate fund. 00:07:47
Which provides funding for experts and professional attorney services and guardianship and conservatorship cases. 00:07:49
And we have a Justice court enhancement fund. 00:07:57
Which I brought through this board in 2019 I believe. 00:07:59
We are asking to do 2 things with the fee schedule. 00:08:07
Subject to your input, of course. 00:08:10
We would like to increase the probate and the justice Court fees. 00:08:14
The probate fee was established in 2006. 00:08:21
Has never had an adjustment to whatsoever. 00:08:24
The Justice Court enhancement fee is $20. 00:08:27
Pretty modest and that was a pre COVID figure. 00:08:31
And speaking with her. 00:08:35
Elected justices of the peace. 00:08:36
They were interested in increasing that fee. 00:08:38
We'd like to establish 2 new fees. 00:08:42
Two new fees, not surprisingly, are in the areas that. 00:08:51
We're looking at an automation fee. 00:08:55
That would be split with the Clerk of Courts office. 00:08:57
And we're looking at a security fee. 00:09:02
Which would be. 00:09:04
Available to all courts and any of the. 00:09:06
Expenses from that fee would be subject to. 00:09:09
Written approval from the presiding judge and of course, coordinate. 00:09:12
County administration and county facilities on. 00:09:16
How those funds might be utilized? 00:09:19
The fee proposal. 00:09:22
That I anticipate or I would like to bring before this Board. 00:09:24
Is not radical. 00:09:28
These fees exist in other counties. 00:09:29
Now, not everything that's right for other counties is right for healing. You will let us know that. But we felt that these fees 00:09:33
that address the immediate pressures that we're seeing. 00:09:37
And they have been accepted by other. 00:09:42
Or the supervisors and other counties. 00:09:45
The automation fee will be a. 00:09:48
$20 and I. 00:09:50
I attached summary sheets for both of the new fees. 00:09:51
And I used. 00:09:55
Very low end estimates. 00:09:57
And so we modeled them at a low cost. 00:10:00
I didn't want to. 00:10:03
To put big numbers in there without talking to you first. 00:10:04
The court automation fee. 00:10:09
With generate approximately $25,000. 00:10:11
Be a $20 fee assessed on top of. 00:10:15
Civil case filings. 00:10:17
The security fee. 00:10:21
Is the exact same security fee that's in Grant County right now? 00:10:23
Our numbers are slightly different. 00:10:27
The security fee in Grant County. 00:10:29
Says it's $10. 00:10:31
On every criminal or civil traffic disposition sentence. 00:10:33
And uh. 00:10:37
That fee applying. 00:10:39
Those numbers to Hila. 00:10:40
Would be about 20 grand. 00:10:42
One more note on the proposed local fee schedule. 00:10:47
It's not overly. 00:10:50
Onerous. 00:10:51
The filing fees are not going to prevent anybody. 00:10:53
From Accessing Justice in Hilo County. 00:10:57
Filing fees in both the Justice Court and if applied. 00:11:00
Superior Court. 00:11:04
Are subject to fee and our fee deferral and waiver provisions. 00:11:05
That currently exists within the Code of Judicial Administration. 00:11:10
If you want to bring your case in Healing County, you're not going to be priced out. 00:11:14
The criminal disposition fees. The security fee in this example. 00:11:19
That is subject to the discretion of the judge. 00:11:23
As to the imposition of that fee? 00:11:26
So that is the fee proposal in a nutshell. 00:11:29
And I'd like to hear any thoughts or questions that you might have. 00:11:33
Thank you, John, Supervisor No for anything. 00:11:38
OK, these fees, who? Who will pay these fees? 00:11:41
The users of the services. 00:11:46
Court users in the instance of the. 00:11:48
Filing fees. 00:11:51
A lot of civil cases and superior courts are filed by attorneys. 00:11:53
Of course, their clients always bear cost as well. 00:11:59
But again, it wouldn't prohibit anybody from filing a certain case with us. 00:12:01
In the other instances, the security fee. 00:12:06
That is tacked on to. 00:12:09
Criminal defendants as part of their sentencing or sanctions. 00:12:11
OK, Yeah, because I was going to say, you know some of these that. 00:12:17
Use our court system. Who's going to collect? 00:12:21
Things. So if it's if it's the filing, then then I I can better understand it and the security fee. 00:12:24
Does that include the security at the front door? 00:12:33
I mean, because that's a, that's a big cost that was brought to the county. 00:12:38
Because of our courts, to protect our courts, that was mandated by the state. 00:12:43
And so it's like, oh, OK, Big Brother, thanks for putting this burden on us. 00:12:47
When I don't see that it's, you know, all our burden carry. 00:12:51
And so you know, that could help our. 00:12:56
Our couldn't agree more. Yeah, that could help. 00:12:59
You know our our. 00:13:02
Our budget. Our manager. 00:13:04
Our tax base money. 00:13:06
From not. 00:13:08
You know, paying the fees that are from the court. 00:13:09
And so. 00:13:12
Yeah, if that could. 00:13:14
Then I would. You know I would. 00:13:16
I would like to see that be at a point where it could. 00:13:18
May be helpful with that cost. 00:13:21
I will disclose to the board that I had. 00:13:24
Talked with County Manager Men Love on a number of occasions about this P proposal and that was one of the very options that we 00:13:27
discussed. 00:13:31
Yeah, yeah, 'cause I, we, we love to put a service out there, but it costs us and so yeah, anything that we can do there to. 00:13:35
To help that and you know and like you say that the people that are coming to use the court that. 00:13:46
That's you know. 00:13:52
That's something that. 00:13:53
I appreciate you. 00:13:55
Bringing these up to a work session. 00:13:56
For our awareness. 00:13:59
Of these things so. 00:14:01
Thank you. 00:14:03
Appreciate it. 00:14:04
Thank you. 00:14:06
So Jonathan was by. 00:14:08
Umm, setting these fees and and working with these fees that'll that'll bring. 00:14:11
The courts up to kind of where you need to be financially and. 00:14:16
Not quite so. 00:14:21
Yes, I do, honestly. 00:14:24
You honestly believe that? 00:14:25
You know, we do have. 00:14:27
Tremendous flexibility with the coordinated structure of the court's budget. 00:14:28
We can reapplicate resources to where the. 00:14:33
Actual demands are. 00:14:36
It's just. 00:14:39
Security and automation. 00:14:40
Are threatening. 00:14:43
Our framework. 00:14:44
Made general fund budget request for absolutely fundamental operations. 00:14:46
We have other special revenue sources which might be limited. 00:14:51
To certain services and can't be spent. 00:14:54
Across the board. 00:14:56
And I do really believe. 00:14:58
You know, I've been working with this budget since 2014. 00:15:00
I've actually made pitches for local court fees before. 00:15:03
And never been able to get the support I needed at the Supreme Court level. 00:15:08
And sharing the basically the same presentation with them that I just shared with you all. We were able to get there. So what I am 00:15:12
seeking. 00:15:16
Is not an abundance of money. 00:15:20
I'd like to see. 00:15:23
My coordinated courts budget be sustainable for the next 10 years. 00:15:24
And I think this will greatly help us reach that goal. 00:15:29
Well, thank you for putting the time and thought into this and what you proposed here seems to me to be real reasonable and. 00:15:33
And, umm. 00:15:40
Looks like I don't know why it can't be done so. 00:15:41
Thank you for that. 00:15:44
Thank you. 00:15:45
Yeah. Thanks John for the presentation. So. 00:15:46
I'm kind of a proponent that would support. 00:15:51
Users paying for. 00:15:54
The product or the service that they're using? 00:15:56
We do that with community development. 00:15:59
A landfill and other soap. 00:16:02
A lot of some of the burden on all these departments share equally. 00:16:08
Throughout the county. 00:16:13
But uh. 00:16:14
If you're not using the service, you shouldn't have to contribute to it. 00:16:15
And a large amount, so I totally support. 00:16:20
The fees and these seem like really low numbers to me. 00:16:23
But if you if you feel that that's. 00:16:27
What you'd like to? 00:16:31
Offer then I feel I can support that. 00:16:32
Yeah, yeah, it's a fine line. You know, there's a. 00:16:35
I'll give you an example of. 00:16:38
Something that. 00:16:40
We couldn't get behind obviously when we developed these proposals. I mentioned I had been down this road before and didn't have 00:16:41
the support I needed from the Chief Justice to to get their approval, but. 00:16:46
We studied models in all these other counties. 00:16:52
The two new fees, as I mentioned, are. 00:16:55
The exact same thing in other jurisdictions. 00:16:58
But Coconino County, for example, charges an $85 assessment fee on all of their civil and family law filings. 00:17:01
That's something that I wouldn't bring to this board. 00:17:11
I agree with you entirely, Mr. Chairman, I think. 00:17:15
There is room for. 00:17:18
Perhaps a slightly more aggressive program here. 00:17:20
But we didn't want it to be. 00:17:23
Onerous to the citizens of Hilah. 00:17:25
Like some of the other examples of me. 00:17:28
You want to file a civil case in Maricopa County. It's going to cost you like 300 plus dollars. 00:17:30
That certainly wasn't. 00:17:36
Right for healing. Nothing that he would ever bring to this board. 00:17:38
Well, one thing that I've noticed is if we delay the. 00:17:41
Increases long enough, then it becomes much more problem because we're we're literally absorbing the loss over. 00:17:45
These years and then we say, well, we've got to jump it up and we had to do that with the landfill. 00:17:54
And it's better to me to say, look, we need to adjust this the fees and the schedules and all of that every. 00:17:59
Couple years or so. 00:18:07
And we need to do that with community development. I think that we're way behind on that too in this. 00:18:09
Then it becomes a big jump, and then everybody you know hollers about the big jump. 00:18:14
When they've been. 00:18:19
Living pretty comfortable for the last maybe 10 years on fees that should have gone out. 00:18:20
I agree so. 00:18:25
You know the thought here? Oh, Jessica. 00:18:28
Chairman. Member. Supervisors. 00:18:31
Mr. Merrup, I did hear you mention an allocation in regard to the needs. 00:18:34
Assessing the needs when they come, but just for clarification for the public. 00:18:41
I just want to clarify that the fund increase is intended to cover the cost. 00:18:45
Of the actual service, so for example security the. 00:18:52
The fee increase is intended to cover the cost of security. It is the statute requires that we use these funds to be free those 00:18:56
expenses. So that's the exact intention. 00:19:02
OK. Thank you, Jessica. 00:19:10
Anything else? 00:19:12
No, I'm fine, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Jonathan, very much. 00:19:14
I just had one more Johnson The Security Service you use in your courts is the same as we got the front door. Same, same company. 00:19:18
Is that right? Yeah, it is in both locations, Pace and Anglo, same contractor. 00:19:24
OK. 00:19:29
All right. Thank you. 00:19:30
Thank you very much. 00:19:32
OK, good item 2B. 00:19:36
Information Discussion. 00:19:42
Regarding pending legislation addressing rural groundwater management. 00:19:45
Good morning, Michael. Good morning, Chairman, members of the Board. 00:19:51
So today there's a group of residents in Northern. 00:19:54
Gila County that are here to sort of. 00:19:58
Present some information about rural groundwater. 00:20:00
Possible legislation. Future legislation ideas. 00:20:04
And I'm going to go ahead and introduce Miss Chris Ray, who's the first speaker from the group. 00:20:08
OK. Thank you. Thank you. 00:20:13
Good morning, Chris. How are you today? I'm doing well, Mr. Chairman, how are you? Very good. Honorable board and supervisors, I 00:20:16
want to thank you for hearing us today. 00:20:21
OK. 00:20:28
OK, sorry. 00:20:33
What we've come to discuss is in regards to. 00:20:35
The state authority about groundwater in the proposed legislation that umm. 00:20:40
We actually have. 00:20:45
There we go. OK. 00:20:49
Sorry. No, that's good. OK. 00:20:52
We would ask, we have a lot of information that we're going to go through and so we would ask that you would hold your questions 00:20:54
to the question and answer if you would please. 00:20:58
OK. 00:21:02
Why is this important and why should we care as Heila County who were speaking about this? 00:21:05
Excuse me, I apologize. 00:21:13
On the state authority, this means the state or local level cannot operate in isolation. 00:21:17
We, let's face it, we in Gila County, we like being a rural county. 00:21:24
And we enjoy that. 00:21:29
But we have to consider. 00:21:30
What Arizona State and our policies will actually do and might impact national security and we're going to go into that. 00:21:33
We are. 00:21:41
In the interconnected world now. 00:21:42
The governor's executive order. 00:21:45
She has recently signed some. 00:21:50
And what that is, is it's treated as law. 00:21:52
In a state agencies. 00:21:56
They will implement that. 00:21:59
Here's an example. 00:22:02
Remember COVID, all of us. 00:22:04
Governor Ducey wrote over 45. 00:22:07
Executive orders that were implemented. 00:22:11
State and in our county. 00:22:15
In regards to COVID. 00:22:17
Remember. 00:22:19
Schools closed those types of things. 00:22:21
So they are treated as a law until. 00:22:24
Either a governor. 00:22:29
Deletes it. 00:22:33
Overrides it. 00:22:34
Also if it's suspended if the state actually. 00:22:36
Legislation actually enacts the law. 00:22:41
OK, next one. 00:22:44
The governor has vast powers and as we've been looking at these laws, we've seen. 00:22:48
How that actually is? 00:22:53
And even though their executive orders, they are implied as law in regards to that and Allstate agencies will enact those. 00:22:55
Groundwater. 00:23:07
One of the things that we found found in our research is. 00:23:09
That groundwater can be taken. 00:23:13
As legitimate public youth under state law. 00:23:16
And here's an example of eminent domain. 00:23:21
We just had this in the last six months in pine strawberry with pine straw, better Berry water Improvement District. 00:23:25
And that's they actually declared imminent domain for their deep oil in regards to that. 00:23:33
So the reason we bring that up? 00:23:40
Is because it does mention this in some of the legislation that we have been researching. 00:23:42
OK, I this is uh. 00:23:50
Quite a slide that we have. 00:23:54
I don't know a lot of people. I didn't realize it till we started researching. Arizona has moved into the 21st century as a 00:23:58
leader. 00:24:03
In AI, advanced mobility, clean energy. 00:24:07
And ship manufacturing. 00:24:12
We have the largest. 00:24:14
Chip manufacture. 00:24:17
In the world. 00:24:18
In Phoenix now. 00:24:20
We have a total of 105. 00:24:22
Of those at this time in the state of Arizona. 00:24:25
And in regards to them. 00:24:29
It takes 1,000,000 gallons of water. 00:24:32
In order for them to fill and start fabricating. 00:24:36
And they reuse but. 00:24:40
Just to start off, it's a million gallons water. 00:24:43
Um, she just Governor Hobbs just recently. 00:24:48
Announced and it is on her web page. 00:24:53
Space station? Have you heard of it? 00:24:56
Yuma, it is on her web page. She announced it. 00:24:59
And they are planning on setting up a Cape Cernavil a Houston in Yuma. 00:25:03
And one lift off. 00:25:11
Just for that one lift off takes a half million gallons of water. 00:25:15
For that lift off. 00:25:19
In regards to it. 00:25:21
So these are some of the reasons. 00:25:23
If you go on and you start looking at Title 45. 00:25:26
Which is. 00:25:31
In regards to the powers of the. 00:25:32
Water director in regards to that. 00:25:35
He controls decision making on. 00:25:38
All waterways. 00:25:41
All watersheds. 00:25:43
Surface water. 00:25:45
Groundwater. 00:25:47
Groundwater basins. 00:25:49
He cooperates with the United States of America in. 00:25:51
Anything that they may need in the way of water or decisions about water, such as the Colorado River. 00:25:56
And he has the decision, the final decision on Paul Van. 00:26:04
Right of way and water rights. 00:26:09
OK, in regards to that. 00:26:14
Essentially on Title 45 about the director. 00:26:17
He has all. 00:26:22
Authority. And it's all spelled out in Arizona. 00:26:23
Title 45 in regards to that. 00:26:27
And so. 00:26:31
We're going to continue. 00:26:33
I'll step away. 00:26:37
Good morning. 00:26:42
Good morning, Carolyn Eppler. 00:26:43
If you didn't know. 00:26:46
The right button. 00:26:48
OK, I'm Carolyn Eppler. I'm also a concerned citizen and resident of Hewlett County. 00:26:49
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and Members, for allowing giving us the time to talk about this. 00:26:56
Let's see. 00:27:02
As an example. 00:27:05
The current legislation, Senate Bill 1425. 00:27:07
Is the focus of today, but strictly as an example, there's been over 100 bills. 00:27:11
That have come across the table. 00:27:18
Chairman Christian shared with us the other day he has had a chance to look at several of those. 00:27:21
The main thing that we noticed is probably. 00:27:28
More than half of these bills. The language in these bills has been. 00:27:31
Very beneficial to Hula County. 00:27:36
The other part of that though, however, is they have got language that's more focused on the issues in other counties. 00:27:39
But this is a bill that's intended to actually affect the entire state. 00:27:48
So those guardrails and things that are missing. 00:27:53
With the language, that's more specific. 00:27:56
So what's going on in the other counties? 00:27:59
Is the big concern and what we'd like to kind of cover a little bit today to make you more aware of what we've been finding. 00:28:02
And you probably heard the 30th of January, Governor Hobbs. 00:28:10
Announced. 00:28:13
That we have a Rural Groundwater Management Act of 2025. 00:28:15
That's how she referred to. 00:28:20
She's told the state legislative body that if they can't. 00:28:22
Come to an agreement. 00:28:26
She plans to actually initiate an executive order to implement this act. 00:28:28
Uh, there's a rural water working group that is not sanctioned, but it's a very little, excuse me, a fairly large group of. 00:28:36
Individuals. 00:28:44
And also some other county. 00:28:46
Supervisors that have been participating in it working. 00:28:48
With a gentleman named Chris Kuzdis, who overseas most of it, he is. 00:28:51
Also working very closely with the governor. 00:28:57
So there's a lot of influence in that group and it's given the three of us, Shirley, myself and Chris, an opportunity. 00:29:00
Staying track on track with. 00:29:09
Proposals, the comments, the issues. 00:29:13
That it keep coming to the table that cause. 00:29:15
This constant change in revision. 00:29:18
The problem is a lot of those are staying in the last three bills that we looked at. 00:29:22
So impacts the Gila County. This is a very short summary. 00:29:27
There is a council that's proposed. 00:29:31
If a rural groundwater management area is selected either by the governor. 00:29:34
Or even the Department of Water Resources director if he sees based on the data he has. 00:29:42
There may be a need the governor just recently. 00:29:48
Created an AMA active management area in Wilcox. 00:29:53
There was number vote. 00:29:57
It was executing order. 00:29:59
If in that space the way it is, and that was in large part because of the water table problems down there. 00:30:01
The law that they're looking at now that she's referring to as the Rural Groundwater Management Act of 2025. 00:30:09
That would immediately change. 00:30:16
What's happening in Wilcox from an active management area which has significant water management restrictions in groundwater? 00:30:19
To a real groundwater management area which is not as restrictive. 00:30:26
But still very similar. 00:30:30
And for Gila County, because we are so different, you know, environmentally, ecologically, our population. 00:30:33
The topography, the weather, everything is quite different in Healey County. 00:30:40
A lot of what most of our state legislators are looking at. 00:30:45
Is their knowledge of other counties. 00:30:49
Not so much heal the county so. 00:30:52
If this RGMA act passes, it will create storage and use restrictions. 00:30:54
Anybody that has more than one residential well. 00:31:01
We'll have to monitor because they don't want you to go over 30. 00:31:04
Excuse me, 35 gallons a minute. 00:31:08
Or 10 acre feet a year, which is about the same. 00:31:10
It would affect your ability as county supervisors to. 00:31:15
Fully implement your legal obligations on Land Management decisions. 00:31:19
What have we seen so far is they're not using. 00:31:26
The best available science that we would hopefully would use to address. 00:31:29
Water issues, especially if they're going to do it statewide and impact what you've already got in place for Hewitt County. 00:31:34
And the one thing that I saw that would be a huge concern is there's no. 00:31:42
Guardrails in the current language in this SB1425 and its beard. House Bill. 00:31:48
That. 00:31:54
Control the cell. 00:31:55
Or lease of water rights. 00:31:57
And we've seen this across the state where our water situation, our groundwater situation is. 00:32:00
Dire in some places, the town of Queen Creek. 00:32:07
Had a company go outside of the county. 00:32:11
To buy property that had really good water rights. 00:32:16
They're now using the water rights from a whole of the county. 00:32:19
To provide water to Queen Creek. 00:32:23
That's done. 00:32:25
Buckeye. The same thing. 00:32:27
There was one we had heard there was one acre of land in a separate county. 00:32:28
Where Buckeye is. 00:32:34
They purchased for several $1,000,000. 00:32:35
Just for the water rights. 00:32:38
So of course, as citizens, we don't want that to happen in Human County. 00:32:40
And is there a way you can prevent that? 00:32:45
You know, those are things that we're helping by just sharing you with you what we've located. 00:32:48
In the data what we found. 00:32:53
In conversations and meetings. 00:32:55
That we can start thinking about. 00:32:58
Find some solutions to to protect this. 00:33:00
You know, there's always that imminent domain that I think if there's a way that we can. 00:33:04
Demonstrate. 00:33:08
The needs of Gila County. 00:33:10
And take a look a harder look at other options rather than just going out and buying land. 00:33:12
Can we stop that in Hewitt County? 00:33:20
Then we put restrictions on who. 00:33:22
The purchase of land in Gila County so that there isn't a well that's dug that's going to take more than 35 gallons a minute. 00:33:25
They can do that under restrictions, but right now? 00:33:33
There's no restrictions. 00:33:37
Anywhere except for active management areas, and those are primarily the urban areas in the central part of the state. 00:33:38
So the bulk of our rural country. 00:33:45
In Arizona, including Hewlett County does not have. 00:33:48
Restrictions on groundwater use. 00:33:53
We just get a permit to dig a well. 00:33:56
This slide here is a sample of the current bills. 00:33:59
Idea of how? 00:34:03
A council would be formed if they declare a rural groundwater management area. 00:34:05
And the other thing that the governor created? 00:34:11
Was restrictions on how the size of these? 00:34:14
Groundwater management areas. 00:34:18
Everywhere else in the state they can't go smaller than a sub basin. 00:34:20
But in northern Gila County. 00:34:25
There's not that restriction. 00:34:26
So that opens the door for. 00:34:30
More. 00:34:33
Possibilities of somebody. 00:34:35
Coming in that lives in Gila County that may see a concern on a groundwater issue. 00:34:38
That it could be much smaller area, like a watershed, a small watershed or something like that. 00:34:43
And they could use 10% of the voting. 00:34:49
Population in that area. 00:34:53
To create a petition. 00:34:55
Or the Department of Water Resources Director to create this new level of government. 00:34:57
As citizens, we've already experienced what the three of you, as our Board of Supervisors, have done. 00:35:03
To manage this county and this county has been very successful for decades. 00:35:09
And we see that and we find. 00:35:15
That another layer of government could create some serious problems with how we function as a county now. 00:35:18
This is just one example of what's in the current law that Governor Hobbs used to declare. 00:35:27
That we will have a Rural Groundwater Management Act of 2025. 00:35:34
This is requiring measuring devices on individual residential wells. 00:35:38
If you have more than 35 gallons a minute or more than 10 acre feet a year. 00:35:46
Out of that, well. 00:35:51
So all of us that have one single residential well it's typically A10 acre feet a year or 35 gallons a minute is what's what that 00:35:53
well produces. 00:35:58
You don't have to monitor. 00:36:03
At this time and even if this law goes into effect. 00:36:05
However, if you have more than one property. 00:36:09
That puts you more than. 00:36:12
What's typically? 00:36:14
Available with one well. 00:36:16
And you would have to monitor it. 00:36:18
Something else that a lot of folks don't know, the Department of Water Resources has over 14115 fourteen 150. 00:36:22
Wells that are monitored across the state. 00:36:30
They get a lot of their data from NASA satellites. 00:36:35
Data. There is a lot of telemetry involved and a lot of these wells are actually manually. 00:36:39
Red and they're looking for the change in water level overtime. 00:36:46
Looking at the depth. 00:36:51
To the water table, those kinds of things, but they're keeping track of it. 00:36:53
And the other thing that comes into what? 00:36:58
Chris Ray shared about the national aspect of it for the state. 00:37:01
Which ultimately affects us as a county. 00:37:06
Is how they look at groundwater. 00:37:08
And it is considered part of the national critical infrastructure. 00:37:11
So knowing we've got this new Taiwan semiconductor facility and several other. 00:37:16
It chip companies in the state. 00:37:22
Umm, you know, our hope is they won't end up finding a need to come to US county to take our grandmother, but that's a possibility 00:37:26
and that's why we're trying to follow this and stay more closely involved. 00:37:32
And some of the data sets and this is. 00:37:41
I asked the question, is the median enough? Because if you look at what I'm going to show you next. 00:37:44
Umm, here. 00:37:51
This is a very busy. 00:37:54
I'm just going to tell you, take a look at the upper right. 00:37:57
That's the Little Colorado River Plateau. 00:38:00
This is an example of the data sets our state Department of Water Resources is using. 00:38:03
And if you look there to the. 00:38:09
Legend the yellow. 00:38:12
Is most of the rural areas. 00:38:15
So based on their own data. 00:38:17
They're showing that the wells in our rural parts of our state, including the HeLa County area. 00:38:20
Are fairly stable. 00:38:27
So the change in their monitoring wells isn't just between 1 foot? 00:38:29
From zero between a negative foot declining or increasing by a foot. 00:38:34
And all those areas that are blue are primarily blue because they're being recharged. 00:38:40
With Colorado River water. 00:38:46
But the challenge is. 00:38:49
When you look at that, you see the little round dots that are in the upper right larger area. 00:38:53
That's actually a sub base in a little Colorado River plateau just above us. 00:39:00
Healey County gets a lot of our groundwater. 00:39:04
That drops down from that basin. 00:39:07
But they're only using 31 wells. 00:39:10
In that entire area, that's 26,000 square miles. 00:39:13
And they're using that data. That's what they're presenting to our state legislators and to the public. 00:39:18
This kind of data. 00:39:23
Umm, using the medium information you could have 31 wells. 00:39:25
That are dropping down 40 feet. 00:39:31
Some of them and some of them on this instance have actually increased in their water table up not 20 feet. 00:39:34
Over the last 20 years. 00:39:41
That if you only look at the two middle numbers, which is the median. 00:39:43
That does not tell you as county supervisors, what's really going on in that landscape. 00:39:47
I know Chris wanted us to hold some questions till later, but I'm not going to right now, so. 00:39:54
With all due respect, but Kevin, let me ask you a question because you got the map up by. 00:39:59
Want to ask, but when you look at the little Colorado Plateau up there, a lot of that is Navajo Nation, yes. 00:40:04
And a lot of it is. 00:40:11
The uh. 00:40:14
Apache County. 00:40:15
Reservation there and whatnot. So is that why the little red dots are down there on the lower edge? Is that mostly in Navajo 00:40:17
County? 00:40:21
That, yes, yeah. They don't have any wells currently on the reservation that they're monitoring. 00:40:25
OK, so let me ask you this is. 00:40:32
Because of reservations are considered sovereign. 00:40:36
They have sovereignty. 00:40:40
The state. 00:40:43
Really doesn't have any control. 00:40:45
Over their water use. 00:40:48
Per SE. That's why the big fight. 00:40:50
Has been going on with White Mountain Apaches, the water, San Carlos Apaches, and and and so forth between them and the state. 00:40:52
And the users over here, right? 00:41:00
But there was a Supreme Court ruling in 2023. 00:41:03
And this was more specific to the Navajo Nation and a couple of the tribes in New Mexico. 00:41:09
But the language in that ruling and that Supreme Court ruling actually. 00:41:16
More cemented, but already exists, and that's that. The state of Arizona is the ultimate control of management of all. 00:41:21
Waters in the state. 00:41:30
Over. 00:41:31
And over the tribes. 00:41:34
So that actually helped Arizona, that ruling did. So that was. 00:41:36
A bonus. 00:41:42
For us, but as you know with anything it takes time to implement. 00:41:43
Even Supreme Court ruling. 00:41:48
But you know what's concerning to the three of us right now based on what we learned the last. 00:41:51
Several sessions at the state legislature. 00:41:57
In the last several years that we've been looking at this is. 00:42:00
The information that our state is using right now. 00:42:04
To make decisions and what Governor Hobbs is using to back her plan to implement this 2025 law. 00:42:08
Around real groundwater management act. 00:42:18
You know the data. 00:42:22
That they have there's a significant amount of data. 00:42:23
And it's just like with statistics, you know you can use what you need to get what you want done. But. 00:42:26
This is just a close up. 00:42:32
Of that big map you can see a little bit better. 00:42:35
The wells now they've got data from all those wells. 00:42:37
You know the depth to water and change overtime. This particular set of data where I've got all the red zeros and the minus 10s 00:42:41
and 30s. 00:42:45
That's a 20 year period of time showing the change in the water level. 00:42:51
And they're looking at the entire state. This is information they're using to make decisions, and we're included. 00:42:56
The other county is included in that. 00:43:02
You know, here's what's going on down in the southern part of the state, which is very different than we are here, but. 00:43:06
It's part of the decision making process that they're using. 00:43:12
To come up with these laws or trying. 00:43:16
Very hard to get done. 00:43:19
Before the end of the year. 00:43:21
I'm just going to quickly go through this. 00:43:25
Here this is additional information, I just think it's important. 00:43:27
For you to see how much information they actually have. 00:43:32
So they're looking at the entire state. 00:43:36
As their. 00:43:39
Faucet. 00:43:40
And what are the conditions across the entire state? This one just shows where the aquifers are in Arizona. 00:43:42
And knowing the type of bedrock. 00:43:50
Or the geology of those aquifers makes a big difference on accessibility. 00:43:55
And how well it can store that. 00:44:00
This is a big picture to give you a better idea of. 00:44:04
The water that's out there. 00:44:07
Umm, that has been measurable for decades. 00:44:09
These are our neighbors. 00:44:13
And right now, our governor has. 00:44:14
Committed to the Water Infrastructure Fund money. 00:44:18
That Chuck pedal act is going to take out of state out of the seven state compact to try and find water. 00:44:21
So they are really looking for ways to get more water. 00:44:28
To meet the entire state's needs. 00:44:31
These are the wells they have where they're getting all their data. 00:44:35
It's 14150 wells. That's the states using to look at what can this state. 00:44:38
Provide to ensure. 00:44:44
The infrastructure. 00:44:46
And the population that we have become. 00:44:47
Can continue. 00:44:51
And they've got the legal obligations from the. 00:44:53
The national standpoint. 00:44:56
You know, with our national security and with. 00:44:59
Taiwan Semiconductor and those kinds of things. 00:45:02
This is another part of the data they're looking at. 00:45:05
Southern Arizona. 00:45:08
Has some fairly deep soils. 00:45:10
One reason why their water table has changed. 00:45:12
Also because it's a little different in how it stores that water that the state's looking to get. 00:45:16
These are all dry, depleted wells. 00:45:22
And as you've heard on the news, this is areas where there's actually land subsidence in the southern part of the state, another 00:45:29
part of that big picture. 00:45:33
Our governor is looking at. 00:45:37
When she's trying to find, where can she get? 00:45:39
She's going to look in the state first. They're already looking out of the state. 00:45:43
But they're looking at all. 00:45:48
Areas where they can get water to meet the needs of the state. 00:45:50
So, you know, it's something we need to think about in all of our counties. 00:45:54
Those are fishers, so. 00:45:58
That's a lot of information, but my hope is that. 00:46:02
You'll take a good look at what we need to look at. Umm. 00:46:05
As a county. 00:46:11
As a state and where our state's going right now. 00:46:13
In order to meet the needs of the state. 00:46:18
You know they're gonna draw. 00:46:20
There's. 00:46:22
Our neighboring state and just as an example. 00:46:23
In New Mexico, and this could happen very easily and it already is happening in some places in Arizona. 00:46:28
Chama, New Mexico has a water treatment plant and there's a very, very large water pipeline that goes all the way up to Colorado, 00:46:33
where Pagosa Springs is into the Rockies. 00:46:39
And draws all that groundwater out of that precosa spring piece of the Rockies. 00:46:44
For the town of Albuquerque. 00:46:50
Very large pipeline. 00:46:53
And they they put it through a treatment plant and it goes down to Albuquerque. 00:46:55
There's nothing to keep. 00:46:59
That from happening in our state. 00:47:01
And our county. 00:47:04
Depends on. 00:47:06
We've got the Colorado Plateau Aquifer and they call that the Sea aquifer. We've got the Mogian. 00:47:08
Rim which beats Tunnel Creek. 00:47:13
That creates what they call the muggy on basin. All of that creates. 00:47:16
Water that seeps down into Gila County for all the wells. 00:47:21
And the governor in December of 23 already put in her Arizona administrative code direction on where to place wells on the 00:47:26
Colorado Plateau. 00:47:31
For transfer of water. 00:47:36
So there's a lot of things going on in the background that we're trying to bring it all together to look at the big picture to 00:47:39
see. 00:47:42
What's going to happen next and is there anything? 00:47:46
As citizens and as our as our county, our county supervisors, all of you, is there anything we can do to protect what you have 00:47:50
already established through? 00:47:55
A long time. 00:48:00
For the citizens in Hema County. 00:48:01
And I'll turn it over to Chris to close up on the switch. 00:48:04
We did not want to just bring. 00:48:11
Issues that we're discussing, but also possible solutions. 00:48:15
For the Board of Supervisors to. 00:48:19
Possibly consider. 00:48:23
One would be that the Board of Supervisors might want to get involved with the rural working. 00:48:24
Water Group. 00:48:32
That we have been meeting with now for a couple years. 00:48:33
And there are multiple county supervisors that are involved in that. 00:48:37
And they're helping shape. 00:48:43
The legislation. 00:48:45
That is being proposed each time. 00:48:46
In recently a bill was stopped because of it and and so we would. 00:48:50
One possible solution. 00:48:57
Also that. 00:49:00
There, there is no. 00:49:02
In regards to that, they're in ARS Title 45. There's no protection for us in Hilo County or water. 00:49:05
And being involved in that. 00:49:14
Some of that legislation. 00:49:18
You might, you might be able to, whether it's a surrogate or you yourselves involved might be able to help shape some of that 00:49:20
legislation. 00:49:24
Another option would be also to. 00:49:30
Create a Research Council committee of Sheila County residents. 00:49:34
And they would research any proposed legislation, what it is, and analyze it. 00:49:39
And then they would and how it's going to impact Gila County and they would provide you that information. 00:49:46
In order for you to make whatever decisions you would feel appropriate. 00:49:53
And that that committee would collaborate with the. 00:49:58
Rural water working group. 00:50:04
With those analysis and recommendations, you would be more informed on continuing the great job that you've done. 00:50:07
Got sheep on the next slide. This is just a couple suggestions that would be they would be recommendations to the amendments to 00:50:16
SB1425. 00:50:22
One that they should include the best science. 00:50:28
And as was just stated a moment ago by Carolyn. 00:50:31
That they're using a medium. 00:50:35
And she was talking about how statistically that can be changed in any way to support 1's. 00:50:37
Outcome that they want. 00:50:46
That there be transparency in. 00:50:48
That it would include all stakeholders and also. 00:50:51
The ability of the county or residents to be able to. 00:50:55
Appeal because once that final decision is made. 00:51:00
By the director. 00:51:04
There is no appeal process. 00:51:06
OK. 00:51:10
Thank you. 00:51:11
Shirley is going to be taking the questions and answers. 00:51:13
Shirley died. Thank you so. 00:51:17
We have 15 minutes. 00:51:20
Shirley died from Basin. 00:51:22
Yes. Are you making comments or receiving questions? Are making comments first. 00:51:24
Right. Because I heard we had 45 minutes and then you guys get QA, right? 00:51:30
OK. So OK, I've been timing it. 00:51:35
All right. So there's there's all these initial Amas that were developed. 00:51:37
Back in the 1980s with the Groundwater Act. 00:51:41
And Tucson, Phoenix, Prescott, Pinal County. 00:51:44
Our Penile and the Santa Cruz. 00:51:47
Well, one of the things that we are working here. 00:51:49
The rural water working group that we've been working with is La Paz County. 00:51:52
Nava, uh, Mojave County, Yavapai. 00:51:57
Coconino and then us. 00:52:01
There's a lot of supervisors, there's a lot of mayors, there's a lot of concerned citizens on that group. 00:52:04
We would love to have one of you. 00:52:10
Take on being on these. 00:52:12
Right now we're meeting every other Monday on Zoom calls with updates. 00:52:14
We have been working the last year and a half. 00:52:19
Every month we would have a Zoom call that was over. 00:52:21
Half an hour where we go over all the bills and all that stuff. 00:52:25
So previous bills have not included. 00:52:30
Northern Hialeah County. 00:52:33
The northern counties. 00:52:35
But this bill also includes. 00:52:38
Five problem basins. 00:52:41
Like we've already mentioned, this bill would supplant. 00:52:43
The AMA that was just imposed upon Wilcox. 00:52:47
But there's also the Gila. 00:52:50
Bend Basin area. 00:52:53
In Maricopa County. 00:52:55
Koala Pie in Mojave County. 00:52:57
The Rhenagras in La Paz County, the San Simeon, which is in a basin that overlaps Graham and Cochise County and underlies, I 00:53:00
should say. 00:53:05
The two county border. 00:53:10
And then, of course, the Wilcox Basin. 00:53:12
Part of the initiation. 00:53:16
Of a groundwater basin. 00:53:19
Is that some person in this county? 00:53:21
Maybe a? 00:53:25
Environmentalist. 00:53:28
Could come and say Oh my gosh, we need to fix this. 00:53:30
And initiate. 00:53:33
A petition to get 10% of the people. 00:53:35
To then get a whole election going with hearings and all that. Very expensive to run an election to prove it. 00:53:38
The other thing is, and I think briefly we went over it. 00:53:45
You need to have the governor and the minority and Majority Leader of the House and Senate, so those five people. 00:53:49
Get 3 referrals. 00:53:57
And they get to then the governor gets to choose from that pool of people. 00:53:59
Who is going to be on our board? 00:54:04
Our council in Healy County. 00:54:07
And since we have three major areas, we have the northern basin, we have the central basin and we have the globe area basin. 00:54:09
And all these other basins and sub basins like Young. 00:54:19
We could end up having 4 councils. 00:54:23
Each council has to have an irrigation district, a industrial area. 00:54:26
A municipal person. 00:54:33
And then you know, and a member at largest was on your chart there. 00:54:36
So who are we going to get? 00:54:42
To recommend. 00:54:45
There. 00:54:48
The pool for who they're choosing from. 00:54:50
It's supposed to be local control. 00:54:53
However. 00:54:56
In past renditions of the bills. 00:54:57
These water councils have superiority. 00:55:01
Over the municipal water users, the irrigation districts and water companies. 00:55:06
So this can be end up being a big thing. They will have the power. 00:55:12
To get grants. 00:55:16
For conservation and all that. 00:55:17
You guys get grants for conservation? 00:55:21
These things are very unclear in the legislation. 00:55:24
Who has what power over what? 00:55:28
In this particular rendition. 00:55:31
It's simplified from the other ones, but what is the underlying? 00:55:33
Channel under the tent. Camel's nose under the tent. 00:55:38
You know. 00:55:42
Didn't inch. They could take a mile. 00:55:43
Our biggest things are. 00:55:46
This particular bill, the one that we have been watching so closely, which is the. 00:55:51
Governor's choice. 00:55:55
Which we examined last year along with the bill that was going through that was not heard. 00:55:58
And they did update it and simplify it for this year. 00:56:04
According to our sources down there on the water working group. 00:56:10
This has not even been heard in the House or the Senate yet. 00:56:13
And it was not expected to because it's still being under negotiation. 00:56:17
And we're not. It's not just our rural water working group that's negotiating. 00:56:22
It's those other basins that. 00:56:26
Will be immediately put under this law. 00:56:29
It indeed goes through SO. 00:56:34
It could go through on a strike. 00:56:37
And be heard in the joint committees of the House and the Senate and passed out of both committees at the same time, and then go 00:56:39
on to the governor. 00:56:44
Or like she said, she threatened last year that if we if that last year's bill. 00:56:49
Who did not arrive on her desk and she wasn't happy with it. 00:56:55
She was going to do executive order. 00:56:59
And mandated. 00:57:01
So this GNA just mandated, it just may be that she is holding it off from going through legislation. 00:57:03
So we're concerned about that. 00:57:09
So, umm. 00:57:12
There's a lot of push from the agricultural. 00:57:16
Huge areas down there in the South part. 00:57:21
Because Big AG is being pushed out. 00:57:25
Because developments in residential housing. 00:57:28
Has uses way less water. 00:57:31
They're trying to push AG out. 00:57:35
Well, it's very possible that some agricultural would end up in Gila County. 00:57:37
On a bigger scale than the cook. 00:57:42
Cook Ranch. 00:57:44
That's on Hwy. 188. 00:57:45
Where they grow their own. 00:57:48
Feed for their cattle. 00:57:50
So those are some areas that we're concerned about. 00:57:52
Umm, so heavy minutes. 00:57:56
OK. 00:57:59
What? Umm, and we may get some manufacturing to come up here. 00:58:04
With all the other it and everything going on. 00:58:11
So the requirements in order to set up a basement management are. 00:58:16
The declining, declining well levels. 00:58:21
And the median we have decided is not. 00:58:24
You need 10 years of actual readings of actual. 00:58:27
Depth below ground. 00:58:31
Subsidence, which I don't know that we've have any subsidence here because our ground is so much more stable than down there. 00:58:35
And the water quality? 00:58:42
Well, we had Jake Garrett, your county water. 00:58:44
Umm, the environmental. 00:58:50
Part of the health department. 00:58:53
Which does all of the sewage issues. 00:58:54
And the especially these septic systems. 00:58:59
That are like that were up by the landmark up there in Christopher Creek. 00:59:03
And the water was the groundwater that was overflowing out of their septic system. 00:59:08
Was going through crevices and. 00:59:13
Going into the Creek downstream and they had to trace it all back where it was coming from and then they had to put in a very, 00:59:15
very expensive. 00:59:19
System there. 00:59:22
Now down in Geisela. 00:59:24
They have that $250,000 grant. 00:59:26
That will only because the new septic systems are. 00:59:29
20 to $30,000. 00:59:33
And these people that live in these homes down there that have not. 00:59:36
Great value. They can't even sell their homes without taking money out of their home in order to upgrade for the buyer. 00:59:40
Because that's the way it goes. That's. 00:59:48
My background 15 years before I moved here was septic systems and sewers. 00:59:50
So there is a lot of areas. 00:59:54
Where you have groundwater contamination and that's one of the three things that someone could come in and say, oh. 00:59:58
You know you're contaminating Tonto Creek. 01:00:05
Therefore, we need a basin. 01:00:08
Counsel. So anyhow, let's see here. 01:00:11
March 4th. 01:00:17
Is the day at the Capitol for the Rural Groundwater Working Group? 01:00:19
Yep. 01:00:26
I have it on my phone here. 01:00:29
So anyhow. 01:00:30
We would just love to have. 01:00:32
One or two of you, you don't have to hang outside by side. 01:00:34
And not. 01:00:39
Via Quorum. But we're going to go down there. They're going to sit through the Natural Resources, Energy and Water meeting. 01:00:40
And we're starting in the morning and includes lunch and it's like a nine to four. 01:00:46
But that is March 4th, and it would be really great if you could join county supervisors from La Paz and Mojave and Coconino and 01:00:51
Yavapai and Gila. 01:00:57
On that working group to go down there and mix and mingle with those other people and find out what their problems are. 01:01:03
You know, fundamentally. 01:01:10
Whatever the alfalfa growers there in Mojave County that are sucking water out of the hawala pie. 01:01:12
And La Paz is where they're transferring water from that one acre into Buckeye, and that's one of the basins that's in trouble 01:01:18
now. So there's a lot of issues. 01:01:23
That we would love for you all. Send us an e-mail regarding that March 4th meeting. 01:01:29
Say what? Have you sent us all an e-mail regarding? I don't know that I've sent. 01:01:37
That one I've sent you an awful lot of stuff. 01:01:43
We will definitely do it. All right. Thank you. 01:01:46
It is time for Q&A. 01:01:50
OK, jump in. 01:01:53
President Humphrey. 01:01:55
Yeah, my head's swimming. Thank you for all these information. 01:01:58
Holy smokes. Holy smokes. 01:02:01
Yeah, and and what wasn't mentioned is, is like here in southern Halo County is mines. 01:02:04
Our minds are using an awful lot of water, they have an awful lot of property just for the wells that are capped off. 01:02:10
Just in case they needed in the future. So you know, there's there's just an awful lot of issues. 01:02:17
That weren't even brought up and like I say, my head swimming with what you did bring up so you know and and and condensing. 01:02:24
Closer into Gila County. 01:02:31
And interested? Yes, very much. 01:02:33
About it. 01:02:36
But it also seems like you know, and in the politics of the world. 01:02:37
The small rural counties don't get listened to because we don't have the vote. 01:02:43
I've been fighting issues for eight years that I've been a supervisor that fall on deaf ears. 01:02:48
Because when you get down to the state. 01:02:54
They don't listen to you because you don't have the votes. 01:02:57
And so I, yeah, I, I, I'm not, I'm not saying that I'm not interested and not going to work hard at it. It, it, it's just, I've, 01:03:01
I've seen a lot of issues. 01:03:06
With that happening to rural areas and so we try awful hard and so. 01:03:11
I thank you for the information when I get the invitation. Umm. 01:03:19
You bet I'll look into it. Supervisor Christian is already working with the legislature through. 01:03:24
Through. 01:03:30
Our CSA, Yeah, Thank you. 01:03:31
For your interest of gathering this information. 01:03:36
To present to us. 01:03:39
I I thank you very much. 01:03:42
The first rendition of our PowerPoint. 01:03:45
Had the quote. 01:03:48
Whiskeys for drinking, Waters for fighting over. 01:03:50
Didn't make it into the second rendition. 01:03:54
So anyhow. 01:03:57
Yeah, you're just ready to blow up. No, no. 01:04:00
This issue is older than I am. 01:04:05
And so. 01:04:08
You know, growing up through all the years, there's always. 01:04:11
There's always been the threat of monitoring wells and everything. 01:04:14
Like that, it's always been a fight. 01:04:18
Quite honestly, it always will be a fight. 01:04:20
There is a lot of moving parts to this. 01:04:23
An awful lot. 01:04:27
Umm, you know, a lot of it is a huge concern of mine as well as what what you ladies and Andrew's talking about what not so. 01:04:28
We're all on the same page. 01:04:39
You know, being a real rural county and things like that. 01:04:42
They do look at us. 01:04:46
With that respect. 01:04:48
Here not too long ago, I listened to the speaker down there at the Capitol talk about water issue, some water issues he just 01:04:51
hitting on. 01:04:55
On bits and pieces of it and how many bills are going through. 01:05:00
That's trying to deal with water and the governor and all that. But the one, one part of that that really caught my eye that I 01:05:05
asked him about was water transfers. 01:05:11
And so I know that there's already been attempts for some of that. 01:05:17
To some extent. 01:05:22
Umm, what happens? 01:05:23
I just let you know is the back door deals. 01:05:28
You know when you have SRP, that's a. 01:05:33
Major corporation and. 01:05:36
You have a DWR. 01:05:38
You have the. 01:05:40
Development communities that just keeps building. 01:05:44
House after house after house. 01:05:48
In the desert. 01:05:50
And so it's the backyard deals that. 01:05:52
That we don't. 01:05:56
We're not Privy to unless just by accident. 01:05:58
And by the time they're made, it's too late. 01:06:01
One of the things that hopefully. 01:06:04
Here, in time, we're gonna. 01:06:08
Be working on as a Land Management plan for Ela County. 01:06:10
And this is going to be one of the. 01:06:15
Something that would be a part of that. 01:06:17
You know, the other thing that that kind of has frustrated me along the way in the last eight years is we've dealt with 01:06:20
developments that I know. 01:06:24
Are pushing the limits on water supply. 01:06:29
But we have water companies that still given the certificates. 01:06:33
We, we can't. We have no real control over that. We're not water specialists setting up here at this board we rely on. 01:06:39
On them and that's who has to give certificates for development water. 01:06:47
And usually it's 100 year supply. 01:06:52
And it seems to me, and somebody may very well correct me one of these days if I'm wrong, but they handle melt like candy. 01:06:55
Well, we all know better, especially in a year like we're having right now. It's a tough year. You know, we're not, we don't have 01:07:02
the snowpack and that's what we need is the snowpack for our water supply. 01:07:08
And so. 01:07:15
Like I said, to start with, there's a lot of moving parts on it. We, I shouldn't say we. 01:07:16
I get a lot of emails every week. 01:07:22
Water and bills. 01:07:25
And and so forth. 01:07:27
Uh, there's, there's a lot of people involved with this right now. Our main player in the water part of it. 01:07:29
Has umm. 01:07:37
Been our CSA, our accounting Supervisors association. 01:07:38
Is on. 01:07:42
Big committee that's dealing directly with the governor on this. 01:07:43
I've talked to Craig several times about about the water issues and what I felt like was my. 01:07:48
Concern. And like you all said, you know they talk. 01:07:56
Um, about. 01:08:00
Control, you know, here locally and everything, but I know that's not where they're headed. 01:08:03
I know that in all my heart they don't want local control. 01:08:11
And that's that to me is a big issue. 01:08:15
I've always said if you could bring in the local control, put it on this board. 01:08:17
You people send out there, they are the ones we work for. 01:08:23
We work for all of you, so if this board isn't doing something to. 01:08:28
So that that that's right. 01:08:32
You have the ability to come in here and raise hell with us and. 01:08:34
Until we got it right. 01:08:37
You know, but I'm almost positive. 01:08:39
In the end, it's not going to shake out that'll. 01:08:43
But it doesn't mean that we don't keep trying. 01:08:46
And we keep pushing it and so. 01:08:48
Umm, so I really thank you ladies and everybody involved for everything that you've done. You're spot on. 01:08:51
What Jim said about the minds is absolutely right. You know, a long time ago when we had a tour of resolution. 01:08:59
Their pipe and water out of that deep hole down there on the flats around Casa Grande and Coolidge and storm it. 01:09:06
My question is, is OK that's easy to say? 01:09:13
You pump it out of this ground, you know you're 7000 feet in the. 01:09:17
Dirt. And you pump it out and you go down there on the flat and you put it back in the ground. That's easy enough, but what makes 01:09:22
you think it's going to be there when you need it? 01:09:25
Or is it the quality? 01:09:30
Well see, their quality is they need it to wash the tailings all the way to Dripping Springs come back. That's where they really 01:09:31
need it. And until they do that, they need a place to store it because their hole fills up with water. 01:09:37
If they don't pump it out. 01:09:43
So they're doing all this, but but it's like, you know, I don't. 01:09:45
I don't know that he can be positive that it's going to stay in one place or be there or whatever, so. 01:09:49
So there's always that. 01:09:55
You know there's a question there and if it's not there. 01:09:57
Where are you going to get the water? 01:10:00
You know so. 01:10:03
So there's a lot of concerns, a lot of questions, a lot of things that in. 01:10:04
And definitely the last six years or so that's been kicked around and looked at and talked about, and it's a fight that it will 01:10:09
continue. 01:10:13
The governor very well may. 01:10:18
Pull the power she has and do an executive order, in which case it'll stand until another governor comes along and redoes it. 01:10:21
But so it's but it's not a fight we we just give up on and roll over for it. We we all need to keep up on it and so. 01:10:28
Quite honestly, I'm on so many boards right now I don't think I could get on another one but. 01:10:39
But we'll we'll see where it goes on James. 01:10:45
But thank you, Shirley, and thank you everyone. We don't want to be in the warmest, but we didn't want to get your attention. 01:10:48
You know, but I OK guys, you better step up. 01:10:55
No, but the fact is surely what you don't see is we already have. 01:10:58
In many different ways, yeah. And so we are, we are a part of it. It it's just that. 01:11:02
Well, there's there's going to be a lot of negotiations and I honestly believe it's going to come to an executive order at the 01:11:10
end. 01:11:13
Steve, I mean. 01:11:18
Yeah. Thanks, Chris and Carolyn and Shirley. 01:11:24
Both. I have Mr. Costanzo here with us. He's a new kind of a new member of the group and so. 01:11:28
Of no, you've been working on water for a long time. 01:11:36
They're concerned about it and I think we have a real history. 01:11:41
Of water concerns in the state going back 100 years or more. 01:11:45
That's why we have the cap, that's why we have the, you know, the tunnels and the, and the dams and the reservoirs and all this 01:11:49
stuff. It's all because of that. And so as we grow. 01:11:53
It becomes more and more concerning the. 01:11:58
I would love to see the board of supervisor have more power over water in the county than we do, which is almost nothing. 01:12:01
The state has always controlled it. They're the ones that. 01:12:09
Issued the permits for the wells. 01:12:12
The governor wants to. 01:12:15
Solved it all with an executive order. 01:12:17
But that's not. 01:12:20
That's the wrong approach in my opinion, because. 01:12:21
It's one person deciding what happens in the state and that's not really. 01:12:26
The way our government is set up, a representative government is not just. 01:12:31
Person and the highest. 01:12:36
Office in the building. 01:12:37
Socializing the utility is what it looks like to me. 01:12:40
It's the same. Well, because we're having trouble. 01:12:43
Let's let the government step in. 01:12:47
And take over all water concerns and. 01:12:49
You no longer have rights anymore. 01:12:52
We'll say it's eminent domain, we'll say it's an emergency. We'll say. 01:12:55
We're going to monitor everybody and the same kind of discussions occur with. 01:13:00
Are you using too much food? Are you using too much gasoline? Are you using too much electricity? 01:13:04
It's a it's a move toward socialism. It's not. 01:13:10
It's not the solution, but that doesn't mean that. 01:13:14
We shouldn't be addressing the solution, my major concern as well. 01:13:18
Is the harvesting of water to go to to move out of? 01:13:23
Accounting and that could happen. 01:13:27
Because we have the the drainage systems in the reservoirs. 01:13:30
To just dump it into the Salt River and the Tunnel Creek. 01:13:34
Reservoirs and it ends up in Phoenix. 01:13:38
And so we don't want that. 01:13:40
So some of what you suggested I think is great, more involvement. 01:13:44
More research. 01:13:50
And research committee. 01:13:51
And indicating amendments to bills that we don't like. 01:13:54
The bills that you mentioned I don't think are going to pass, but there's going to be a continuous pressure. 01:13:58
To create legislation. 01:14:04
That is going to work in some places and not in others. 01:14:06
And so. 01:14:10
I really do appreciate the presentation is very insightful. You guys are very. 01:14:12
Involved. 01:14:17
I will send me the invite. 01:14:19
And I'll consider how much involvement I'd like to do. 01:14:22
With that and justice, keep us informed as you keep going. 01:14:26
Anything else? 01:14:30
No, I just think it's a huge problem when water transfer. 01:14:32
When you go hay and ship it out of the country. 01:14:37
That's water transfer that's already happening. 01:14:39
When you can buy water and store it in Lake Mead, I hope it's on the bottom half, not the top half because there isn't any in the 01:14:42
top half. 01:14:45
So, you know, water is is a major issue and I appreciate your interest. I just hope that we can get some ears from some people 01:14:49
higher up on the totem pole. 01:14:55
To help us. So thank you very much. 01:15:01
Daniel the only thing else I would throw in there is that the state is so diverse in everything that just one catch all water bill 01:15:05
or whatever you want to. 01:15:10
Say it will not work. 01:15:15
It just will not work. 01:15:18
That every every county's needs are basically different that I see. 01:15:20
And so. 01:15:26
That's just a huge red red flag right off the bat and and hopefully. 01:15:28
Hopefully somebody will pay attention to that and try and. 01:15:34
And correct it. 01:15:38
I would hope but. 01:15:41
That's I think one of the main messages that we need to drive the people that hey. 01:15:42
You know, you can do a bill or whatever you want for Wilcox and down there. 01:15:48
Meets the needs there, but it isn't going to meet the needs up here. 01:15:54
And so. 01:15:58
I think that's something that our legislators really need to take serious. 01:16:00
And pay attention to. 01:16:04
Can you share that? 01:16:06
Yeah, so this is Katie Hobbs. 01:16:10
Management Act. 01:16:14
And it sounds marvelous. Local choice, local solutions. 01:16:18
Let's see that happen. 01:16:24
Flexibility protection. 01:16:25
Adaptable. Customize it. 01:16:28
Funding. Oh great. 01:16:30
Protection of basins. 01:16:33
So it all sounds like that's what we all want, but this is not really what she wants to do. 01:16:35
She wants to take it. 01:16:42
And make the choices for you. 01:16:44
Not local choices. 01:16:47
If you want to speak, come on up to the mic. 01:16:50
That sure. 01:16:53
May I ask? 01:16:56
Did you get a chance to see the first rendition of Our Power? 01:16:58
Point, which was what was prepared by the attorneys. 01:17:02
For the governor's office. 01:17:06
That gave the whole big breakdown of all. 01:17:09
Yeah, that one, yeah. 01:17:12
OK, because it gives you more insight also into how this bill. 01:17:14
Is umm. 01:17:20
Look like. 01:17:22
OK. Thank you, Shirley. 01:17:24
Appreciate you guys coming down taking the day. 01:17:25
Well, that's a good lunch. 01:17:28
Anything else supervisor? 01:17:30
I'm good. Thank you. Thank you. All right, thank you very much. Let's move on to the next and last item. 01:17:32
Item 2C. Information discussion regarding the Gila County Courthouse paving project. 01:17:38
The Globe Jail paving project and Gila County Courthouse roof replacement. 01:17:44
Good morning, Joseph. 01:17:49
Good morning, Chairman, Board of Supervisors. 01:17:51
Thank you for your continued guidance over our past capital project presentations based on your invaluable input. 01:17:53
We have refined our approach and have now established recommendations for source funding and preliminary budgets. 01:18:00
To the following capital projects. 01:18:07
Hill County Courthouse paving project Estimated cost is 1,000,000. 01:18:10
And source funding recommendation is LATCF. 01:18:15
The Globe Gel Paving Project estimated cost of 5000. 01:18:20
For 500,000 excuse me and source funding. 01:18:24
Latcf. 01:18:29
And Hilla County Courthouse roof replacement project. 01:18:30
Estimated cost of 450,000. 01:18:33
Source Funding from the General Fund. 01:18:36
And also a combination of LATCF. 01:18:39
With that, an important note is I'd also like to briefly mention one of the Board's top priorities. 01:18:44
The courthouse electrical infrastructure. 01:18:50
Recognizing its importance. 01:18:52
We just wanted to note that we are moving forward with that project. It's just in the very early starting stages of architectural 01:18:55
design and of course that's going to be paramount to. 01:19:00
That project. 01:19:06
With that, I'd be happy to take any. 01:19:08
Any questions? Can you tell us what the LACCF means? 01:19:11
The latc F is. 01:19:15
The Local Assistance and Tribal Consistency Fund. 01:19:18
That was the $12 million got that's kind of. 01:19:22
Basically same as built money. OK one time. 01:19:25
One time money. OK, great. Thank you, Joseph. Supervisor Humphrey. 01:19:30
Yeah, 1 and it's a minor deal when we do all this paving and we put new parking places in. 01:19:38
That last one that you have right there is a horrible place for the parking place. 01:19:44
Because all you got cars in like this and then you put one where the car back. Any cars that backing out of there can't see. 01:19:49
And where we park, it makes it difficult to back out or to swing wide enough to turn in. 01:19:56
With that one parking place. 01:20:03
Umm, other than that, it's going to. 01:20:05
I would. 01:20:08
It's going to be a large job. 01:20:10
It's going to create a lot of chaos. 01:20:13
Especially with some of our parking down off. 01:20:16
Below umm. 01:20:19
And so. 01:20:21
Good luck with the project. I think it's necessary, but it's. 01:20:23
It's gonna create some some traffic issues. 01:20:27
I'm sure. 01:20:30
Yes, Sir. I thank you for the feedback. We'll certainly take it into account when we're finalizing the design. 01:20:31
And we look forward to this project and in the roof. 01:20:37
We have parapet walls around the roof, is that correct? 01:20:42
Yes, Sir, Our roof project that we're just going to build another pond or are we going to put a pitch up there? 01:20:46
Where we don't have a flat roof with purple walls around it. 01:20:52
How we appreciate that feedback, that's something that we're still in discussions with the administrative team to see if. 01:20:57
If that's going to fit in with the budget. 01:21:03
Or if we're going to do a direct replacement of what is existing. 01:21:05
Because if you build another pond, it's going to leak. 01:21:10
We don't disagree, Sir. 01:21:13
OK, I'm done. 01:21:17
By decline. 01:21:18
Joseph, are we able to lose? 01:21:20
Able to use some local contractors on these. 01:21:22
It's a high probability for the paving project. 01:21:28
We will be looking at outside of the county. 01:21:32
We're certainly always open to that. 01:21:37
And we're always looking for new companies, whether they can support it. 01:21:39
The roofing project, that one's a different one. I think there's a high probability that we're going to be able to use local on 01:21:43
that. 01:21:46
Umm, so it just depends on. 01:21:49
The prioritization of the timeline and what we're working with. 01:21:51
I think. 01:21:55
I think Cactus has done quite a bit of paving force. They're not in the county, but I know that they've done a lot of work, but. 01:21:57
You know, for projects like this, it'd be awesome to see if there's somebody local that can do it. 01:22:04
Keep the money local. 01:22:09
Yes, Sir, agreed. We can certainly take a harder look. 01:22:11
And then one more question, Mr. Minlov, how much LATC F funds do we have left? 01:22:14
Mr. Chairman, we want to decline about 5 million, a little bit over $5 million. 01:22:20
OK. 01:22:25
After the after these projects are taken out. 01:22:26
About five and a half million right now. 01:22:30
OK. 01:22:33
These projects would be. 01:22:34
Well, with the paving stuff going to. 01:22:37
He's about half of that. 01:22:40
OK. 01:22:41
Thank you, Joseph. 01:22:43
Thank you. Yeah. Thank you, Joseph. So, yeah, keeping up on all this, so. 01:22:44
That's the shortest presentation you have ever made. 01:22:50
That's a new record. 01:22:53
Doing our best to set records. You're doing great, thank you. 01:22:55
I don't have any questions, so I just have one, OK. 01:22:58
Supervisor Klein brought up Cactus. If you're talking to Cactus about doing the paving, I would definitely vote against them after 01:23:02
my Geisela. 01:23:06
Process with them. 01:23:10
Noted, Sir. Yes, Sir. 01:23:14
OK, that's all. 01:23:16
Thank you. 01:23:18
Yeah. OK. Thank you. 01:23:19
We all get over there. Yeah, OK. 01:23:23
All right, So that's all we have on our regular items. So call to the public anyone here in? 01:23:25
Flow no anyone in Payson? 01:23:32
No. And anyone on the Internet, no. 01:23:35
OK. 01:23:38
So let's move on to Item 4, which is our presentations. 01:23:39
Management love. 01:23:43
Mr. Chairman, members of board last week attended the Arizona Local Government Employee Benefit Trust annual meeting. 01:23:45
That's mean where we review our health insurance. 01:23:51
Trust that we have health insurance for our employees. 01:23:54
I spend most of three days in that discussion about health insurance. 01:23:58
And the end result is that there was a recommendation from our actuaries. 01:24:03
For the trust, so we have a 5.9% increase. 01:24:08
And our health insurance costs for fiscal year 2526. 01:24:12
We have been banking some money. 01:24:17
In the trust the last few years that we've been responsible and how we're supposed to address it. 01:24:20
One of the biggest issues that we have. 01:24:26
Currently regarding. 01:24:29
Cost, drivers and health insurance trust is a semaglutide. 01:24:32
That's the GLP ones. 01:24:36
That are related to. 01:24:38
It's what everybody's using to lose weight. 01:24:40
The trust only. 01:24:43
Prescribes semaglutides to diabetics. 01:24:46
And you're not prescribed that drug? 01:24:50
It's an injectable. 01:24:54
Do not prescribe that drug, just simply simple weight loss. 01:24:55
But it's a. 01:25:01
The latest thing you see? 01:25:02
What are the ones you see on the TV of all the commercials? 01:25:06
I'm losing weight. I'm doing this and doing that. 01:25:09
That's what is driving a lot of costs is. 01:25:12
Very expensive new drugs and. 01:25:15
They're trying to open it up that you can. 01:25:17
Use it for. 01:25:19
Other health related issues. 01:25:21
Helping heart attacks. 01:25:24
And stuff like that. 01:25:26
We only do it for diabetics very specific that we can hopefully try to control cost of that. 01:25:27
Instead of the 5.9% recommended increase because we have been able to manage our health insurance costs. 01:25:34
The increase will be 4.5% for fiscal year 2526. 01:25:42
On our health insurance. 01:25:47
We do. 01:25:49
Pass a small portion on to employees. 01:25:51
That's typically same percent percent like employee only maybe a 90%, ten percent, 9% covered by the county. 01:25:55
10% covered by the employee. It's whatever that split. 01:26:03
Maintains or whatever that split is to maintain that split of a 9010. 01:26:07
7723%. 01:26:15
Who maintain those splits? Who contribute? 01:26:18
Costs. So there is a small cost increase to employees. 01:26:21
And a little bit more increase if it's if they have employee and family coverage. 01:26:26
Uh, certainly can. 01:26:33
That will be coming up in our budget discussions that we have. 01:26:35
That you have with finance department. 01:26:39
That is results of. 01:26:41
Arizona Local Government Employment Trust meeting last week. 01:26:43
This week I am going to Flagstaff for a couple days for. 01:26:47
Training of government accountants. I maintain my certified public accountant. 01:26:51
Credential and as part of that. 01:26:56
On Friday, Sherry and I will be traveling to Washington DC again, as mentioned last week. 01:26:58
To try to get a little bit firmer grasp of what is happening in Washington DC with. 01:27:05
A change in administration and different things that we can expect. 01:27:12
Particularly in financial and the grants and things like that. I had a discussion yesterday. 01:27:15
With folks from Washington have. 01:27:20
What is going on and what kind of things that we can potentially? 01:27:22
Expect the financial so. 01:27:26
I will be in Flagstaff next couple days and in Washington DC through next. 01:27:28
When they has allowed for in county policy. Mr. O'Driscoll, deputy County manager. 01:27:34
Is umm. 01:27:40
Given authorization to. 01:27:42
Act as county manager while I am out of the county. 01:27:44
That's my report, Mr. Chairman. 01:27:49
Thank you, Supervisor Humphrey. 01:27:51
Yeah, I held a Guy Sila community meeting on the 22nd. I want to thank staff for showing up. We had. 01:27:53
Homero was there. 01:28:02
We had engineering there. We had. 01:28:06
The SO showed up and so it was. It was a good meeting. I appreciate staff being willing to go to Diceyla on Saturday and. 01:28:10
Taking notes. 01:28:19
I'll hold a I'll hold a Public works staff. 01:28:21
And directors meeting on the 20. 01:28:25
6th and there again, I like to meet with everyone to talk about what's going on in District 2 and where we're at with it. 01:28:28
Introduce new projects. 01:28:35
See where existing projects are going. 01:28:37
I'll hold a southern. 01:28:41
Healy County preseason fire meeting and it's not preseason because we never got out of. 01:28:43
Out of. 01:28:49
Fire danger. And that's not, you know, to divide North and South. It's just. 01:28:50
When I got elected, I started having meetings down here because. 01:28:56
21 We have a completely different environment in the northern part does. 01:29:00
And also too, to help get our everybody on the same page down here Gila County DPS A dot. 01:29:05
And so and Forest Service comes and our local fire departments come in it. 01:29:14
It just helps us get. 01:29:20
Everybody on the same page and also. 01:29:23
If we do have lightning strikes and things of this nature. 01:29:25
Everybody understands which are going to be our worst areas if we. 01:29:29
End up having to fight a fire. 01:29:35
And also to help with evacuation. It's amazing. 01:29:37
When I had my first when we had our first meeting, there was. 01:29:41
You know what county was willing to put water tanks and things that needed them but. 01:29:44
I mean, nobody even knew which hoses fit which trucks and so. 01:29:49
You know, things are like that and our first couple meetings we didn't even think about evacuation and then. 01:29:53
All of a sudden that came in when we had a fire and so. 01:29:59
It really helps to get everybody on the same page. 01:30:02
With Emergency Management, so. 01:30:07
If we do have a fire. 01:30:10
We know you know what part of the fairgrounds we can use for. 01:30:13
Animals and things of that nature and so. 01:30:17
It it it really helps and and I understand you and yours too so. 01:30:20
Yeah, it just helps, I think to get. 01:30:26
Our emergency staff. 01:30:30
All on the same page so. 01:30:33
I'm looking forward. 01:30:35
To that. 01:30:37
And so then. 01:30:38
Let's see, and then I'll hold the Tunnel Basin community meeting. 01:30:41
On the 4th at at 5:00 PM to. 01:30:45
I thank you very much, very good. 01:30:49
I'll start with a few days ago I met with Jenna Dean with APS. 01:30:53
Here a couple of years ago they started that public safety power shut off project and basically what that is is when. 01:31:00
Indices start showing that we're an extreme fire danger, which it was based on humidity. 01:31:08
Temperature timing. 01:31:16
In fuel conditions. 01:31:19
They would start entertaining the fact that shutting power. 01:31:22
And so. 01:31:26
She had requested a meeting with me and I visited with her and because of the time, type of year that we're having. 01:31:28
Having that, there's a real good chance that can happen this summer. 01:31:35
And it's not only APS, I believe SRP or. 01:31:41
Are picking up some lines as well. 01:31:44
Their their areas are starting to expand. 01:31:47
More and more. 01:31:51
And so. 01:31:53
Is probably going to get to the point here pretty quick, especially in the northern part. 01:31:55
And places like the canals. 01:32:01
Maybe on some of your Roosevelt country. 01:32:08
Him, but anyway. 01:32:10
It might come to the point pretty quick where we need to help start getting the word out so people could somewhat be prepared. 01:32:13
The power shut off could be a few hours. 01:32:21
To who knows how long. 01:32:25
And the problem is, and you know, there's a lot of people out there that rely on that electricity for medical. 01:32:27
Equipment to run or. 01:32:33
Or whatever. And if you're talking about the middle of June, you know, temperatures in the middle of June are pretty hot. 01:32:35
Things of that nature. So it's going to be a real hardship on a lot of people. 01:32:42
If this does actually come to happen. 01:32:46
I think, you know, I thought a lot about this. I've been working with APS and the Forest Service here quite a bit. 01:32:51
And I think we're on the on the right route. 01:32:58
APS, and I believe I've talked about in this this meeting before, is APS on their right of ways, on their power lines. It's only 01:33:02
20 feet. 01:33:06
Well, that's like for me to carry. 01:33:11
And so in the pine type where the biggest concern is, is you have a right of way that's 20 feet that they work on, they keep it 01:33:14
open. 01:33:18
And cleaned out. 01:33:23
But beyond that, it's heavy fuel loadings and everything, but you have 120 foot pine trees. 01:33:25
Beside it. 01:33:31
So they can still reach the power lines if something. 01:33:32
Blow one over whatever and cause problems. 01:33:36
In all of my years, I don't believe I remember ever having a fire off of the secondary APS lines. 01:33:41
We had fires off of the big KV lines that you see going through the country. 01:33:49
One one side is APS and one side is SRP. 01:33:54
And in the summertime, they'll stretch and arc out, and we've had several fires from them. 01:33:58
But not really a secondary alliance, but neither here nor there. 01:34:03
My goal has been is to work with APS and the Forest Service. 01:34:08
To try and widen these right of ways. 01:34:12
Maybe to a couple 100 feet. 01:34:16
And and get them cut back and opened up. 01:34:19
So they have the room that a tree can't reach the lines, or if a line falls they have the room. 01:34:21
And the latitude to make a run at it and catch it before it gets. 01:34:29
Into the heavier fuel so. 01:34:33
Trying to work on that, but that's that's down the road and that isn't going to help this this spring. And so we have that ahead 01:34:36
of us. 01:34:40
Umm, I attended a ECO meeting last Wednesday and the CSA board meeting on Thursday. I did that by Zoom. 01:34:46
Umm, really? There's so much up in the air with this new administration. 01:34:55
I don't know that you could even out guess where we're really headed right now. So and what's gonna happen. 01:35:00
Everybody's just kind of sitting back waiting for the dust to settle and. 01:35:08
And see where we're at. 01:35:14
I think that's going to be the case for a while. 01:35:16
Umm, we'll just have to see I the. 01:35:19
Another big concern is, like the Forest Service, probably the state. 01:35:25
To some. 01:35:30
Amount uh. 01:35:33
The big question is their firefighters this spring and how many they're going to have and if they're going to have. 01:35:36
I honestly believe they're going to have them. Somebody will shake loose and say no, you're going to have to hire them. 01:35:43
Let's go. Let's get it done. 01:35:48
I think that'll happen, but. 01:35:50
But some other people aren't real sure, so I think we'll just have to hang back and see. 01:35:53
Me and Kathy are headed to DC tomorrow. 01:35:58
Will fly out to DC. 01:36:01
I've got meetings on the hill with. 01:36:03
Ruben Gallegos, Senator Gallegos, Senator Kelly. 01:36:06
And Congressman Crane on Thursday. 01:36:10
And then my meetings will start on Friday and Saturday and there will be returning on Sunday, so. 01:36:13
That's where I'm at this week. 01:36:19
Busy. Thanks for that SO. 01:36:21
I don't have a lot to report other than I did meet with the water group last Thursday so. 01:36:25
This was a rerun. 01:36:30
And so appreciate all their efforts. 01:36:33
And. 01:36:38
Let's see, it seemed like there was something I was going to say, but. 01:36:40
Anyway, just looking forward to this week and. 01:36:43
Keep them busy with some things so I don't have much to report today. 01:36:48
Jessica, do you have anything today? 01:36:53
Now you're kind of looking like. 01:36:55
Have no authority to speak at this time. You want some? 01:36:57
OK. All right. Well, if there's nothing else, then I'll adjourn the meeting. Thank you. 01:37:02
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